Heres a face i’ve been working on it was in the w.i.p forum but i moved it here . Its stylised and i am tryin to go for a ww2 soldier look although i just want to get the basic head down before i start adding cuts etc…
C&C please. It would be a great help such as which bits need changing and such, although i’m not going for complete realism i want something that is going to please the viewers eye.
Thanks
Reaper
Is there any kind of concept drawing you could post with this to give us an idea exactly what it is you’re going for. By saying you’re going for a stylized look, I (and I imagine others) have a hard time giving suggestions because I can’t point you in any specific direction.
It looks sort of like Gollum from LOTR especially with the eyes. His proportions are out of wack unless the camera angle is just making it look that way. His nose looks like it could use some refining and his mouth appears to be too wide. The mouth should end at the halfway point of each eye.
I’m guessing i shouldn’t take that as a compliment as that is not how its meant to be. Yeh i need to change the eyes and thanks for pointing out the lips i will edit them i can’t quite put my finger on whats wrong with the nose, any guidence on that would be appreciated.
Thanks
Reaper
The nasal septum (bridge between the two nasal holes) is too thin. Could you post wires?
So we know he’s male, under 30 and probably white, unless your talking about a Japanese WWII soldier, in which case he’s probably Japanese. Not a whole lot to go on. WWII soldiers really look a lot like Punic war soldiers or Desert Storm soldiers, except for the haircuts and the uniforms. ReaperX: you’ve obviously got some “look” in mind. If you want realistic, go for a 20 something male, then stick him in a WWII uniform. If you want stylized, give us a sketch, a concept drawing, something, anything… to help us help you. What are you looking for in the finished product. Remember, we’re artists, ie: visual people. Give us something to look at.
Thanks for the replies i have just worked on it now its getting late though so this will be it for the night.
I was pretty amazing i rotated the tip of the nose down and its changed the look a lot. I also worked on the scalings they are still a bit off and the lips are still giving me stick so any help would be appreciated on them. He’s also starting to look a bit to old which i think are from the facial lines so i will soften them up a lot and change the eyes a little more to give him a younger look. But overall i think its got better. What do you think?
I will post a doodle i did of a little thing it was incomplete but i will need to do more soon for the other people who will probably be used. But i don’t want to let onto the animation idea just yet :p. I will also post a wire but i have way to many verts for a face i don’t know how you guys keep your counts so low and still get amazing faces, ohwell something else to work towards i guess you get better with practice right?
Thanks
Reaper
Ok heres an update i re-worked the whole face becuase i didn’t like it i altered parts and completely re-did the mouth from scratch
Tell me what you think. do You think it would pass for a soldier ?
And heres a wire :o i’m not a very clean modeller.
Thanks
C&C welcome
Reaper
P.S i will try and get some concepts up on here soon
The reworked face is actually a very big improvement. I think you’re going to run into a problem of contradictions here because you’re trying to make this stylized face with the large eyes and unusual proportions, but large eyes are generally seen as a sign of innocence and harmlessness. Neither of those two qualities are generally attributed to anything having to do with war.
Maybe if the rest of the head keeps with the proportions of the top half of the current model then it will look a little bit darker. I’m assuming that’s what you’re going for at least.
-Anthony
I think i will make the eyes smaller becuase of the innocence etc. As this clip i’m working on will try to show the horrors of war.
I always have that problem , when i make a head i always make the eyes to large i don’t know why that is maybe from years of watching cartoons when i was younger.
Thanks for pointing that out Veach
Reaper
You put in your original post that you’re going for “complete realism”- you’re nowhere near that. If that’s what you still want, you need reference photos. No one can get “complete realism” without reference. I’m not saying that what you are doing is bad, or that I don’t like it- just that you’ll never get where you apparently want to go without reference.
Having said that- I quite like the stylized way this is turning out so far. I think this will work much better if you keep it stylized. The over large eyes denoting innocence on a soldier is a great contrast, and can make for quite a powerful image. It’s still way too early to tell, but I think you’re off to a good start in that direction.
As for your wondering why you naturally make the eyes too large for the head- it’s most likely due to something called “heroic proportion”. Heroic proportion is an art term that mostly means making the most important character in a piece of artwork unnaturally larger than the rest. It also applies on a lesser scale, where the artist over-scales a particular body part or something in order to emphasize it. So, if a character has unusually large legs, it might mean that they are or have walked a lot or something of that nature. This form of heroic proportion is something that naturally occurs with artists. Sometimes it’s intentional, but usually we just put more time and focus on what we deem important in a piece, and we sort of ‘zoom in’ on it in our mind, and naturally make it bigger. Obviously the eyes are very important to you, so you naturally emphasize them. It’s not a bad thing, but it might help to know why this happens if you want to prevent it- which would be necessary if you want to work on “complete realism”.
I think you misread the original post, Hewer.
You’re right- my mistake. Sorry.
