The Artist
Roumen Filipov roumenilipov.com Roumen Filipov is a 3D generalist born in Bulgaria, currently living in Brazil. His specialty is making 3D characters or ilm and the advertising agency.
The Artist
Roumen Filipov roumenilipov.com Roumen Filipov is a 3D generalist born in Bulgaria, currently living in Brazil. His specialty is making 3D characters or ilm and the advertising agency.
3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
Character ZTool
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CHAPTER 01 | Modeling in ZBrush
Improve your ZBrush worklow by ollowing Roumen Filipov’s tutorial advice…
Head sculpt progress
This is the irst o a series o our tutorials covering the production o a stylized 3D character using ZBrush and 3ds Max, rom the initial blocking to the inal render and postproduction. In this irst phase, we will l ook at the creation and blocking o a ull character in ZBrush without worrying about mesh topology and integrity. During the process, I’ll be showing techniques or organic and hard-surace modeling using ZBrush’s internal tools like DynaMesh and ZRemesher, smart ways to use the primitive geometries to create accessories and details in the clothes, and also some tricks to deorm the mesh without hours o sculpting and polishing. The aim is to deine the orms and proportions o the character as quickly as possible, just to use as reerence or subsequent production in another sofware, like 3ds Max, where the mesh will be ready or texturing, rendering and posing. The character will be a steampunk pest
The process o sculpting the ears
exterminator girl with an athletic igure and all her equipment ready or the job. Now, let’s have un!
01
Sculpting the head and eyes from
primitive spheres: Every time I sculpt a character, I preer starting with the head since I consider it to be the most signiicant and difficult part o sculpting. It’s no use having a body with perect anatomy and all the details in place i the ace is not the most expressive part and as pleasant as possible. I usually start with a primitive Sphere3D in ZBrush and, with the help o DynaMesh, sculpt each acial detail to achieve a shape that suits me. For the eyes, I usually use two primitive spheres with the pupil subtly marked to help position the eyelids.
Building up the body
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Adding the ears: Some o the most
delicate parts o the body, such as ears and ingers, are easier to sculpt separately and then merge with the main mesh using DynaMesh. In the case o the ear, I generally start with a sphere, scale it in the Y axis using the Transpose tool, planiy one side by dragging the irst axis o the Transpose, and then sculpt the basic shape and position o the ear to the head. Once properly positioned, I merge the ears and body SubTools and turn on DynaMesh, causing the contact zone between the two objects to join and orm one continuous mesh. Finally, I give some inal touches to remove the intersection mark.
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Sculpting the body: To sculpt the
body I generally use a structure ormed by ZSpheres and converted to a mesh. I start by creating a ZSphere at the base o the n eck and then creating all the body parts rom it. Afer creating the structure in a pleasing proportion, I convert the ZSpheres to a mesh by pressing
‘A’ and then ‘Make Polymesh3D’ in the Tools tab. Then I start sculpting until I reach the inal orm shown in the image. To join the head with the body, I merge both the SubTools and apply the DynaMesh with a reasonable amount o subdivision so I don’t lose any o the details rom any part.
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
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Sculpting the hair: Every time I make
a character, I usually sculpt geometry to block out the hairstyle, even i it is completely thrown away later to create it rom scratch using hair and ur tools. Hair blocking is important because it helps deine the silhouette o the head and the character’s ace. To sculpt the hairstyle, I add a SubTool with a primitive sphere and start adding DynaMesh divisions, then reining until I get a nice result. Some artists preer to use ZBrush’s FiberMesh to create the hair, but I stick with the geometry because o the speed with which you can get the desired result.
Hair sculpting steps
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Extracting the cloth mesh: Now that
the body is inished, it’s time to start creating the base mesh to sculpt the clothes. Some clothes can be sculpted directly onto the body, such as the shirt, though some others that are not as close to the skin should be sculpted into separate SubTools. To create new meshes without using primitives, I usually create a mask over the portion o the body that the clothes will cover, then use the Extract tool (in the SubTools tab) with ‘S Smt’ set to 0 and ‘Thick’ set to 0.01 as a base. Finally, I apply some inal sculpting to the extracted mesh to mimic the natural behavior o the garment.
