Minor Project Update

Setting

The setting has been a constant question in the back of my mind, and Pols too. We have discussed and changed the location a number of times, but each time one of us just weren't satisfied with it. I suggested setting it in a valley of some sort, and we ran with that for some time. But it became apparent that it just was not going to be as visually pleasing as we would have liked. So it was decided that we would return to a cliff face type of thing.

Character Design
I have been working very hard on my character, I've been suprised by my knowledge of edge flow, I studied hard over Summer on clean topology and flow and I am very happy now that that is kicking in. My knowledge of anatomy is progressing along nicely now, and I am so close to a realistic character model. Last year the only head models I produced were video game ones, ones that weren't to be smoothed, simply normal smoothed. (Normal smoothing is simply smoothing out the the vertex normals in order to make the object seem smoother and softer as opposed to hard edges)

The spheres above are both 81 faces, however the one on the right looks far more satisfying, and is the technique used in video games. What I am ultimately getting at here, is, that with video game modelling you do not use sub-D which means that you model in a different manner. I found myself modelling my head model in a similar manner to the video game heads leaving awful results in the mouth corners and such when using sub-D. So simply put, it was a challenge for me to model with the intention of smoothing.

So here is a drawing of my character concept.


Things have already changed since these drawings. I will be removing the leg bandage things, and the sock thing on the feet. She will just be wearing some sandle type shoes. I've spent a long time working on modelling my characters legs and feet, I want to use them. The character as a whole has a serious lack of accessories which I am not happy about, and I shall be revisiting my design (and posting the drawings here) as soon as I have finished with the body and head model. However, it is important to note that I am quite happy with most of the outfit design.

Here are some updates on my character body model:

The legs are coming along nicely. Though I can push the knees a bit more. I had a lot of problems with the legs due to the feet. There is naturally a lot of geometry in the feet and a lot of it wants to run up into the legs. So you are forced to end them suddenly and reroute them around the leg horizontaly as oppposed to vertically, which is very annoying. Why is this annoying? Well you end up with what I call "3 Edge Poles" and because of this they can be very very apparent in your model by causing an annoying bump or crease. Something to be aware of, you should put these poles in places where it won't cause a problem in deformation.


The edge flow in the torso is really nice. As someone that has become quite obsessed with clean and nice flowing topology, I am quite happy by how this has turned out. It is looking really nice in my opinion.
Here are the hand and feet models. I've already posted the feet previously, but I felt it wise to post again so that this post can feel more complete. The hand model I am pleased with, it is very clean which is exactly what I wanted from it. Once it's rigged and skinned and of course, animated, the rig will do all the work to bring it to life. As for the foot, I like it :)



Here is the head model in its current state. The edge flow is really nice here. But there are a lot of issues that I now must resolve through sitting there pulling and pushing points for hours on end untill suddenly it works. But I thought I'd show it here as it is now. Hopefully my next post will see me showing the finished one off!

Things to work on :
-The jaw bone is sticking out too much.
-Shes smiling, remove that and give her a more natural look.
-Resolve the front view, the jaw line needs reshaping and the head thinning a little.
-Sort the ears out, some of the geometry has gone crazy, I think I managed to select some of the verts whilst adjusting part of the face without realising (what an idiot) and now some of the points are buried into the head. This needs attention.
-The nose bridge extends above the eyes, this needs fixing.
-The nose needs to be upturned a bit more to make her feel more effeminate (oh yeah, this is meant to be a woman, though it looks more like a prepubescent boy right now.
Here's a funny image. I sat there for a LONG time trying to work out what the hell was wrong with this head (on the before image) untill It came to me that the mouth was too low... I raised it up and it instantly started working. I show this image, because it's crazy to think that one small little detail like that, being moved up a small amount, instantly makes things work. It really shows just how we as humans read faces.
Also, here is the characters outfit so far. I threw a quick blue shader on there to make it clearer. I will have a belt around her waist and then split the torso from the lower part of the robe, so that I have have a simulation (nCloth) on the lower portion, and the upper portion will be skinned into the rig. However, I plan to use either joints in the breast area, or blend shapes, to simulate what I like to refer to as 'Jiggle Physics' (the bouncing of the breasts) though It will be subtle, and not overly done like you see in video games.

I really hope it is apparent how hard I am working to try and achieve absolute realism in my anatomy. But also working to achieve some really professional and clean topology that will be great for deformation.

I know this was a long post, and if you made it this far... Wow. Thanks for looking :)

A foot model.

So I've been ill... since like last Wednesday evening. Got the Flu or some crap. But I won't bore you with that. I've barely managed to produce any work this week, it's so frustrating. However, I have managed to model a foot for my character and start on the body model. The foot took me like Three or Four attempts to get it right. I think that might be more to do with the tiredness and feeling horrible more than anything. But here it is, enjoy.





There's still some more sculpting work to be done on this. But I think I will leave it for a few days and work on modelling a hand now. Hands are easier (Never thought I'd say that) so It should be fine.

