Hawk Prey's 13

[KICKER]

I remember seeing this model on Bobo the Seals page but only Uv'd so I thought it would prove to be a decent challenge for my current skill set. I'm going to aim for around 4-5K tris and generate a normal map from textures.


http://www.stevekick.com/temp/Kick_13.jpg

[funkdelic]

Nice start man, really like how it looks like the concept,
keep that up! :)

[kongni]

You should come up with your own concept dude. I bet you have some killer ideas of your own. Just my 2C
model looks good so far btw

[KICKER]

I agree! I am taking an elective next semester where I will spend the time designing a character for my reel, right now I don't exactly have the time and figured this would be great practice, and not only that, but prove to potential employers I can take a professional concept and create a nice clean model from it.

If you have any suggestions about what the content of my reel should have in it I would be very appreciative to hear what you have to say. Since I am so close to completing mine I think I may start a thread, we'll see.

[Marcus Dublin]

I've always enjoyed this concept art done by hawk prey and it's cool to see it resurrected again! For the most part there's nothing wrong with using someone else's concepts, and when and if you turn pro you'll be working off of some concept artists work anyway so it's a great way to show how well you interpret 2d art into 3d. When you get inspired to create something of your own then tackle that but for now your on the right track. On your next post can you display some additional views, it'll be easier to make suggestions this way. Once again nice start and good luck.:thumb:

[kongni]

I agree with what Marcus is saying. My point is that when you get into the games business, you may not be the one doing the initial design for the character. Now is your chance!
Also, if the character you're making is not a well known superhero or something like that, it might be good to ask if you can use the design. Chances are that that person would be totally flattered. However, I definitely think that if someone was planning on downloading a 2D image that I made from my website to use as a 3D model reference then I would want to know about it.

[KICKER]

I've been thinking about that a lot lately. Now is definitely the time to design and model my own characters, but I hope to not fall into that slump I see a lot of friends fall into after getting their first job in the industry. You know, that one where they finally get out of school and they model and texture all day but then when they get home they are completely unmotivated to do anything on their own? I don't know how common it is, but I will fight it! :confused:

I will post some updates later this evening. It took forever just to finish the boot on this chick!

[Alix]

You mean like me? :eek:

Yeah its tough, as soon as I got into the industry I just tanked on being creative and started playing WoW...yeesh (you know this first hand kicker :p ) But I finally decided to lift myself back up and get moving with my creativity so that I can expand my talents through any artistic medium and practice communicating my imagination through my art.

As long as you keep thinking that you will always be creative, no matter what life throws your way, then by gosh you WILL! keep up that positive attitude hun.

All the best,

[kongni]

Kicker and Alix-
I've had both scenarios play out in my career so far. There was a time in the beginning of my career when I wasn't totally into the game I was working on so I got into playing Quake3 a LOT. Eventually I phased out of that and got into making Q3 levels and characters. Ever since then I've always tried to put aside time for side projects and experiments. I think forums like this one are a great way to stay motivated and current on technique so you're already on the right track :)

[KICKER]

http://www.stevekick.com/temp/13_Kick_Wip2.jpg
5105 Tris

Thanks for all the comments and suggestions guys, it is very much appreciated and gives me a few insights into what I can expect ... in a few months :eek:

Here is as far as I got tonight. I'm finding myself adding in a crazy amount of detail when I'm not exactly sure it's the direction I want to go. I'm getting close to the limit I'm giving myself so after it's done I may go in and optimize it a bit and combine a few of the pieces into a single mesh by merging verts as opposed to just hitting combine. Any thoughts on that? Also, I'm still thinking I can do a pretty decent job creating a normal map from the texture like Marcus did for his dominance war character...which I still drool over... :D

4 am... eep!

See you all tomorrow,

Kicker

[Alix]

Hey Kicker

This looks like its coming together really nicely! Yes it seems that you've about reached your initial poly limit...I would definitely optimize if you feel bound to the limit.

One quick crit from what I can see here so far: Give her some booty! Really play up that almost comic-book likeness to the drawing but...

Can you post the concept for reference (if not, thats ok). It would be nice to get a better idea of what your trying to accomplish here (for those of us less familiar with it). I am just looking at the models profile and her calves are cut off? There is a big hole in her boots from the side and it appears that she has no legs below her knee, only robotic feet. It's throwing me off design wise a bit.

Great start, keep it up! Look forward to more progress soon!

[Frozan]

I must say that this is looking pretty good! keep it up!

ps i see some spots where it could be cut down on the polys if u want to lower your poly count. take another pass at it if u are looking at lowering your polys.

again looks great!

[Xenobond]

oh, wow. Ancient memories! as with the others comments, looking good so far, just need to see more into the concept than just the front and side view. that, and make her some more bootylicious-ness.

[KICKER]

So after a few nights away from it I've decided that after I finish all the initial pieces I'm going to make a high res version of it with no poly limit. I haven't really tried doing hi poly hard surfaces yet and it looks like a challenge! In my low poly version I'm going to be looking at between 8-10K faces which is about where current gen is...

Alix!

I forgot to put her legs in the boots! They are supposed to be there :lucky:

and I know how you like those voluptuous women so I'll tweak her butt a bit more :approve:

Here's the concept by James Hawkins

http://www.hawkprey.com/thirteenline.jpg

[KICKER]

http://www.stevekick.com/temp/13wip1.jpg
http://www.stevekick.com/temp/13wip2.jpg

So here are some updates, it's been difficult to find time! All I really have left is the arm gauntlets and tweak the anatomy some more.

So my question is, how should I go about modeling these pieces into uber sweet hi-poly versions? My experience is very limited as all I've ever done was model for current gen games...or past gen I should say and I'm at a loss here. Should I convert to sub-d? Continue to poly model just adding edge loops, booleans?

