Tsumea Challenge - AWHITELAW

Forum
Sumea Modeller Challenge

Gday, thought ide jump in on this comp. looks like fun.
got a few ideas moving around in the old noggin.
ill chuck some concept up very soon.

Submitted by NKennedy on Sat, 23/08/08 - 3:02 PMPermalink

Hey Alex, looking forward to your concepts, good luck!

Submitted by Deathshead13 on Mon, 25/08/08 - 12:54 PMPermalink

http://i401.photobucket.com/albums/pp91/awhitelaw666/slide0061.jpg

Heres my idea.
HANK "THE TANK" GRAVES
Ex-special forces sergent used by the military to test a new super-soldier project.
The project involved bio-alteration as well as attatching an exo-skeleton combat suit directly onto Graves.
The extreme nature of the experiment as well as the immense pain he endured during the attachment process Graves went insane. The sergent, once a brilliant and brave soldier is now a hulking monster, a twisted creation, half-man half-machine.
Graves escaped the military facility mid-way through the experiment and as a result does not have the complete battle-suit, only his arms and legs.
The suit enhances his already incredible strength as well as offering protection from most weapons. it also has built-in weapons such as a 50 cal. Machine gun and retractable bayonets.
While almost completly psychopathic Graves still retains a small part of his former self. given to moments of near-genius and cunning as well as psychotic rage.
His current location is unknown. he comes out of hiding to wreck havoc on military instalations and bases. he has also been known to go on killing sprees during his rages.

His calling card (other than the piles of bodies and utter destruction) is a pair of his old dog-tags he hangs around the necks of some victims.

Submitted by sebp on Wed, 27/08/08 - 10:32 AMPermalink

Sweet i like the idea its is gonna be allot of fun to doing high ploy work in mud box for this character. I am looking forward to the next round of sketches.

Submitted by shika on Thu, 04/09/08 - 12:25 AMPermalink

who did you learn your workflow from?
I notice a lot of beginners these days still finalise their low res mesh before even starting their high
its strange.

Submitted by Kookiemunster on Fri, 05/09/08 - 1:51 AMPermalink

Shika For doing normal mapped models you can approach it 2 ways. One approach is you can model your low res mesh and get a good base. Most 3d artists have an idea of the detail they want to go into already. So by doing this you have a good base to export you model into z brush or mudbox. Also b4 you export with this approach you generally do an unwrap of the model, and allow you to bring the high res mesh back into max or (maya)? (Im a max user maya users please verify how good / bad the normal mapping is in it.). Then project a normal map onto the low res mesh from the hi res mesh. I find this method can give you better results with your normal maps.

the other way is to sculpt first and go to town with the detail. and then model your low res under the hi res. I personally didn't like this approach until Z brush 3 came along. Has Some real nice features for building your low res meshes straight in z brush. Anyway both methods are viable and used within the industry.

It just takes a bit of time and practice to work out which one suits your modeling style better.

Anyway looks like you off to a good start man looking good.

Submitted by shika on Fri, 05/09/08 - 10:16 AMPermalink

i realize that :)
don't confuse your base mesh with your optimized low res mesh. 99% of the time there's no reason to finalize your low res mesh before you start sculpting(the other 1% of the time is when something forces you to do it backwards). you can optimize your base mesh to become an optimized low res mesh if you want later on though

just speaking generally here
a base mesh is best for sculpting - It will contain mostly even spaced quads and loops that are appropriate for the surface detail you will be sculpting.
eg. you wouldn't model a belt buckle on to your base mesh because its detail at a higher subD level will be out of whack.(you could model a belt buckle base mesh and put it in a separate layer though, or even stamp a belt buckle shape into your sculpture)

an optimized low res mesh will have plenty of triangles, it'll have animation friendly topology and it will be adjusted so the normals from the high res mesh are projected accurately.

most of the time you wont even have a single base mesh but you *will* have a single optimized low res mesh. it would be ridiculous to finalize your low res mesh first in these cases

I find sculpting without constraining myself to a *finalized* low res mesh is more organic and a lot more fun :)

Forum
Sumea Modeller Challenge

Gday, thought ide jump in on this comp. looks like fun.
got a few ideas moving around in the old noggin.
ill chuck some concept up very soon.

