Hello, It has been a little while since my last post, I've had a busy couple of weeks. I have been trying to really up the qualiity of my work by really focusing on each individual asset as its own object, and taking into account all the advice I received at the portfolio review.

I had to ensure I was very happy with my blockout and silhouette before I moved onto things like the surface details. I made the hardsurface props in 3dsMax and brought them into Zbrush. Below is the belt buckle and earring.

I got the silhouette in for the earring before moving on to detailing. 

I added slight bulging around the hips and the creases added to the slouched effect of the shorts.

I tested the shorts in max to make sure the normals weren't messed up.

 I  was very happy with the shorts, and so  moved on to the leotard. I worked on it using the same sculpting methods as the shorts to represent the same material. I kept in mind the way the belt sits around the fabric, using reference of 1980s workout outfits. I had to keep in mind my character's body shape and that it wouldn't be as flat and unwrinkled as someone with less body fat. I managed to find some good references to help me with this.

The leg warmers were a challenge. I couldn't ge thte folds right at first and they were too noisy, so I redid them and this time payed better attention to the way the fabric slouches.

The one on the left leg is the new attempt. I am a lot happier with this shape, I think I managed to get the sharpness of the folds and the layered slouching.

The shoes were made of lots of components. I was using 1980s reeboks as ref which are made of a bunch of different layers. I kept each layer low res to get the basic shape in until I detailed them.

Once I was happy with the shape I added stitching and other details. 

Another component I needed to make was the glasses. I did this in Max and added planes for the glass. 

There would be a chain attached to the glasses via a rubber link. 

This is the clothing so far, with the added glasses and belt! I did some adjusting of the leotard around the stomach to make way for the position of the belt. 

To make the chain I used a free IMM curve chain brush. I will bake this using an alpha. I placed the glasses at the hip, hanging off the belt.

At this point I received some feedback from my tutors on how to make the design more interesting. I decided to create a hair curler hairstyle instead of the bouffant look to add a new element. Making the curlers was simpler than I thought it would be; I made a cylinder and used inset to create the divisions. 

I then played around with the position of the curlers. Once the hair cap is in this may change.

Up next, the bingo cards. To add some variation I created a dog-eared fold and minor tearing.

I also put one down the side of the legwarmer.

To make the towel I used reference of  sports towels draped over the shoulders. 

 Here is a quick turnaround of my character so far:

  

In this blog I will be discussing the beginnings of my new character, plus some feedback I received from industry members!

Richard Smith and Hazel Brown from Deepsilver Dambuster Studios very generously offered a portfolio review for the third year character artists on my course. The feedback I received delved deep into how I could refine my work, regarding sculpting techniques, reference I should use to better my work and ways to improve mood and presentation. I also received lots of helpful tips of what to do and not to do on portfolios.

Something I really liked was the advice to treat each individual object on a character as its own asset, to ensure that it reaches a high level of quality and consistency. Also simple things to improve the quality of textures and normals after rigging deformation, like using a half pose and resculpting and rebaking areas under arms. With things like skin, I needed to think about the raggedness and the translucency in more depth.

Taking this advice forwards will help me to push my FMP characters further, starting with my next character. I also refined my plan for my FMP, and so far I am on track.

  I gathered some scan references as well as existing models and my face reference I was using to block out the body. 

The face is something that will be difficult to perfect. I spoke to my mentor Del who gave me some advice on how to get the shape of the face correct, especially the jowels and jawline of elderly people. I added some face lift before and after images to my reference which helped me to analyse how the skin droops in some areas of the face. 

I did the same research for the areas around the clavicle and arms.

I noticed that there were areas of skin on the legs thta created a striped effectvfrom how the tissue is gathered, particularly in the fattier areas like the backs of the thighs.

Once I was happy with the body shape blockout I moved on to Marvelous designer to create the lycra leotard, shorts, leg warmers and the towel.

To create the leotard and shorts I changed the fabric preset to featherweight elasticated nylon. I will do a lot of sculpting in zbrush to finesse these folds as I can definitely make them more prominenet in areas of creasing, particularly around the crotch and waist.

