Character creation
The fusion of Blender and Zbrush in our model creation process — From the initial blockout phase igniting creativity to sculpting intricate details, witness our journey of crafting lifelike characters. Experience the artistry of shaping emotions and animating our creations, resulting in a seamless and captivating final outcome.
Date : 09 Mar 2024
Blockout phase
At this point I started mapping out the general forms of the character. And modeled them in blender with basic shapes and modifiers to get the feel of the character.
I marked the face of the characters where the mouth would be placed, so that I can easily sculpt it over in Zbrush.
Sculpting
After blocking out I took the mesh into zbrush and started sculpting the model after joining everything.
I sculpted until I was satisfied that my sculpt and proportions resembles the reference.
Retopology
spent some time Zremeshing the character to get the desired look. But eventually decided to retopo the character based on the sculpt. So I took the sculpted mesh back into the Blender and started retopology.
Shape keys
For shape keys, I took the retopologized model back to Zbrush and started sculpting faces for each emotion until the desired result was achieved. Then I took each sculpted model to blender and created a shape key for that emotion.
Rigging
After getting all the shape keys I started with the basic rig for the character. I tweaked weights, bones to get the desired result.
Presentation
After rigging everything seemed to be perfect. So I stared with basic 3 point lightings and camera to start capturing the best of the character.
Animations
After l was satisfied with lightings and camera, I started animating the character, which was pretty easy. I had to tweak some weights around to get the best result.
I created simple walk and idle animations in loop for the character.
At this point Everything was ready but I had forgotten that I had placed materials for the character and I needed to optimize them. So I went into adobe illustrator and created a simple palette. So that I could only use one material for character.
Model Testing
After the I was satisfied I took the character into unity to test out the blendshapes and animations which worked perfectly fine. I also exported a .glb file so it could be viewed easily.
Time
Time total spent on this character was 2 and a half days. I started on Monday. I couldn’t work before as I was busy with my friend’s wedding.
Result
