Jedi character: My first, help?

[seth raad]

Hello folks.

I've posted some images of a model I've been working on for the past couple of months now. I feel I've tweaked until I could tweak no more; however since this is my first model, I would like to hear the thoughts of you pros, to see if there is anything I can do to improve it. Since I will be using this in a movie I am working on, I'd like it to look as decent as possible.

Some notes:

1. The entire model was made via box modeling technique; meshsmooth was applied with an iteration of '1'.
2. None of the meshes have been welded, so you'll see a seam down the center of each mesh
3. I modeled everything from the ground up; first I did the body (torso) then the head, then I welded the two, refined the mesh, the head also includes the ears, eyebrows, eye lids and eye lashes; all of which I extruded from the head mesh. The eyeballs, clothes, and the accessories are all separate; so I can re-clothe and re-accessories the "template" for the sake of efficiency. This model is not all one single mesh.
4. I didn't have any guide images to use at all, so I basically used my imagination, a tape measure, and I ran into the bathroom a lot to look at myself in the mirror. So please, any advice on how I could make the character's anatomy more believable would be helpful.

Anyway, if your wondering what the hell I designed; I'm a Starwars fan, so I decided to make my first "learning through practice" project a Jedi which I'll use in an action/fantasy short. Hey, learning is supposed to be fun, right? In his holster, he has a lightsabre, which I also designed from scratch before I worked on the character…

Anyway, the attire is simple, it'll all look better once I design and apply the materials; which is my next step. But before I tackle that, I just want to make sure that my model is sound, design-wise. Then comes the materials, the rigging, lights camera and action!

…I hope…

Anyway I hope the images I provided is enough, this is the first time I do this, so I tried to render the relevant angles, so you can get a good idea of what I did. If you need any additional info, please ask.

Thanks for your time :)

[seth raad]

A perspective shot...

[seth raad]

front and side view of the face...

[seth raad]

And perspective view of the face...

[rubberduck]

It's a good start:)
Is it going to be realistic or cartoony?
He looks good for a cartoon, but needs more work on the proportions if he's going to look realistic.
He's a little boxy/square in some places
His face is a little flat in the sideview and maybe too small too
I think his feet should be longer too
He looks good in the front view but dosen't look quite right in the sideview
:)

[seth raad]

Well I'm aiming for realistic; I know I won't be able to pull it off on my first try, but I am definitely going to do my best.

When you say boxy, do you mean lack of detail? From what I notice the arms and the legs do lack detail; but this is because I'm afraid to add too much, lest they should not bend correctly during animation, any tips on this?

When you say that his face is flat, should I pull the checks back? Or just pull the face out more? This part confused me, cause to me it didn't look right either way, so I left it in hopes of some advice.

I think another problem I have is getting the clothes to fit right. Originally I started out by cloning the parts I needed from the body, detaching it and pushing it, then adjusting vertices as needed. So whenever I make any slight adjustment, this means the painful task of shifting vertices around to accommodate the adjustment; e.g. if I make the chest smaller, I'll have to adjust the shirt, the armor and the vest...

...most of my time in the past few days has been spent making such minor adjustments, so I was wondering if there was a technique where I could automatically make the clothes take the form of the body (I use 3D Max 4.2 btw)

Thanks again for your insights rubberduck.

Take care

[Daniel]

I think he's cool, but there's a few thigns that really jump out at me...
1. His head is too round.
2. His back needs more shape, it's too flat
3. His clothe looks too plasticky (no folds at all, but you said you'll put texture and all so I guess it'll fix it up
4. Put a bit more shape in his legs.
Hope it helps, these are all pretty much easy to fix, after that I wouldn't see anything wrong with him :D

[seth raad]

Thanks for the advice DanielB.

Yes, I'm definitely going to be using materials on everything from the hair and skin to the clothes and accessories. I just slapped on some basic materials for the sake of visualization; they don't even represent the final colors (except for the skin, which I hope to make dark).


The head is a bit round, I'll fix that today, along with the back.

As for the legs, how would I go about changing that? The pants around the thigh are pretty tight, but around the shins are lose.

Q: Also, for those who use 3D max, is there a modifier or something I can use to make the clothes take on the form of the body?

Thanks again for the advice, I should have some updated pics by later today/early tomorrow... this is the only P.C. in the house, and everybody wants to use it all of a sudden lol

Thanks for the advice so far, I really want my first project to stand out :)

Peace.

