This is my first proper attempt at a hand. Any advice on how I can improve this would be appreciated. Was thinking that the joints need a bit of work, but I’m not sure as to show I should implement that.
Attachments
hand2.blend (513 KB)
hand2.blend (513 KB)
the fingers should be larger imo, except for maybe the pinky
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Just for a still image at the moment, may try animation later.
It’s pretty good for a first try, though I think you have some fundamental things you could improve on (for instance, your knuckles are too far back). You should watch this tutorial on modeling a human hand. It walks you through constructing the basic topology correctly so that the hand looks natural.
Keep it up! There are a lot of forms in the human hand that are hard to make without just the right topology.
your main problems are: the index finger beeing smaller than the ring finger, should be the other way round, altho they are almost the same size. the knuckles have been mentioned. the thumb is rotated way too much… it shouldn’t be turned 90degrees to the side compared to the other fingers… rather just 45° people often treat the thumb as a slightly bigger finger that sticks out one side of the hand, when in fact its base is so big that it makes up about 1/4th of the whole palm… its the meatiest part of the hand with the biggest muscle mass. using iwarp is not really good enough to show you how its sposed to look… since i can’t easily rotate the finger to get a more natural pose… but still my gif should help you a bit
@MoredDread - I would agree with you on all of your advice, but I would add that there are critical elements of the topology that prevent this model from being more realistic. It’s much more than just the shape. The mesh simply doesn’t have the correct edge flows for a proper hand, nor the required mesh density, and no amount of tweaking the volumes will fix those fundamental issues…
@Ashley S - As much work as this took, it would be better off left as is and tallied up as a learning experience. I would also point out that all hands are different, and the person modeling the hand should use their own as a reference, as they will be most familiar with it. From here, learning about edge flows and proportions will serve you best. Practice your modeling all you can, learn the proper methods for adding detail so that your forms look realistic and your edge flows are well suited for animating. You’re off to a great start, but it’s very hard to learn how to model properly. Keep up the hard work!
Edit: I would also reiterate - check out the hand tutorial over at blendercookie.com. Here’s the link again: http://www.blendercookie.com/2009/10/03/modeling-a-human-hand/
Edit, edit: Strike that link, the video isn’t there. Try this one: http://vimeo.com/6866079
Since the advent of the retopo tool, I have changed my approach to modeling certain things. It involves making a ‘form’ out of multiple objects, and then using the retopo tool to extrude a new mesh, with optimized topology, over the form. I recently made a hand this way, and it worked very well. I would highly recommend learning to use the retopo tool, and trying this approach. It is much faster, for many things, and allows you to focus on the topology without having to constanly orient yourself in 3D space.