This blog chronicles my creation of characters and creatures of Planet Idolai for my MFA Thesis while studying at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, California.
Thesis Presentation:
I presented my midpoint to my committee in October 2013 and was approved. I presented the backstory of Planet Idolai, a savage planet visited in the future by humanity as Earth's ability to sustain life has faded, bringing the necessity of space exploration to find a new planet.
Long story short: I passed
My project centered on three characters and three large dinosaurid creatures. I aim for next-gen quality and techniques in games such as "Ryse" and "The Order." With a max budget of 60,000 triangles, I have a lot of wiggle room to make sure I get the proper silhouette. I am also trying techniques I researched from Uncharted and Killzone: Shadow Fall such as open mouth modeling, PBR rendering, wrinkle maps, and others.
My anticipated workflow begins in Zbrush where the base meshes are completed. Then concepting from them armors and silhouettes. Using Zbrush's Retopology tools, I will create the forms and high-resolution details. I plan to have some post-Zbrush clean up done in nDo and dDo, but after that I should be clear to paint them in 3D coat. I am going to be hand painting realism as well as I can, and possibly layering other hand painted textures in dDo/Photoshop. From there, I will work out Materials in Substance Designer or just getting a clean render in Marmoset 2.
The Dinosaurs may take more time in zbrush to get the scales and feathers looking correct. I'm going to try and render out the feathers to get my AO and mask layers, then using photoshop, create some more detail. Then that itself will become the texture map. Scale alphas are going to be created by me as well, using alphas from the internet makes certain issues I don't want.
Issues I've encountered thus far
I looked for concept artists, but each of them that agreed to help have since stopped following up. I'm not the best concept artist, so I am going to be borrowing ideas from other concepts. Since I want this to be my own design, that has been the biggest hurdle to overcome thus far.
Thesis Presentation:
I presented my midpoint to my committee in October 2013 and was approved. I presented the backstory of Planet Idolai, a savage planet visited in the future by humanity as Earth's ability to sustain life has faded, bringing the necessity of space exploration to find a new planet.
Long story short: I passed
My project centered on three characters and three large dinosaurid creatures. I aim for next-gen quality and techniques in games such as "Ryse" and "The Order." With a max budget of 60,000 triangles, I have a lot of wiggle room to make sure I get the proper silhouette. I am also trying techniques I researched from Uncharted and Killzone: Shadow Fall such as open mouth modeling, PBR rendering, wrinkle maps, and others.
My anticipated workflow begins in Zbrush where the base meshes are completed. Then concepting from them armors and silhouettes. Using Zbrush's Retopology tools, I will create the forms and high-resolution details. I plan to have some post-Zbrush clean up done in nDo and dDo, but after that I should be clear to paint them in 3D coat. I am going to be hand painting realism as well as I can, and possibly layering other hand painted textures in dDo/Photoshop. From there, I will work out Materials in Substance Designer or just getting a clean render in Marmoset 2.
The Dinosaurs may take more time in zbrush to get the scales and feathers looking correct. I'm going to try and render out the feathers to get my AO and mask layers, then using photoshop, create some more detail. Then that itself will become the texture map. Scale alphas are going to be created by me as well, using alphas from the internet makes certain issues I don't want.
Issues I've encountered thus far
I looked for concept artists, but each of them that agreed to help have since stopped following up. I'm not the best concept artist, so I am going to be borrowing ideas from other concepts. Since I want this to be my own design, that has been the biggest hurdle to overcome thus far.
I began the base mesh work in the Summer using images I found on 3D scan store's website and their Facebook page.
Most of the anatomy would be covered up by armor and dinosaur leather, so I was only concerned with the proportions. The exception is Garret's arms, head, and chest area which will require a high fidelity in surface detail. The heads are separate sub tools so they can be modified readily. I have more work to do for the faces still, but these are where I'm extrapolating shapes and creating armor. Mostly though, these were practice, I plan to remove their hands for a more favorable rigging pose, and again, most of this will be deleted anyway.
Week 1:
First week of class was pretty busy, but at this time I was able to create a couple of base meshes for the Saurotitanus (adapted from Sauroposeidon) and Idoraptor (Adapted from a Utahraptor). I also had some time to quickly sculpt a new creature for my Creature Design Class. Unfortunately the dinos were later redone.