[Daniel]

For the legs I meant, even if it's loose, add some creases. In maya it would simply be to add some splits (edges) and give em a bit the shape of clothe that's folding over itself. Not sure about Max, but I'm sure it works the same way, splitting faces in two, then pushing em in or out. As for cloth, I really suck at cloth and I never endevored to learn it really, sorry

[seth raad]

Okay, here are some updates:

Following rubber ducks advice:

I made adjustments to the feet: I made them longer, and twisted them out a bit so they didn't look so pigeon toed.

I also adjusted the over all shape of the legs and arms, both the body itself and the clothes, to give it a less "boxy" look. I adjusted the vertices of the pants, and shirt sleeves, so that they collapsed onto the body where they should, instead of sticking out like they were overly starched. Hope it was effective.

Thanks rubberduck :)

Following DanielBs advice:

I adjusted the head and cheeks so the head didn't look so round.
I also made some slight adjustments to the jaw and ear area to make it look more natural, and fixed a slight glitch I noticed around the eyebrows.

I put in some wrinkles in the shirt, and a lot in the pants. Hope it was effective. I had to clear up a lot of wrinkles I made in the pants because I didn’t want to make it too difficult to add materials later, I may simulate further folds with the bump map, and rig it so that they morph as the leg bends (make the wrinkles get deeper as the leg bends).

I rounded out the back to give it more shape, and pulled in the armor around the waste to give the body a more "V" shape.

I also added some dents in the chest armor to show where the chest is, and adjusted the vertices around the vest to simulate the armor making an impression on the vest.

Thanks DanielB :)

So what do you think so far guys? Do you see any other adjustments I should make before delving into materials? Just to remind you, I'm aiming for a more realistic look.

Thanks, and take care.

[seth raad]

perspective shot...

[seth raad]

mug shot :p

[seth raad]

last one...

[Rump Dreggel]

the head is far to small!!! get a nice fair reference pict with right prop. and u will see your self... otherwise if it´s your first.. G J...

[seth raad]

LOL

I guess that was my subconscious reacting to the fact that I have a big head, and have a hard time finding hats that fit... or fitting into turtle necks :p

Thanks for pointing that out, when I originally modeled the head, it was so big I couldn't find the body on the screen :p... I guess in a panic I scaled it down too much.

And thanks; this is my first model. I'll post an update tomorrow, as it's way past my bedtime (3:20 am).

Take care,

[Daniel]

It's a lot better, but he's right, his head is too small, I hadn't noticed before. Also I would adjust this, hope you don't mind I drew on your render
I'd pull out the cheek bones just a bit, it looks too flat, there's a little glitch on his lip as well, and I'd make his jaw bone a little more prominent. You've done a great job so far :)

[seth raad]

Okay, it's official, I'm makin' the head bigger :p

Thanks for illustrating your point on my renders, it gives me something to work with. Feel free to do it any time you see fit (that goes for all of ya).

I'll make the adjustments and get back to you ASAP.

Thanks again :D Your help is very much appreciated. I'm feeling very encouraged at the moment, and if I weren't so darn tired, I'd reconnect my stylus and get to work right now...

I'll talk to you all tomorrow. :)

- Seth

[seth raad]

Okay, here it is:

Following Dreggel and Daniel's advice I made the head bigger, and the neck slightly longer. I may need to adjust the neck a bit, it looks fine without the clothes, but once I add the clothes and the armor, it looks a bit off to me. What do you think?

I also, as Daniel pointed out, adjusted the top lip, cheeks, jaw line and chin. I made the chin slightly smaller after the adjustments, and further adjusted the shape of the legs and the pants.

So what do you think so far? Are any further adjustments needed?
Thanks for all your help so far :)

[seth raad]

mug shot...

[seth raad]

last one...

[seth raad]

Hope u all didn't think that I just gave up did you? I actually spent the last couple of weeks offline, doing some heavy remodeling on my character; starting with the head and working my way down.

I'm almost finished with the head though, had to really clean up the topology, and do some major tweaking. I even totally remodeled the nose and eye lids.

This render isn't the latest; it's as of yesterday. Today I did some work on the eyes, and lips... very subtle but effective. I hope to have some more updates later on tonight.

Let me know what u think so far, any adjustments needed? I'm aiming for realism, so any little detail will help.

Thanks.

[sarN]

he looks a lot better now :)
i think i like him better without the hair since he looks a lot older and more jedi like :D
nice work!

[seth raad]

quote

he looks a lot better now
i think i like him better without the hair since he looks a lot older and more jedi like
nice work!