Minor Project Joint Blog

Just a heads up, a joint blog for mine and Pol's Minor project collaboration has been setup.

For those interested, follow it here : POW!

Eye texture test

Just couldn't stop myself throwing a quick texture on there ;)

Japanese (female) Eye modelling rework

I reworked some of the topology, and worked on the tear ducts more. They are a LOT cleaner now, but could probably still use more work. I'm tired now, time for a break.




The previous models are here.

Japanese (female) Eye modelling / topology

I decided today to practice modelling a Japanese Eye. What I quickly found was how different the topology really is to a caucasion eye. That little crease in the corner throws the whole flow out entirely, and it really makes it tough to reroute. I think I have made a good effort here, it looks okay but there is room for improvement. The Iris colors aren't accurate however, as Japanese people tend to have more brown coloured Iris', at least in most cases. But it's important to state that it wasn't my intention with this model to get that right, I just wanted to see if I could get the correct topology.




Below is a basic locator setup so I can aim the eyes seperately, or use the middle locator to aim both together. The middle locator can be constrained to an object thats animated to move around and the eyes will automatically look towards that object.


Below is a close up of the actual eyeball. For the Pupil I just extruded into the sphere and textured it black. For the Iris I have just flatened that part of the sphere and textured it. Also, I made a new object covering that, that has a "phong" shader attached to it that is transparent for the lens. So when I render it I get that shine that eyes have.
Below is a screen shot that I've drawn over marking out the edge flow. I've read and noted many times in 'professional' models, that the eyes aren't circular loops, infact they are a 'swirl' that are encased by a circle loop around the eyes.

^ As you can see, I've got the swirls in there, that start from the side of the nose. They go around to the tear duct in the corner of the eye, and then inside of that are circle edge loops. The outside of the eyes have the proper circle loop. This is a professional edge flow, and granted, it might be unclean in places, but modelling a Japanese eye is no easy feat, especially when I am not Japanese and don't have much 'visual reference' inside of my head as to how they work. So it will take time to achieve this.

Thanks.

Japanese (female) Eyes, Nose and Mouth drawings

I want my character to be very realistic. I want people to look at it and say "that character is a young Japanese girl in her teens." So I have been studying their facial features quite a lot. What I have noticed is how different the Japanese features are to ours.

^ Take this image for example. The inner corners of asians eyes have a pinch in them that caucasians do not have. This will need to be reflected in my characters modelling. The shape of their eyes are completely different to that of our own. Also, at the edges of the mouth is a weird 'pinch' that we don't tend too show. They also tend to have smaller 'cuter' noses, less 'dominant' than ours. All of these things are important touches to make my character look asian, which is what I want. There is a lot of theory behind these, Easteners read faces in a different manner then us, and so that's why their features are a bit different. I still have more reading to do on this and so I won't delve into it too much right now, instead, here are some drawings of features!

I hope it really shows how much I am trying to push my drawings nowadays. I spent so long on these drawings it's unreal. I really want to get better!


Thanks!

Concept Art

The following are some of my concept art for my character. I've been working on my drawing skills more and more in this project, and these drawings are almost a time lapse as it were of the past couple of weeks. I hope that it shows in these images the progress that I am making with my drawing skills. Thanks for looking.



^ This was one of the first images I drew after Summer. The pose is so incorrect it's not even funny, it seemed I had forgotten what Justin had showed us the previous year!
^ This drawing is a vast impovement already from the first. the proportions feel a lot better, but even still, it is very "sketchy", a problem I suffer with a lot.

^ Experiment with sword straps and placements. I have a lot of these!
^ Another experiment with sword sheafs, and boots/arm guards. Not very detailed on the later stuff, I don't know what I was thinking.. idiot.

^This is a character design I was doing with the weapon sheafs, and a bow at the front to hold it together. But also I just wanted to try a cool pose and stuff. The Katana is waaaaaay too long :( But I think over all it's not a bad sketch.



^And old man! The top one is the initial sketch, this is usually about the place I leave a drawing. But I decided to push it further and really try and practice my line art to give it more of a 'finished' feeling. The second one is me pushing that, and the Third is me trying to replicate a 'light source' with my line work.

^ A painting attempt, not the best, but it's been a while!

Thanks.

misss_fast_skin_Maya Tests

High res and zoomed in parts of the misss_fast_skin_shader tests I ran. also an eyeball! :D

More on the eyes and fast skin here : Eyes, Hair and Skin.

Eyes, Hair and Skin.

Pol and I are very keen to push this piece of work to the next level.We want everything to feel alive, and part of that is to have convincing hair, eyes and skin on our characters. We want all of this to feel 'alive'. Of course, this is a big challenge, and we might be expecting too much of ourself. But why not? We may as well aim for a high standard and not reach it, then aim for a low standard and not feel satisfied.