The leg warmeres needed to be tighter at the very top and then looser and more gathered in the middle, and sagged on the other leg.

I will work on the belt mainly in Zbrush but I needed a base of it here to hold the towel down in the fabric simulation.

Using the layering function I was able to drape the towel over the shoulder and under the belt.

I played around with the position and then brought it into Zbrush.

I remeshed the objects and added subdivisions.

It will need a lot of work to acheive the correct density and heaviness of the folding, so I will use some scan references for clothing folds.

To add thickness to everything I used Zmodeler.

And this is the block out so far. I am looking forward to implementing the new tips and tricks I learnt from the portfolio review session! 

The final part of this first FMP character was theriggign and presenting process. I started by setting up my HDRI and lighting in Marmoset.
  

I created a plinth using a circular plane and used a damaged painted cement texture.

I wanted to imply the setting of a concert stage so I added in a duct tape marker on the floor.

This added a bit of grounding to my scene.

Now onto the rigging. I actually tried using an auto rig from mixamo but I found that the rig couldn't pick up parts pf the head or the wrists properly. So I decided to make my own rig to use with the animations instead.

I also used this opportunity to make a pose.

  I wanted something where he was holding the can and lighter up ready to use them in battle.

AFter some feedback from my tutors I ensured that the weighting around the elbows was fixed.  

The result was pretty cool.

With the mixamo animations, I experimented with combat animations and idle. I went with an idle pose in the end as it would showcase the details of my character better.  

This isn't the final idle animation I used as I ended up going for something more action-ready, but it was fun to experiment regardless.  

 I had another feedback session and was told how to make certain details stand out more, like the flame design on the back of the jacket, which I changed from black to gold.
  

  I also added a flaming skull decal to make the other leg of the chap more interesting.

  This is the final idle pose with the mini textural additions.

I had to go an edit the weighting of the netted shirt to stop it from clipping into his body, but other than that I think that this rig and pose is very successful!

Despite this success, I had some issues when importing  the idle animation into Unreal. For some reason the weighting was messed up in Unreal despite working perfectly in 3Ds Max and Marmoset (P.S. If anyone knows how to solve this please let me know!)

I will definitely revisit this but for now I can start working on my next character!

Last thing I did was a bit of branding. I made a logo for the game, 'Culture Clash Club' , which I used on a poster to present my character. I will do this for the other characters also.

After putting my meshes and textures into marmoset, I found that there was a lot I needed to fix. My main areas of concern were the skin, eyes, and a couple of accessories.

The trousers needed warmer tones to match the rest of the clothing. I also needed to play around with contrasts and add in some dirt to break up the surface.

 I didn't like the quilted effect on the jacket sleeves so I removed it, and edited the roughness and height values. I also added in some creasing to make it more realistic.

With these adjusted values the sleeve material resembles fabric more.

I took the opportunity to adjust the roughness values of the jacket some more as there were areas that were too shiny still.

  I played around with the eyeball texture a lot. I found that the original version was too light and not very realistic. I needed to add in some darker and more yellowish tones.

This is the eye after adjusting the vlaues some more. When trying it in marmoset I still found that it was too light around the edges.  

I know this looks insane but when placed in the model I really liked how this looked. The contrast was a lot better.

 I also adjusted the tone and the roughness values of the gloves, to stop them from being too shiny and too cool in colour.
  

  Something I also added was  a gradient to the chaps and edited the shade slightly.

  To add depth to the brass belt buckle I revisted it with a fractal sum under colour and then added some clouding.

  I matched the lighter and spray can colour schemes to the rest of the model and added the same fractal sum base.

To make the headbnd more realistic and textural I added stronger highlights too the folds and some stains.

  I did the same with the tie around the leg.

The boots were also splashed with dust as they were too clean previously.

The skin needed more variation in colour so I added some more clouding . I also made the fingertips more red.  

I added some bruising and redness to break up the skin more.

I added the same effects to the face, but I also adjusted the makeup to make the lipstick and eyeshadow smears more convincing.

The skin had a lot more depth and realism after these changes.

