For now I'm putting my Amir project on hiatus because I felt my portfolio needed a PBR piece, particularly one where I could practice hard surface modeling. While searching for concepts I came across the work of Amanda Kiefer and her original character Shofari and was immediately inspired https://www.artstation.com/artwork/lAbrO

Please check out more of Amanda's work here: https://amandakieferart.com/

I'm almost done with the high poly, I still have some things I need to add such as scratches and fine details on the armor :)

It's been while since I've posted, so I thought I'd share a WIP of a project I've been working on! This has been on a hiatus since I've started my most recent project, but I've been planning on this project for a while now and and want to return to this afterwards. The character is Amir from the manga Otoyomegatari (A Bride's Story) by Kaoru Mori, which is an incredible series that I highly recommend! I'm going a less anime-styled route with my project, but still keeping it more on the stylized side.

First I started sculpting in Zbrush. I didn't do much with the clothing to begin with because I wanted to wait until after I made some of the assets in Marvelous. After getting this base going, I exported the model to import as an Avatar in Marvelous.

Learning Marvelous Designer was a little tricky, it's very different from any workflow I've ever done. As I started getting used to the program though, it became really fun to use! There were a couple items I was hoping to make in Marvelous, such as the cloth on her hat and the wrap around her waist, however I decided the rest I would just make in Zbrush. Overall I'm happy with what I was able to accomplish in Marvelous :)

I've finished the retopo and am currently on the early stages of texturing, I've baked the maps using Marmoset Toolbag 3 and am creating the clothing patterns using Photoshop and 3D Coat. 

I've been a little quiet lately, so I thought I'd post a WIP! I've been working on my Astro project in my free time, but before I finish it I decided to return to my Rohan sculpt.

Rather than going through the entire game character pipeline, I'm instead keeping this as a high poly sculpt. I've posed him using TPoseMesh, which was really helpful for the posing process but did end up destroying some of the mesh details. I still have some work to do, mainly going through and fine tuning the clothing folds, hands, stomach, and expression. I'm hoping to be done with this project soon! : )

  

Along with my Casca project, I also wanted to work on a smaller project that focused more on shaders and animation, since my portfolio is currently lacking in both. Originally I wanted to make a quiet beach scene, but as usual I ended up working a character into the project. I sketched up some ideas of things I wanted to try out with this project which include: cel shading, water shader, day and night cycle, idle animation, and glow effects.

For his design, I was inspired by a combination of Yuna from FFX, the FFXIV class Astrologian, and the robes of Shinto priests. I love stars and moons and decided to make him a mage character centered around those designs.

Since my focus was not on the character itself but rather the project as a whole, I tried to move quicker than usual with the sculpting / modeling / texturing process so I could use my time more towards the shaders  / animation later down the line. Despite the deadline I gave myself, I was pleasantly surprised with the outcome. I kept the shapes more on the bubbly / simple side to better fit my concept. In the end, it also worked better with the cel shading style I ended up going with!

I also wanted this to be my first project using strictly Blender for modeling so I could force myself to learn it quickly (I've been using Maya for all previous projects). It took a little time to adjust to, but it's starting to feel more comfortable. I did retopo + partial UVing using 3D Coat and modeling + partial UVing in Blender.

Texturing was pretty minimal. Aside from some details, like the eyes and cloth seams (which I will be adding later), I intend to keep most colors flat. Before I went any further with texturing, I wanted to test out cel shading in UE4 and see what the outcome would look like by default. After trying some things out, I decided to follow this super helpful tutorial and was very pleased with the results! I actually had a lot of fun working with shaders in UE4 and I'm excited to try more things! :)

For my next character, I've decided to go a bit more realistic! I wanted to practice and learn things such as hair cards and hard surface modeling. That's when I decided to return to Casca from Berserk, a character I had once sculpted a while back as Zbrush practice. 

In terms of reference, I'm aiming for a happy medium between the Casca designs from the original manga and the video game, Berserk Musou. I like the artstyle of Musou, but her clothes and features are slightly altered in the game, such as the chestplate design, addition of a belt, etc. I'd like to get as close to the original manga design as I can!

I'm currently still in the sculpting phase, so this isn't complete. The biggest areas I need to finish are the chestplate, gloves, cape, and creating a sword + sheath. I also need to decide how I want to create the haircards! For the armor, I'm going back and forth between Zbrush and Maya.

I'm changing a few plans and working on a new, smaller project before continuing with Rohan. I decided to make a stylized version of my D&D 5e character, Lunen (who was an Artificer with the alchemy specialization~). My primary goal with this project is to brush up on my baking + PBR skillset since my last few projects have been diffuse only. 

I've really been enjoying this project, I've learned a lot so far! One really neat tool I came across was the Strokes tool in 3D Coat, which made retopo-ing the hair waaay faster!

Currently I am still in the retopo phase and hope to move to baking soon!