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Finishing the cloth piece: The problem
with using the Extract tool to create multiple garments is that afer some time, your ile will be quite slow and heavy. It will be very difficult to work with and will consume a lot o hard disk space. To resolve this issue I usually use the ZBrush’s automatic retopology tool, ZRemesher. Simply select the desired SubTool and click the ZRemesher button, then repeat the process to reach a reasonable polygon count, while o course keeping the volume and silhouette o the original mesh.
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Boot modeling: For hard-surace
or hybrid objects it’s easier to take advantage o the various primitive geometries that ZBrush offers. To model the boot, or example, I select the Cylinder3D tool and e dit the settings in the Initialize tab to get a good mesh to start sculpting. Then I click on ‘Make Polymesh3D’ and start sculpting the boot, adding DynaMesh subdivisions. Remember that the Initialize tab disappears i you add the primitive as new SubTool; thereore, conigure what you need in a new tool and then add the mesh as a SubTool in the main ZTool.
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Other uses for primitives: Another
example o how to use primitives is in the case o objects ormed by closed pieces like rings and chains. There are several ways to create
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The mesh extracting process
CHAPTER 01 | Modeling in ZBrush
ZRemesher coniguration
Modeling the boots
Modeling extra clothing accessories
this type o object. You could draw the shape as a mask on a 3D plane and extract it as a new SubTool, as was done with some o the clothes. However, in this case, I preer to use the Ring3D primitive and deorm it with the Move brush until I achieve the desired shape. Afer it’s inished, I just position the object with the Transpose tool, duplicate the SubTool and press the Mirror option in the Deormations tab.
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
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Cloth detailing: To help deine the look
o the character a little better, always add the essential detail to distinguish between different types o material such as skin, metals and abrics. To model the shirt underneath the overalls, I draw a mask where the clothing covers the body and use the Inlate deormation to extrude the edges. To inish the details, I usually use the Clay Buildup, Slash3, Standard, Inlate
Examples o deormations
Hard-surace blocking technique
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and Clay brushes. It is important to always keep a ZTool saved with the original character’s body; it will be essential later or the correct retopology and modeling o other objects close to it.
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Blocking the spray tank: At this
stage, ZBrush primitives are used to block the spray tank that the character carries. Analyzing some steampunk reerences, I notice
the presence o gas tanks with various tubes and valves, so I decide to make a large, heavy tank with some smoking rusty pipes and various screws and welded metal. To create the pipes, I use masks and the Transpose tool to get them in the desired orm, applying DynaMesh or iner details. The main tank is basically made o a cylinder with the ends inlated and smoothed using the Smooth brush.
CHAPTER 01 | Modeling in ZBrush
Reining tools or the spray tank
Extracting the exterminator’s gas mask
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Finishing the spray tank: Afer inishing
the blocking o the basic parts, I use some techniques and additional primitives to inalize the spray tank. At the blocking step, remember that what matters is the volume and silhouette o the character and its accessories; there’s no need to add time-consuming details such as handles and screws yet. In the case o the tank, I just use masks to inlate some details, and test out eatures such as welding in the pump part using Clay Buildup.
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Making the gas mask: To model the
character’s gas mask, I decide to use the same technique used to extract the clothes, this time masking the covered region o her ace and extracting it with the same coniguration as beore. When this is done, I sculpt into the extracted mesh the volumes o the lenses and ilter, and then apply DynaMesh to reconigure the mesh. One thing that eases the process is to sculpt the inner and outer parts o the mask to prevent DynaMesh rom creating holes due to mesh intersections.
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
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Finishing the gas mask: As the mask
is a hybrid object with both organic and hard-surace orms, it may require a little more detail, mostly because it’s an object that can create a totally different tone depending on whether the character is wearing it or not. Following the steampunk style, I decide to sculpt a ew divisions as i it was made o metal plates, with exaggerated screws joining them together. Sometimes it’s easier to create hard-surace details through alphas using the DragRect brush mode (or the breathing ilter, or example). I use both DragRect with alphas and sculpting to create the mask.
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Blocking the utility belt: This
accessory is important because it’s made o several smaller pieces orming a utility belt. In addition to the spray tank, it might be interesting or the character to have ormulas and portable insecticides or more precise work. For this, I decide to model three tools separately rom primitives: tubes with poisons, an insecticide can and pockets or other related stuff. Afer that, I extract a belt mesh rom the body and insert the objects as new SubTools, inishing by using the Transpose tool to rearrange them in scale and position.