/quote

LOL thanks man. I actually thought that to; he kinda looks like Mace Windu's son or something... Which is very cool, cause Mace is my favorite Jedi character. But now I'm conflicted, 'cause I was hoping to add some hair later on, to make him look closer to my age (20 yrs). Y'know, kinda like an "alter ego" type thing. I have curly hair, cut clean and short. And the 3D character is as close to a self-portrait as I can get without any digitized pics (hope to get a camera soon to remedy that)… ah well...

Who knows? When the time comes I'll post some renders with and without hair, and see which looks better... It all depends on how well I can box-model hair *chuckles*

I should have some more updates soon. Thanks for the observations :)

[seth raad]

Hey folks :)

Alright, here are the latest updates for tonight. After this I'm hitting the sack (it's 3:30 am).

Let me know what you think please. As you all know, I'm aiming for reaslim, so be objectively harsh.

updates: tweaked the eyes, the forhead, the eyebrows, remodeled the eyeballs (it's all in the eyes) and added a quick iris texture.

I also threw in some lights for effect...

in addition to any advice you have, I would like to know the ideal material settings for the iris, eye-white, cornea and pupil. I use Max 4.2.

Take care, and good night/day.

[seth raad]

here's the low res wire (before I added the relax and meshsmooth modifiers)

[seth raad]

another angle

[seth raad]

last of this batch...

[seth raad]

Just when ur on a roll... just when things are crackin' and u see the light at the end of the tunnel... ur pc crashes, and u find out that u have a virus, and that ur anti-virus software isn't up to date.... argh!

:lol

The good news is, none of my work is lost, and my poor loyal 'puter is fixed... poor thing’s goin’ thru a lot for me...

Anyway, I'm working on the hands and feet of my character now; I just wanted to post the latest renders so y'all don't think that I flaked out or anything...

As usual, I will be very appreciative of any help and advice... I know I still have a lot of tweaking to do (aiming for realism), but at that time my main concern was getting the topology right (I'll be animating this character)... after I'm done remodeling the hands and feet, I will do another “pass” over my model to do any necessary tweaking...

Whaddayathink?

[seth raad]

final pic, I know, he's missing 3 fingers lool

I'll copy and past the index finger once I'm done modeling the details... and then just resize and readjust for the final hand...

I'm hoping that in the end, rigging this sucker isn't going to be a nightmare.

peaceout.

[seth raad]

Well, I'm in the final tweaking/cleaning up stages of this model. I must say that this has been a learning experience. Every time I learn a new trick, I always find some new flaw to fix, or something I could do better...

But I don't want to spend the rest of my youth tweaking this character, so I think I'm just about ready to cloth this guy, and prepare him for my first short.

In hopes of some last minute crits, before I attempt to paint and clothe him, I've posted a couple of renders. I'm still tweaking some of the obvious flaws, and when I'm done I'll post some wires and low res shots, so I can be sure that it will animate properly.

Any thoughts so far? Please let me know if anything stands out (in a bad way :ufo:)

Thanks :cool:

[seth raad]

final shot...

[Chronepsis]

Ok a couple of things I think need fixing if you wish a realistic model.

http://www3.sympatico.ca/sebastiencouture/tmp/correction1.jpg

1. The front of the ear should not look like it was extruded from the but should be a continuation.

2. The upper eyebrows should be a continuation of your forehead.

3. the upper eyelash looks wierd... like there is 2 of them.. should be smoother.

Otherwise great job continue to practice and for the best realistic result use a mirror or friend for reference.

[[X]treme]

nice work! looks like you've come a long way just by working on this model :D

can't wait for it to be finished!

also, if u need a lightsaber to use i recently made one, you might need to tweak it here and there to fit ure character and all, but if you wanna use it just say the word ;)

great job

[seth raad]

Hey thanks guys,

Chronepsis: Thanks for the advice! I knew some things were off, but couldn't quite put my finger on it. I'll adjust the ear and the eyebrow right away.

About the eye: Although I modeled the eyelashes in my earlier models, I deleted it, and decided I would use another technique later on, using renderable splines. So those flaps are supposed to be the eyelid (not the eyelash)... y'know how the upper lid is supposed to fold when the eye is open...

Does it still look wrong? I'll look at it and see if there's anyway I can tweak it, in my next renders I'll pop an eyeball in there so you can see how it should look...

Thanks, I am aiming for realism so any subtleties will make a huge difference.


[X]treme: LOL thanks man, for the kind words and the lightsabre. I can't wait for it to be finished either; I have so many cool stuff I want to do with this one character... it's going to be exciting.

