Studies.

This is today's batch of studies that I have drawn based on the sculptures of Michael Angelo and other artists. I very much enjoy studying bodies, proportions and different muscle groups. I think that the more I do it the more I improve in drawing. I chose sculptures because these exaggerate muscles and show the bodies in a very athletic state, which makes easier for me to study muscles. With these studies I started quite slow. I wasn't very sure where to start, I tried to follow some sort of system, simplifying the shapes, but I found that when I slowly build up the body it works the best for me. Putting these side to side I can already tell the difference and the improvement in my understanding and the muscle flow.

New York rooftops conclusion.

With the project now being finished I wanted to have a little talk about how it was to work on it.
To begin with, I want to talk about the task itself. I quite enjoyed working on the New York rooftops. I myself always wanted to visit New York and it was a great opportunity for me to have a crack at recreating some of the aspects of this beautiful city. While our level does not quite resemble New York's architecture, I think we captured everything that New York has to offer. From the start we aimed to have a mix of science-fiction and modern architecture, and we always based our work around Blade Runner which very effectively shown future of New York, but did not go over the top with the visual effects.
As far as the team work goes, I had a pleasure working with very talented people. My producer, Stefan, has proven to be a great leader and an amazing Maya Modeler. His work have always inspired me to go beyond my skill level in texturing and concept working. Chris, our scripted and person responsible for Unity project, have been an amazing person to work with. He has a great knowledge and has always been helpful to me when I was stuck during my work. Unfortunately we had two people in our group, Amber and Henry, who have done nothing to contribute to our project. Due to their lack of engagement with the assessment we have been at disadvantage from the start. It was quite intense to work on the whole level in a group consisting of three people, where some groups went up to even six. Fortunately we have managed to do everything on time without their involvement and have came up with an amazing work that I think everyone will like.
With this project being finished I am really looking forward to producing something new in the second part of the year. I hope that I will be able to stay with my teammates as they proven to be a hard working crew.

Ladders!

I was wrong saying that I was done with the texturing. Due to a upcoming deadline we have forgot about ladders. With these ones we wanted to achieve a dirty look. Since they're always displayed to the weather conditions they are covered in rust and dirt. I think they will fit perfectly whether they will go on the sci-fi section of the buildings or on the living units.

Housing units - props

With all the housing units finished I have started to texture assets that have been supplied by my producer. At this point I am feeling very confident with the task since I have discovered the "cgtextures", an amazing website full of photo textures that I can use in my work.
I quite enjoyed working on these more than on science - fiction stuff. I prefer to work with realistic textures. I feel that I can achieve more with the looks, but also it is easier to identify objects for the audience and make them understand better what it is representing.

Each of those objects have a subtle bump map. I did not want to go over the top with the maps so I applied a very gentle wash just to make bumps noticeable. With the project heading towards it's final steps this is probably the last batch of texturing I am going to produce for the New York Rooftops. I quite enjoyed working on every aspect of the project and I am looking forward to share the in-game screenshots here on the blog. 

World building - Studies

With the character design I am also producing human studies both in 2D and 3D. Personally I think it's the most important thing to have the understanding of body proportions, anatomy and muscle flow. With that in mind, I know that I am capable of producing a solid character, that is both readable to the audience and has all human features even though they might be exaggerated. As I mentioned before I don't only draw studies I also use 3D software such as zbrush to sculpt and do get a better understanding of how body works in 3D space. This was suggested to me by one of the graduates that told me of the benefits of learning software such as zbrush. I tend to lock myself within the profile view of the character. I think this is caused by two things. Firstly, I think I am the most confident drawing character from side view, and secondly I think it is due to the lack of visual library in my head which could help me to recreate poses that I've seen before. With that in mind I am hard at work in expanding my visual library as well as trying to push myself towards more dynamic poses that could benefit my future characters.

I was also advised to study bodybuilders. Since my character is a big guy I decided to look into a character of Conan played by Arnold Schwarzenegger. At his times he was a competitive bodybuilder and I thought that both his body and the role he was playing would be beneficial towards understanding the anatomy of non-average person.

With this one I did not really follow any reference. I wanted to see if I was able to recreate a male torso from a top of my head. I am quite satisfied with the outcome even though some proportions aren't correct. 

I don't consider this to be a study. This was more of an experiment. I wanted to quickly sketch out my character using zbrush and see how it could look from different angles. This was quite an early stage of the character design, the helmet is different now as well as some of the proportions have been adjusted in the sketch attached in previous blog post. 

This might sound weird but I quite like studying things. I feel like when I do it I benefit from acquired knowledge. I can see a difference if I was to create drawing from top of my head, and if I was to study it before hand and then recreate it. I think this is because I have a better understanding of the object and I am more confident when it comes to reproducing it. 

The Fallen - New design.

With some free time on my hands I decided to look for new inspirations and  references. I thought of different ways in which I could improve my character and find some new ideas. I immediately thought of Diablo franchise. The brutality of the game combined with the dark and gloomy feel quickly become a new source of influences. One thing in particular has caught my attention, the Barbarian class.

He is eveything that I wanted my character to look like. A big, brutal and wild character full of 

spikes, heavy armor and massive weapons. With this in mind I have redrawn my character giving him some new features and armor elements. I really like the new design, it really pushes the tanky nature of the Fallen and makes him appear more brutal and strong.

As of now I am happy with the design, but I am still looking forward on expanding the character. My next step is to give him some sort of weapon. I know that I have drawn him with a sword but right now I am considering changing the idea. 

The Fallen - ideas, variations, finalizing design

I am still trying to keep my things rough and open. I have been exploring different ideas regarding my character design and I feel like I'm getting closer to the finish line. At this point I still need to work on few things, such as final pose, fine details and perhaps consider the setting in which I will place my character.
In very early stages of creating my character I have drawn few helmet variations that could perhaps be placed upon the head of the Fallen. While many designs do not work with the nature of the character I am still glad that I tried this out. The funny thing is, all of these designs didn't get to the final stage. One day I was sketching my character and the idea of pointy tall helmet came up and I stayed with it since.

    

While I don't think this is the best I could draw I quite like the idea of this concept. I'd love to have my character a lot bulkier, and looking more aggressive. Right now in this sketch he looks to much human. His personality has to be reflected in his armor, choice of weapons and body size.

This idea is definitely what I like. Big muscles, massive belt made of skull and a small head. Gloves also add a lot of size and aggression to the character and definitely fills up the gap in the armor set.
As of weapon I am still considering different types. As of late I really like to look at him holding two handed axes, hallberds and spears.