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Adding color and basic materials:
Now that we have the blocking o the model inished, it’s time to create a color palette and basic materials that can guide the texturing and render later. I use a triad o colors with shades o yellow, blue and pink. To plot Belt accessories modeled separately
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Techniques and tools used to inish the mask
out the materials, I use a slightly relective metal simulating bronze; SkinShade4 or parts like skin, eyes and hair; MatCap gray or inorganic parts like clothes, and SofPlastic or less relective parts
like the gloves and belt. A good tip is to never use 100% saturated and vibrant colors, except in extreme cases like a magical stone in the character’s armor.
CHAPTER 01 | Modeling in ZBrush
Painting and materials details inside ZBrush
The Artist
Roumen Filipov roumenfilipov.com
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
Scene iles
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CHAPTER 02 | UVing with 3ds Max
Improve your ZBrush workflow by following Roumen Filipov’s tutorial advice…
Decimation Master workflow and 3ds Max setup
This is the second of a series of four tutorials covering the production of a stylized 3D character of a steampunk pest exterminator girl using ZBrush and 3ds Max, f rom the initial blocking to the final render and postproduction. In this second part, we will loo k at the modeling and retopology of the sculpted mesh done in the previous tutorial as well as UV mapping techniques, all inside 3ds Max. During the process, I’ll be showing how to mix 3D sculpting with the awesome pol ygon modeling tools present in 3ds Max in order to achieve every aspect of the final topology, without losing silhouette and shape of the character. This tutorial will also show some workflows using modifiers to improve our modeling speed, the benefits of instancing geometry, and finally some tricks using the native UV mapping tools in 3ds Max in order to prepare the mesh for displacement sculpting and texturing. Now let’s have some fun!
01
Preparing the sculpted mesh: Beore
starting to work in 3ds Max, the sculpted mesh needs to be prepared to be exported rom ZBrush. The problem between the two sofwares is that 3ds Max can’t handle the amount o polygons displayed in ZBrush, so the irst step is to use the Decimation Master plugin to reduce the polygon count without losing details. This depends on your video card, so testing is necessary, but in my case a little less than 600k is okay or smooth perormance. Afer importing the mesh into 3ds Max, I usually scale the mesh to something around 1.80 meters tall or lighting and shading precision in later steps.
Process of retopology using the PolyDraw tool
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Using the PolyDraw Tool: The easiest
and most secure way o starting to draw the new topology over the mesh is to create any primitive in the scene and add an Edit Poly modiier to unlock the PolyDraw tool. It’s a very efficient tool but a little conusing in the beginning. You need to select a mesh to draw over by clicking the Pick button, then select Step Build to start creating vertices. Connect the vertices by holding Shif and dragging over them with the lef mouse button. To begin with, I always draw the basic circular loops around the openings o the ace, like the mouth and eyes, as they are the most important loops or deormation.
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
Retopologizing the head mesh
Using primitive cylinders and the Conform brush to model the arms
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Retopology of the head: Afer making
the circular loops in the ace, I start connecting them using the Extend option in PolyDraw. To increase mesh density and relax it locally over the mesh, I manually connect the edge loops using the Edit Poly modiier and then use the Conorm brushes to stick the new mesh over the sculpted character, so it ollows the surace along with the drawn polygons. To inish
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the head, I connect them in the back and start dragging edges downwards until reaching the neck and bust.
04
Building the arms: There are some very
quick ways to build efficient topology without drawing poly by poly over the sculpted mesh. One o the best or me is to pose basic cylinders over the arms and legs, subdivide them
properly and use the Conorm brush to make them ollow the surace. Afer that, I attach the conormed cylinders to the main topology and connect them properly. This same process is used or the hands and ingers, with some adjustments in PolyDraw aferwards. Any other details like the insides o the mouth and eye cavities are modeled using the Edit Poly tools, since they are not sculpted in the original mesh.
CHAPTER 02 | UVing with 3ds Max
Cloth modeling details
Process of modeling the boots and other accessories
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Modeling the clothes: Now that the
required portion o the body has proper topology, I start creating the clothes using similar techniques. The difference now is that the cloth needs to be thick and more precise than the sculpted version, and this can easily be achieved using a lot o stacked modiiers adding local and general modiications to the mesh. Having three or our Edit Poly modiiers is very useul to go up and down in the hierarchy, always having in mind that lower modiiers affect the behavior o al l those above.
