Sumea Challenge #8 - shika - CH#7

Forum
Sumea Modeller Challenge

ok, im in. just posting to make sure i do some work.

all i know is ill be making a female character, and she may or may not have a weapon :)

Submitted by silvermirage on Mon, 03/07/06 - 9:51 PM Permalink

looking good
eh, david do you have any online portfolio of sort?

cheerios

Submitted by J I Styles on Wed, 05/07/06 - 1:02 AM Permalink

Good job man, I'm liking the paint over -- reminds me of costume design from Marko Djurdjevic's tribal sketches.

Although the body anatomy is good, proportionally it looks awkward. Kind of like there's no room for things like the tapering of the ribcage, or the shoulder blades are collapsed inwards. Same awkward feeling with the head; certain elements detract from what the eye is used to percieving as basic feminine curves (normal ones, not over-sexualised ones). I'd suggest you get some three-quarter view referance and camera match your model against it to check things like how far back cheekbones go compared to the eyes and eyebrow ridge etc. I'm not sure on the breasts since it's hard to tell without a side view, but you may just be compensating for them sitting within clothing (which is great), so I'll stay away from commenting there. The hands are great, very nice form.

Submitted by Kalescent on Wed, 05/07/06 - 10:07 AM Permalink

Nice quality progress so far! her boobies look more like the silicon 'morale booster' kind rather than natural. Im guessing they are like that because they are pushed up by the costume etc ?

Submitted by Neffy on Thu, 06/07/06 - 8:24 AM Permalink

Is she going to have any shoes ? i think knee high boots of the same style outfit would rock on her.

Submitted by caseyjones on Thu, 06/07/06 - 10:46 PM Permalink

Man, that's a tight looking model.
HOORAY FOR BOOBS!

-caseyjones

Submitted by EIN on Fri, 07/07/06 - 7:29 PM Permalink

Hey dude that is looking awesome, love the armour detailing. Only crit would be that the fingerts look a bit stumpy, but otherwise, best model so far.

Submitted by tojo on Fri, 07/07/06 - 10:32 PM Permalink

looking really nice man..

how many polys in your source model so far?

is that just a screen grab?

keep up the good work

Submitted by PeterDavis on Fri, 07/07/06 - 11:02 PM Permalink

another member of the highpoly before lowpoly party? looking good.

Submitted by silvermirage on Sat, 08/07/06 - 12:27 AM Permalink

i think once you finish this comp you should post this on cgtalk
high probability that it will be plugged on the front page
=) awesome work man

Submitted by shika on Sat, 08/07/06 - 5:05 AM Permalink

thanks peeps
EIN, critique noted for when i get back to work on the body :)

the model is about 300k at the moment, my computer isnt great so ive had to be really stingy. for example the body out of zbrush is only subd level 2 and most of the simple objects arent subdivided.
heres a screen grab :)
[img]http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d3/shika01/screenie.jpg[/img]

quote:Originally posted by PeterDavis

another member of the highpoly before lowpoly party? looking good.

yep, ive tried both ways before and prefer this method. polyboost and snap to face toggle are my friends

ill consider posting on cgtalk, couldnt hurt. most of the responses to those plugged threads are pretty mindless

- David

Submitted by PeterDavis on Sat, 08/07/06 - 6:59 AM Permalink

quote:
yep, ive tried both ways before and prefer this method. polyboost and snap to face toggle are my friends

would you be able to explain these tools?