  Lastly, I added in some more hair cards to the sides of the hair to better match my concept and to make it more volumous.  

This is the final result.

  These changes all improved the quality of my work drastically! In th next post I will be discussing my rigging process.

I tried a little eyebrow experiment out in XGen for the first time ever. It was hard to get the hang of controlling the guides, but I was quite happy with my first eyebrow experiment. SO why did I go back to fibermesh?

For a start, I was very time conscious at this point and I knew better how to use Zbrush than Maya, which I have very llittle experience using. I definitely want to learn how to use XGen at some point inht e near future, but as my character's hair is very elaborate I decided to make the hair cards in zbrush instead, so that I had more time for laying the cards. The difference is, this time I created individual sheets of hair which ended up being a lot more manageable for me than my first fibermesh experiment.

Here are a few examples of the types of hair clumps I made. From my research I needed thick clumps, long strands, thin fly-aways and medium length strands for the crown of the head.

This was the final selection. From my reference I saw that 80's hairstyles feaured a variety of textures, and even though blowdried hair was mainly straight, there were elements of waviness and clumpiness in some parts.

I also recrafted the eyebrow, this time making sure the anatomy of the eyebrow was more correct. I liked the one I made in Maya but I had more control here to direct the hairs as I knew how to use the groom tools better at this point.

I then imported the hair and eyebrows ainto my max scene and retopped them using flat planes.   

I then baked everything and applied the opacity map, before I started texturing.
 

I had some trouble with the cage but this was only a matter of tweaking the bake settings.

Opacity map made from normal map in photoshop.

I added in a streaky roughness noise to enhance the wavy shape of the hair.

For the cap I used a mix of curvature and projection to create a hair texture.

 I then applied the base colour and alpha texture maps in 3Ds Max to test how they looked. I wa shappt with the results so far.

I started applying the hair cards towards the bottom of the hair cap first, and then gradually worked my way up in rows. In order to stay organised I placed the hair rows in folders.

I stuck the other maps on just because I wanted to see it altogether.

 It was satisfying to see the hair layers all build up slowly to make something quite convincing.

I also periodically checked the alphas in Marmoset to see how it was coming along.  

This is here purely because it made me laugh.

Eventaully I got a silhouette that I really liked! The fly-away hair cards really helped to make this style look even better.

At this point I also played around with expression to get an element of personality into the character.  

 What I do really like is the leather texture on the jacket, but I want to revisit the belt buckle also andadd in some more fly-away strands of hair on the sides to make it look messier.
  

At one point I realised I had forgotten to tattoo his arms, so I used my flame decal along his forearms according to my concept.

I also painted his nails black.

Back to the clothes. I had an issue with the bake. Baking by mesh name worked on everything here apart from the jeans under the chaps, which had an AO overlay on them despite changing the cage size and trying different settings. I decided to move them out of the way and bake by mesh name like this.

I also had issues with clipping in some parts which affected the bake, so I went back into max to fix them.

I then was able to apply my base leather texture, and used curvature highlights and crevices layers to make the folds and stitching stand out.

Working out the suede was a challenge but quite enjoyable. Correct roughness was essential here as suede features areas of dictinct coarseness and worn down shiny patches.

I ensured I used reference for stone wash jeans when working on them to acheive the correct levels around the folds. Highlighting was easy when using curvature.

The leather belt is mpre rigid than the jacket but still features areas of wear around the edges and patches on the surface.

At this point, I decided I wasn't happy with continuing the texture process as  the texel density for the jacket UVs was wrong. I took the time to resize the islands  better in my UVs and then rebaked. Retexturing was fast as my process had been non-destructive so it was a matter of making minor edits. 

I am much happier with the resolution of the jacket,.

The boots were textured using a more rigid leather with stitch highlighting.

I revisted the  chaps and added in some lighter areas around the folds to show wear.

For the sleeve of the jacket I used my own jacket as reference for the lining. I created a quilted effect using a blurred stitch alpha in height.

After gaining some feedback from my tutors I found that I should add more wear and variation to the metals, particularly on the belt buckle. I did this mainly through the use of roughness masks.

