DW4-3d-Vinsanity - Untitled

[VinsanityV20]

Alright; here we go! Dominance War IV!

Well, for my first post; some concepts! I worked on various ideas in between the mini comp and this, and found something I liked:



So I've been refining that idea:



And while I'm not 100% in love with it (I really don't like the legs; looks TOO Samurai-esque, y'know?), I'm definitely happy enough to keep moving in this direction. It's still early so whatever; I'm turning in for the night. I'll continue on my concept later...

[VinsanityV20]

http://al.chemy.org/

Well, I'm not entirely happy with where my character is going, so I decided to start exploring doing additional sketches. After talking with a buddy whose entering D-War on GameArtisans.org, I've discovered something really cool. A sketching program called Alchemy that's perfect to get the creative juices flowing. I've ended up with a new idea that I may push further, and I'm getting back to sketching some new ideas.

Unfortunately, photobucket is down for maintenance, so I'll put stuff up later. Still, if anyone's reading this, you may want to check this program out.

[VinsanityV20]

These are some things I got while screwing around in Alchemy. I need to keep playing around a bit...

[M_Cederstrom]

Dude the blue guy looks cool. nice armor.

[VinsanityV20]

Basically got it! In terms of character design; this guy has everything I'm happy with. The armor has the 3DT logo carved in on the front, as the first two concepts. He has elaborate tribal and asian influences in the carvings throughout his armor. He has an overall build not unlike a Gears of War cog or StarCraft Terran marine mixed with a Ninja Gaiden-esque character. His pants/boots look good (lack detail, but I'll have fun with that when sculpting). The swords look great; I'm ready to move onto model sheets, barring any terrible things that may be pointed out to me in the future

[M_Cederstrom]

nice hand swords.

[Puckducker]

I really like the intial concept you threw up. Kinda looked like a cross between a medieval warrior and a parkour runner. I know it's still early, but the boots in your last concept look like they'd be too big, the smaller feet in your original design fit nicely.

[VinsanityV20]

PuckDucker: I had a friend make that same comment, about the boots versus the original guy's shoes. However, thank you for mentioning Parkour runner -- I'll sketch up a variant with shoes again now that I have something to reference

M_Ced: thx man!

Btw; I know you said you liked the Blue color scheme (3DTotal colors!), but I wanna hear the preferences from anybody checking in. I'm mostly happy with the design, though I don't know what colors I wanna go with yet. Even though it's early.

EDIT: New concept, back with the parkour style footwear (though the pants are too baggy now)


tweaked it so the pants are no longer silly looking, but no coloring. I use a lot of white on my various layers, and it's getting annoying to color.

versus the current favorite:

[VinsanityV20]

Also deciding to put up my model sheet for this guy's head. Which was easy cuz I just grabbed something I had previously worked with:



This is just a trace-over job of digital photos taken of myself for a character modeling class from back when I still in the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. Except I gave myself a slightly different, Nathan Drake-esque haircut.

However, this was a little weird to me. Plus, after seeing all the art the CGLand guys did for the mini comp, and also being an anime fan myself, I decided to have some fun:



Not yet sure which one I'll go with, or even if I've settled with the eyes for the second design, but it's something to put up, so here it goes.

[VinsanityV20]

Oh, I guess I should pick a magic element also, huh? guess it depends on the color I choose; if the red looks better, than he'll wield flame magic. Whereas if the blue looks better, I guess I'll add some frost elements to this guy's swords and details...

[miycko]

I liked the Samurai-esqe look of the first concept. Especially the tatoos. Still the new one's cool too. The blue armor's good it seems fitting for some reason. As for the shoes, they seem like they'd weigh him down.

[Warlock 279]

I'm with PuckDucker I'm liking the parkour style shoes.

You don't seem to have really decided what his role is yet, so I say to you, here's something to think about. Given the shoes, and most of the look he's got going now, perhaps with a little streamlining [more compact armor/swords], he could become a pretty nimble looking assassin/nimble type character. Sorta mixing free-running with combat, and quickly darting around a battlefield cutting down everything in reach, could make for a pretty cool fighter.

I really like the swords as you have them now, if you did decide to make them more compact it'd just be a matter of shrinking the guard in closer to the hand, and shortening the blade a bit.

As far as color choices go, I think either could work, and I wouldn't limit myself to thinking that red has to be fire, and blue should be ice. While that's the logical choice, and for ice it should probably blue, you could certainly have blue flames if you wanted. Maybe blue with the gold pants?

For the face. I think it depends a lot on whether you go full on stylized with the whole character or if you keep it pretty realistic.

[VinsanityV20]

This is my final -- FINAL concept. The design was mostly figured out from the last one I did, but the boots were deemed too clunky and I hadn't yet figured out which color scheme to go with. Well, take most of that design and than look at this:



The colors -- from the 3DT team logo -- informed the decision to go with an ice elemental norm. I know I shouldn't limit myself to blue=ice/red=fire, as there are very, VERY creative people entering this comp, but I don't have a chance a winning, so technical practice trumps creativity this year. The pants are now a finished design, as are the boots -- not clunky anymore! The sword also now has a clear ice element to it, and the skin too has a frosty look in some areas. I'm very happy with this design now -- thanks to PuckDucker, Miyko and Warlock for their input. I'll probably still tweak this guy based on what you guys said (the gold pants/blue armor color that Warlock said, for example). I just couldn't go with the parkour-style shoes; they looked too wussy imo. Still thanks for the critiques and comments.

I have to do some model sheets now!

EDIT: Warlock is the man; made me think about a few things. I'm going to figure out this guy's deal to make sure my decisions are all informed by a consistent role/history. I'm going to take into account that comment about the swords too, to tighten their design up. Also. I'm shootin for a realistic look; I probably won't hit it, but I gotta raise the bar so that even a miss will still shoot high. I'm gunning to hit this quality:



Capcom's next gen characters, like Nero from DMC4 and Wayne from Lost Planet, were basically PS2 characters (very clean PS2 characters) with all the next-gen shader effects we westerners use to fake detail! At least, until RE5, when they decided to give Epic a run for their money in terms of sculpting and texturing. Oh well, a step at a time

[VinsanityV20]

Got the model sheet done! Or rather, done enough -- I still have some tweaks to make, which I hope don't become entirely redrawing things (like his side view). Also, he's uncoloured. Still, I'm where I wanted to be by the end of this weekend

I tried to really learn from the critiques and criticisms thus far; notably PuckDucker's comment about this guy looking almost like a cross between a parkour runner and a medieval warrior. Tried to keep that in mind as I polished up the design. The color definitely came out to blue, as people were feeling it and it is 3DTotal's team color this year Miycko liked the tats, and so do I, though they're not on the model sheet cuz I skip a few corners -- they'll definitely be on there in the final. I'm thinking of doing them with a glow map too and seeing how it looks, or with some effect going on (maybe frost). And I tried to shorten up the swords and downsize the hilt like Warlord said to make the blades slightly less unwieldy, though they still retain the basic design I've been working with. I like the tilted handle -- it seems to encourage stabbing maneuvers.

You guys have really helped tighten up my design and get me focused. Thanks for the input!

[miycko]

very nice concepts. Especially the wolve's on the shoulder pads, kinda look like they're spitting out his arms though, but i'm sure you'll refine that on the model.