Submitted by shika on Sat, 08/07/06 - 7:49 AM Permalink

well if you use max youve probably used the snap toggle tool before, just set it to snap to face and that will enable you to extrude edges that conform to your high poly.
ill borrow this example from pior
http://www.pioroberson.com/images/minitut_topology_worflow.jpg

[url="http://www.polyboost.com/"]polyboost[/url] is a plugin for max that speeds up this process 10x, as well as doing a whole bunch of other cool things

-David

Submitted by PeterDavis on Sat, 08/07/06 - 8:16 AM Permalink

hrm. im still finding trouble seeing the advantages, but ill guess ill have to try it later. I can see it being better if you start in Zbrush, but since i dont own it and after trying in the demo and finding myself utterly confused with the program, my roots remain in sub-d modelling. ive always found it simpler and more logical to make a low poly with solid topology, then sub divide and sculpt the low poly and then go back to the low poly to make sure its all consistent. thats what i did for my challenge entry anyway.

so basically you are extruding edges along the surface of the highpoly? sounds handy enough.
oh, and polyboost looks fantastic, thanks for the heads up.

obviously im limited somewhat without zbrush, but as long as the results are as impressive as anyone elses im happy. however its always good to get some insight into alternative workflows. I experimented with a new modelling method (new for me, anyway) and found it far less daunting.

updates?

p.s sorry about huge post ;)

Submitted by silvermirage on Sat, 08/07/06 - 8:40 PM Permalink

hmm, that a nice workflow method!
wonder if there's any similar counterpart to do so with maya?

Submitted by shika on Mon, 10/07/06 - 12:30 PM Permalink

i guess the end result is all that counts :)
zbrush is worth the effort it takes to get over the confusing UI, its so damn fun.

i dont know of a maya equivalent silvermirage (cause i dont know maya), but im sure there's a maya savvy chap on these forums that could share some wisdom via PM.

updates soon

- David

Submitted by Makk on Mon, 10/07/06 - 9:07 PM Permalink

Looking good!
And high poly then low poly is the way to go IMHO

Submitted by J I Styles on Tue, 11/07/06 - 7:09 PM Permalink

lookin' cool David -- I'd say my favourite hair is the fourth variation cropped dreads look since it's interesting and fits the character style the best.

Submitted by PeterDavis on Tue, 11/07/06 - 11:17 PM Permalink

id say the 4th or 5th, but the dreads would be very cool.
ps you scared me for a second, i had to make sure that first rendered hair was painted.

Submitted by caseyjones on Wed, 12/07/06 - 9:12 AM Permalink

Man this model is definately coming along real well. I like the hair you've got in the full body render, IMO it just seems to suit the character more than the others. The face came out great as well!
You're definately pushing the quality of work in this comp, which is great because it takes this challenge up a notch and forces others to put some to push themselves further to compete with you! Especially myself!
Keep it up!

-caseyjones

Submitted by caseyjones on Mon, 17/07/06 - 11:03 PM Permalink

Great work dude!
A quick question for you, as you seem to know your way around ZBrush. You started with a naked body mesh then added the clothing later. Are you bringing the naked body back into ZBrush with the added clothing attached then sub dividing and detailing as you go? Or are you just bringing in the clothing on their own and detailing then exporting it back into Max/Maya/etc and just placing back over the top of the model.
I wasn't sure how to go about it with my model, because I want to work on certain parts of the model at one time then go from there. Or should I just bring in the whole low base mesh then mask out the bits I want to work on and do it that way?
Hopefully that made sense (because my previous post didn't) :/

-caseyjones

Submitted by PeterDavis on Tue, 18/07/06 - 12:15 AM Permalink

the low poly mesh is so tidy, its almost like theres no flow at all but there no 'bad' flow, if you catch my drift. almost like its so subtle that it just looks uniform.

Hair looks good, makes me wish i wasnt so amazingly confused with zbrush.

Submitted by shika on Tue, 18/07/06 - 1:23 AM Permalink

after subD modelling the gear in max, i export it all as a single OBJ file, but keep everything as seperate objects, that way i can use the handy hide by object shortcut(shift + ctrl) that makes working on overlapping gear easy as pie, and make sure everything still fits together after zbrushing
after that i exported just the pieces that had work done on them and imported them into hidden layers in max to save memory on my poor computer.

you could do something similar with your character and seperate the arms/legs/head/torso and just hide the bits that you're not working on in zbrush.

