Introduction
This week I tried to initially design the color of my character, but after trying several options, I still did not confirm one. Then, in order to model, under the recommendation of Sean and Yann, I started to learn Zbrush. In addition, I also participated in the course project of Zhu and his classmates. This is an RPG, and I am mainly responsible for modeling and animation.
Process
First of all, I have to determine the color of the character first, but before that, I didn’t have much experience, so I went to collect information and summarized some principles:
https://weibo.com/ttarticle/p/show?id=2309404322242891746374
1. Using the main color can increase the recognition of characters and avoid visual confusion and incoordination.
2. The combination of colors can emphasize the character of the character.
3. After confirming the main color, add other colors to add details.
Based on the above principles, I think the main color of my character should be black and dark yellow (the color of the African grassland), which reflects the calmness of the character and looks like a hunter hidden in the grassland. And I refer to the color scheme of Sombra (the character in Overwatch), the ratio is 5:5, because she wears a vest, revealing a lot of skin, I can’t ignore this dark skin. Of course, the cheetah is also a good reference.
In addition, I also contacted a friend of mine who studied Chinese painting, hoping she could give some advice. She said that I would first find some similar skins in Overwatch, and she would help me look at them. Of course, she gave me some suggestions.
So I found a reference in the game.
Of course, my friend did some experiments for me, but the effect was not very good, but thank her!
In addition to the main color, I also added bright green and contrasting colors, and finally designed a version by myself, but I was not very satisfied. Yann didn’t think it was very good, so I thought I would do other things first.
Next, I started learning ZBrush! In fact, before doing this project, I also did a ZBrush project, this is a general, I completely carve it out by myself using sphere. So I also have some experience. But this software is very powerful, and I think I still have a place to learn.
I found a more comprehensive video tutorial:
https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1S7411V76C
This is a video of more than 20 hours. I watched most of it at twice the speed (the rendering does not need to be watched). I just learned that ZBrush is a very powerful software, it can model, bind, animate, topology, and render! But I just need his modeling capabilities, especially move and smooth brush. I followed the video and used a lot of new methods to model. This is something I haven’t done in Maya. It’s really cool!
Finally, I want to talk about Zhu’s project. I am working with Zhu and his classmates to complete the project that his major needs in this semester. They want to make a role-playing game. In a randomly generated map, the wizard picks up a magic wand and attacks the enemy. They use a downloadable asset, but the model in this asset is not exactly what they want. They also want more magic wands.
Among them, I also saw the UE4 bule script for the first time. They only need to connect the required attributes together to form different magic wand skills, in other words, this is add buff.
Zhu said that they need magic wands with the four attributes of fire, lightning, dark, and ice. They also need ordinary, continuous, and rechargeable attack methods. I have to make many magic wands to meet their needs. So he recommended a game to me, Noita, which is a game with many magic wands, which may inspire me.
Zhu doesn’t want me to spend too much time on this, because the focus of their game is not my magic wand. The requirement he gave is that the model is low-poly, but there are some details, as much as possible. In addition to watching Noita, I also checked some pictures of magic wands on Google and Pinterest, and finally designed some magic wands on paper.
With the blueprint, I can model in Maya. Because in the last semester, I made such a model in the joint project with Zhu. I already have experience to do it, and I finished it very quickly.
Of course, when modeling, I asked Zhu whether these wands should connect different elements together or if I make them into a model through Boolean operations (because the faces count is not high, I can directly use Boolean), Zhu is asking My classmate told me later that I could send it to him separately.
When the first magic wand was completed, we first tested whether we could import the files into UE4, because I had a large number of modeling, and if I found that I couldn’t import it after completion, it would waste a lot of time. This is what I learned in the last cooperation project.
After I sent the file to Zhu, he opened it in UE4 but found that the model was very small. He asked me the parameters of my reduction, and then completed all the model enlargement in UE4 alone. I think the reason why I am still willing to cooperate with Zhu is that he will try to solve the problem by himself instead of always seeking help from teammates. This is where I have to learn from him.
(210526 update)
Zhu told me that the magic wand was done very well, and he and his classmates were very satisfied! This is really good news and I am very happy to be able to help him. And when I saw that my model was rendered particularly well in the game, I was very excited!
To make a digression, when I was communicating with Yann, he showed me the materials of his cooperation project with Karl. I think it’s very cool. Because I will also use substance painter to draw textures later, this is an early learning!
Conclusion
There is no actual practice content this week. For example, I have learned ZBrush for several days. Of course, I definitely can’t use most of the functions, but this is a learning process. I can now use ZBrush more conveniently. Come to complete my project.
In this week, I learned how to design colors for a character, how to use ZBrush to make a model, how to adapt my model to UE4, and the most important thing is to communicate with different people. I learned about character design and modeling, Knowledge of texture.