Most of the anatomy would be covered up by armor and dinosaur leather, so I was only concerned with the proportions. The exception is Garret's arms, head, and chest area which will require a high fidelity in surface detail. The heads are separate sub tools so they can be modified readily. I have more work to do for the faces still, but these are where I'm extrapolating shapes and creating armor. Mostly though, these were practice, I plan to remove their hands for a more favorable rigging pose, and again, most of this will be deleted anyway.
Week 1:
First week of class was pretty busy, but at this time I was able to create a couple of base meshes for the Saurotitanus (adapted from Sauroposeidon) and Idoraptor (Adapted from a Utahraptor). I also had some time to quickly sculpt a new creature for my Creature Design Class. Unfortunately the dinos were later redone.
A bit of unrelated work, I practiced sculpting and poly painting with this centaur gorilla.
Week 2:
Week 2 marked the beginning of my Enforcer work. The background of this character is that she was raised from birth aboard a starship to be a part of the Special-Military Interplanetary Department of Acquisitions Security force. She exceeded expectations and was awarded bodyguard detail of the ship's Captain Garret Dura, a mechanical and technical genius. The biggest challenge, aside from the actual design, is avoiding any tropes. My vision of their dynamic is that of Army of Two's Tyson Rios and Salem. So I'm avoiding the sexualization of her character, and I want them both to be visually interesting as well as engaging.
Week 2 marked the beginning of my Enforcer work. The background of this character is that she was raised from birth aboard a starship to be a part of the Special-Military Interplanetary Department of Acquisitions Security force. She exceeded expectations and was awarded bodyguard detail of the ship's Captain Garret Dura, a mechanical and technical genius. The biggest challenge, aside from the actual design, is avoiding any tropes. My vision of their dynamic is that of Army of Two's Tyson Rios and Salem. So I'm avoiding the sexualization of her character, and I want them both to be visually interesting as well as engaging.
Among other practice work, I made an Yzma speed sculpt from Emperor's new Groove
Week 3:
Week 3 begins the blocking out of major armor forms: the same technique used in Eat 3D's Hard Surface Techniques Vol 2. videos.
Week 3 begins the blocking out of major armor forms: the same technique used in Eat 3D's Hard Surface Techniques Vol 2. videos.
Week 4:
More of the same, my thought process is that I need to finish the raptor before I can begin the major cloth work on Garret. That being said, many of his other forms will be derived from the enforcer as well, just in male form. This week I experimented with more forms, bigger shoulders, and leg armor. The idea is to create it in such a way that it doesn't decrease a given range of motion. I also want a sort of "death mask" that can open and close so I can show off her high-fidelity face that will come later.
I want to intermix cloth and hard surface forms. I think the eye needs to see a lot of lines and angular forms, but also would like to rest on softer forms as well such as bags, packs, and other military-esque cloth.
More of the same, my thought process is that I need to finish the raptor before I can begin the major cloth work on Garret. That being said, many of his other forms will be derived from the enforcer as well, just in male form. This week I experimented with more forms, bigger shoulders, and leg armor. The idea is to create it in such a way that it doesn't decrease a given range of motion. I also want a sort of "death mask" that can open and close so I can show off her high-fidelity face that will come later.
I want to intermix cloth and hard surface forms. I think the eye needs to see a lot of lines and angular forms, but also would like to rest on softer forms as well such as bags, packs, and other military-esque cloth.
Week 5:
I recieved feedback saying the chest was too concave and that other areas were too undefined. I spent more time on these areas, and went through about 20 iterations of the helmet. I knew at this time I needed a new way to quickly create helmet parts, but everything I explored at this time led to time that could have been better spent making more of the organic creatures so I took a break from this and went to other elements.
I recieved feedback saying the chest was too concave and that other areas were too undefined. I spent more time on these areas, and went through about 20 iterations of the helmet. I knew at this time I needed a new way to quickly create helmet parts, but everything I explored at this time led to time that could have been better spent making more of the organic creatures so I took a break from this and went to other elements.
Say hello to the Idoraptor. It's based on the Utahraptor, six feet tall, and about eleven feet long. The plan with this is to get the forms figured out, then cover areas with feathers. Since this is a different planet, I can afford as many liberties as I want. I plan on coloring it like a pheasant. The biggest challenge is going to be the feathers. I'm not familiar with a way to easily place planes or how to keep it in my poly budget, so I'm going to have to do some research.
Week 6:
Okay, back to the Enforcer. I am having trouble deciding what I want. I block in forms, make the parts with zspheres, but it doesn't end up what I want, so I delete them and start over. This process is really slow, and it's bottlenecking my entire workflow. I need to find a more efficient way to work.