About the lightsabre, hey could you post a render or two? I'd love to see it. I'm into them, and plan to design a whole collection of "non-traditional" sabers; double blades, triple blades lol the works :). My first model (an incomplete Tubby McChubbs not included) was actually a sabre, I'll post some renders for you to check out in my next update.

rubs hands together aaaaaallllrightythen!

(hiho hiho its back to work I go.. *whistles*)

[seth raad]

Okay, it's been a almost 2 months since I started this project; I don't know whether that's good or bad for a noob, but I must say that I've learned a lot (check out the images on page one to see how much I’ve learned :) ).

Anyway, I spent the past couple of weeks trying to squeeze some ‘puter time into my hectic offline schedule. *sigh* I did manage to finish what I set out to do; some major mesh tweekage and cleaning up.

Anyway, what I got here is basically the semi-finished product. The two halves aren't welded yet; but this is how it's going to look. I'm going to spend a few days scrutinizing it to see if I can find anything that sticks out; but I won't bother adding any more details as I plan to texture and clothe him etc.

So guys, what do you think? Any adjusting? I plan to use this character for a short, so I don't want to ruin a good production with lousy modeling :p If needed I’ll post some wires so you can check out the topology for errors…

*wonders how to get the big guns, like Monte in here*

[seth raad]

perspective shots of the body...

[seth raad]

perspective shots of the face...

[seth raad]

Okay here are a couple of renders of this characters lightsabre.

Now this was my first model, all the textures are standard Max textures, with the exception of the reflect map, that I downloaded off the net.

I didn't know what the heck I was doing with this, just fiddled around for hours until I got this...

[seth raad]

last one...

I know the wall texture is a bit off, and the lighting... but it's a good start, I think. I plan to expand this shelf and wall into an entire room for the scene.

The plaque on th wall and the book meshes are obviously Max's meshes; I just threw them in to add the vibe :) Oh, and the cool dragon yinyang was design by a friend, I added that in 'cause I liked it so much.

Well anything? Words of advice? Cussing? Threats? :p

This noob could use an extra pair of eyes...

Well goodnight y'all. I'm hittin' the hay, see you in the morn'

[Daniel]

I'm impressed, you've definately improved since the beginning or this ordeal. For your character I would still work on the shoulder blades, but if he's always gonn be wearing clother, who cares right? :D

[seth raad]

Oh Hey DanielB! Thanks for stopping by again :D And thanks so much for helping me out so far :cool:

Yea *cough* I agree with ya, I do want my character to look right for those topless scenes though :p I plan to open up with him doing a Kata with his lightsabre, and he's going to not have a shirt on ;)

Now, I just know I'm delirious from lack of sleep (it's 5 am, been on the pc since around midnight)... so please don't feel obliged to answer this right away, as all may be revealed after a few hours sleep...


...but what the heck is a shoulder blade???

*I gotta catch some serious zeez*
:ufo:

[Rump Dreggel]

Hey i´m doing an evil jedi now!! I´ll give u this; Mine´s gonna win!!!

Just keep it up n we´ll meet again!!! :p

[MonteCristo]

Ok, there are a lot of anatomical issues with this model, but I have to congratulate you on your improving skills. You have taken a big leap forward since the last model, and that is excellent news. Now if you can continue to practice you will just get better and better. I recomend doing another from the beginning again. I used to keep trying to tweak my first female mesh to get her to look right and I never could do it. Then I started again, and I just didn't make the same mistakes again. Pretty simple really :)

Keep at it. Work hard, and you will rock. :cool:

[seth raad]

damn! I accidentally deleted that post, and all I wanted to do was delete the attached image.

*sheesh*

Anyway, in case you didn't get to read that post:

Thanks for stopping by Monte; I realize that you have a lot on your plate right now, so I appritate it.

I know that practice makes perfect, and I plan to get a lot of practice by desigining every one of my characters from scratch. Once I'm done with this one, I will pratice spline modeling techniques on a female character, and nurbs on some kind of monster... then box modeling again.

I would very much like to follow through with this one though; just so I can see what it's like to texture, rig and animate a character... that way when I go back to square one, I will have a good idea what to prepare for.

Anyway, my pc crashed, and I had to reinstall my wacom drivers and some other softwear. I did manage to get some work done. Mostly on the back, shoulder blades and traps... as Daniel pointed out.

I also made some adjustements to the chest, so I didn't stick out so much around the collar bone area; fixed the legs a bit, and the middle area. Oh, and I tweaked the face and ears to match my own, with the help of a small mirror.

Here's the back...

[seth raad]

and heres the front, plus the face...

I'll revisit the mesh again after I get some sleep, to see if I can do any more tweaking... I realize I could spend forever on this...