Oooh! He said BOOLEANS! :mad:

I look at pieces like Rawkstars Necromancer model and I see all that mad detail and I get freaked out! How does one go about that kind of modeling?

http://www.t3h-v.com/folio/corum_highpoly.jpg

Holy jesus. :brick:

[Japhir]

wow that looks amazing!!! great stuff! and lol @ forgetting the leg :P

i think/am almost certain that he used 3d sculpting software, like zbrush or mudbox to create the high poly model.

[KICKER]

On some pieces, yes. But for the legs and the torso I'm assuming he used max to get all those nice hard surfaces. I'm going to give this a shot today and see what I can accomplish. I'm so bad. I have 3 character models I have to texture for my class but MEH! This is far more important :lucky:

[KICKER]

http://www.stevekick.com/temp/hipoly.jpg

I managed to get this done during my character animation class today. It sure is time consuming but I'm getting used to the process. Still have a lot to learn! I'll finish the hi-poly version of the boot tomorrow and try projecting normals in maya and see what happens.:think:

[iceblazer17]

Your stuff looks really good man. The legs and boots are awsome. Just a question, what school are you going to? Im a student in michigan and our program is hurting me more than helping me...

[iceblazer17]

By the way.... I went to your website and it turns ot that I am a CA too! nice to see ya on here!

-Andrew

[KICKER]

I was wearing my fluorescent yellow GDC shirt yesterday at school to piss off the fashion students...and because it's just so sweet!

I go to the art institute in san francisco. As for my experiences, after my 4th or 5th quarter the program really started to dig its teeth in me. I havent had any time to do anything but stupid GE classes which really hurt my progress in 3D and texture painting. Not only that but 95% of the students just plain suck and put forth almost no effort which REALLY kills the classes and the way the teachers educate us. It's really sad, especially since I'm paying so much money for a stupid degree thats going to do me little good. I have one more quarter left though and I'll just be happy when it's all over.

I know some people have had some good experiences at game schools but unless you are a complete n00b to 3D like I was then there is no reason to go to an Art Institute, that's for sure. Your time would be better spent watching gnomon DVDs and scrounging up tutorials on the web and posting on sites like this.

[iceblazer17]

haha, I feel the same way at my school. It is a genaric degree focusing on "digital animation and game design." (I think they threw game design at the end to attract more people) But my teachers have no experience when it comes to modeling for games. I went to GDC in 2006 and came back knowing how to normal map and my teachers had no clue. and thats just the tip of the ice berg....

Anyways, I got about 2 years left in my program, so I can start to see the light at the end of the tunnel. I am just glad I found this web-site so I can get some real critiques and feedback. You will have to show me some of your stuff at GDC this year.

[KICKER]

Here's an update so far.

1092

1093

Almost done with the lowpoly cage...ugh this is taking forever. :uhh:

[Swisher]

I love the work that you've put into this model. She's coming along quite nicely. Keep the updates coming.

[KICKER]

http://www.stevekick.com/temp/13tex4front.jpg
unlit from viewport


http://www.stevekick.com/temp/13normalrendersmall.jpg


http://www.stevekick.com/temp/13tex5front.jpg
http://www.stevekick.com/temp/13tex5back.jpg

Just finished a little bit more. Texture still needs more work and there is not a specular map yet...

Long list of things to do but should be done by Sunday at the latest. I have my friend rigging this character for their TA demo reel so hopefully I'll get some sweet poses and maybe an animation in.

[Deto]

Very good texturing and modelling there, Kicker :) I like the blue skin and the contrast its given with darker armor pieces. Brilliant job with the normals and diffuse :D

One complain though... Her butt looks like two small football halfs, and not necessarily in a good way. Can you post deadrear view of her? :)

[Thunder Bunny]

Those boots are hella hot. How in the world did you come up with them? Better question what was your insparation for designing such "kick ass" boots?

[EVIL]

hmm, hope you haven't rendered your normal map yet, I'm seeing a ton of weird anatomy problems but the most obvious one to me are the:

mouth corners, you have to tuck them in, just look at a picture of a face and pay attention on the mouth corners and see that the mouth isn't just an opening in the face but that the corners of the mouth are tucked inwards.

You modeled her without a pelvis, which is something a human should have for him/her to be able to walk

eyelids. the eye lids aren't elastic, the skin that you don't see when the eyes are opened goes somewhere, it gets folded under the eye socket and above the eye, also eye lids have skin from the eye brow overlap them a bit (corners), once you get older this soft skin gets more floppy and visible, but still its clearly visible in younger persons. and finally just like the upper eye lids, there is at least one fold of bottom eyelid that is folded under the eyes when the eyes are opened.

all together, recheck your refrence and try to fix them before rendering the normal map, and then adapt your texture to it

[KICKER]

http://www.stevekick.com/temp/13render2.jpg

Doing some more lighting tests.

Deto: Thank you for your kind words. I will revisit the butt :approve: you're right it is definitely off.

Thunder Bunny: I cannot take credit for this awesome design. If you go to page 1 of the thread you will see the initial concept which was done by the amazing James Hawkins, concept artist for Epic games. I did however redesign some aspects of the model and came up with the texture design on my own except for the blue skin part

Evil: Thank you for your critique it is most helpful. Unfortunately I have projected the normals already because I am running on a very tight time budget but I will revisit those areas very soon. I haven't finished the texture on the face yet and have so far neglected the lips. I will be posting some final renders hopefully by Sunday

[KICKER]

http://www.stevekick.com/temp/13render4.jpg

Ill be messing with the lights for my reel...annnd I've already spent too much time on it so on to the next one!