Week 6:
Okay, back to the Enforcer. I am having trouble deciding what I want. I block in forms, make the parts with zspheres, but it doesn't end up what I want, so I delete them and start over. This process is really slow, and it's bottlenecking my entire workflow. I need to find a more efficient way to work.
Week 7 and GDC:
This week was more clean up and just working on what I had.
This week was more clean up and just working on what I had.
I roughed in muscle forms, primarily the legs as they'd be the forms exposed. Claws need major work still, as well as much of the rest of the model. I had a cool idea to make the front of the muzzle be scaled with beak-like material. I hadn't seen something like that before, so I think it'd help set this apart from other raptors. Not to mention it's boring to see yet another raptor. Setting it apart is going to be the most important objective in this.
I finally got over my design slump and decided a whole new direction in the chest was needed. I'm not a fan of armor that wraps underneath chest forms, so I made it more plate or compartment focused. I also added more cloth forms. It'll be easier to add more pouches and packs from here I think, I can make them appear sewn into the pants or what have you.
This week was also the 2014 Game Developers Conference! I volunteered as a Conference Associate this time around, and boy was it valuable!
I attended some very important talks for my thesis. The first talk I'd like to mention was presented by Abdenour Bachir and Christopher Evans about creating the characters of Ryse. Their method was to first off make a material that fits all situations, such as a universal metal, or a wood that are physically based. The texture maps were 4k, and brought 144k total texture resolution per character. They also split the models up into pieces so Zbrush could handle the high poly sculpts (each part was about 130 million polygons, and 4 million in each subtool). They sculpted all details in these meshes rather than going through their normals and adding detail. Game meshes were character-based, with a single LOD of 40k to 160k. Which is amazing, that a single character reached 160k triangles in game! They also used the same meshes for cutscenes and animation. For hair, they used Ornatrix for 3DS Max which I've never heard of, but apparently it's an amazing tool.
Another talk relevant to my thesis was Scott Shepherd's talk about making customizable characters from Destiny. Basically, this was an important talk for me to hear. He explained that the characters in Destiny were all kit-bashed from a massive parts library. This will help me get my ideas out better because I can create the shapes I want, texture them, then put them all together in Maya for my Enforcer instead of trying to create everything all at once. I can spend less time figuring out what I want, and more time finishing parts. I'm going to immediately use this method, it sounds so obvious, but it'll really help me to finish this model. Though, he did mention a downside and that's that the artists weren't able to create fully finished models at a time, but rather parts of them. That's fine though, since I'm the only one working on this project.
The last talk that I'll mention was done by Jeremy Bernstein. This was more about the narrative behind the characters, rather than a procedure or a method. He explained the three parts of a character being Unity of Trait, Unity of Action, and Unity of Purpose. This is more going to come into use if I ever render the characters into posed composites, but he described these traits as how they connect with the player. Purpose being why the player cares about the character's cause, Action being if the player would do what the character does in the same situation, and Trait being the character's personality which in the scope of things doesn't matter all that much.
Last talk can be found summarized here:
http://www.polygon.com/2014/3/24/5541390/blizzard-character-design-concept-art
This week was also the 2014 Game Developers Conference! I volunteered as a Conference Associate this time around, and boy was it valuable!
I attended some very important talks for my thesis. The first talk I'd like to mention was presented by Abdenour Bachir and Christopher Evans about creating the characters of Ryse. Their method was to first off make a material that fits all situations, such as a universal metal, or a wood that are physically based. The texture maps were 4k, and brought 144k total texture resolution per character. They also split the models up into pieces so Zbrush could handle the high poly sculpts (each part was about 130 million polygons, and 4 million in each subtool). They sculpted all details in these meshes rather than going through their normals and adding detail. Game meshes were character-based, with a single LOD of 40k to 160k. Which is amazing, that a single character reached 160k triangles in game! They also used the same meshes for cutscenes and animation. For hair, they used Ornatrix for 3DS Max which I've never heard of, but apparently it's an amazing tool.
Another talk relevant to my thesis was Scott Shepherd's talk about making customizable characters from Destiny. Basically, this was an important talk for me to hear. He explained that the characters in Destiny were all kit-bashed from a massive parts library. This will help me get my ideas out better because I can create the shapes I want, texture them, then put them all together in Maya for my Enforcer instead of trying to create everything all at once. I can spend less time figuring out what I want, and more time finishing parts. I'm going to immediately use this method, it sounds so obvious, but it'll really help me to finish this model. Though, he did mention a downside and that's that the artists weren't able to create fully finished models at a time, but rather parts of them. That's fine though, since I'm the only one working on this project.
