Working on textures

Been working on textures, I have the normals where I want them I believe. The diffuse is almost done, still have work to do on the shirt, hands, eyebrows, forearms. Plenty of things I wont do next time. I have some bad UV placement on the chin that makes the beard look crappy up close. The character won't be seen up close so it should be alright.

Here is a picture of the the Model in the Marmoset engine with diffuse and normal maps, as well as a picture of the diffuse at. 2048x2048 being used on the model.

UV Mapping, Normal Maps,

Once I finished my new topology I got slowed down by a bunch of zbrush size and projection issues that made me decide to be done with Zbrush even though I wanted to use its projection tools to better transfer my detail, and bake normal maps where I am familiar. I decided to decimate my mesh to 200k and bake the normals and ambient occlusion in 3ds max with cages. This also eliminated xNormal from my plans for AO. The normal Map is 2048x2048.

I installed the marmoset toolbag from 8 monkey labs and am going to use this for realtime renders and texture preview.

I am currently working on eliminating seems and getting the normals adjusted in photoshop to the best of my ability. Then I will do the same for AO.

The UV's were done with a combination of 3ds Max and Roadkill 1.1

So far I'm pretty happy where it is at right now for 3300 Tris's although I have found some weird spots in the model that may need fixing of some sort.

High Res Photoshop Brush tutorials

I ran across this photoshop tutorial last semester and I use this method to create brushes for textures and photoshop work. Thought I would post it up for anyone that might find these useful. Most the brushes used in my concept art are from different stock photo's that I took around grand rapids with my Sony point and shoot before it died.

This is a great way to make grunge or dirty brushes and some you find to have a ton of uses.

I actually have a photoshop action setup that I run on an image I am planning to use as a brush and then modify the image for whatever purpose. The action performs all the invert/levels/saturation changes in one click. Erasing away parts of a new brush with an already good brush can also make way for tons of variations of your brushes. Usually this is how I will end up with more interesting and useful brushes.

The pic above is of one of my better brushes, and this is typically one that I will use later to create others. The picture is from a warehouse by my apartment.

Here is the tutorial that will tell you how to make 2500x2500 brushes

http://www.bittbox.com/photoshop/how-to-make-a-photoshop-brush

Also another that shows the technique of using an earlier created brush to enhance another. In case that doesn't make sense how I explained.

http://www.myinkblog.com/2009/06/10/how-to-create-your-own-photoshop-brushes/

I'm also reading through 3dTotal.com's Digital Paining Techniques book that describes these type of brushes more in depth as well as technique of course. If anyone wants to take a look at it I'll bring it to class, I would lend it out but I'm working on textures now and will use it.

New Topology

I have been working on this new topology for what seems like forever. This mesh is around 3400 tri's which is still under my goal of 4k for the main body without accessories.

Zbrush really hated me on this one, don't think I will be trying that again with this type of a model. Will be trying Topogun or 3d Coat's new topo tools. Or I will just send out a lower res obj and try Modo's tools. Zbrush I feel really wasted my time on this part.

Still Have to bake the normals and see what problems persist and fix them. I'm planning to use Xnormal for baking but haven't used it before without UV matched high and low meshes. Not sure what problems I will run into.

Hopefully it goes without error and I can move on to textures.

Final High Poly Model

Pretty sure this is the final for high poly but may make a few small changes after I retopo. I think the hands need to be adjusted a bit more.

Facial sculpting

More sculpting on the face, I changed the proportions on the hands and legs a bit. Legs are a few inches longer like Cory/Stephen suggested. Still need to sculpt the face a bit more, it looks bit bland but textures should take care of that. Then just final detail on the clothing which should be quick.

Model update

Here is an update of my high res model, hands a kinda weird, some of the folds I like others I need to smooth out. The face is really yet to be addressed. Will be my first try at a beard and hair soon.