Introduction
Today I officially started making my own animation. Originally, I found different game character models, but they were either without rigging or the models were particularly ugly, so I just made them myself. Because I have gained experience in making my own model in the last collaborative project, I can make this model faster.
Process
If you are interested in my last project, you can check my blogs:
https://lucylueng.myblog.arts.ac.uk/category/collaborative-unit-game-character/
It includes how I learned to draw concept art, modeling, texturing, etc. skills.
With the previous experience, this time I plan to simply design my character. For example, reducing the area of the hard mesh makes the character look lighter.
I want to make a handsome swordsman similar to Yasuo in LOL, but he will be younger, like Genos in One Punch Man. His city was destroyed, his family was killed, he was affected by the disaster, and was later remodeled. In short, he will not be a normal growing up boy. It was mainly because I wanted to practice the animation of the sword-wielding character, so I formed the image of a young sword-bearer in my mind.
So I drew my thoughts on paper and drew a draft on the computer.
Actually I am not good at drawing, but I try to draw the characters in my mind. In the process of drawing, I guess the model I made may be different from my design, but this is determined by the actual situation. I named him Xin, which means trust in Chinese.
Next I need to make my model. My initial idea was: first use ZBrush and MD to make a high-level mode and bake a normal map. Then topological low poly in Maya, use RizomUV to expand the UV, and finally draw the texture in SP. The difference between this process and my collaborative project is that I will draw a high-level model and try some new techniques.
For example, the last time I made a hard mesh was Maya, this time I found that ZModelder of ZBrush can also be made.
Then I went to learn some carving skills:
https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1jP4y1s7Ai
https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV13v411a7BF?spm_id_from=333.999.0.0
Then I opened ZBrush and started sculpting. In order to save time, I used a basic human model, but its face count is very low, I have to increase the face count to use it. To be honest, I am not good at sculpting the human body, but I checked a lot of information and observed real human muscle models to determine the structure of the lower face.
Of course I also encountered some troubles: Mesh have layers. I don’t know what this is, and finally I found out that this basic model comes with layers (similar to Maya’s blend shape), so I can’t use the insert brush. Of course, if the face count is high, I can’t use a similar brush.
I modified the character’s face to look more like an Asian face, mainly because the bones of the nose bridge are not so high, and the eyebrows are not deep. Then I used the mask brush to determine the position of the hair. Use the downloaded new hair brush to first determine the basic shape of the hair. Then use claybuildup and slash3 to continuously polish the details. Drawing hair is a patient job, here I refer to solider76 in Overwatch, his hair is very similar to my character.
In the meantime, I modified the facial structure of the character again. For example, the eyes became bigger and the lower lip was not so obvious. The cheekbones are more pronounced.
When I wanted to continue the operation, ZBrush suddenly crashed and I don’t know what happened. After checking, I found that as long as I move the sub-tool (similar to Maya’s outliner), the software will not work. This is really weird! Finally, I tried to merge similar models and reduce the number of sub-tools to solve this problem.
Because the software crashed, I didn’t record my steps, so I can only use the thumbnails in auto save to show my work.
Next are some tips I summarized:
- In the automatic mask of the brush, adjust the “polygon group mask” to control the brush to sculpt according to the polygon group, even if they are in the same subtool. The “back mask” is placed on a thinner model to prevent adjustment, and its back will also change accordingly.
- Use “ctrl+w” to group the sub tools, and the divided polygon group can be split into different sub tools.
- The depth of the brush can affect the depth of the insert brush, so that the brush can be attached to the surface of the object.
The next step is to draw clothes and body!
Conclusion
This is the third time I have used ZBrush to model characters. For the first time I carved an ancient general. This is my attempt to learn basic operations. The second time was my collaboration project. I used it (mainly move brush) to make an African female warrior. And this time I used more functions, and started to sculpt the high face count model, and learned some tips. I hope my learning and sharing can help others!