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Modeling the hard-surface accessories: Some parts o the
The spray tank’s modeling process
character are easier to model rom scratch in 3ds Max in order to achieve hard-surace precision. For the boots, I model everything rom a box primitive, using the Conorm brush or the upper part. Afer the basic shape is done, I model the belts and buckles separately. The rest o the props and accessories are made using similar techniques, always leaving identical meshes like the pockets on the belt as instances; this will make uture changes aster to make on all the models simultaneously.
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Modeling the tank: There’s no point in
doing retopology o an object based on primitive shapes. To model the spray tank I start by blocking a sphere and a capsule primitive over the sculpted mesh, then start subdividing the meshes and extracting other parts rom the same. I make the pipes using primitive cylinde rs, adding thickness at the end using a Shell modiier. Everything is attached at the end in order to unwrap the mesh later.
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
Bolts distributed using the Spacing tool
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Distributing the bolts: Some repeated
details, such as bolts and clips, are always easier to model once and duplicate using instanced geometry. There are some ways to easily position repeated models along suraces; in the case o the bolts, I extract some Splines rom the tank mesh then use them as target shapes in 3ds Max’s Spacing Tool to make the instances ollow. In other cases, when the number o meshes is bigger and more random, it’s better to use tools like the Object Paint, Array, Particle Flow or even instanced geometry in the Hair And Fur modiier.
Final models of the spray tank
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Finishing the spray tank models: As
described in the irst tutorial, the spray tank had no need to be blocked in ZBrush since it’s a separate part and does not inluence the overall shape and silhouette o the character. It’s always good to remember that the whole process is not necessarily linear, and i the artist eels the need to go back and redo some stuff, they can deinitely do it with no ear. I create the spray tank model using a line shape with thickne ss, then converting it to an Editable Poly and extracting the other meshes rom it.
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Modeling the eye: The last model
that deserves special attention in the character is also one o the most important o all: the eyes. A character can look either dead or alive through the eyes’ appearance, so precision is important here. I always model the eye with a large pupil so it can easily be dilated later without losing iris details. To behave realistically, I model an external sphere to add reraction and distort the sclera.
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Unwrapping the body: Now that
we have a proper topology or deormation and rendering, it’s time to prepare
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or displacement sculpting and texturing by unwrapping all o the relevant parts in 3ds Max. I usually begin with the most organic and complicated parts like the body. I use a worklow based on making the mesh planar, cutting where I want it to be opened and then unolding it using
the Quick Peel button combined with Relax in the Tools tab. It’s always good to cut the mesh in areas less visible or with strategic texture transitions, like the sides o the ingers and the back o the head.
CHAPTER 02 | UVing with 3ds Max
Eye modeling process
UV layouts of the head and hands
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
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Unwrapping the clothes: It’s important
to know what kind o object you are unwrapping and how the shader will behave to speed up urther steps and avoid headaches like correcting seams and distortions on the texture. Clothes are the most common case o objects with bad shading due to chaotic UVs, thus I always cut the mesh and arrange the UV islands so that the abric texture ollows the cloth panels like it would be beore being stitched.
UV islands of the shirt
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Unwrapping the belt: Some stuff like
belts and cloth strips are always boring to unwrap, even in more advanced UV sofware, but 3ds Max have a very good speciic tool just or this case. When it comes to long cloth pieces that need to have a straight abric low, all the edges must be aligned horizontally or vertically. You can automatically achieve this just by selecting a perpendicular loop to the direction you want to unwrap, and clicking the ‘Unold Strip rom Loop’ button in the Wrap tab rom the Unwrap UVW modiier. It will make an instant straight UV island.
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Unwrapping the spray tank: There are
some more complex objects with too many elements to unold one by one in a single mesh. A workaround I use or this is to break the model down into several similar meshes and unwrap them separately. Afer each mesh has its UVs completed, I attach them in one single model and then use the automatic pack options in the Arrange Elements tab located in the side bar o the UV Editor. I set the padding to a very low value
Spray tank UV layout
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The belt’s UVs
CHAPTER 02 | UVing with 3ds Max
Applying a checkered UV to the character
The Artist
Roumen Filipov roumenfilipov.com
and turn on Rotate, then inish by clicking the Pack Normalize button to rearrange the UVs into one tile.
