Final Project complete bibliography

Ashley Lyndhurst. (2013). 3ds Max 2014 - Clothing YOUR characters (BASICS) - "The naked truth...". Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0f7OKD_8OQ. Last accessed 15th Feb 2016.

Farid. (2007). "Yes, but how many polygons?" An artist blog entry with interesting numbers. Available: https://forum.beyond3d.com/threads/yes-but-how-many-polygons-an-artist-blog-entry-with-interesting-numbers.39321/. Last accessed 13th Oct 2015.

Antony Ward. (2011). How to create character models for games: 18 top tips. Available: http://www.creativebloq.com/how-create-character-models-games-18-top-tips-9113050. Last accessed 13th Oct 2015.

Jason. (2013). Tips & Tricks related to Facial Modeling for Animated Productions. Available: http://www.cgmeetup.net/home/tips-tricks-related-facial-modeling-animated-productions/. Last accessed 13th Oct 2015.

Various. (2010-2015). FaceTopology. Available: http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/FaceTopology. Last accessed 20 Oct 2015.

Del. (2011). Face Topology [Breakdown Guide]. Available: http://polycount.com/discussion/80005/face-topology-breakdown-guide. Last accessed 20 Oct 2015.

Christopher Albeluhn. (Unknown). Normal Map Tutorial. Available: http://www.chrisalbeluhn.com/Normal_Map_Tutorial.html. Last accessed 8th March 2016.

Edge-CGI 3D. (2014). Zbrush for Beginners Tutorial - Essentials to get Started with Sculpting HD. Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PO--0h8XHiw. Last accessed 1st Dec 2015.

Serhat Yücekaya. (2013). ZBrush 4R6 New Feature: ZRemesh ( No More Retepology ). Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xiCSw7LXew. Last accessed 1st March 2016.

Faolinfalalay. (2014). Creating Clothes & Armor With Panel Loops in Zbrush. Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGqMYhueyLc. Last accessed 18th Feb 2016.

Liam Shaw. (2012). Zbrush Tutorial - Answering TrickiiT - How to sculpt detailed muscles [pretty quick and dirty tut]. Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyoMb83kI2Y. Last accessed 28th Dec 2015.

ZBDRipley. (2012). Quick Tips: Sculpting the mouth. Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nsHdcprF-gY. Last accessed 17th Jan 2016.

Aleksey Bogatyrev. (2013). ear sculpt realtime. Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyqkDJhZuKA. Last accessed 17th Jan 2016.

Scott Spencer (2010). Zbrush Digital Sculpting, Human Anatomy. Canada: Wiley Publishing Inc

ROOKEXE. (2013). Character Modelling Pipeline research. Available: http://polycount.com/discussion/115231/character-modelling-pipeline-research. Last accessed 14th Feb 2016.

Man Child. (2015). Generate Normal Map in 3ds Max Fast!!!. Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGHirP8WE-I. Last accessed 18th Mar 2016.

Korosh Ghanbarzadeh. (2010). Perfect UVs by Pelt Mapping in 3ds Max.Available: http://www.3dtotal.com/tutorial/124-perfect-uvs-by-pelt-mapping-in-3ds-max-korosh-ghanbarzadeh-uv-face. Last accessed 18th Mar 2016.

CGDreamsTutorials. (2014). Making a eye texture in Photoshop.Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orXGn6SfoNY. Last accessed 3rd April 2016.

David Vercher. (2016). Modeling & Texturing Head Tutorials (Autodesk Maya & Mudbox). Available: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/XGwQa. Last accessed 9th Apr 2016.

Giancarlo Arriola 3D Game Artist. (2012). Basic Retopology in Zbrush.Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-zMGK4qj9s. Last accessed 2nd Mar 2016.

North Pixel. (2012). Pelt Unwraping a Face in 3Ds Max. Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3w-kEukP6wI. Last accessed 18th Mar 2016.

3dmotive. (2012). Rendering Ambient Occlusion with Mental Ray in 3ds Max - 3dmotive. Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYBBt1utWb0. Last accessed 23rd Apr 2016.

Brian T. (2005). Best way to mirror a UV Map for symmetry. Available: http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?35959-Best-way-to-mirror-a-UV-Map-for-symmetry. Last accessed 8th May 2016.