The last talk that I'll mention was done by Jeremy Bernstein. This was more about the narrative behind the characters, rather than a procedure or a method. He explained the three parts of a character being Unity of Trait, Unity of Action, and Unity of Purpose. This is more going to come into use if I ever render the characters into posed composites, but he described these traits as how they connect with the player. Purpose being why the player cares about the character's cause, Action being if the player would do what the character does in the same situation, and Trait being the character's personality which in the scope of things doesn't matter all that much.
Last talk can be found summarized here:
http://www.polygon.com/2014/3/24/5541390/blizzard-character-design-concept-art
Also, for anyone interested in the scope and lore of this project: The entire idea of this 'game' is that it's evolutionary. It's an over the shoulder third-person shooter much like Army of Two or Gears of War, but with a twist. The premise is, humanity have left earth to go colonize other Earth-like planets after they discovered the wide practical use of Thorium, a nuclear resource less dangerous and more powerful than other energy sources, and the best part is: it's plentiful. So, with this thorium come new efficient space ships that can travel faster than light. So the Space Military of Earth starts a program to send humans to each of the nearest Earth-like planets to colonize and spread the population around so they can repair Earth. So, roughly 70 planets are selected, and a few million scientists, farmers, soldiers, etc are sent. This story follows one of the fleets. The bulk of the landing party touches down in the target area, but Captain Garret orders his ship to scope out the other side of the planet. In the process they are forced to make an emergency landing on the planet, losing most of their ship, including their matter generators (which are like 3D printers that are programmed with any number of resources they may need until they get resupplied). So, Garret, an engineering genius is escorted by his private body guard (who doesn't have a name yet but will) who is heavily armored. The objective for both of them is to make their way back to the primary touch down area and reestablish and replenish supplies there. But to do that they have to travel to a very savage and dangerous planet filled with intelligent predators and overprotective prey.
Okay, sounds pretty run of the mill, but here's where I think it becomes interesting. As the game progresses, you meet more and more creatures who want to eat you and stomp on you and whatnot, and so being alone definitely has its disadvantages. So, your enforcer character gets weaker, as the Captain finds elements in wreckage to make himself stronger. He's still not ever going to reach the amount of awesome the Enforcer is at the start, with her guns and knives and CQC, but he'll make cool things like Idoraptor invisibility cloaks that pipe into his Thorium power pack and controls the chameleonic nature of the feathers in short bursts for stealth. Where your other character also has to find fragments of military hardware along the way to survive as well. So gameplay isn't linear, it evolves and changes according to where you explore and what you find. So that's where the design challenges are coming in to play.
I have to envision what they will look like halfway through the game, from some changes they had to make to themselves to survive. Garret is going to have his cloak and a bunch of other weapons, the Enforcer is going to have 'McGyvered' weaponry as well, but they will still have initial elements from their former posts. Captain's outfits, armor, Thorium packs (diegetic health gauges). So, that's where I'm at with everything right now, thanks for reading, and if you're interested, every week I'm going to p
Okay, sounds pretty run of the mill, but here's where I think it becomes interesting. As the game progresses, you meet more and more creatures who want to eat you and stomp on you and whatnot, and so being alone definitely has its disadvantages. So, your enforcer character gets weaker, as the Captain finds elements in wreckage to make himself stronger. He's still not ever going to reach the amount of awesome the Enforcer is at the start, with her guns and knives and CQC, but he'll make cool things like Idoraptor invisibility cloaks that pipe into his Thorium power pack and controls the chameleonic nature of the feathers in short bursts for stealth. Where your other character also has to find fragments of military hardware along the way to survive as well. So gameplay isn't linear, it evolves and changes according to where you explore and what you find. So that's where the design challenges are coming in to play.
I have to envision what they will look like halfway through the game, from some changes they had to make to themselves to survive. Garret is going to have his cloak and a bunch of other weapons, the Enforcer is going to have 'McGyvered' weaponry as well, but they will still have initial elements from their former posts. Captain's outfits, armor, Thorium packs (diegetic health gauges). So, that's where I'm at with everything right now, thanks for reading, and if you're interested, every week I'm going to p