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Finishing the UVs: During and afer
each unwrapping, you must always keep
an eye open or any UV distortions in the more visible areas. It’s almost impossible to have a zero-percent distorted UV without breaking the mesh into dozens o islands, but you can try to hide the
most critical ones. To visualize them, always have a good checker texture to hand to see i all the squares are well distributed. The standard black and white checker in 3ds Max is usually not very precise, so you can create your own with more inormation to visualize it better.
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
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CHAPTER 03 | Adding displacement detail
See how Roumen Filipov brings a character to life with small details… This is the third of a series of four tutorials covering the production of a stylized 3D character of a steampunk pest exterminator girl using ZBrush and 3ds Max, f rom the initial blocking to the final render and postproduction. In this third phase, we will sculpt the displacement details like pores and cloth wrinkles, then finish the texturing process using Photoshop, with some composite and mask blending tricks in 3ds Max. During the process, I’ll be showing how to reproduce fine details in ZBrush, then I’ll show how to correctly set up and export displacement and normal maps to reproduce
Creating skin pores and wrinkles in ZBrush
the same information on a low-poly mesh in 3ds Max. This tutorial will also show you how to quickly create textures and other maps like specular, bump and dirt masks in order to set up semi-realistic materials in V-Ray. Now let’s have some fun!
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Sculpting the skin details: Now that
we have our model ully retopologized and with proper UVs, it’s time to send it back to ZBrush or some displacement detailing. I always start with the skin since it’s the most tricky and delicate surace to work with. At irst, you should look out or imperections lef rom the sculpting process and even re-sculpt some detail that has been lost in the new topology. Multi Map Exporter setup and differences between displacement bit depth Detailed cloth in ZBrush and stitch alphas
As soon as I have my model subdivided and ready, I start to sculpt the most delicate wrinkles around the eyes, mouth, hands and neck. Finally, I use the Standard brush with the stroke on DragRect to spread some pores and very ine wrinkle alphas all over the body. It’s important to look very careully at how you distribute the size and direction o pores. One thing that’s good to remember during this whole process is that every detail needs to be twice as strong as the other suraces, because SSS (subsurace scattering) kind o ‘eats’ a large part o it, even with good relections in the shader.
production-riendly, so I keep with sculpting the old way. The secret or me is to always observe what places in the body inlict more tension on the cloth and try to sculpt all the olds coming rom those spots. The result is always some kind o generic but believable abric behavior over the body. I the character’s clothes are too loose and hanging rom the body, I usually pose the base mesh irst and then sculpt the olds according to the pose, but in this case, the generic cloth over the body will work ine, even in more extreme poses. The stitches are all made using the stitch brush with the alphas shown in the picture.
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Detailing cloth in ZBrush: Clothes are
usually tricky to make. You’ll see a lot o artists using different worklows nowadays in order to avoid having to sculpt olds and wrinkles, but not all o them are very practical and
Exporting Maps from ZBrush: I
see a lot o people discussing correct displacement map exporting in ZBrush, and I’ll show you what I’ve ound to be the best worklow regarding quality and rendering speed.
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
Setup of VRayDisplacement in 3ds Max
Beore anything, the inal result in 3ds Max will depend directly on how your mesh behaves. I you have many stars in your topology and some odd distribution o polygons, this may screw up the displacement. That’s why I always export two types o maps in TIFF ormat: 32-bit displacements with mid 0, and 16-bit with mid 0.5 setup. The irst is obviously much more accurate and I use it with VRayDisplacement modiier, but the second is or using a non-scale-dependent worklow with the displace modiier in 3ds Max. I also use the 16-bit version to help a dd details to the texture. In the image you can see my setup or exporting the maps and mesh.
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Using VRayDisplacement in 3ds Max: Now that our displacement maps
are properly exported and our new meshes are imported in 3ds Max, it’s time to reproduce the sculpted details directly in the render. First you should check i all the vertices are split using the Unwrap UVW modiier – this method helps to avoid wrong distribution o details afer subdividing the mesh. Afer this, add the VRayDisplacement modiier and ollow the settings shown in the image. It’s important to apply the displacement map using a VRayHDRI shader, since it’s made especially or handl ing 32-bit images, and make sure you set the Color
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Skin Polypainting in ZBrush
Space option to ‘None’. Another important setting is to set the Texmap min and max to -1 and 1, in order to tell the displacement to add negative and positive deormation to the mesh.