I did the same for the zip also.

I was also told to look at references of wear on leather jackets, particularly around the edges and folds. It could do with more patchiness.

I then moved on to the buckle design.

I created the text in phtoshop and imported it in as an alpha.

I also added the same braiding pattern from the metallic shoulder pad braids around the outside of the belt as I liked this better than the chain pattern that was there.

I went back into my clothing alphas and unified the colours of the metals with the other metals on the character for consistency.

The button was textured using the same metal, and I played around with the level of wear to make the design stand out.

Both the shoulder pad and the gloves featured different types of leather, from coarse and stiff leather (that would be backed onto plastic or wood) to a soft fine leather used for gloves.

I played around a bit with values, opting for a more brownish colour of the chaps.

To make the hem of the tank top I used curvature once again to highlight the warping of the material and textured it with the same fabric as the netted shirt.

The final thing I needed to do to the jacket was add the embroidered flame on the back with the black leather.

The clothes required a huge amount of reference research and feedback but I am happy with the outcome.

To start the texturing process I sorted my UVs into material IDs.

I applied a base of colour zones that I then set to multiply. This would be near the bottom of the skin stack.

I used a combo of skin material and my own curvature maps to create the skin texture. I wanted the roughness of the skin to be slightly varied for realism, so I added in my own roughness values.

I used a variety f noises on the makeup areas and skin areas to create roughness variaiton. I edited the noise with levels.

You can see how the skin is now more varied in roughness.

I created two curvature map fill layers - one fore skin crevices and the other for highlights.

With these I was able to make a more realistic skin texture.

I used the same techniques for the gum curvature highlights and crevices.

To give the teeth a little bit of texture I used a striped height noise with a blur filter.

This is the first sheet completed!

I started by creating a mask for the pupil and using a deep black with no reflectivity. This helped get the impression of depth and the eyeball will be covered in a glossy layer later on. I then created the iris using curvature highlights and crevices, before using the frost pattern alpha to get the thin lines on the iris.

The scelera had an off-white, red and yellow layer all stacked with different blending modes. FInally the veinswere added using a thin brush.

After baking the fingers however it was clear I needed to adjust the positions of some verts in 3Ds Max. I was really pleased with the bake overall.

I made sure to add a cloud noise layer for variation in the skin tone, which would contribute towards realism.

Curvature was especially useful for the creases on the hands, such as around the joints of the fingers and on the palms.

When making the alphas I used the alpha blending mode in substance painter and created an opacity map in photoshop. I was pleased with the results of the alphas, although it took a few attempts with the bake settings to get the correct appearance.

I started by texturing the netted shirt, which is made of roughspun elastic fabric. I expressed this mainly through the use of roughness variaiton to mimic cloth bumpiness.

The linen on the thigh was made by modifying a susbstance designer texture and adding a lightened tint on the end to show wear.

I really liked how varied the surface texture appeared. 

To make the gold braids from the shoulder pad, I used the fibers 2 noise and twisted them, as well as adjusted the histogram position to make them more tightly bound together.

I used the brass material and edited the colour to appear more aged and added in some roughness varation on the metal.

 I did the same with the necklace, but changed it to a dark gunmetal.
  

Here are the clothes alphas altogether.

 I decided to move onto the props next. I finished off the lighter finally, and unwrapped it and baked it. I went back and forth a few times to perfect the bake, as some parts were messy due to bad smoothing groups.
  

I created a brushed aluminium effect and edited the length of the brush strokes.

I also added in edge wear using curvature maps.

I played around a lot with roughness values and wear on the metal, using reference.

I added in this oxidised effect inside the lid using layers of colour with different blending modes.

The worn leather of the holster was made using grunge masks. I added in two brass studs.

I used a similar anodised brushed aluminium for the spray can, and created the ribbed plastic top using striped height noise.

For the can label I made a parody of 1980s Aqua Net hairspray design in photoshop that I would apply as an alpha.
  

  Using UV alignment I was able to place the label neatly. I used a glossy plastic material for the printed label.

