Average soldier. Anatomy advice/critique hoped for.

[neurogenesis]

My first zbrush character. Actually, my first anything artistic. Started off in zbrush but have gone back and forth with it and maya, and a little modo.

It’s supposed to be a sort of average soldier, not too herculean or wizened or rugged or whatnot. I’d really appreciate any critiques, especially help just making sure that the basic anatomy is proportional. I plan to use this guy as the starting point for my other human characters so hopefully I can get him to where he is well proportioned.

I also plan to animate him, so I need to make sure I am not making any mistakes. I put in some pics of his base level mesh so if you see any problems please point them out. 2200 polies, about half of them in hands and ears. The idea is to try to make sculpting simpler but I am not sure how much that actually helps anyway so I might go with simpler ears. I’ll put in some wireframe pics after I clean it up a bit outside zbrush.

Thanks!

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[neurogenesis]

I forgot to add these views. I think it looks a bit off from the back, but I am not sure what the problem is. The arms in general seem slightly off. I think it’s the shoulder somehow but I’m not sure how to fix it.

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[jaystein777]

I think the main issue to work on first are the proportions the legs are way to short, and the major masses are way off. Good texturing.

[neurogenesis]

Hmm, it seems like that is off. Funny how the big things in plain site escape the eye like that. Thanks.

[system]

I agree, the texturing / medium detail and muscles are OK, but the proportions are weird. Look at the face, it’s either too big or the head is too small, also the eyes are too far away from each other, and yes, the legs and feet are too small. But don’t worry, it happens, that’s why we come here, so that others can easily see the errors that look right to us. It’s a matter of eye training I think.

[neurogenesis]

Thanks a lot for the help, you guys are great. I think you are right and something is wrong with the head/face and having the face too big for the head could be the problem.

I made the legs bigger and I think I need to adjust the hips or something, that might be part of the issue. It does look better with the longer legs, though. Now that the legs are bigger it’s obvious that the neck and arms are a bit small, as well.

I’ll post more pics for feedback after I get it to the point nothing obvious seems wrong. I don’t need it to have too much close in detail, but I’d like it to be as clean and proportionate as reasonably possible.

[JakeLV426]

You need to get some anatomy books. It will be the best thing for you, because i’m seeing lots and lots of vague areas in the muscles. You’re kind of putting them in the right place, but what will make your sculpted anatomy believable is a sense of how they attach, and work together to appear natural.

Pay close attention to the shape of things. I know it seems obvious, but you have to really look at what things are really doing. For example, clavicles have a bit of an S shape, as the curve backward form the center of the neck and meet with the deltoid. The muscles on the back/neck (trapezius) form the shape of a kind of stretched 4-pointed star, and pectoral muscles flow under the shoulders where they connect. Just check out any anatomy and you’ll start seeing how everything connects.

I agree with above comments about proportion. Don’t worry, nobody notices these things until someone shows them. This is a good start for having never done anything artistic before. Don’t give up!

PS. Bridgmans anatomy is a awesome for sculptors.

[neurogenesis]

That is a good notation about the clavicle. I will work on that, too. I guess I am sort of going head to toe right now, but anything pointed out like that is a help.

I do have anatomy books, but my eye is just very untrained still. I seem to be getting a lot better, but for me it has been very very slow going to get even this far, and most of the time I can tell when something is wrong but it’s often still very difficult to figure out what.

[Tristikov]

The muscle definition looks pretty accurate, but I think his general proportions need some tweaking. His frame is very stocky, heavy, thick torso but rather slim limbs. His legs seem too short to me, but I think that they would work at that length if they were just a bit thicker. Arms could probably be a bit thicker too. Conversely, you could shave a little bit off of the midsection and just make the legs a bit longer, and he’d look good that way too. Good luck!

[neurogenesis]

Yeah, I think that the limbs were a big part of the problem. I guess it was just all kinda subtley out of wack but mostly the torso was too big for the arms and legs and the chest too narrow.

The head was also way too round and the face was too big for the head, as was pointed out.

I lengthened the neck and the arms, too, and went head to toe and added in a lot of muscles that I didn’t put in initially and took out some imaginary ones I added in. I didn’t want to make him a muscle man or have muscles that look drawn on or too cut, but it just looked too amorphous the way it was.

The crotch looks a little odd but I was not sure what to do with it. I plan to make some clothes for him next, though. I also couldn’t get the back of the shoulder quite right because of an issue with the base mesh. Looks like I’ll have to fix up its topology a bit.

As you can see, there’s a dramatic difference, so thanks for all the feedback. It helps immensely.

Any more advice would be great, especially for the face and eye region in particular, though it might be hard to see it in detail from the pics. The paint job got a bit smeared and was distracting so I turned it off.

