3D MODELING / FINAL PROJECT
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
FINAL PROJECT: CHARACTER MODELING
WEEK 10 - Patrick's Basic Form Practice
In Week 10, Mr. Kamal released the final project brief, which required us to model a character. Before he started the demonstration process, he explained how lines flowed on human faces. It is important to arrange our wireframes according to the facial lines to ensure the surface of each face's features are placed in the right place.
Figure 1.1 Project 03 Organic Character Modeling Brief
Next, Mr Kamal used Patrick as a sample to demonstrate in class, giving us a better understanding of how to use the most common tools to make a cute model. First, I downloaded Patrick's model sheet from MyTimes and cropped the front and side views as a reference. As Patrick's body was rounded, I added a cylinder while removing the top and bottom surfaces. The extrude and scale tools were mainly used to make the basic star form of Patrick. To save time and ensure both sides of Patrick were balanced, Mr Kamal also taught us the technique of using the mirror modifier, so we were able to get a symmetrical balanced model by just making one side of it.
Figure 1.2 Patrick Model Sheet
Figure 1.3 Patrick Star Form
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WEEK 11 - Patrick's Face Modeling Practice
In Week 11, Mr. Kamal taught us how to make Patrick's face. He showed us the face topology of characters especially humans in class. Mr. Kamal mentioned that it was important to model based on the line and edge flows to ensure that all facial features were in the right position and make the overall proportion look good. After confirming the position of Patrick's mouth, I used the knife tool to draw an outline while using the mark seam tool to leave a mark there. Mr. Kamal asked us to inset the selected faces and move inwards to make an inverted mouth shape. After exploring mouth modeling, I also tried adding eyes and eyebrows while adding colours by rendering the model. I am satisfied with my Patrick model as this was my first attempt to make a character model. Before leaving the class, Mr. Kamal wanted us to think of one character and try to find out its model sheet for future reference.
Figure 1.4 I used the mark seam tool to leave a mark for the position of the mouth
When I reached home, I did my research on which character to make. I initially wanted to make Labubu, but I found that the information was not enough for me to do so. At last, I decided to make a model of Charmander, which was a cute dragon character in Pokemon. Without further delay, I saved multiple images of Charmander with different angles to use as my reference image for future modeling.
Figure 2.1 Charmander front and side view image
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WEEK 12 - Modeling Charmander's Basic Form
I imported the two reference images into Blender and started to model this cute character. First, I made the shape of the head by using the subdivided cube form, while extruding and adjusting the scale of cylinder form to make the body. Once done, I joined the two parts by using the magnet tool to connect them into one. As I realised the number of loop cuts for the head and body was not equal, I drew extra lines with the knife tool to ensure the overall wireframe looked neat.
Figure 2.2 Once I got the basic form of Charmander's head and body, I connected them into one
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WEEK 13 - Hands & Legs Modeling
As this was the last 3D Modeling class of the semester, we were allowed to continued working on our current progress while having a consultation with Mr. Kamal. In this week, I explored modeling the character's hands and legs by selecting four faces and extrude them out. However, I wasn't sure on how to make the fingers, so I watched a YouTube tutorial and tried to select one out of the four faces to extrude outwards. Then, I made the legs by using the same extruding method, but it was more challenging compared to the hands part as it took more time to adjust the leg sizes. As Mr Kamal mentioned using the mirror modifier before, so I just did one side of the character's hands and legs while mirroring it to another side. Nails were added too!
Figure 2.3 Making Charmander's fingers using extrude and scale
Figure 2.4 Modeling Charmander's legs and nails
Figure 2.5 Charmander's body after applying mirror modifier
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Independent Learning Week - Tail & Mouth Modeling
During independent learning week, I have more time to explore the methods of modeling the other parts of my character. I switched the viewport to the side view and started to model Charmander's tail. To make a curved tail, I kept on adjusting the rotation while extruding the surfaces from the body. The fireball located at the end of Charmander's tail was quite challenging as the form was irregular. Therefore, I imitated the shape of Pikachu's tail by making the fireball look zigzag in form. I also selected parts of the tail to extrude along normal as I wished to show 2 different fire layers when rendering.
Figure 2.6 Modeling Charmander's tail
As referred to the reference image, Charmander has a beige-coloured part which connects the tummy to the tail. To make it look obvious, I applied an inset to the center parts and extruded them outwards. The wireframe for the top parts was rearranged to form a curved shape on the tummy.
Figure 2.7 Extruded tummy with arranged wireframe to form a curve shape
Figure 2.8 Extruded part that connects Charmander's tummy to the tail
After completing the overall form of Charmander's body, I started to model its face. I used the same technique taught by Mr. Kamal by drawing wireframes around the mouth while moving the selected parts inward. It wasn't an easy task when I explored modeling the mouth because Charmander's mouth was much bigger than Patrick's one, so my wireframes will somehow crashed together due to narrow space. However, I successfully overcome this issue by redoing it multiple times to get the best effect. I also added other facial features and elements, such as teeth, tongue, eyes and eyebrows to make my Charmander character model look complete. Finally, my model was done!
Figure 2.9 Modeling Charmander's mouth using mark seam, knife tool, inset and extrude
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Week 14 - Rendering & Lighting
As this was the submission week for my final project, I did some touch-ups and started to render my character model. I painted Charmander in orange while its tummy was in beige. Every colour applied to Charmander was referred to in the reference image to prevent errors in colour matching. In addition, I wanted to showcase the lighting of the fireball, so I added emission to make it glow. I watched a YouTube tutorial and followed it step by step to make my wishes come true. Gradient texture was added to the two layers on the tail, and the colours were set to change gradually from yellow to red. I loved this glowing effect because it made my model perform special, similar to how Charmander uses its tail to light up the shadowy surroundings.
Figure 2.10 Rendering the fireball on tail to showcase glowing effect
Figure 2.11 Setting up backdrop and lighting before exporting the rendered image
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My Project 03 Showcase
Figure 2.12 Charmander Wireframe
Figure 2.13 Charmander after rendering
Comments
Post a Comment