So, with regards to the hair. I was planning on running some tests with nCloth, and seeing if that would be suitable for simulating hair with. I was hoping to have some form of control wherein we can switch between rigged hair and nCloth dynamic hair as and when it's needed. However, Pol says he has found a way of producing a great hair effect using Soft Bodies. He showed me a sample of this, and I must say, I am very excited by what I see there.

We also plan on using miSSS_fast_skin shader for the characters. This uses a technique known as SubSurface Scatering (SSS) and it really makes the skin feel 'alive'. We have a basic knowledge on how to achieve this, but we don't want to waste too much time experimenting adjusting the fields on old models. We'd rather press on, get the models for this project made, and then tackle Fast_skin with full force.
Anyway, here's a test I did do on an old model:

I like it, it came out quite nice. With more tweaking it could be really good. Also it needs a saturated texture connected up to the Epidermal Scatter Colour for things like the lips, and darkening around the eyes. This model is rather poor, it's an old one of mine. Those eye holes... *shudders*.



So that leaves the eyes. This is where I have been focusing my attention today. I love eyes, and so I was quite excited to try making some. I have been loving some of the results I have been getting.

Here was my first Render, It wasn't giving the results I wanted, and so I actually opened a new scene and restarted.


This one is my second render, It came out a lot better. But it had a weird specularity glow around the eyeball and the actual eye lens.My third render was more successfull. I worked on the textures a bit and I managed to remove the outer glow of the eyeball. But I was still getting a weird line around the iris. This was a modelling issue and wasn't so hard to rectify.
And here is my final render with that model. I learnt a lot already, but there are a few mistakes here. The actual pupil needs to blend with the white. Right now it's very harsh. Unfortunately the model I made doesn't allow me to make this blend, as I seperated the model out and laid out the UVs seperately. So now I shall work on a new one, taking all the good stuff I have learnt and fixing the mistakes I have made. Hopefully from this I can produce a photorealistic eye (or there abouts).

I shall update soon with my progress with that.

The joys of drawing orthographics.....¬_¬

So I spent god knows how many hours today trying to draw a front view orthographic of a female that I can duplicate and do out fit designs on. For some reason I got carried away, everyone I drew I wasn't satisfied with. So I drew another one, and that too wasn't good enough. I thought i'd post some of them. What's funny to note is, the first ones were actually nice, but it began to drift off and become rather craptular, untill the last one where I revisited the first ones and altered them.

As you can see it drifted off some where in the middle. I think the last one is working okay. But i'm not sure, I still prefer the first ones.

Any way, this is a little over the top simply for some concept stuff. But I saw it as an oppurtunity to learn more about orthos and muscle structure :D

Locators and Blending a sword to jump between hands

So today I have been trying to work out how we will animate a character holding a sword with two hands. Basically I was practicing some animations with a character holding a sword ( with two hands ). I had made a Locator in the Right hand, and then constrained the sword to the locator so that it would always move and stay in the Right hand. This isn't a problem, it works well, however, the left hand doesn't have the same constraint.

Here in lies the problem. I am forever counter animating the left arm/hand when I move the right one. It looks aweful. What I want to have is a system wherein, you have the sword constrained to the right hand via a locator, and when you animate/move the right arm and hand, the left arm and hand will automatically follow. The way I imagine doing this is something like, making a locator on the Katana that is the parent of a locator in the left hand. So that when I move the katana the left hand will follow it perfectly. Meaning I can just go ahead and animate the right arm and hand as I want and the left hand will always follow the swords handle. So I set about trying to set something like this up, but it just didn't want to work at all. I managed to set up a blend so that you can make the sword switch from left or right hand just fine. But I just can not figure out how I can make the right arm control the sword and the sword control the left arm. Every time I try and constrain the sword to the left hand I get an error.

Here are some screen shots of the locator Blend I set up. Just as I am writing this I am getting an idea on how I can resolve the aforementioned issue, so I shall have to give that idea a go.

The way this blend works is by changing the values in the highlighted fields below. By changing the WO field to 1, and the W1 field to 0 she is holding the sword in her right hand. By changing W0 to 0 and W1 to 1 it is now in her left hand. If you were to, say, put it to .5 each, it will hover between the 2 hands. I was hoping that this would offer a reasonable result when you bring the two hands together, but it too was aweful.





Oh, and yes the Katana is way too big :P

I really ought to go and fix my Scanner too. It's about time I get some drawings uploaded.

During the past days I have been :

- Drawing concept art
- Starting production on 3D Previs assets (ie the low poly characters)
- Practicing animation with Pol's transcription character
- Practicing more with nCloth
- Trying to resolve the issue of how we will produce 2hand sword animation easily

I hope to have some drawings up for your viewing pleasure sometime today.


Previs Female Character (yet to be rigged)
Previs Location:
Of course the two previs images I just posted are very crude models at best. However, that is the point of previs. Quickly made models and animations to give quick feedback on whether things are working or not.
Thanks!