- David

Posted by shika on
Forum
Sumea Modeller Challenge

ok, im in. just posting to make sure i do some work.

all i know is ill be making a female character, and she may or may not have a weapon :)

Submitted by silvermirage on Mon, 03/07/06 - 9:51 PM Permalink

looking good
eh, david do you have any online portfolio of sort?

cheerios

Submitted by J I Styles on Wed, 05/07/06 - 1:02 AM Permalink

Good job man, I'm liking the paint over -- reminds me of costume design from Marko Djurdjevic's tribal sketches.

Although the body anatomy is good, proportionally it looks awkward. Kind of like there's no room for things like the tapering of the ribcage, or the shoulder blades are collapsed inwards. Same awkward feeling with the head; certain elements detract from what the eye is used to percieving as basic feminine curves (normal ones, not over-sexualised ones). I'd suggest you get some three-quarter view referance and camera match your model against it to check things like how far back cheekbones go compared to the eyes and eyebrow ridge etc. I'm not sure on the breasts since it's hard to tell without a side view, but you may just be compensating for them sitting within clothing (which is great), so I'll stay away from commenting there. The hands are great, very nice form.

Submitted by Kalescent on Wed, 05/07/06 - 10:07 AM Permalink

Nice quality progress so far! her boobies look more like the silicon 'morale booster' kind rather than natural. Im guessing they are like that because they are pushed up by the costume etc ?

Submitted by Neffy on Thu, 06/07/06 - 8:24 AM Permalink

Is she going to have any shoes ? i think knee high boots of the same style outfit would rock on her.

Submitted by caseyjones on Thu, 06/07/06 - 10:46 PM Permalink

Man, that's a tight looking model.
HOORAY FOR BOOBS!

-caseyjones

Submitted by EIN on Fri, 07/07/06 - 7:29 PM Permalink

Hey dude that is looking awesome, love the armour detailing. Only crit would be that the fingerts look a bit stumpy, but otherwise, best model so far.

Submitted by tojo on Fri, 07/07/06 - 10:32 PM Permalink

looking really nice man..

how many polys in your source model so far?

is that just a screen grab?

keep up the good work

Submitted by PeterDavis on Fri, 07/07/06 - 11:02 PM Permalink

another member of the highpoly before lowpoly party? looking good.

Submitted by silvermirage on Sat, 08/07/06 - 12:27 AM Permalink

i think once you finish this comp you should post this on cgtalk
high probability that it will be plugged on the front page
=) awesome work man

Submitted by shika on Sat, 08/07/06 - 5:05 AM Permalink

thanks peeps
EIN, critique noted for when i get back to work on the body :)

the model is about 300k at the moment, my computer isnt great so ive had to be really stingy. for example the body out of zbrush is only subd level 2 and most of the simple objects arent subdivided.
heres a screen grab :)
[img]http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d3/shika01/screenie.jpg[/img]

quote:Originally posted by PeterDavis

another member of the highpoly before lowpoly party? looking good.

yep, ive tried both ways before and prefer this method. polyboost and snap to face toggle are my friends

ill consider posting on cgtalk, couldnt hurt. most of the responses to those plugged threads are pretty mindless

- David

Submitted by PeterDavis on Sat, 08/07/06 - 6:59 AM Permalink

quote:
yep, ive tried both ways before and prefer this method. polyboost and snap to face toggle are my friends

would you be able to explain these tools?