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Painting the skin colors: I usually
paint most o the textures directly in Photoshop, but or the skin I use a mixed worklow o Polypaint in ZBrush with some
CHAPTER 03 | Adding displacement detail
blending o detail maps in Photoshop. Start by going to the last subdivision o the body model in ZBrush and, with a very smooth Standard brush, start painting the basic color regions o the skin. When you’re inished, export the texture generated rom Polypaint, reset the color and generate a surace noise using a slightly darker color. This noise will be added later in order to create an irregularity effect over the overall skin tone; you can even play with different hues, like more green and blue in some regions. This is more important to me than any o the detail painting because it removes the latness o the skin, which can ruin even the most detailed and realistic models.
“We need more than a good texture to reproduce a believable skin shader in any renderer”
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Finishing the skin texture: We need
Maps used to create the skin shader
more than a good texture to reproduce a believable skin shader in any renderer. In the image, you can see that I use an additional normal map and a grayscale bump to make the pores pop again afer the light scatter, ollowed by specular map to control the shininess o the skin in certain areas. To inish the skin texture, I usually add the bump map along with the 16-bit displacement over the basic colors in order to orce the pores and other sculpted details to come out. Since it’s a young girl, you don’t need to do a very contrasting texture – even a really smooth result still works in most cases. I’ll share the skin shader settings at the end o this tutorial.
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Texturing the eyes : Eyes are usually
the biggest challenge there is when it comes to making cartoon characters. There are some things that I usually care about in order to achieve an organic and alive look when creating the eye texture: 1. The iris border needs to be darker and with
Maps used to create the eyes shader
a smooth transition. Sharp and perectly round always kills the look. 2. You can try out higher IOR values in the external sphere material; sometimes this reinorces the depth o the character’s look. 3. The sclera o the eye is never ully white. I always make a gradient o a bright yellow to a darker pink in the borders. 4. I always make the specular map very saturated. More vivid relections in the base o the iris help to bring the character’s gaze to lie. 5. Always use SSS or the eyes, since they’re an organic part too.
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
Fabric textures used in the cloth shaders
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Texturing the clothes: The secret to
making good cloth shaders, or me, is to choose a nice abric texture as a base to create the bump and diffuse maps. I rarely add relections to cloth, only i it’s really visible in the type o abric I want to mimic. I usually run away rom very lat and realistic cloth – I really try to give a quick and exaggerated look to the abric, and also try to make the stitch texture not too tiled. I use many images to make the dirt in the clothes, but also some texture brushes in Photoshop with scatter and hue variations. For all the pockets and leather materials I use a similar worklow, but with a blurry relection using the unsaturated texture as specular map.
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Texturing the spray tank models: I’ve
developed a very quick shader worklow or scratched and worn-out metal. I know that I have to replicate the same shader with little differences through all the metallic objects, but i I had to paint all the diffuse, specular and bump textures or each one separately, it would take a lot o time. So I create a blend o two shaders: painted metal and rusted metal. For each slot, I create a composite shader with a base color using VRayColor, then tile metal textures with different opacity values on top o it. I use a normal map o random noise surace over the metal bump to make it look more ir regular. To blend the two materials, I paint masks in Photoshop or each object, and then, i I want to apply the same shader to another object, I just change the mask and it works ine.
Metal shader workflow of the spray tank
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Basic shader setup: These are some
examples o how I set up some o my shaders mentioned beore. The red one is my skin material; it’s basically a VRayBlendMtl composed o an SSS2 shader or the skin itsel and a VRayMtl with black diffuse in additive mode or realistic relections. I always use the GGX BRDF option in all o the shaders – this new V-Ray eature makes the specular more accurate and detailed. The blue material is the basic metal shader I use or all metallic objects. The last one is the
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Setup of the main shaders I used
cloth shader with a alloff shader applied in the diffuse slot. I use the alloff between the texture and a brighter version o the same in order to
mimic the roughness o the surace caused by the microibers in the cloth, usually not present in leather shaders.
The Artist
CHAPTER 03 | Adding displacement detail
TOP TIP UV Master solution
Roumen Filipov roumenfilipov.com
Sometimes, even with the correct setup, distortions may occur in some areas when you apply the maps in 3ds Max. A workaround or this is to always unwrap the mesh again in UV Master, checking the ‘Use Existing UV seams’. This correctly recalculates the distance between the edges or displacement generation.
