Haplo, another character portrait

[Roja]

This is the 2nd character portrait I finished in Zbrush. His name is Haplo, from the Death Gate Cycle books by Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman. It’s a great series that I highly recommend.

Base model & UV’s done in blender, then high res model done in Zbrush. This was fully textured in Zbrush too(except for the eye), didn’t use photos for this one, just the Zbrush paint tools. Hair strands were added as post in Photoshop.

I found it’s pretty easy to create nice skin tones/textures without using photo projections on the model. I didn’t fully finish the skin here…especially got lazy with the neck, however this project was meant for me to “sketch” what I think the character from the book looks like, so I can have a clearer picture in my mind of him. For me it’s easier to sketch something out by modeling instead of drawing. I find I can push the “clay” around easier to make the shape and form I want than I can with constantly erasing and redrawing with pencil on paper.

Anyway, please give me a full critique on things you think I can improve upon, etc! Thanks

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[Roja]

I really hate to ask again, but I’d really appreciate a critique…can someone give me some advice and critique this for me? Thanks!

[britofeliz]

Humm I don´t know the character. What I think is that it might need some work on the muscular structure. Now how i said, i don´t know the character, he might not have this details.

About the texture, i think it would be cool to have some color variations… you can noticed it by looking to your own face, and you will discover that there are lot´s of tonalities and colors. Once i saw a tutorial saying that the secret to the organic modelling is IMPERFECTION, and i think realistic imperfection is one of the difficult things!

I am a starter in Zbrush, so if anybody has a different oppinion, LET`S GO! hahah

Brito

[Roja]

Thanks for the response

I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the muscle structures…at least, I can’t see it.
But you’re right about the skin tones…now that I’m looking at it it does look pretty monotonous. I did put more reds in the ears and nose, but it needs more overall I can tell. I will have to work on that more later, thanks for pointing it out

[britofeliz]

you are welcome!
post the updates!
wanna see it!
ehhe
cya

[Roja]

Finally fixed this up some more. I changed how he looked a bit, because I felt it wasn’t quite how Haplo should look.
But now I did finally get his appearance down well, and I’m very happy with it

I changed the material settings around…but I’m really still learning about that stuff and am kinda just changing settings around blindly, just trying out stuff and going with what looks good.

If you guys can give me some tips on how to make the render look even better it’d be a big help! I see that most people don’t use Zbrush to render in…is that because it’s just not good enough as other renderers or what? I’m only using Zbrush here, except for adding the hair strands sticking up, and the eyelashes, in photoshop…

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[Angelstein]

Check out this lighting setup created by Mahlikus The Black: http://www2.zbrushcentral.com/uploaded_from_zbc/200305/user_file-1053650485cua.zip Also this thread which contains light and material settings (also by MTB!) is great also: http://www.zbrushcentral.com/zbc/showthread.php?t=37139

MTB, knows his stuff!

Hope that helps, Roja. Nice modeling skills by the way

[Bimm_the_Stone]

If i remember correctly (it’s been a while) he is covered with tatoos in the books…

so the question that would logically follow is;

…yur gonna make im sum tats?

edit: typo, apart from the obvious

[Roja]

Angelstein, thanks, I checked those files out, really great light setup with the shadows and all. I hope to learn more from it

Bimm, yes he has tatoos, but not on his face. He does have them on the neck, and when I get around to making the full body I will of course put them on him. Just didnt’ feel up to it with only the neck there.