Submitted by shika on Sat, 08/07/06 - 7:49 AM Permalink

well if you use max youve probably used the snap toggle tool before, just set it to snap to face and that will enable you to extrude edges that conform to your high poly.
ill borrow this example from pior
http://www.pioroberson.com/images/minitut_topology_worflow.jpg

[url="http://www.polyboost.com/"]polyboost[/url] is a plugin for max that speeds up this process 10x, as well as doing a whole bunch of other cool things

-David

Submitted by PeterDavis on Sat, 08/07/06 - 8:16 AM Permalink

hrm. im still finding trouble seeing the advantages, but ill guess ill have to try it later. I can see it being better if you start in Zbrush, but since i dont own it and after trying in the demo and finding myself utterly confused with the program, my roots remain in sub-d modelling. ive always found it simpler and more logical to make a low poly with solid topology, then sub divide and sculpt the low poly and then go back to the low poly to make sure its all consistent. thats what i did for my challenge entry anyway.

so basically you are extruding edges along the surface of the highpoly? sounds handy enough.
oh, and polyboost looks fantastic, thanks for the heads up.

obviously im limited somewhat without zbrush, but as long as the results are as impressive as anyone elses im happy. however its always good to get some insight into alternative workflows. I experimented with a new modelling method (new for me, anyway) and found it far less daunting.

updates?

p.s sorry about huge post ;)

Submitted by silvermirage on Sat, 08/07/06 - 8:40 PM Permalink

hmm, that a nice workflow method!
wonder if there's any similar counterpart to do so with maya?

Submitted by shika on Mon, 10/07/06 - 12:30 PM Permalink

i guess the end result is all that counts :)
zbrush is worth the effort it takes to get over the confusing UI, its so damn fun.

i dont know of a maya equivalent silvermirage (cause i dont know maya), but im sure there's a maya savvy chap on these forums that could share some wisdom via PM.

updates soon

- David

Submitted by Makk on Mon, 10/07/06 - 9:07 PM Permalink

Looking good!
And high poly then low poly is the way to go IMHO

Submitted by J I Styles on Tue, 11/07/06 - 7:09 PM Permalink

lookin' cool David -- I'd say my favourite hair is the fourth variation cropped dreads look since it's interesting and fits the character style the best.

Submitted by PeterDavis on Tue, 11/07/06 - 11:17 PM Permalink

id say the 4th or 5th, but the dreads would be very cool.
ps you scared me for a second, i had to make sure that first rendered hair was painted.

Submitted by caseyjones on Wed, 12/07/06 - 9:12 AM Permalink

Man this model is definately coming along real well. I like the hair you've got in the full body render, IMO it just seems to suit the character more than the others. The face came out great as well!
You're definately pushing the quality of work in this comp, which is great because it takes this challenge up a notch and forces others to put some to push themselves further to compete with you! Especially myself!
Keep it up!

-caseyjones

Submitted by caseyjones on Mon, 17/07/06 - 11:03 PM Permalink

Great work dude!
A quick question for you, as you seem to know your way around ZBrush. You started with a naked body mesh then added the clothing later. Are you bringing the naked body back into ZBrush with the added clothing attached then sub dividing and detailing as you go? Or are you just bringing in the clothing on their own and detailing then exporting it back into Max/Maya/etc and just placing back over the top of the model.
I wasn't sure how to go about it with my model, because I want to work on certain parts of the model at one time then go from there. Or should I just bring in the whole low base mesh then mask out the bits I want to work on and do it that way?
Hopefully that made sense (because my previous post didn't) :/

-caseyjones

Submitted by PeterDavis on Tue, 18/07/06 - 12:15 AM Permalink

the low poly mesh is so tidy, its almost like theres no flow at all but there no 'bad' flow, if you catch my drift. almost like its so subtle that it just looks uniform.

Hair looks good, makes me wish i wasnt so amazingly confused with zbrush.

Submitted by shika on Tue, 18/07/06 - 1:23 AM Permalink

after subD modelling the gear in max, i export it all as a single OBJ file, but keep everything as seperate objects, that way i can use the handy hide by object shortcut(shift + ctrl) that makes working on overlapping gear easy as pie, and make sure everything still fits together after zbrushing
after that i exported just the pieces that had work done on them and imported them into hidden layers in max to save memory on my poor computer.

you could do something similar with your character and seperate the arms/legs/head/torso and just hide the bits that you're not working on in zbrush.

- David