Release2. (2008). Symmetrical character UVW unwrapping. Available: http://www.maxforums.org/threads/symmetrical_character_uvw_unwrapping/0001.aspx. Last accessed 8th May 2016.

Final Project Post Mortem

Overview of project

The original concept to undertake in this project was to create a 3D character, texture, rig and animate it to a professional standard, after a matter of weeks researching into how much work would be needed to complete this and having meetings with my tutors I decided to change my final project into something more manageable but just as challenging.

The new concept to undertake in this project was to create a 3D character model that would be created and textured as if it would be used for animation, while following the theme of the uncharted games, this boiled down to theme, assets, texture resolution and poly count.

I began the first half of this project solely focusing on male anatomy, poly counts of 3D characters and topology for animation. All of this boiled down to help me begin to create my own 3D character. I began with designing my character, focusing heavily on the main protagonist of the Uncharted series, Nathan Drake.

Leading up to the Christmas break I was able to do my research in male anatomy and topology for animation and I got a start modelling my character in 3DS Max, I wanted to create a base mesh in Max and export it into Zbrush so that I didn't have the challenge of trying to create a human form from scratch in a program I did not yet know how to use.

Following my project time line I managed to get my base model completed before the seminar presentation, this allowed me to show where I was in the project and where I was heading next, the feedback I received was that I may be going off track because my model was not looking how I set up in my project proposal, I was also told that I could have been further down the 3D artists pipeline had I followed it correctly, this is where I feel I could have saved a lot of time if I did the relevant research and stayed to it. Upon researching the pipeline I discovered a much more efficient method of creating my model, as my model was not going to have removable clothes the mesh underneath was not needed, which meant that all the work I had done beforehand was irrelevant. However due to me keeping with my time line I was at the exact point in which my model was meant to be finished, meaning that I did not lose any time to work on the next part of the project.

I didn't really encounter any hardships during the clothes sculpting, but I did learn a great deal about the software I was using, i discovered various tools that made creating clothes extremely simple in Zbrush, this helped a lot to boost myself forward in my time line which gave me extra time to work on re-topology.

Most of my most serious issues that I encountered came from UV unwrapping and texturing, these came in the form of, visible seams, broken textures and when exporting it to unity, a shiny model, all these issues were fixed with the help of the 3DS Max forums, experimentation and other websites with useful information detailing to 3D modelling.

What went well

• I have completed what I set out to do, create a 3D character model following the theme of Uncharted, fully textured.
• I have learnt new and more efficient methods of using 3DS Max.
• I have learnt the fundamentals and some advanced techniques of Zbrush in a short amount of time.
• I have learnt new UV unwrapping techniques.
• I have learnt how to create a texture for a face from a photograph.
• All problems encountered were fixable and did not halt progress on the final product for too long.

What could have went better

• Some of the choices I made in terms of creating my character could have been changed, e.g: Using a pre-existing mesh and manipulating it to what I want.
• More research of creating textures and more time into creating those textures.
• Overall more research before I began the practical.
• Clarifying my marking criteria earlier in the production of this project.

Final Thoughts

In the end, what I have created is what I set out to achieve, where there are some areas I wish I could have had more time in, or allocated time differently, I am happy with the final outcome. I put 110% effort into this project and I feel that it shows in my final product.

This entire project has helped me to see what it takes to become a 3D artist and what I need to do as a junior to excel into becoming a veteran of this work. I know there could be a lot of things that could have went better with this project as well as things that have went better than expected, I have learnt to have an eye for detail in anatomy and creation of assets as well creating organic models. 

At the end of the day I am pleased with the outcome of this project and it has only fuelled my desire to continue to create 3D characters and truly get better and better at this craft. 

- Jonathan Willetts.

May 9th - Final Renders

After some unity scene set up and sourcing an appropriate image to use as the backdrop, I have took several final renders of my model.

These renders will be accompanying my assignment hand in.

The next blog post will be a post mortem of this project with my thoughts and processes behind my workflow and methods.

-J.W

May 9th - Seam fixes and UV update

A problem that I had been facing with my textures was the horrible seams that were visible on the head of my model, when rendered in 3ds Max, they were not so visible however upon exporting the model to unity the seams were extremely visible and made the face of the model look ugly and poorly done as a result.

