Project Pitch & Formulation of Ideas

Pitching my proposal was a valuable insight into the way my project looks from the outside. My pitch itself was rather basic, just outlining the points on which i wish to focus and allowing me to elaborate on those points that were picked up, whether that may be in relation to the credits it may be worth or fine tuning my progression route through the work.

My pitch came across well with little interaction, only really highlighting the point that i have chosen to do a large amount of work that i may have trouble completing. As i realised this when putting the brief together, i was not at all surprised that this came up. Justifying it with sound reasoning in that the whole process is one that feels complete. Having this initial 2D stage, then progressing through to 2D does not only allow for progression of my skills, but allows for a full product to be3 produced. I believe this in itself constitutes a high credit project and with my determination to work through this project as much as possible whilst achieving all i can, i welcome the challenge. I think it will push me to the limit of my creativity and allow me to explore new avenues of design.

Formulation of Ideas

As with my initial proposal, i already began with ideas of things i wanted to include; The Environment itself being slightly medieval with a heavy grounding in fantasy. Being greatly inspired by Lord of the Rings i think including some of the stylised elements from there will benefit my project.

With my project broken up into the sections i previously mentioned, i feel my best course of action is to first concept my ideas. Knowing that my style is that of fantasy and my environment work potentially taking heavily from this, i thought it best to begin on my character concepts. Now, of all the concept work i have done, character work has always been a weak point for me. For this reason, i wanted to include it in this project. Not only will it test me creatively, but allow me to progress in an area i currently find i lack in. 

Beginning the concepting stage of characters lead to a new way of thinking. As with my previous environmental concepts i can place general shapes in certain areas and extrude them with light later on to make them realistic, with characters i realised the shapes that make them up are very specific. This in itself tripped me up as i'm very heavy handed when it comes to drawing, using lots and lots of lines to define a shape rather than doing it until it is finessed. With this, i sought out to learn the ways to create an anatomically correct face from all angles as i knew that moving to 3D would not only require me to have a front view, but also a clean side view.

I began to work on the basics of faces uses reference images to create an anatomically correct face.

Although none of them came out too well it gave me a base idea of this diagonal side profile view that i may need wen creating 3D models. The frustrating thing i came across quite quickly was consistency. It seems as though i could get the faces to look consistently similar. With my time frame as it was, i wanted to establish my character base quickly so i could begin to work on the more complex parts of the design. Still, i continued to develop my facial geometry in order to give me a foundation to work from. The more i worked the easier it became to add more detail to the faces, allowing me more of a clearer idea of the types of things i could create.

Continuing with facial anatomy i began to add more detail, allowing for the introduction of hair, contours of the neck and face and a new view altogether, this time allowing for the front to be seen. Through development of the faces and working through different processes i began to realise the only faces i could create were those that seemed very thin. Although i was now adding more detail to these structures i felt my knowledge of them would not allow me to further explore different face shapes, and through development; different types of characters altogether.

Pushing further into these creations i thought it best to try and stick to something that could not be too easily linked to the human anatomy. With this, i decided the best avenue for me to go would be some kind of creature. Namely a troll. This would allow me through progression to add a rather large body, helping to cover up any deformities with simple justification in battle scarring and allow for me to utilise tutorials that included anatomy creation but also adjust it to fit my need.

With this idea established, i began again to try and work on a "hero" character, at this time hoping to work on two separate characters, one hero and one villainous. Though my progression of anatomy had not been swift, i had managed to establish a consistent, basic face shape. This lead me to reference games such as Destiny. In this, the heroes are always covered in some kind of mechanical suit. I believe that having this basic structure underneath would allow for the creation of some kind of helmet.

Through sketches i began to create a structure i became happy with. Outlining the creation with pen and removing construction lines, this in itself gave a very geometric face shape that could be used if need be, but again the only real problem was that of consistency thorough orthographic views. From the side rotation to the front it became more and more difficult to match the two up. Although this character concepting is necessary, i think perhaps there may be another way of doing it.

I began to look for tutorials in the softwares i would be using, specifically Zbrush, Maya and Unity. Downloading all i could, i took a quick look a few of them starting with ones looking at ZBrush. In the assumption that Zbrush was the only way i would be able to model characters, this was the avenue i took. Following a short tutorial showing the basics and then proceeding to try and create something myself. With this short stint, Zbrush promptly crashed and left me without any concept to work from and no idea of where to begin.

In the downloaded files i found a set of videos called "Creating a Medieval Character using Maya and ZBrush" Watching a few of these tutorials i began to see that ZBrush could be used as a refinement of blocked shapes created as objects in other software. Modelling slightly differently in Maya, using points and edges as reference instead of brushing polygons, the video ran through many of the things i would need to begin my creations. Some of which i did not quite understand, especially the interface and the way in which certain objects interact with one another. Although this tutorial should end up being the one i use to base my own creation on, i think the most important thing at this point is to learn the basics of Maya, as i did with ZBrush, and allow me to create something a little more intricate, with a little more effort, both allowing me to learn software that i otherwise would not have known, and helping me fuse these two things together.

My original schedule lead me to spend a week on each of my initial sections, but now factoring in these new Maya tutorials i may have to extend my time on the character modelling an find it from somewhere else. Although this scheduling conflict is an issue, as my intention was to use Maya for the Environmental assets anyway, i feel more confident i can still make everything fit into my time frame.

With this, my next task is to begin "An Introduction Into Maya 2015"