I had difficulty visualising the underlying forms of my character at first, so I traced over my previous drawing to get a better idea. I made several versions and tweaked it until it looked balanced.
I found that some of the asymmetrical elements would be easier to adjust in 3D, such as the top hat and hips. When drawing the clothing, I kept some of the lines of the body underneath at a lower opacity so I will be able to refer to it in 3D. I also used different colours so it would be easier to differentiate between objects.
I took my three favourite sketches and drew them digitally to decide which to move forward with. Although I think they would all fit into the Rango IP, I have a preference for the Jerboa character because of its more animalistic features and potential for iteration.
I turned my sketches into silhouettes and noticed some errors with my jerboa character which I fixed in the 4th silhouette. I experimented with a few more ideas and I have concluded that, although I find them visually appealing, 7 and 9 don’t quite fit my chosen IP. 6 and 8 are just not interesting enough to continue with, and 3 seems too simple. 4 and 5 are my favourite ideas so I will sketch them in more detail and decide which character to move forward with.
Above I have rendered two of my characters and although the bird character has interesting shape language, I slightly prefer the Jerboa character because of the personality and I find the design more appealing and a better fit for the IP. I also think it would be more fun to model in 3D.
feedback: was to think about how my character will look in 3d, for example how will the tail come through the trousers, how do the ears look underneath the hat and from different angles etc. This is all what I’ll need to think about when making my turnaround. For the bird character, I also put the bandolier above the gun strap which isn’t practical and makes the rifle inaccessible. I also could have given him an insignia of some kind to make his role in the world more obvious. Additionally, I need to think more about what textures I will use for the fur and clothing, and how the clothing actually works, especially the white shirt on the jerboa.
In my first few sketches, I was trying to build a character based off of my narrative piece, however I think I will find it easier to design how the character looks first and then think about the story after as I felt a bit confined by my earlier description.
After my first few sketches, I decided I needed to take a more creative approach as my designs were looking quite basic and I was stuck trying to make one version work. Below, I used a highlighter to draw a random shape and I tried to find a character within it. This method yielded results that were more true to the spirit of my chosen IP and gave me some designs which I may develop further when moving on to some more detailed silhouettes.
I have decided to make a character that would fit into the world of the IP Rango, however it will have an output quality suitable for a game such as the league of legends IP
Mind map
Character narrative piece
My character is a morally grey scientist who draws fear and fascination in equal measure. In the city, her radical alterations to the living beings were met with disdain and resistance, yet in the desert, she finds an audience who both revere and revile her, acknowledging her talents with a wary respect. Her specialty is integrating prosthetic limbs with deadly functionality, helping gunslingers beat the odds which some locals consider cheating. Because of this she is suspicious and unfriendly towards strangers, and conducts her business discreetly. Amidst the grime and grit of her surgical endeavours, she maintains a façade of elegance, her delicate dress juxtaposing her psychotic personality and the crude implements of her trade. Despite all this, she has found a place within the small frontier community that she inhabits, and has helped many who have passed through it to make a name for themselves, for better or worse. In doing so, she has been able to work towards her goals of scientific revolution in undisturbed peace.
product benchmark
I chose this model as a benchmark because of its good stylized proportions and good quality despite low polycount. Textures are effective and colours work well together. Ropes on the cape and other details are painted/sculped in as a texture rather than hard modelled. Looks like it could all be one mesh except for the hood and cape which could be separate. I could potentially have a separated clothing element to animate and pair with the base mesh when baking.
I’m overall happy with my painting and think the strongest parts are the colours, lighting and atmosphere. what I would do differently next time is give the creature a more dynamic pose and make the composition more dynamic. I did put the camera at a low angle looking up at the creature but it didn’t have much of an effect. I also had to replace the tail as it wasn’t reading well and the overall image looks flat as the creature isn’t crossing over into the foreground or background. although I reviewed the design and exaggerated it I think I still could have made it more interesting as the silhouette remained similar throughout. I also think I should have tried experimenting with different colours for the creature and thought more about how it would interact with the environment and depict that, rather than have it standing there.
I found a more effective approach to the paint over was to start in black and white so I could decide on the values and composition. it also made the photo bashing easier. I then added gradient maps and colour layers to add colour.
Feedback
the feedback I received was to increase the contrast between the creature and the background by adding a multiply layer on the creature, enhancing the rays of light in the background and making the rim light stronger. I also lightened some of the darkest values so the background wasn’t drawing so much attention.
Here I continue working into the textures and lighting. I also altered the tail to make it look more like it was wrapping around the pillar.
I found the lighting coming from the left didn’t look natural so I added some planes to block the light from shining through the columns which gave a better sense of depth into the temple. My first couple tries at photobashing have ended up looking muddy and unnatural. I think I will revisit the creature and adjust the colours as they don’t work well together. I might try doing some renders without the textures/ background and practicing my photo bashing and painting on those before moving on to one with a background if I have time.
I used the Arnold renderer in maya to render my image for painting over. I have given it a key light, a fill light and a rim light. I have put the camera at a low angle looking up at the creature and framed it with the columns, using leading lines to direct the viewers eyes towards its head (the focal point.) I am planning to paint in the atmospheric details and background textures.
I decided to uv unwrap in zbrush and keep a relatively high poly model so I can texture it in substance painter. I ran into some issues when trying to unwrap my model because of the topology which I fixed by filling in holes, using inflate brush to prevent parts from being too thin and then using z remesher in stages rather than trying to do it all at once.
I then used uv master to unwrap the separate meshes and projected and divided it onto the original mesh until no detail was lost.
then I was able to export them as objs and texture them in substance painter. When adding these textures into maya I also had to find some workarounds for the metallic texture not working which I solved by going into the hyper shader and connecting the out colour to metallic.
Array mesh, cloth modifier, posing mesh and decimation for exporting
I looked into some more interesting features of zbrush including simulating cloth/ dynamics, array mesh, decimation master and transpose master.
I used array mesh for the tail club of my creature and, although decimation master was very useful it decreased the detail of my model too much for painting over in substance painter and lost some of the details in the face as I merged it with some of the body.
I also experimented with lighting and adding materials within zbrush.
