LogInArtiom Solomein joined us to talk about creating the Homo-Cameleopard project, explaining how he visualized wrinkles and fur using ZBrush and Marmoset Toolbag.
Introduction
Hi! My name is Artiom Solomein. I unofficially list myself as a Character Artist, as it's more in line with what I want to do in the future. I'm 16 years old, and I only plan to enter university next year, so I cannot showcase many working projects yet.
I got interested in 3D graphics exactly 3 years ago. Suddenly, I decided to learn Blender to create different 3D graphics. Then I discovered a great tutorial on making a donut in Blender. This is how it all started. I began consecutively consuming all the Blender tutorials I could find and went through them for a month. After, I started trying to create my first personal projects.
At first, like many self-learners, I took on everything: props, environments, animations, and so on, until I got to the sphere of character creation. Then I realized that I wanted to convey ideas and tell stories through the creation of different creatures, characters, and weirdos. I started sculpting characters in Blender, as I was only familiar with that program. But then some friends advised me to try ZBrush, which turned out to be much more convenient for me in creating characters and navigating with a graphics tablet.
About the Project
Recently, I created my new personal project – The Homo-Cameleopard. I was inspired by the story Four Beasts in One (The Homo-Cameleopard) by Edgar Allan Poe, namely a fascinating fantasy description of the Syrian king Antiochus Epiphanes. For some reason, it created in my head a crazy image of a mutant man trying to hide his ugly giraffe-like nature under the skin of a giraffe, and I immediately wanted to realize it in 3D!
References
To get started, I collected images of giraffes, anthropomorphic animals, and more in a reference board program called PureRef. I needed these images to create my concept of the fictional creature. At first, I wanted to do only the bust but then I realized that the idea would be better revealed if I did his whole ugly giraffe-like body!
Getting Started
When the references are selected, you can begin creating. I opened ZBrush and started with a basic sphere as I always do, pulling shapes with the Move and SnakeHook brushes, and began to pick up the image that was born in my head. First, I sketched a dummy of giraffe's head and then started turning it into a human head, changing the proportions and characteristic features.
At the first stages of work, the Sculptris Pro function can come in useful. It allows me not to fixate on the grid and create details in different places of the model. However, unfortunately, the use of this brush greatly increases the weight of the project file.
After the main body mesh was created, I used the Extract tool to extrude the head and body skin from it. Working on the scalp was not easy, as I had to make it look artificial and give the impression that it was hanging from a "real" head. I achieved this by creating folds with ClothNudge, ClothHook, and the very basic DamStandard fabric brush. Fabric simulation brushes are great for creating draft folds of any organic matter.
Hair
Hair is something I've only recently started to work with. My models used to be bald, partly because it was coincidental and partly because I didn't know how to visualize hair. But ZBrush has a wonderful tool called FiberMesh, which can quickly create a character's hair.
Texturing
In this work, as in many of my recent ones, I used a texturing technique called Polypaint. With this technique, I don't need to go through such technical steps as retopology, UVs, and baking, as they can sometimes seem boring, and I can quickly achieve visualization of my ideas. However, it doesn't allow me to make the high-resolution details I could get using a Normal Map.
I colored this model in ZBrush with basic brushes and alphas and exported it to Marmoset Toolbag for rendering and assigning materials.
I assigned each object as a separate material with its settings. This allows me to achieve flexibility in customizing the final look of the model. For example, on the ear mash, I assigned a material with a higher SSS value than on the scalp. This way, I can illuminate the ears without illuminating the head.
Render
For rendering, as mentioned before, I use Marmoset Toolbag 4. It works very well with highly polygonal models and can handle scenes featuring them. This is what I need because I skipped the retopology step and I'm going to render a scene with 20 million polygons!
The lighting process was the most difficult for me, probably, because of my lack of experience. First, I set up the simplest scheme of three-point lighting. After that, I start moving the sources randomly, based on taste, creating the image I want.
I refined the resulting images in Photoshop, made basic color corrections, added grains, and refined the blur elements to add focus points to the images.
Conclusion
The work took me about 5 days, while the modeling process in ZBrush took me 23 clean hours. It's not my most complex project, but in terms of model details, it surpasses many of my other works. I spent a lot of time working on the details of the jewelry, body, and other things that aren't visible in the final render. I'm trying to improve my diligence and attention to detail, and I think that's what I lack the most when creating a character. As they say, beauty is in the details, and if the details aren't there, then where can the beauty come from?
As I said before, the most difficult stage for me is the lighting, which includes light placement and maintaining the same lighting at different camera angles. I have not yet developed my lighting tactics, which is probably the skill that professional artists have, so I am striving for it.
I want to tell beginner character artists that the most important thing that defines the entire creative process is practice. You need to practice a lot to improve your skills. Each new finished project will bring you closer to mastery. It is important that you complete the projects you start. Don't put them off halfway through the result. I've noticed the frustration of people who often abandon projects halfway through because they don't see the result of their learning in front of their eyes. The lack of finished projects doesn't allow for a comparison of past and present skills, so it feels like you're just stuck.
Thank you very much for reading this article! I hope it was interesting and maybe even helpful in some way! You can find me and my work on ArtStation and Instagram.