Scuplpting the manequin

Having previously sculpted my character for my group project in Zbrush, I am already familiar with the process and the workflow that I need to approach. Of course, in the industry and between artists, there are tons of different workflows that are being used, but this particular one has felt very intuitive and natural for me, so I am excited to get back into it.

Before I started doing anything, I gathered some anatomy references and also borrowed the book '' Anatomy for Sculptors, Understanding the Human Figure '' by Sandis Kondrats and Uldis Zarins to help me along the process.

I started with a block out made up of primitives that I manipulated afterward using the move tool.  While working on this stage I tried to stay mindful of proportions, posture, and angles, cause these would be more difficult to fix at a later stage. I also tried to mimic the volumes of the muscles, since I want this mannequin to resemble an athletic body. 

After I was happy with the shape, I dinameshed everything together, refined the seems, and then Zremeshed everything to even out the geometry. At this stage, I was finally able to start refining the shapes and adding more details, using different subdivision levels.

Sculpting the Captain

 At this point in time, my workflow for sculpting humans is quite established. I start by blocking out the general forms with primitives such as spheres and cylinders, which I afterward alter with the move brush to get a closer resemblance to the actual silhouette. Of course, this character was no exception in that regard. 

When I finally reached the point where the model started looking more human, I dynameshed everything together and zremeshed it afterward to get a more clean result, which I polished afterward with the smooth brush.

At this stage, I have reached a decent base that I was able to start polishing, fixing the proportions and placement of the body parts. Looking at anatomy references while sculpting is crucial, so I used the images I have gathered to help me out with the process. I also heavily used the book I borrowed, because it has very good examples of the actual planes that I need to recreate, especially for the face.

Looking at other body sculpts that people have made was very helpful as well.

Getting the initial structure of the face can be quite difficult to achieve in Zbrush if the mesh is dense, so for this stage, I kept the model quite low poly so that it would be easier to get the planes and angles right.

The next thing I did was taking specific parts of the model, and focusing my attention only towards that, adding more detail and getting a closer resemblance to how it would normally look like. 

I did want my character to be physically fit, but not extremely muscular, so I did tune down the size of the muscles. Focusing on the face, I started adding more detail and sculpting the features. I did not want to get too much into details at this stage, because eventually I  would have had to dynamesh and zremesh everything again when it was time to attach the hands.

My approach for the hands was a bit different than what I have previously done. I really enjoyed the workflow that Speedchar showed on his youtube channel, so I adapted it, which made things go a lot smoother. Sculpting the hands differently from the body was a good decision because I was able to rotate them as I desired, without having any other body parts getting in the way.

The process was quite similar to the one I used for the head, having things be quite low poly at the start, which let me manipulate geometry quite easily. The fingers were relatively easy to make, having made one and duplicating it,
and adjusting the copy accordingly.

I did not go into too much detail with the nads, because my character will have gloves afterall, so all detail will have had to be erased anyways in the process.

After I dynameshed them to the body, I went back to the face and did some more work, making lots of corrections to the proportions, and trying to get him to resemble the face model that I chose for this project.

I also added a blockout of the eyebrows, because by doing that it would be easier to get an idea of how he was going to look at the end.

Making moodboards for my projects

 Characteristically to every start of a project is figuring out the concepts themselves. I already had a rough idea surrounding what I wanted to do, but looking for references and inspiration has tied everything together quite nicely. Learning from my past mistakes, I am moving quite fastly through this process, trying to not overthink every single aspect of the design. The projects need to be done in a relatively small period of time, and at the highest possible standard. This year is crucial.

For my captain, I knew from the get-go that I didn't want to go the traditional route, so no pirate or anything similar. In order to help me figure out the route that I wanted to approach, I needed to understand what this captain could actually be. Captain of a vehicle of some sort, captain of a group of people?

 Then I started to research interesting vehicles and universes I could approach. After some digging on Pinterest, I found the idea of a captain of an airship to be the one that I liked and enjoyed the most. So something in the SteamPunk universe would be the most appropriate for this concept. After I had that settled, I started looking for actual character concepts that would fit this theme, and thankfully I found more than enough references, so I started picking and choosing what I liked and assembling my mood board.

I really loved the concept in the left-down corner, but I do not want to make it entirely the same, so I started to extract some elements from different places as well. I want him to look villainous, tough, and mysterious. And what better way to translate that than with some victorian style clothing?

I searched for some material references as well, just to help me along the modeling process. I will also need to add some storytelling elements, to make him feel believable and recognizable even if he is observed outside of his environment.

For my Jacket project, the first thought that came to my mind when I saw the glowing bits requirements was cyberpunk. Unfortunately, this is a theme and subject that is currently being overly used and approached, even by some of my peers that also chose this particular project. 

After some conversations and feedback with my professor Will, I decided to approach the fantasy theme. At the end of the day, magic can also glow, so I don't necessarily have to go the technology route. Happily, I was able to find many references and concepts on the Internet, mainly related to elves. 

At this stage, I am not really sure how I want the jacket to look, but what I do know is that I want to have a variety of different materials to showcase my understanding of surface properties and also my texturing skills, which I need to improve thinking and analyzing my previous projects.

For a more interesting silhouette, I will be using some layering of different bits and materials. Since this concept is still a bit blurry, I will be doing some iterations next and will start working on my mannequin at the same time in order to save some time.

Start of the third year and choosing my projects.

 My second year of studies has been the most difficult so far, mainly because there were so many new techniques and software to study in a relatively small period, considering I had to work on my projects at the same time. 

Luckily, this year is way less of a shock, mainly because I already have the basics set in my mind, so it really is just a matter of applying those to my new projects while also learning new things on the go depending on my needs.

From the early start of my studies, I have known that I wanted to become a Character Artist and happily that hasn't changed during those years. So when I was given the choice of pursuing a path, I had no hesitation in choosing characters.

For this term, we were given the option to choose from a variety of briefs made by companies from the industry which is fantastic. After some analyzing and thought I have decided to go for The Captain brief made by Ubisoft and the Legendary Jacket Project by Rocksteady.

This choice was not unintentional. I intend on making the Captain as realistic and at the highest standard as I can, considering it has to be a fully working character. The jacket is relatively more simple, not having to worry about rigging and topology for the mannequin. That does not mean though that I won't put as much effort as I will be putting into the Captain. On the contrary, having a smaller-sized project will allow me to spend more time on the texturing process, while also allowing me to learn Marvelous designer, for a better overall result.  I will not be neglecting the mannequin as well. I am planning on keeping it anatomically correct while also being mindful of the proportions.

The next stage is figuring out the concepts for my projects and assembling some mood boards, so when I actually start working on them, I will have everything I need.