Spacetornado - Army of One - Lt Nikolai Kuprin

[spacetornado]

Hey, this is my first comp. Still trying to fully decide on all the details.

My concept is of Lieutentant of the now ruined soviet army. He's an expert in explosives and engineering and salvages anything which he may find of use. The current state of the world and constant threats against his life also has obviously affected his mental well-being, so I kinda want to get that across.

I want to finish drawing this concept and color, I particularly want to add my junk etc attached to his coat and so on. Anyway Im gonna get back to it, any suggestions are welcome! Thanks

[berendey]

I think there is no vodka bottle in the right hand, maybe in left hand too :)
nice idea!

[spacetornado]

Berendey: Thanks! Might add a vodka bottle to the robotic arm.

Ive finished the concept drawing, I would have liked to have spent more time on it but its already the 8th and dec is always a busy month. Im going to start on the base mesh in lightwave then move onto sculpting in zbrush. I'll keep updating

[Rezdoggy]

hehe. looks like a tech marine ;) when you model it, the mechanical arms should have pistons and stuff, to make it look like it would work like an arm, and also would look more mechanical :) looking forward to the mesh

[spacetornado]

Rezdoggy: Yeah Im deffo gonna put more work into the mechanical arms than I did in the drawing, I'll also need to work out how there attached to that backpack too. :S

Here's the mesh in its current form, there's still a good bit of modelling to do and Ive currently used up about a little over half the polylimit, but still think I should be able to complete the additional modelling without worrying about the polylimit. Im hoping to get the rest of the mesh finished tonight so I can get cracking with the sculpting tomorrow.

[Martin_x]

Nice start!

[Mr.fE]

Nice start!

yeah no kidding!

[lampshadehead]

Really good start. I like the topology of the face. Can't wait to see the mechanical arms, too.

[Mr.fE]

Do you use the RED STAR graphic novel as reference?

[spacetornado]

Martin_x: Cheers!

lampshadehead: Thanks, I might still do a little bit of work on the face before I go to zbrush, not adding more polys but I might reshape it a little.

Mr.fE: Thanks! Ah no ive not heard of it, my main inspiration came from Fallout 3 and the adaptus mechanicus from the warhammer 40k universe.

Unfortunately Ive been pretty busy over the weekend, which is already causing me to panic just a little in regards to time. Ive managed to get one of the robotic arms however as you can see theres only one. Thats cause Im already on the verge of overtaking that 10k polylimit. So ive decided to leave in just half of the second arm and Im going to texture that side of robotic arm/backpack as very damaged. Im gonna spend a bit more time trying to cut that polycount down a little more since I want to add in some wires hanging from the robotic arm. Im gonna do quite a long shift tonight with this and try get a good bit done. Keep y'all updated.

[Tarik2d]

Its looking good, I like all the features on it. Im nearly over the limit too

[spacetornado]

Tarik2d: Thanks! Yep, its surprising how quickly you can use up those polys.

This is the final mesh, its came in at 9875 tris so I just made it. Ive opted to do the uv unwrapping after I finished all the sculpting.

[spacetornado]

Ive also started sculpting the head. Atm I think it looks a little goofy but hopefully with some more work on it and the addition of teeth it'll look better.

Any comments or suggestions are welcome. :)

[spacetornado]

Some more sculpting. Im not too sure how much more I will do in zbrush. I only plan on sculpting one of each mag/utility pouch as I'll be planning on cloning them to save space on the texture map. I'll also be missing out most of robotic stuff in zbrush, Im not mad on sculpting these type of things.

[Tarik2d]

This guy looks totally mental, good stuff

[D R E A M N T]

Some of the wrinkles in the hat look a bit blobby maybe you could touch it up a bit.Beside that everything looks good man.

Keep er chuggin

[Mr.fE]

something wrong in the edge of the coat...

but still very cool

[spacetornado]

Tarik2d: Thanks, yeah Im trying to make him look pretty crazy.

D R E A M N T: Cheers! Yeah Im having a few problems with the hat. I also tried using the slash tool(add) in zbrush to try and create a more furry look but it just looked weird. Not too sure what Im gonna do

Mr.fE: Thanks, yeah its not looking good. I want to give it a kinda torn look but it doesnt at the moment have enough geometry to create that look. I might try add like flat polys(that arent attached to the coat) and use opacity to create like string and hanging bits of cloth. I dont know if that makes sense lol or whether it would even work.

[VinsanityV20]

holy crap you move fast man! Guess I shouldn't be surprised. I'm sure a Space Tornado wouldn't move slowly:)

[spacetornado]

VinsanityV20: Hoho! Thanks!

Not made much progress however the normal is all finished and baked on to a 2048X2048 uv. Here is the model posed and the normal map. Im now gonna start moving with texturing the model. There are a few artifacts on the normal that need fixing too, I also intend to do something with the bottom of the coat, not sure what yet.

[dark_maggot]

Looking pretty nice.

Cheers.

[Specialboy]

man i like ur work ,,, really good ... go on like it ... i want to see this guy textured soon ...

[spacetornado]

Dark_Maggot: Thanks!

Specialboy: Cheers! Im going to lay down the base colors for all parts of model then move on to completely texturing the coat first probably.

[Specialboy]

spacetornado - one question ,,,, how u bake the normal maps ( i`m using 3ds max and have some problems ) , and how u put all together in 1 map ,,, when before u was using multi sub tools in zbush ? --- sorry for little nooby question but i just want to know u method - method that works how i can see :)

[spacetornado]

specialboy: It kinda depends on when you create your uv, before sculpting or after sculpting. I also use lightwave but Im sure 3dsMax is much similar.

If you create your uv before sculpting, then when your done scupting, generate all your normal maps and bring all your exported level1 subdivision objects back to 3dsmax. Put them into the one object file but keep each subtool seperate via layers(or 3dsMax equilivant).

Give each subtool a seperate surface/material. Then set its diffuse color, using the normal map as the image map and your uv.
I use lightwave's surface baker to bake all the object's color into one map using your uv. So you end up with your normals all in the one image.

Lol, hope you can follow that, I suck at explaining these things.

However if you create the Uv after sculpting, then things are slightly more complicated. Let me know though and I'll try and explain that. Your basically using zmappers capture mesh for that.

[Specialboy]

spacetornado thanks for ur quick answer , i understand u in the explanation in general ... but i was thinking ur using 3ds max ... so that i can fully understand ... but ... however thanks ... i`ll fix this somehow... i have done normal maps in max too many times but sometimes give me errors ...

by the way what soft. ur using for texturing ? :)

[buzz001]

That's one mean looking russian. The model and its accessories look great.

[Kraken]

Hmm. Interesting combination of techpriest from Warhammer 40K and soviet soldier:)
Can't wait for textures!