For this assignment I wanted to play with an early morning lighting sequence. Since I've been listening to more and more country music, the image of soft warm lighting and rays of morning light has been stuck in my head. This project was enjoyable, if anything a bit challenging to compose together, as I couldn't figure out to enable the subsurface scattering that really makes foliage pop. Instead I had to lean on warming the light and tinting it ever so slightly more purple.
Environmental Character
( Lit / Detail Lighting / Lighting Only)
Three Point Lighting
( Lit / Detail Lighting / RGB Detail Lighting)
Default Lighting
Straight out of the box of the environmental mixer / No Post Process Volume
For our lighting assignment I decided to have a little bit of fun and focus very heavily on the artistic side of lighting, specifically referencing chiaroscuro for how to light the subject.
chiaroscuro, (from Italian chiaro, “light,” and scuro, “dark”), technique employed in the visual arts to represent light and shadow as they define three-dimensional objects. Britannica
In hindsight, I think I could have pushed the lighting further to be more dramatic, but being limited to three-point lighting setup, I think it works for what is needed.
Playing with the different temperature of the lights did also help create a better story for the statue. Warmer lighting next to the bird's neck and a dim light behind the man help imply a story taking place.
This is my favorite of the two due to the high amounts of detail within the statue; with the primary shape on the helmet and small secondary details of the ruffles, it creates an interesting contrast of light and dark.
All of these critiques were labeled as 'critical critiques,' meaning they are fixating on small details that may or may not be worth changing in the grand scheme of the project.
Feedback from Noah Hunter
Regarding the last version
There are features that are too soft currently, like hair chunks, eyebrows, transition lines from lip tissue to not-lip-tissue (idk the anatomy of that part), and earring hone points could be sharper. What if one of them was chipped and missing the point? What if her horns had a couple that were splintered? That could break silhouette and symmetry and be more interesting.
Regarding the final version
How are the vertebrae attached to the character? Wouldn't it read better if the vertebrae had some interaction with the cape?
The fingers on them also look very thin, especially if you are going to print them.
HAIR PROCESSING
Another attempt down, this project has made me learn two things:
1. A big portion of Zbrush tutorials regarding hair focus on longer styles OR entirely simplifying the shapes so much that they don't break off whatsoever.
2. Everyone has a different method for hair, and no one is 100% right.
This caused a lot of problems for me, since regarding Purah's design, her hair works best as a short, messy design, notably longer than her first form, but not extensively so. I took a lot of inspiration from arcanegold_'s character Maple, who has a very similar hair design, minus the horn protrusions.
I was able to talk with Roanna (@Roanna_0) on Twitter about her character Naiá and how she did the hair as a reference. It ended up being one large piece of geometry at the back with sculpted in lines. Although this wouldn't help with Purah's as much, it helped give a visual as to the different subtools in the final product.
Progress of the different variations of hair from final to sketch (left to right).
For the very last version of the hair, I tried something new; I remembered using Dave Hasan's stylized fur IMM brush in my Kakx sculpt to add texture to the fur. One of the main issues I was having with the hair was the lack of volume; as one friend put it 'her hair has the resemblance of a wet cat.'
So I took the hair design of a previous version and overlayed a few IMM brushes in specific sections to create pieces of geometry that pull out from the main body while not flattening the hair itself.
Additionally, my favorite artist, Mark Lambert made a return to the scene with his very simple but extremely helpful dynameshing and ZRemesher process.
ICE TEXTURING
One of the last things I did was a brief check/polish of any props in the scene; this included adding a light amount of tertiary detail and adding secondary detail to any overly smooth shapes, especially the antlers.
I used Hossein Hatami's VDM ice brushes as a good base, especially the ice shards, which worked really well in adding volume and variation to the horn sheaths.
FINAL SCULPT
It's very interesting to me to see how the reference board for this project has grown over the time working on it. I'm a big fan of adapting projects if they are or are not working. This project has been a great example of what does and does not work and how to pivot and take time on it.
Final PureRef
Starting PureRef
PRINTING
While trying to get a license for Reallusion's Character Creator (please JR get us a license), I realized I was hard blocked by wanting to pose Purah before I could begin posing. However, I was reminded of a creator named h3LL Creator who has a vast library of popular media characters for people to print, specifically how they have both a full-body print and a smaller 1/2-body or bust for around $5-10 per month.
Example with Mollymauk Tealeaf from The Mighty Nein on Amazon Prime.
I decided to make her pose in this instance a bit more complicated, using a relatively hidden part of her design, her ice knife, to surround her. This weapon is a part of some integral moments of her character during the campaign and helped convey her design without many of her other tools.
One adjustment I will be making as soon as I get Character Creator is a slight edit to the pose, which is based on KamuiCosplay's Xalatath Cosplay pose. In this Kamui keeps both of her shoulders straight since the camera is on a lower angle and looking up to her. Since Purah is the opposite, looking up past the viewer's straight-on eye level, I'll be adjusting one arm slightly higher than the other to create more varied sight lines and asymmetry.
In terms of the half-body, it is five pieces in total: a base, the body, and the three swords. The swords have their own keys into the base, with the body carving out its own key in the middle. I do want to test out a secondary version, since one has already been requested by my party member, where I insert a key for the body into the base and reduce it in the cylinder of the body.
I'll be looking at h3LL Creator's outlines for these models as shown below.
SOFTWARE AND HARDWARE
For these projects, and because I want to get more statues from creators similar to h3LL Creator, I decided to get my own printer. I ended up going with an Elegoo Mars 5 due to my good experience with FIEA's Saturn 5, although the price point is too high for me at the moment.
As mentioned a few times in this section, I'm trying to get my hands back on Reallusion's Character Creator 5 since my trial expired in January. Unfortunately it seems I'll have to buy my own subscription; however, they do have a pretty large discount for individual student licenses (60% off). Unfortunately, at the time of writing this, I'm still waiting for approval after sending documentation.
