(EDIT (25 Feb): updated lip sync anim file has been uploaded& decreased size. It now takes the body language into account, so I would like to have the gurus feedback. A fully rendered version, it is 4MB zipped and 13 sec long. See my thread update of today on p.3 for details.)
I’ve had this model in the WIP forum for a while, so I thought I’ll now “lead it like a lamb to the slaughter” on Focused Critique.
IMPORTANT to note is that I am not trying to model for the sake of a “perfect model”, but rather a caricature that I want to use in an animation. (It is actually already a bit more realistic than I planned on the outset.)
The hair has been a bit of a mission and there are already ±50 or 60 curve guides for the head’s hair. Due to the beard (normal of the particles), I had to drop the eyebrows’ curve guides for “wind”.
(BTW, the thin blue line between the hair and other objects is a Blender rendering artifact.)
first of all, this is brilliant. You nailed the expression, especially on the mouth.
As for crits, underneath the chin the hairs seem to be glowing, I think this might be because of rendering layers or something like that, I’m not too good with hair. Also the bandana beneath the lower ear (and the lower ear itself) seem to have the same problem.
Great stuff! I know you’re going for a caricature look, but have you had a look at any of the sss/skin shading posts? Not to make him ‘hyper-real’ or anything, but with all the effort you’ve already put in, it might just make him a little more natural looking.
I like it. One part that could be improved is the nose. Right now it doesn’t “integrate” very well with the rest of the face. And I agree about the skin - you really need to work on it.
Alex_G: The “glow” around the chin is just the angle at which the light is striking his beard - and the camera is picking up the reflection.
BenDansie: I spent some time on the fake SSS: it seems the it works fine on its own, but it does not seem to “gel” very well with the other 7 textures I have on him his skin ends up with funny artifacts. I tried to fix it, but then I have to downgrade e.g. the normal maps, which lets him look worse. So, I’ll have to give it a skip this time round. I think the fake SSS is fine for something that does not have other colour and normal textures…
Bugman: I hope to have at least a few shape keys with lip sync soon…
cipix: I’m not sure what you mean by ‘it doesn’t “integrate” very well with the rest of the face’… can you explain some more? I attached two other images to give you some other views on him. Do you perhaps mean the expression around his nose/cheeks?
I know how to get SSS to work. Set the SSS materials to be exclusively lit by the SSS lamps, by using the ‘GR:’ text box and the accompanying ‘exclusive’ button in the shaders tab of the materials button set. Actually, if there is no ‘exclusive’ button, you should probably try one of the CVS builds or an RC, I know for a fact it’s in there.
IanC, I think yo hit the nail on the head: his nose was too good to be true. So, I did a bit of a nose job on him: broadened and slightly skewed it. Re the eyelid: I did it on purpose, because he has these kind of “hanging” eyelids according to the pics I have of him. I actually slightly accentuated it for the caricature.
Here is his nose now:
EDIT: OOPS, I loaded the wrong pic above (actually tried to save the “previous” render [J-KEY ] in render view, but it still saved the last render…). Here’s the correct one:
BlackBoe, Thanks I for the input, but I do not think it will help, as I tested the SSS with only three lamps, all of which were correctly set up (together with the material) - and they gave me problems in conjunction with certain textures on the skin material that I was trying to do SSS on. It worked fine if I switched off some of the textures, so it would mean a trade-off between what I want to lose on the textures in order to gain on SSS. With the amount of time I’ve already spent on this guy, I opted to leave the textures as-is and skip SSS for now. I’ll have to get back to it at some later stage.
Re the eyelid: I did it on purpose, because he has these kind of “hanging” eyelids according to the pics I have of him. I actually slightly accentuated it for the caricature.
Fair enough, it’s true about that. Personally I think if he’s being beaten you would expect under the eyes to bulge (like his right eye), but the caricature is more important than this, so go with it. I’d still raise it slighty, only because it really sticks out, it’s the first thing my eye is drawn to.
Phew, after doing the shape keys to do the facial animation, I tried to join the face to the body… and forgot that you can’t do it! So, I had to join them and re-do the shape keys. It took me 3 days the first time round, and about 2 days the second time.
I did keys for all major sound phonemes, as well as for an angry and friendly (smiley) emotion. Attached are static renders of the latter (the emotions are slightly exaggerated):
The Windows Media Player version is here - 288KB. Note that if you play this one in VLC, the aspect ratio is out.
I did find that the .avi is viewable in VLC but in mine it is accompanied by slight noise at the bottom. It plays fine in Windows Media Player.
The animation and model is great, looks just like him. The only thing is the first time he blinks, his eyes dont completely shut, unless you were making him squint and not blink
I think the model/texture and the shape keys are really great, man. Congrats on that! =D
My only crits would go to the animation.
His lipsync is good. No crits on that. Probably is the best part of the animation; =D
His arm moves in a too linear way, you can tweak this to get a more natural flow;
I think you can move a bit his torso. As his arm moves, the whole body moves a bit, specially the part where it’s attached; =D
His fingers all move on the same time, reinforcing the linear feel of his arm movement;
As Nivek said, the first blink needs some work. Maybe he can also blink faster. (the time to open his eyes usually should take a bit more than the time to close them);
Also about his eyes, try to make them not move in a too linear and slow way. Our eyes usually moves very fast and stops repeatedly;
He moves only the inner part of his eyebrows. I think when he moves his eyebrows, they should move entirely, even if the focus is on the inner parts.
Another thing that I think you should do is add a force field near his neck/shoulder to avoid his hair to pass through his body, but this is a minor check for a later stage.
About the render times, I suggest you to take GL previews to speed up your workflow. All those particles should take a while to render. Since you can get your modeling/texturing/lighting feedback from stills, it’s fine to upload a GL preview movie of the animation to get critics on the movements/acting. It took a while to me to figure that feature out: on the 3D window header, hold Ctrl and click on the last icon.
Good work you have. Looking forward to see updates! =D