Submitted by NKennedy on Sat, 23/08/08 - 3:02 PMPermalink

Hey Alex, looking forward to your concepts, good luck!

Submitted by Deathshead13 on Mon, 25/08/08 - 12:54 PMPermalink

http://i401.photobucket.com/albums/pp91/awhitelaw666/slide0061.jpg

Heres my idea.
HANK "THE TANK" GRAVES
Ex-special forces sergent used by the military to test a new super-soldier project.
The project involved bio-alteration as well as attatching an exo-skeleton combat suit directly onto Graves.
The extreme nature of the experiment as well as the immense pain he endured during the attachment process Graves went insane. The sergent, once a brilliant and brave soldier is now a hulking monster, a twisted creation, half-man half-machine.
Graves escaped the military facility mid-way through the experiment and as a result does not have the complete battle-suit, only his arms and legs.
The suit enhances his already incredible strength as well as offering protection from most weapons. it also has built-in weapons such as a 50 cal. Machine gun and retractable bayonets.
While almost completly psychopathic Graves still retains a small part of his former self. given to moments of near-genius and cunning as well as psychotic rage.
His current location is unknown. he comes out of hiding to wreck havoc on military instalations and bases. he has also been known to go on killing sprees during his rages.

His calling card (other than the piles of bodies and utter destruction) is a pair of his old dog-tags he hangs around the necks of some victims.

Submitted by sebp on Wed, 27/08/08 - 10:32 AMPermalink

Sweet i like the idea its is gonna be allot of fun to doing high ploy work in mud box for this character. I am looking forward to the next round of sketches.

Submitted by shika on Thu, 04/09/08 - 12:25 AMPermalink

who did you learn your workflow from?
I notice a lot of beginners these days still finalise their low res mesh before even starting their high
its strange.

Submitted by Kookiemunster on Fri, 05/09/08 - 1:51 AMPermalink

Shika For doing normal mapped models you can approach it 2 ways. One approach is you can model your low res mesh and get a good base. Most 3d artists have an idea of the detail they want to go into already. So by doing this you have a good base to export you model into z brush or mudbox. Also b4 you export with this approach you generally do an unwrap of the model, and allow you to bring the high res mesh back into max or (maya)? (Im a max user maya users please verify how good / bad the normal mapping is in it.). Then project a normal map onto the low res mesh from the hi res mesh. I find this method can give you better results with your normal maps.

the other way is to sculpt first and go to town with the detail. and then model your low res under the hi res. I personally didn't like this approach until Z brush 3 came along. Has Some real nice features for building your low res meshes straight in z brush. Anyway both methods are viable and used within the industry.

It just takes a bit of time and practice to work out which one suits your modeling style better.

Anyway looks like you off to a good start man looking good.

Submitted by shika on Fri, 05/09/08 - 10:16 AMPermalink

i realize that :)
don't confuse your base mesh with your optimized low res mesh. 99% of the time there's no reason to finalize your low res mesh before you start sculpting(the other 1% of the time is when something forces you to do it backwards). you can optimize your base mesh to become an optimized low res mesh if you want later on though

just speaking generally here
a base mesh is best for sculpting - It will contain mostly even spaced quads and loops that are appropriate for the surface detail you will be sculpting.
eg. you wouldn't model a belt buckle on to your base mesh because its detail at a higher subD level will be out of whack.(you could model a belt buckle base mesh and put it in a separate layer though, or even stamp a belt buckle shape into your sculpture)

an optimized low res mesh will have plenty of triangles, it'll have animation friendly topology and it will be adjusted so the normals from the high res mesh are projected accurately.

most of the time you wont even have a single base mesh but you *will* have a single optimized low res mesh. it would be ridiculous to finalize your low res mesh first in these cases

I find sculpting without constraining myself to a *finalized* low res mesh is more organic and a lot more fun :)