Denzil Forde
P Number: P13214286
Email: p13214286@dmu.ac.uk
Project Title: Semi-Stylized Aviator Character
Over 3 weeks I’ve been working on the Semi-stylized aviator project. We were instructed to create an Aviator within 7000 triangles using a 1x1024x1024 texture sheet with implied lighting painted into the texture. We were also advised to follow this concept for the creation of our aviator's.
After initially reading the brief thoroughly and highlighting the key information, I began the project by collecting images using Pinterest. This was an interesting process, which got me thinking about how I might approach the project.
With the Pinterest board complete, I began putting together some of the most fascinating images into a mood board in Photoshop. The board became a journey as I posted images ranging from realistic female aviators of the early 1900’s such as ‘Amy Johnson’, ‘Amelia Earhart’ and ‘Bessie Coleman’, to steam punk and then to more contemporary interpretations of aviator’s.
This process allowed me to jump through ideas until I was able to settle on one which fit the brief and was also unique. From the Journey mood board, I was able to develop the idea of creating an Indo-Arabic desert aviator.
With the idea chosen, I looked into the Indian and Arabic culture, thinking about clothing and lifestyle. During my research, I took 2 books out from the library: ‘Art of Arabian costume: a Saudi
Arabian profile’ by Heather Colyer Ross
‘Costumes of India’ by Dorris Flynn
From reading these books I learned a great deal about the Saari design and complexions of women from these locations.
On the side of the idea development process, I was also making a list of all the tasks and how long it should take.
Similarly, I had been documenting everything that I had achieved daily.
Following this, I produced a refined mood board with the most important images which I would use for reference throughout the development pipeline. I aimed to consider most of the aspects of the character in this board, including complexion, clothing, colour palete and the environment she would inhabit.
Just to get more grounded reference for her look, I was able to use (with her consent) my friend Simran Shah’s complexion for inspiration.
When the idea development was complete, I moved onto concept work. Using the line art method, I was able to work quick and get my ideas down.
With the character concept design picked, I then created a colour concept board to decide on which outfit goes best.
Unwrapping was slightly difficult this project. I believe that this is solely because I wanted to make sure that I made the most efficient use of my texture space, and this is quite time consuming. I wanted to improve my UV packing especially as Casto (my tutor) had noted that one of the texture sheets from my helmeted character project was not as great as it could have been. Nonetheless, I am glad with this outcome; I do feel like I’ve utilized as much space on this UV sheet as possible, without compromising texture detail.
Textures: In comparison to the helmeted character, I feel as though texturing was much more challenging in this project. This is perhaps down to a number of factors, for one I had been practicing PBR texturing for over a year now: I found some difficulty understanding the principles of where to paint in lighting information, more importantly, I was unsure of which reference to follow.
Nevertheless, after a while I started to get into the hang of it and the process was quite enjoyable in the end. I feel for this project, I have created a believably mobile character with decent textures.
To get to my end result, I needed to use a number of software. I used Zbrush to sculpt her anatomy.
Another was Marvellous designer to create the Jacket and trousers. This process was challenging and took a number of iterations to get right, however it was also educational.
I used Zbrush to do some polishing and add some texture information. I also used zbrush for re-meshing.
Working in zbrush allowed me to use X-normal to bake the normal map and ambient occlusion maps which were then used to influence my painting lighting information in m textures.
I used Dd coat to re-topologize the jacket and coat.
And lastly I used substance painter to fix any blatant seams.
Here is a small list of all the references that I used to complete my texturing of the character.
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Dmitry Grebenkov
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‘Steam Punkgirl’
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‘Miss Fortune’
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‘Necro Mage’
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‘Caitlyn’
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Anthony Wiesheng Lee
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‘Domwar hooded character’
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‘Pharrah’ from Blizzard’s ‘Overrwatch’
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Yekaterina Bourykina
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‘Paladin Alyonushka’
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To conclude, this 3 week project has been quite challenging in many aspects. For one the technical side of the project was much harder in comparison to the previous project, especially when creating hand-painted textures. Similarly it was hard to Semi-stylize my character, I had not worked on a character of this type before for a large part of the project I wasn’t sure how I was going to demonstrate this style with my character. Most importantly however, it was most hard to create believable Indo-Arabian women, with attractive features that also looked like an aviator. Whether I have achieved this, I still debate now.
Nevertheless, I am very proud with the outcome of this project. This is my first female character which I have taken through the full production pipeline. I was able to learn a lot about female anatomy and demonstrate it in the aviator’s body sculpt. Additionally, feel as though I have improved in my skill of using Marvellous designer as a means of creating clothing with believable folds. I feel as though I know a lot more about the Semi-stylized genre than I did at the start of the project, especially, where I should exaggerate certain aspects.
Nonetheless, I am most proud at the fact that I was able to explore a different ethnicity which is contrary to the norm, I feel as though thinking outside of the brief, has certainly been my greatest achievement for this project.
So there you have it, my Desert Aviator, I home you enjoy. I cannot wait for the next project!