I have now fixed these issues, my model and all textures are now complete, the next step will be to export the model into unity, light the scene appropriately and collect renders of my model with an appropriate backdrop.

Fixing the seams

The main problem that was causing the seams to be visible was that my the UV's on my models face were not symmetrical, this meant, because my face texture was symmetrical, that the resulting texture was off on certain parts and this caused the seams to be noticed. 

The way I fixed this issue is by deleting half of the models head, then I used the symmetry modifier to re-create the other side of the head, this caused the UV's of the head to duplicate perfectly, all I had to do then was to horizontally flip the UV's and stitch them back together, resulting in a perfectly symmetrical UV layout for the head.

I discovered this method using by Brian T's workflow.

General model polish

I have also updated the model ever so slightly, fixing issues with vertexes around the fingers and eyes, not visible from far away but on a closer inspection these would have been noticeable if they were not fixed.

The fingers had extended vertexes making the tips of the fingers pointed and broken and the eyes had strange vertexes that led to nowhere, these have now all been fixed.

 

The last step, to put this model into unity and collect multiple renders is the final thing I will be doing, and this should be finished by tomorrow evening, resulting in one final last blog post about the model itself before the post mortem.

-J.W

Bibliography:

Brian T. (2005). Best way to mirror a UV Map for symmetry. Available: http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?35959-Best-way-to-mirror-a-UV-Map-for-symmetry. Last accessed 8th May 2016. 

April 25th update - general polish and issue fixing

This week I was able to export my model into Unity to get an idea of what the final product would look like and to see if there were any obvious faults in the textures, seems or other things of that nature.

Upon importing my model into Unity and taking a look at it the first thing I noticed was how over the top shiny my model was, my first thought was that this was due to the brightness of my specular map, upon turning it down my model is still extremely shiny but this seems to only be on the face, the clothes are not shiny as such, just have a mild glow of warmth to them.

Here is an example of the model in Unity:

And here is the full model rendered in Unity:

With the model imported into Unity I encountered a number of seeming issues with the hair as well as the textures on the shoes looking somewhat poor, I have fixed 1 of 3 issues with the hair and I fixed the shoes issue, 

I also dimmed the brightness of the Specular in hopes that my model would have not as much glow as before, this did have some effect but not enough, however I think if I dim the specular a touch more and change unity's lighting settings I should get the desired effect I want on the model.

Here is the new updated Diffuse: 

And here is the updated Specular:

As with this week, next week I will be focusing on Polishing my model even further and I will be baking an ambient occlusion map and uploading the results here.

-J.W

April 18th work update - Diffuse+Specular

This week has unfortunately not been a very productive week, with my other modules starting to take over the work flow, my final project has taken the back-seat for the moment, right now I have a work in progress specular map and a slightly more updated diffuse map.

Here is the updated diffuse:

It may not be very clear what I have changed as it mainly looks the same, however what I have done is change the skin colour of the arms to match the head so that there is not a contrast of colours and cleaned up the overlaying textures.

Here is the W.I.P specular: 

Very short update this week however I hope for this to change soon when I get my other modules under way and then my focus can go back to the final project taking the front-seat.

-J.W

April 11th - Diffuse continued

I have now added the face to the diffuse map and re-baked my normal maps, both the face and the normals have came out much better than I expected. Because of the length of time that it took to get the head texture looking right I was not able to polish up the other textures as I hoped to do, so that will fall to this week.

Here is how the diffuse map currently looks:

The head that I used is an actual photographed head of a Caucasian male, edited in Photoshop.

(Reference: David Vercher, Modelling and texturing head tutorials)

Here is how the new normal map is looking:

The new normal map has given the object much more noticeable creases and extra details around the head which is exactly what I was going for.

And finally here is a render of the model itself with the new normal and diffuse map:

The plan going forward for this week is as follows:

• Polish the diffuse colour and add minor details where needed.
• Create a new texture for the arms that match the faces colour range.
• *If there is time* Start work in the Specular map.

-J.W

References:

David Vercher. (2016). Modeling & Texturing Head Tutorials (Autodesk Maya & Mudbox). Available: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/XGwQa. Last accessed 9th Apr 2016.