So folks... any thing you see that you find especially horrible? I want this to look right... but then again, I do plan to animate this, with clothes and stuff.

My concern especially is rigging, and how the limbs will react to bending...

[crazygui]

Hey, that looks really good, nice work, hoping to see him in action and with clothes very soon, continu the good work.

[seth raad]

Aww thanks crazygui :)

I'm actually online now checking out some tutes on how to paint and texture characters. I do have a few tweaks I'd like to make though, then it's on with texturing the full body and rigging it to see how it deforms.

After I get the body right, the rest will be easy: clothes, the lightsabre, and then a the first animation :)

I'm very motivated to complete this project. Thanks for the encouragement!

[crazygui]

Go here : http://forums.3dtotal.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=90194#post90194

Its my thread.I posted a new image, just thought you'd like to know.Hope this inspires you for your animation (maybe you could do a lightsaber fight on that platform)

[Emperor]

Lightsaber blades are longer (in their full length) then the one you have. You can mesure it like this. The standard for the hilt is 30 cm and for the blade 1 m. ( 1 foot and 3 feet 4" ). Also it's good that you know the colors for blue saber because its not full blue color. The RGB code is 0, 127, 255 for the glown near the white core and 0, 64, 127 for the overall glow. You also need to work out some details on the saber like regulation bars and indicators to m,ake it more belivable. Sabers generraly have a red switch button or in metal on some plus a lenght bar controller that controls the lenght of the blade. Not all sabers have this of course since every saber is a custom weapon.

Great progress so far there. I would like to see him fighting on that platform in the midst of Corousant :D!

P.S. I know this sounds silly but for some reason they spell sabre SABER in Lightsaber. Just a small detail I thought you maybe wanted to know. :roll:

[seth raad]

Hey,

crazygui, yea I just got back from your thread and saw your new image. Awesome work :) lol I too would love to see my character do force jumps around that platform, while fending off blaster fire from a group of bounty hunters or something *dreams*

Who knows, if I can pull this off, maybe we can do something together... it all depends on how impressive my work is.

Emperor,

Yea I got the same comment from a friend when I showed him the work right after I finished it (this was around 4 months ago). He told me the same thing, but didn't supply me with any specific data. Thanks for the measurements and color values, I'll save them and use them to modify the sabre.

(yes I spell it the British way, dunno why though. It seems more fitting, classier looking :roll: )

Anyway, this was my first model, so I was too "scared" to add a lot of detail. I do plan to revisit it to make it more real looking. At the time I did it, I thought it looked rather hansom… now to me it just looks plain.

BTW, this particular model won’t have any external buttons. The activating mechanism will be internal, and can only be accessed using the Force. The same will go for the Length bar controller.

One thing about this model is that I want it to look more ornament like, and less mechanical. I’m trying to go for a sleek, organic look. Towards the butt of the hilt I may have engravings, where the Jedi inscribed a poem or something that is dear to him... I do plan to totally alter the grip area though, and revamp the emitter.

Who knows, I'm tossing a lot of ideas around, and I will definitely be making several sabres, so I will get my chance to try them all. Organic, Mechanical, deadly looking… and some never-before-seen designs that are so off the wall… ah you get the idea.

Now you got me all excited about sabers lol. Let me finish my character first!

[Rump Dreggel]

Im making my lightsabre now!! Anyone knows the rgb code for yellow n purple??

* my jedi is a beastlike one with horns n evil eyes *

* Grrrrrrr * * he´ll get you in the dark *

[seth raad]

alriight man! Beast Jedi lol I'd like to see some renders of that! That would make for an interesting duel :cool:

I don't know the rgb codes for that... but usually I just fiddle around until I get it where it looks right. I never new there were actual codes to use.

I've been struggling to get some 'puter time for the last few days. My dad's been using it 24/7 for some business he's working on. Can't wait to get my own pc :(

Anyway, I'm up now @ 7 am, trying to get some hours in before my dad wakes up. I'm basically doing some final tweaks in the feet, and detaching the toe nails to make them separate elements. I tweaked the hands yesterday, and detached the finger nails. I just have a feeling it will texture better that way (dunno why)

Once that's done I'm going to rig it and see if the mesh needs any additional tweaking. Then, it’s on to the clothing and texturing.

I'll post some updates in a few hours; after I get this guys feet looking more human than ape :p

[RickStefani]

This model has come a long way. It is looking very nice. Looks like you are learnign the hard question. Do I model simple geometry, Texture map or spent hours on the damb part? He looks good.