  To make the lighter more visually interesting I continued the use of the flame design from the jacket onto the body.

  I went back and filled in the label title with black so that it stood out. 

  This is it for part one of my texture process. Please read the next blog for part 2.

This blog will be a short explanation of my particle effect creation in Unreal. 

I used a tutorial by UnrealCG on Youtube to get me started, and edited my parameters as I went to acheive the effect I wanted. I was trying to get this sort of effect, from using a hairspray and lighter as a flamethrower.

To do this I used a smoke noise and Sub UV sheet from the Unreal starter content, which I made unlit and used translucent blending.

Once I had my material I created a GPU sprite particle emitter. By adjusting the initial size and size over life parameters I was able to control the thickness of the flame at different points. I was also able to control the height of the end of the flame by adding an acceleration node.

This is it before the node

This is afterwards, with the smoke added. I actually lightened the smoke to stay truer to my reference material, and I thinned down the flame quite a lot.

I also made it messier around the edges so that it looked more realistic.

I will continue to play around with the parameters however, as there are some things I'd like to edit, e.g. the speed at which the flames come out from the base and the colour near the base, which could be more blueish to represent real flames.

This week was a hefty job of retopping. It was difficult job organising everything as there were a lot of components, but it was an opportunity to do a lot of problem solving along the way. I started with the jacket. Again with this process I used a combo Quad remesher, ZRemesher and 3DsMax retop tools. I used quad remesher initially to get a more basic topology, and then corrected the loops in zbrush with some extra tweaking in max.

The chaps were straightforward as they were comprised of mostly loops.

I retopped the hair cap, and used quad remesh for several other components that needed simple loops, like the choker and, belt. Where possible I used symmetry for a more even structure.

I did the same for the body, before moving onto the shoulder pad.

I actually edited the shape of it so that it was more rounded on the corners.

I had added in roping using a chain bruh in Zbrush, but I needed to edit the positions of the ropes after changing the shape of the shoulder pad.
  

I used FFD to get a more accurate position.

I then retopped these ropes with a plane. I will bake the high poly onto this mesh.

I  tried to make the shape as smooth as possible while maintaining an even and efficient mesh.

The spikes were simply duplicated and the looops deleted to create the low poly.

The necklace was going to be made using quad remesh but I decided it would be much more efficient to use an alpha. It will also look ok as it is a smaller detail.

The strips of fabric from the leg tie will also be made using alphas as I wanted to feature the tears, whilst remaining efficient.

To retop the netting I used the original tank top mesh that I imported from marvelous, and remeshed it. I will use an opacity map with this.

The eyeball was made using the same technique as my last project - I pulled out the concave area slightly to get the shape of the cornea.

The teeth and gums did not need too many polys as they are small details.

The top and bottom set of teeth were retopped in a similar fashion.

The underneath of the gums was deleted as they would not be seen.

This is what I have so far.

The leg tie was cinched and the centre behind the knot deleted.

I retopped all of the boot components into one mesh.

I ensured I paid attention to the silhouette of the boot, particularly the snip toe shape.

I resolved the inside part by collapsing the edges once the faces were out of sight under the trousers.

I tried out a different technique for the hand retop. I started by creating five skeletal strips that I would build from.

I gradually added in more loops, starting with a basic structure and then adding in more where more movement would be needed.

Around each knuckle I made a loop so that it would deform more accurately.

I then disconnected the hand from the body so that I could copy it over and stack the UVs.

The glove was retopped using the hand mesh as a base and extruding this.

For the face I retoppped by hand and used reference for accurate game ready loops in the face.

I used symmetry and welded the edges together.

At first I made a mouth box  by taking the lip area into the mouth and closing it, however I found this messy and it would be unnecessary as only the teeth would really be visible anyway.

I neeed to add a couple more loops to the headband so that it didn't clip into the head.

I really like how the head turned out.

For the sip on the edge of the jacket, I decided to use an alpha as it was jutting out of the jacket and I didn't want it to be too high poly. 

I needed to ensure that it didn't clip too far into the jacket. 

I  retopped the holster by remeshing and manually deleting and repositioning the loops for an even mesh.