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[Benjw703]

Wow, I gotta say this is a big improvement! Its good you’re open to critique, you’ll improve dramatically when listening. The most important thing is reference material. Its good to work from other artists anatomy studies but they tend to be somewhat stylized at times. You can’t beat real life refs so start building up some good front, back, side views of all parts if you truly want to get more accurate. On the back, the deltoids are more pronounced like in the front view, extending inward more than what you have now. The thigh area in your first post had a more round and accurate shape and the shin in the new seems to trail off to the side and not into the knee. Overall, its really good and now its just a little tweaking here and there with ref aid. I think your head looks way better and real, nice job! Keep on brushin’!

[neurogenesis]

Thanks for the encouragement. Those are good issues to address. It’s strange because I really just don’t see a lot of this stuff til it gets pointed out and then it seems super obvious. Having some input saves me so much time and frustration, so thanks again, everyone.

[neurogenesis]

All right, I made those changes, too. Also a few more minor tweaks. Still can’t get the shoulder quite right due to the base mesh having some issues in that area. I don’t have any poles but I think I made the topology flow the wrong direction there.

Not sure what I will do next. The base mesh needs tweaking and rigging and skinning before I can animate it, or I can go back to polypainting and try to get decent at that, or make clothes now. Ultimately I want to make a specific character using the base anatomy and give him some equipment and pose him to make some ‘concept’ art and put him ingame, but maybe I should try to animate it now before I get a complete character which might have to have topology changes made afterwards.

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[JakeLV426]

This is a very nice improvement!! Great job! At this rate you’ll have anatomy down before you know it.

I think a few things need some attention:

-His thigh muscles still feel a bit mushy and undefined, although it seems like your moving in the right direction

-I think his legs may still be a bit small for his body, right now he kind of feels like he’s the size of a horse jocky.

-Something about where his thighs plugs into his hips is vague. The shape of his pelvic girdle isn’t clear.

-Maybe tip his head back a bit…if you drop a straight line from his chin, it would land more or less at the tip of his toes. For a character standing straight up like this, you would want the chin plumb line to land near the middle of his feet to feel balanced, otherwise he might feel like he’s falling forward or backward (forward in this case, but it’s minor)

Keep up the good work!

[neurogenesis]

Thanks for those suggestions. The legs were a real mess, especially the hips and the buttocks. I spent all this time pretty much trying to fix them. I don’t think the length was the issue, but everything was kind of out of proportion and the thigh muscles did not start high enough. I even found that I had the muscles backwards on the calves! I think the butt may be too big now, and the hips still need a little work but I just got too tired of it to keep on with it for now. At least the anatomy seems to be mostly reality based down there, though.

I also worked on the face a lot. It was still too squarish…I somehow made him have a ben affleck chin combined with a matt damon squarehead. Also, the mouth area was sort of recessed and the cheeks were not rounded and a million other issues.

I still need to do more for the face, but I’m not sure what. The eyes maybe need to be lower or closer together and the eyelid area has gotten all mangled from my many moves.

The base mesh is much better, now, too. I cut 300 polies off the hands and added 500 around shoulders and face, and arms and legs and redid the ear. Now the whole thing is 2400, but I think the polygons are all in places that will make life easier for me.

Any more suggestions, especially with face, let me know. I think eyes are biggest issue now, but not sure. I left the head position the way it is, the reason being he’s in a more relaxed stance than models seem to get modeled in. From the references I see his head should be ok like that, though. I cut out the materials and fine detail because I keep changing/ruining it but here’s some screenshots. Hopefully I am NOW finally ready to polypaint and detail…almost.

edit:actually, maybe the head is too far forward. It seems to have drifted more forward somehow…

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[neurogenesis]

Sometimes I wonder if I’ve even seen a face before. I had the upper muzzle area depressed into face all this time instead of coming out and melding into nose. I never even realized it did that. I guess that’s where the glaring wrongness of the profile has come from.

I still need to put eyeballs back in and rework some eyelids, though. Rest of face seems pretty ready to detail and paint, unless someone can spot some wrongness. I probably will not add in many wrinkles or lines, though.

Thanks for all the help, guys. It’s surprising how much feedback helps me improve.

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[neurogenesis]

There’s really no surface detailing, I guess. I did paint a texture for it and move the head back, though. Also, a million little changes, I guess.

The actual eyeballs got all messed up somehow, so I probably have to fix those before I can make the eye area look right. That seems a bit off, too, but I am not sure what I should do with it.

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[mdale13]

looks okay so far. you need to check your proportions however. legs are far too short. the eyes look a little big, and the necks a little long, buts its coming along

[neurogenesis]

People keep saying that about the legs, but I have measured him pixel for pixel and the length is in same proportion for arms and hips and upper body now. I think it’s just that his legs are spread out more and so are a bit shorter and also wider in that stance. Maybe if I make them a tad slimmer or something…

The neck I measured many times against pics and anatomy books, too, and it comes out ok. Maybe the shoulders are too low and that is causing it.

I think the eyes might be too big, though, the actual eyeballs. I sort of wanted to make them bigger than average, but it doesn’t look quite right and I think that might be why. I have to make some new eyeballs.

[lm1]

The legs are short for the body unless that’s part of the characterization.