[seth raad]

Okay, I love my dad and all.... but sheesh! LOL

Anyway, it only took a couple of hours, mostly vert tweakage. I finally got this mesh the way I generally want it. Although I will revisit the face one last time, but that'll wait until after “rigging: round one”.

Anyway, I generally readjusted everything, some places subtler than others, so you may not notice anything drastic. I did pull the neck out a bit more, adjust it, and push the chest in a bit though.

Okay, I'm off to get the rig together, so I can see how the mesh looks with the arms and legs bended and stuff... Feel free to post any observations; particularly any potential rigging problems, and specific anatomy issues.

I'd like to thank all those who helped me thus far, and thank you all for your time and considerations.

I hope to have the rig done as soon as possible; I'm really psyched up about working on the ward robe :D

Peace!

[crazygui]

That model looks really good, only one thing, I think you should texture the character before rigging because if you add a UV modifier after the Skin one the textures wont follow.I had a problem with that recently.I might be wrong.Depends on what software you are using.

Good luck

Crazygui

http://www.crazyscg.tk

[seth raad]

RickStefani: Thanks man for the encouragement :) Yea, I'm just trying to avoid any complications. The mesh looked a lot cleaner after I detached the nails, so I guess I'm on the right track.

Here's a perspective render... one more render to go, for this batch...

[seth raad]

Here's the wires, so you can make topology cc's

Alrighty, time to take that second step...

[seth raad]

Originally posted by crazygui
That model looks really good, only one thing, I think you should texture the character before rigging because if you add a UV modifier after the Skin one the textures wont follow.I had a problem with that recently.I might be wrong.Depends on what software you are using.


Hey Crazygui, thanks for the advice! I was actually wondering about that...

I use max, so I was wondering. Couldn't I just add the UV modifier before the skin on the stack? It's just that I'm anxious to see how the mesh holds up.

Thanks.

[crazygui]

You can skin and then texture but you will have to drag and drop the skin modifier on top of all the others if you want the textures to follow.If you do it this way make sure all the textures are aligned correctly.

Crazygui

http://www.crazyscg.tk

[seth raad]

Thanks for the advice man, will do.

Peace...

[Rump Dreggel]

is´nt the head a bit small? looks kinda wierd i don know, hope i´m wrong.....

anyway good job! you are getting much better every time!

[seth raad]

Hey guys,

Didn't want you to think that I flaked out or anything. It's just that I've been struggling to get some pc time in; schedule's been mad hectic.

Anyway, now that I think of it Rump, after spending a while away from the mesh there are some "anatomical issues" I need to deal with... dunno if it's the size of the head; perhaps its the placement of the shoulders, I noticed it when I tried to move the arm down...

Anyway, I thought I would post the basic rig. Much thanks to Sergio Muciño for his Rigging 101 tutorial on 3D total.

I'm going to work on a short animation straight away, and then work on the skinning process... I tried to do some martial arts moves earlier this morning, but it turned out to be a real mess... so I scrapped it. I'm going to go and draw a story board of sorts and come back to the animation. I have a lot of researching to do, and a lot of questions that need answering… so I’ll be spending a lot of time studying, as opposed to just blindly tweaking in 3D max *sigh*

The rig held up nicely though, putting a side some slight anatomical errors on my part. 200% better than when I first started out... so there's hope! :D

Anyway, I'll post more updates as they come along.

[Borg]

Cool model seth raad
, i can't say much as i'm still learning. although th head did look strange, i'm not sure waht it was though.

[seth raad]

Thanks man. Yea, after spending so much time away from the model (focusing on the rig), I just realize that the head is small, compared with the body. I also spotted a few other flaws that I'll definitely be tweaking before I move on to clothing and texturing... Hate to come this far, and fall short on the count of laziness…

Anyway, right now I have totally immersed myself into the rigging process. Thanks to Sergio Muciño and his "Character Rigging" tutorial; I've found that I actually enjoy this more than the modeling.

Although I completed the tutorial, and have done it several times already, I am now customizing some parts of the rig to suit my character's more realistic motions, like right now I’m adding more custom attributes to the hands. I won’t know if I need to make any more modifications until I start animating; so hopefully the results will be what I hope they'll be (it looks promising).

Anyway, once I get the rig set, the skinning, and a test animation; if all goes well, I'll get right back to the model. The only thing that's slowing me down right now is lack of pc time...

Did I mention how much fun this is? :D

Anyway, back to work…

[seth raad]

Okay, finally an update. It's nothing much I'm afraid, since I haven't had much time at the 'puter :grr:

Pants, tucked into boots, with shin armor. The shin armor will be connected to the boot itself; it's only meant for light protection, so it’s only made up of metal strips inside leather, leaving the area around the ankle flexible for movement.