Thanks for that hewer you have enlightened me. No problem about the mis reading. Anyway heres an update:
I’ve closed the head finally on a second attempt at that and added the start of a neck that is a bit basic.
Might do a render with bigger eyes later on to see what it looks like.
Thanks
Reaper
Yeah, Veach, the big eyes denote innocence, but that might work really well in illustrating the horrors of war. Nobody was BORN a soldier. So, ReaperX, we get a bit more info: its going to be animated. You need to seriously rework all the loops around the eyes and mouth. Most of the expressions your soldier boy will take on will involve those two features. The nose, which you seem overly concerned about, simply provides an anchor for the eyes and mouth. Check out TorQ’s A Better Face Tutorial in the Basics and Interface forum (fastest way to get there is probably to google TorQ Face Tutorial) and check out how he does the face loops for animation. Are the images you’re posting perspective or orthagonal? Most here prefer to see orthagonal, makes it easier to critique proportions and such. Also, this is the focused critique forum. You’re posting here because you want to improve. You know you need to improve your modeling skills, so post the wires. If you want to animate this face, having the vertices connected properly is vital, but if we don’t see the wires, we can’t offer any advice on how to do it so you don’t have to throw it all out and start over later (which seems likely, given the state of the loops in the only wire view you’ve posted so far.) Your assignment for this forum: front and side orthagonal wire views. Hup two, soldier! Post.
roger that!
Heres a wire
And heres an orthographic.
I’ll also take a look at that tutorial in the morning.
Thanks for your help
Reaper
First of all sorry dor the double post.
I don’t see much difference in my mesh / loops to torqs but then again i’m not really that good at modelling cleanly so can you help me and tell me the bits which need changing. Or if you wish you can draw on my pictures to show me.
This would be a great help because i need to be shown where its wrong so i can improve. Then when i make a human again i can implelement the skills i learnt from this one into that one and get it right first time.
Thanks
Reaper
Quads seem to animate best, and they move along their own edges. When we talk about loops, we mean a series of connected up quads. You generally want these loops to follow the muscles that provide expression: the muscles surrounding the eyes, and the muscles surrounding the mouth, and to a certain extent, the muscles above the eyes that control the forehead and eyebrows. And by surrounding, I don’t mean merely near the mouth, I mean going around the mouth. The lower side of the upper lip and the upper side of the lower lip should be a series of connected up quads. With the mouth closed, these quads will be practically laying on top of one another. The first thumbnail shows some loops approximately where the TorQ tute recommends. The second thumbnail shows some of the loops you’ve got. The red dots are called poles: spots in the mesh where three or five edges join. These generally play havok with edge loops, but are sometimes unavoidable: the spot where the loops around the eye diverges from the loop around the mouth (they have a common edge out to somewhere on the cheek) will generally be a pole. But avoid them if possible. The red faces are triangles. Many animators avoid these entirely. Blender has a select tri function in the select menu to help you find them. Pair up two tris and reorient the edges to turn them into quads, or just delete them by merging two of the vertices (which generally creates a new tri, which you delete the same way, until you get to an edge.) The third picture is a way to get from where you are to where you want to be. Delete the vertices marked in red. Just delete them. Then rebuild quads (select four vertices and Fkey to make a new face) as shown. Then pick out the extra vertices closer to the mouth, delete them, and rebuild a loop a bit closer to the lips. Or, you could start at the mouth and work outwards. (You were wondering how to get great looking low poly faces? Here’s how! Get rid of the extra polys.) Upper lip and lower lip: loop. Space between upper lip and nose, and lower lip and chin: loop. Nostril to chin back to opposite nostril: loop. Middle of nose down cheek to underside of chin (beneath the point, not under the jaw) back up the other cheek to the nose again: loop. That same loop splits off at the cheek and goes upward around the eye socket and back to the nose (there’s your allowable pole.) Then you’ve got straps of muscle running from the cheekbone to the jaw on the side of the face. Couple of tips-- first: work on a copy of your mesh, you might get lost the first time through. second: Let Blender help you see the loops. The loop cut tool Control-R will mark loops going through whatever edge the cursor in near. Play around with it to find out where Blender thinks the loops are. Escape will turn it off without actually cutting any new edges, or Control-Z will undo an accidental cut. Hope this helps.
that’s pictures two and three above. Picture one somehow didn’t make it. Shown below. BTW, how do you guys get line breaks into your posts? I put white space in the edit window, but when it posts, it’s just show us as a big block of text. Those little boxed quotes would be nice, too. Is there someplace where this is all explained?
Thanks orninoco i tryed my best at changing the loops but it messed up my model so much i changed it dramatically into maybe another character.
heres the wire:
I know the eyes are to far apart but do you think its salvagable? i spent like 3 hours working on it kinda a waste really.
However i did have a backup so i’ve stuck with it and hopefully i can make it work. Heres an update with the start of a helmet the straps are only there temporarily i will change them add detail etc.
Thanks
Reaper