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Model, Maps &Texture iles
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CHAPTER 04 | Posing and rendering
Roumen Filipov shows us how to bring characters to life with a simple pose…
Hair emitter geometries and hair density masks
This is the last of a series of four tutorials covering the production of a stylized 3D character – a steampunk pest exterminator girl – using ZBrush and 3ds Max, which was made since the initial blocking until the final render and post-production. In this fourth phase, we will learn how to achieve our desired hairstyle using 3ds Max’s native tools, and how to set up the render and lighting in V-Ray. Finally, I’ll mention some quick postproduction tips in Photoshop.
Combing process using Hair and Fur Modifier
During the process, I’ll be showing how to use the Hair and Fur modifier in 3ds Max, taking different approaches depending on how the hair behaves, and also some render techniques with VRayHairMtl. This tutorial will also show how to properly pose and render your character, making it l ook interesting and with personality, even in front of a simple neutral background. I’ll also show how a simple light rig can achieve great results with a very small render time even for a 4k image, and what render elements and tricks I use to enhance the final look in Photoshop. In this project I also use Super Simple Rig script, freely provided by superrune on his website. Now let’s have some fun!
01
Preparing the hair emitters: We have
inished some good work on the look development o the character, but here comes the hard stuff: hair. I’ll use the Hair an d Fur modiier along with VRayHairMtl to achieve the desired look, but irst we need to prepare the mesh that will serve as a hair emitter. I we apply the Hair and Fur modiier to a very dense mesh, we will likely make 3ds Max crash immediately or, when it comes to combing, the number o guides will make your lie a nightmare. First I paint the hair density mask as a black and white map inside ZBrush, then I apply it to a copy o the character’s head mesh and delete all the polygons that are displayed completely black. This avoids creating useless guides that would probably make the combing process difficult. I also detach some speciic polygons that can be used to generate separated parts, such as the ringe o the hair.
02
Combing the hair: Now that our
meshes and masks are ready, it’s time to begin hairstyling. Beore we start, it’s good to import the sculpted mesh o the hair to use as
VRayHairMtl settings and final render result
a reerence or the overall volume. The Hair and Fur modiier works by creating a guide or each vertex o the base mesh and then creating hair strands interpolated between these guides. There are two ways to manipulate the guides: you can model splines and use the ‘Recomb rom splines’ option under the Tools rollout, or you can go to the Styling rollout and click the ‘Style Hair’ option to enable the styling brush. For this project, I use
only the second option, and to make it easier, I divide the hair into a lot o different meshes with modiiers which I edit separately in order to ind the perect shape.
03
Rendering the hair: This step happens
simultaneously with the previous step, due to the necessity o rendering the hair in order to have real eedback on the hairstyle.
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
First, you should look or the ‘mr Parameters’ tab in the Hair and Fur modiier and a pply a VrayHairMtl in the slot. This material is made especially or hair rendering but can be applied to any geometry as well. You can customize how the hair looks by changing the colors o overall, diffuse, specular and transmission but I usually use the VRayHairInoTex shader in order to change the behavior o the strands rom root to tip. As an easy setup or realistic color variation, I use the ‘Hair&Fur/Alembic Color’ mode in the output; this makes the material use the built-in conigurations o the Hair and Fur colors. As a inal touch, you can play with the rizz, kink and lyaway settings in the modiier to get even better behavior o the hair.
Rig locators and full rig built from them
04
Rig basic setup for posing: With all
the look development done, we now need to pose the character. I usually preer to do this using a simple rig solution inside 3ds Max. You can do it using the Biped system, CAT (Custom Animation Toolkit) or even custom rigs, but the best or me is the Super Simple Rig by superrune. It’s a ree rig system and very ast to set up. All you need to do is open the rig-building tools, create the rig locators, move them to the positions o the body joints, and inally just click the ‘Build Rig’ button to create a ully unctional rig ready or animation. The rig even has a similar parameters system to those you ind in Maya controllers. It’s important that beore you build the rig, you get the scale o the locators right in the rigging tools, this helps to create control shapes and bones in a good size to begin with. Extra control shapes and resized bones
05
Optimizing the rig: The Super Simple
Rig is great but it don’t do all the work by itsel – some minor adjustments must be done beore skinning the model, especially i you use the Bones Pro plugin or it. First o all, there are some control shapes that are hard to select in the viewport, so you may want to scale them a l ittle bit or even create new ones, attaching them to the originals and deleting the old shape inside the Edit Spline modiier. Lastly we need to keep in mind that Bones Pro uses the bones’ size and shape to determine the initial vertex inluence o each one, so go to the Animation tab in 3ds Max and open the ‘Bone Tools’ in order to change the size and add side ins. You can always add extra bones to the rig as well as controllers; all you need to do is link them to the original rig.