Things are still very symmetrical (haven’t welded any halves yet). And there's still a lot of details to work out, obviously; buckles, rivets and such, but I'm waiting until I finish the over-all wardrobe before I get into that. Most of it will be texture work anyway; since this character is going to be animated, and I want to keep things reasonably efficient.

I'm now working on the shirt, which will be long sleeves, mandarin collar, which will be tucked into a pair of gauntlets ala Ulic Qel Droma. So we'll see what I can come up with. After that I'll do the jacket, which will be the most elaborate part of the wardrobe, and then I’ll decide on whether or not any additional armor will be necessary... I’m still debating armor vs. no armor, so I’ll leave that little detail till last, everything is separate meshes anyway, so it’s not a problem.

Oh, why isn't he wearing your standard 3-layered robes/tabbard with cloak? Well this character is a Rogue Jedi; not your traditionally trained in-temple Jedi. And he doesn't serve the republic (at least not at first)... I'll write up a back-story for the character for the final renders...

Besides, and this is means no offence to SW fans: There’s nothing cool about brown bathrobes lol. I’m hoping that Seth Ra’ad will have a lot of ‘cool factor’, and I’ll be able to whip out some pretty cool action renders from this one… At least this is what I’m hoping.

What do you think? Harsh C&C is always welcome; still learning, as always…

Thanks for your consideration…

[seth raad]

Quick update, roughed out the shirt, and the gauntlets; will work on the jacket next... then it'll be time to add the cool details :)

What do you think so far? Am I headed in the right direction?

[Stylus]

Its looking good, although that particular render makes it looks asif the upper half of the body is smaller and out of proportion to the thys, legs etc. Maye its just the way youve clothed his legs.
Anyway, keep working on it, youve shown amazing improvement !


:dance:Stylus.

[seth raad]

Hey Stylus,

Thanks for the kind words man. Means a lot to this noob :) Hopefully I'll have the drive to keep improving.

Yea The shirts a bit tight, in contrast to the loose pants. Actually I plan to loosen up the shirt a bit, looks a bit on the smallish side...

I'll post some updates soon.

peaceout.

[seth raad]

Okay, another quick update... improved the shirt a bit, made it looser and added some more detail to the gauntlet... will begin working on the jacket later on today, gotta catch some zeeez....

[x_wolf19]

I would say don't go too loose with the shirt. It looks pretty darn good in my opinion and complements the pants plenty fine.

cheers!

[seth raad]

Thanks Wolf, I actually thought the same thing; but my sis kept teasing me about how the shirt made him look like he had boobs; so I just loosened it up a bit around the chest area...

...if I make any adjustments, it would probably be length wise, so it can tuck under the utility belt, or maybe I'll just let it hang over it as it is.. we'll see.

Managed to rough out the coat; will be working on the hood (what's a Jedi without an air of mystery?), and then I'll go back and refine all the clothes again, adding all the details...

Whaddayathink?

[x_wolf19]

just one idea for post beauty :) hehe just turn the amount of specularity and the intensity of it down ;) make it a bit easier on the eyes, (granted that MAY lose some detail to be seen in the image) but hey its lookin good!! What image if any are you using for reference for the robes?

cheers!

[seth raad]

Thanks for the tip man; but yea, the reason for the high specularity and gloss is so that I can see how the folds and wrinkles flow... I'll lower them down a bit for 'post beauty' lol

As for reference images, as of now I haven't used any, but I will be using some for the details. The 'robe' (which is going to be a rain-coat of sorts actually) is a design of my sister’s that I thought looked cool; so I'm using it for my character. I was too lazy to run upstairs and snag her sketchbook, so I did the rough-design from memory.

I do have tons of Jedi-references that I found online, from various websites, here's one that actually inspired the general design; although I'm not aiming at actually copying it (obviously)...

Ulic Qel Droma:

[seth raad]

Here's what I plan for the gauntlet to look like... I think it's pretty cool... but mine is going to have a glove under it.

When I find the URL to the site where I found these images (which were given to me by a friend), I'll post it.

Anyway, back to work...

[x_wolf19]

nice, good reference material and I thought I was spot on with the high spec ;) good work dude, I'll keep watching the progress.

cheers

[seth raad]

Finally some updates; I try to do as much as I can when I can. I'm actually on my way out again, so...

I'm thinking of either making the robe/duster/kimono either more billowy, or shorter.. I'll try both and compare. I think billowy would look cooler with the martial arts moves, while the shorter would look more urban... Anyway, still have some more details I want to add to it...