I made the zip mesh simplified and low poly.

The jeans only needed the hip area as the legs were hidden under the chaps.

I reduced the tris in the belt and neatened the loops.

The back of the belt buckle was resolved by collapsing the edges.

I got rid of unneeded loops on the can.

The lighter was very difficult to retop. I didn't want to use an alpha for the holes as I wanted the thickness on the inside of the lighter, so I collapsed as many verts as I could whilst retaining the shape of the circles.

I made a couple of improvements to the high poly after receiving feedback from my tutors. I started by adjusting the shape of the finger tips, which were too flat in some places and the joints were too raised.

The shape was a lot better after this improvement.

I also pulled the brow bone fowards a bit for a more masculine facial structure, and to avoid the strange smoothness that was there previously.
  

  The last thing I did was add a couple more folds on the gloves as they were too smooth before.

Once I reimported the new high poly models and reconformed the low poly to them, I unwrapped the objects and packed them in sheets according to object type, e.g clothes, face, alphas etc. 

After talking to my mentor about the best unwrap methods, I tried to keep the UV islands as even and straightened as possible for a better quality texture. 

I've put the boots off for long enough, so let's get back to them.

The shape of the boot is incorrect at this stage. To fix this, I used a combo of images and my pairs of cowboy boots (flex) as reference to get the correct shape.

I added in the snip toe shape and used extract to make the lower part of the boot.

I added in the pull tabs.

I also added in the stitching and shaped the heel more.

The piping along the side was actually made by accident but is more accurate than what I was going to make. I was going to make two separate tubes and put them next to each other, but instead I accidentally projected the fold underneath onto the mesh and it saved me a step! 

This part was challenging. I needed to make the embroidery so I decided to start with a stamp that I could then outline with a custom sewing pattern using a stitch brush. 

I made an alpha in photoshop, faded out the edges then compressed it and used it as an alpha in zbrush.

The stitching part was really fun. I felt like I could be creative with the wat the stitches outline the flames and swirl around inside.

I added the pattern on the front of the boot.

I then refined the heel, ensuring that the angle was correct.

I also refined the instep and added in stitching.

I'm so SO proud of these boots, It was really fun and challenging to figure out how to create such a distinct shape and style of embroidery.

Back to the rest. I added in the same leather divots under the studs of the belt as I did on the choker. I also added in holes.

I used a chain brush to create a braided effect that would be baked into the metal of the buckle.

I also added studs and stitching to the holster.

Using ref I added a filigree pattern to the button. 

The knot took me a couple of tries. I ended up tying material around my leg and took photos for reference to model it from life. After doing this I found that my sculpting was much better and I managed to make a convincing knot, keeping fold anatomy in mind.

I added in two torn thin pieces of fabric dangling from the knot.

Finally I added in the same texture as the reest of the fabric.

I revisted the jacket to add in light folds from the shoulder pad.

The hem of the tank top was also edited. Again I used the standard brush on a light intensity to create light ripples.

The embroidered flame on the back of the jacket was the last detail I added. I used an embroidery stitching brush for this. It made a cool breakup on the back of the jacket.

I did some final edits to the face. Using polygroups I closed the mouth as it has been sculpted now, so I wanted it to be back in a neutral position. I also added in teeth based off of my teeth from my previous projects but editedas I think I have improved my sculpting since then.

 
I added in eyelashes using a free eyelash brush. I will turn these into alphas.

I sculpted the iris and pupil usinf a thin and light intensity dam standard brush.

One thing I noticed was that the nose was a little too high up on the face. This is it before adjusting:

And this is after adjusting. I think that this looks more anatomically correct. To verify this I checked it against my anatomy references.

I received feedback from my tutors on how best to tackle the hair. I decided to make a base cap first for the bulk of the hair, that I would then cover with alphas.

Ahsoka is that you?

Using a hair tutorial I created a custom brush that would allow me to shape the basic clumps of the hair. 

Using this I created the cap.

I will add in all the stray hairs using hair cards later on after I retop this.

With that, my character sculpt is complete! The next stage will be retopping.