06
Skinning the character: The skin
modiier inside 3ds Max is really messy and although you can get really nice results by painting weights, the initial distribution o bone
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inluences is usually very bad. For this reason, I use the Bones Pro plugin, which repla ces the Skin modiier with a much smoother and quicker worklow. I you apply the modiier and assign the bones, you’ll see that the result is almost perect, especially i you adjusted the bones as shown in the previous step. Afer that, you can edit each
bone inluence by the alloff and strength, and i you would like to make some ine adjustments, there is a weight-painting tool as well. You can convert to a standard skin modiier with one click inside the Bones Pro preerences and the skinning will still behave the same way.
CHAPTER 04 | Posing and rendering
Bone influence and settings in Bones Pro
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
07
Posing the character: Now that we
have inished all the hard work, it’s time to put the rig in action. Posing the character with a nice and unctional rig is ofen ver y easy and lets you test many poses, but you need to have in mind some concepts o body mechanics and ollow some composition rules i you want to get a nice result. She is a strong and competent girl that has to ight with some big bugs in her everyday job, so I choose to put her in a conident pose, but still showing that holding all that heavy gear is not an easy task. To make the inal image more interesting, I look at slightly reinorced line o action, but also use some straight lines to help guide the eye towards her. Some things I have to model just or the pose, like the hose connecting the tank and the spray gun.
Planning of the character’s pose
08
Lighting setup: Lighting is something
that can give lie to the image, or kill it. I see a lot o renders o incredible models on the internet, but sometimes they are completely ruined due the act that the lights and exposure are not doing the job. Always think o how you want a surace to behave in the render : or example, a metallic object may look completely bright i you use a light that’s too large or the specular you want. For this character, I use a simple three-point lighting setup, which consists o a key light with slightly sharp shadows, a big and strong backlight to make the character pop in ront o the dark background, and a ill light just to lif the black areas. I always use V-Ray Exposure Control in the Environment tab so that my renders are not dependent on the settings o the physical camera.
09
Render setup: What I love about
V-Ray is deinitely its speed and ability to render nice and smooth images without pushing the hardware too ar. Keep an eye or low relection/reraction samples on the materials and samples in VRayLights. These can add a lot o noise to the render and actually make it slower. You should always have a VraySampleRate element selected so you can monitor where the DMC sampler is having trouble. For primary and secondary GI solutions, I use Irradiance and Light Cache with simple presets, but you can get smooth results with even lower settings. The ‘Embree’ option really speeds up the render with no quality loss, especiall y or hair, but always remember to set your dynamic memory high enough. Lastly, the render elements I use are just some basic ones like relection, reraction, VrayExtraTex with a VRayDirt map or the occlusion, and some masks or easy selection o different parts o the body in Photoshop.
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Three-point lighting and exposure settings
10
Post-production: Render your images
in at least 16-bit TIFF ormat i you want to have good control over color and brightness. I usually do the post-production by using the extra elements to increment my beauty pass.
For this project, I start by adding the ambient occlusion element as a Multiply layer over the beauty pass. This will increase the overall contact area within the image, and cover some light leaks in the model.
CHAPTER 04 | Posing and rendering
V-Ray render settings
Post-production in Photoshop
Afer this, I play with local specular and relection elements to increase and even change the color and intensity o the metallic objects. I add some
adjustment layers to correct some colors and values, like Color Balance, Curves and Levels. You can add some subtle effects like lens dirt and
chromatic aberration, but always take care to not add too much distraction around your subject, the character.
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
The Artist
TOP TIP Super Simple Rig
Roumen Filipov roumenfilipov.com
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You can ind all you need to know about the rig I used in the tutorial at this link. It’s totally ree, and at the bottom o the page you can ind instructions about installation, building the rig and animating with it. You will also need the Pen Attribute Holder modiier rom this link.
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3ds Max character creation
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