...I'm thinking though, since I'm going to animate this dude, how much detail should I add...

Each object is separate, haven't merged or booleaned anything yet.

Right now the polycount is:

30404 ployls (unsmoothed)

122114 smoothed (iteration:1)

Is that a lot? My pc is starting to complain a bit... Maybe I'll keep the hi-res for poster shots... and make a more economic version for the animations...

What do you think?

[[X]treme]

ah that's really high for an unsmoothed... maybe that's just me, but i dunno

looking great! you've progressed alot over the course of this thread

[Daniel]

yeah it's coming along, but that's a lot of polys. Usually a character of mine will be around 28 000 polys with a smooth (don't mean a cartoony char, but one with a lot of detail), so ya might want to try to clean up the mesh possibly.

[seth raad]

Thanks for the kind words guys. I have all the people here at forums.3dtotal.com who have pointed me in the right direction, to thank for my progress :) So cheers to all of you. I'm definitly feeling psyched lately...

I think the main problem is that everything is it's own object: complete body, complete pants etc... so the first thing I will definitly do is merge everything, and delete the overlapping polys... that should reduce the polycount significantly. After that I'll see what needs to be cleaned up...

I'll try to aim for 28000 with smooth... but that's a big leap from where I'm currently at. Is there any way to smooth out a model, without adding the unecessary polys?

[[X]treme]

in max5 u can just use the smooth (not meshsmooth mind you) modifier. it basically smooths the normals/edges of ure polys, its not as effective, but its really useful

post a non smoothed wireframe so we can see exactly where all those polys are going

as long as your system can handle it, polys aren't a problem, but mine would have been mad at me long before i got that many polys in a model

looking great, good luck!

[seth raad]

Thanks man. Yea, Max 4.2 has that as well; I'll try it.

The image is a bit cluttered, because like I said earlier, nothing is merged yet. I removed the eyeballs, and the cloak because they will be separate objects anyway...

I tried to keep things as clean as possible; but of course I plan to double-check everything, just to make sure. I can see where I will make some adjustments after a merge/boolean everything...

Sorry for the size of the image, hope it's useful.

After I finish the utility belt, and some other misc stuff, I will start the clean-up process... I'll post updates of that when I get to it.

[[X]treme]

i don't see any particular area of bad poly usage, but i think overall maybe u used to many polys before smoothing. it's too late to go back and change that now, but just for future reference...

looking good!

[Goj]

Looks pretty good.

Your robe halves are obviouslt mirrored, you should make the wrinkles different on each half so that you don't have that mirrored look to it.

And 35,000 or so unsmooth is fine. My samurai mesh (i'll post some time later on) has around 300,000 Smoothed 2 to Illiterations

[seth raad]

[X]treme, Thanks for the tip. I'll definitely keep that in mind for my next character. I'll aim for a cleaner, more basic mesh. This time around I'm still experimenting, and learning. I had no idea that making a mesh that's detailed AND efficient; would be so complicated! That's an art in itself, as I'm beginning to realize.

Goj, yea man. I definitely will fix that once I weld all the halves. It's the same with the face; I plan to make the jaw slightly crooked, and add some asymmetrical wrinkles to the forehead and such... just to make it a bit more realistic.

I would love to see some renders of your samurai mesh!

Right now I'm working on the utility belt, food pellets, pouches etc. I haven’t had much time at the 'puter, so I don't have anything post-worthy yet... I hope to have something soon.

Peace.

[seth raad]

*sigh*

Man do I miss this place. I've been smacked with technical hassles from all directions. First our ISP went on the blink; no internet, then the pc went on the blink... Total meltdown…

…Yes, I backed up my files in time (Thank heavens!). One can never be too paranoid; and Rewrittable CD's are a blessing!

Anyway, I put my project on hold pending a new rig. This one is too unstable for anything but the simplest of tasks. I've uninstalled all my softwear; its my dad's pc anyway, so I'm sure he appriciates all the extra HD space he's getting.

Anyway, I've been busy with several other projects; screenplays, jotting down ideas, research... trying to keep my mind active until I get that new rig.

I really can't wait to get back on this; lol Everytime I look at a Tekken poster, or see a CG movie/short, I get really burned :p I watched Matrix Revolutions yesterday (It takes a long time for things to get here in Saudi Arabia) and that psyched me up! LOL I don't care what the haters say, Matrix Rules!

Anyway, lookin forward to continuing. Moderators, thanks for allowing this thread to remain alive!

I'll be back!