Making Of 'Technomage'

Razoch, a Technomage, in his final glory

Razoch, a Technomage, in his final glory

Pavel explains how he created his Technomage, Razoch

Introduction

Hi! My name is Pavel and some may know me as GoodAtom. I live in Moscow, Russia and I work as a freelancer. In this article I will tell you about my method of creating this character, who was created for a mini challenge on Pre Dominance War V. I will take you through the steps from sketching, to ZBrush and onto Maya, before outlining my final touch-ups in Photoshop.

Sketching

Now I'll tell you more in detail. The sketches I like to draw on paper. It is not so much fun drawing straight into Photoshop. I like to draw my sketches on paper using a matte brown pencil. Before the creation of any character, I draw sketches, and I always start drawing with very small images. It takes about 2 or 3 minutes for one little sketch.

At this stage of drawing I don't pay attention to details and proportions

At this stage of drawing I don't pay attention to details and proportions

I drew the first things that came to mind and then I choose the best idea. In my head, some interesting ideas would have started to arise, at which time I started drawing sketches in bigger size.

The first character was a man with a futuristic helmet on his head and armored like a gladiator. The idea was based on a parallel universe where gladiators were still fighting in the present day. In this universe, it was possible to use the mechanisms functioning on steam or magic.

How a gladiator may look today

How a gladiator may look today

Concept development

The second character was a robot whose helmet looked like a Conquistadors'. His face was closed with the mask of an early 20th Century diver.

A steampunk-style gladiator

A steampunk-style gladiator

I liked both of these ideas a lot and I decided to combine two into one. I found the character developing into a Technomage; a Gladiator, like a Conquistador, and like a diver of the early 20th century with some steampunk robot mixed in.

The character was not bad or good, but it didn't seem right. There was not a man inside the suit - this was an energetic substance, like a ghost. It needed this suit to be able to live in our world and communicate with people and material objects.

When I shared this idea with my best friend, he said that I would never draw it. Together, we laughed at it, but the next day I began to realize my ideas.

I had to hurry as the time was running out. I created my last sketch very quickly. I generated the general concept but the final shape of the character should be formed in 3D.

The final sketch. Now it was ready for the 3D treatment

The final sketch. Now it was ready for the 3D treatment

Modeling

The organizers of the competition had strict rules: the participants could not use a normal bump map for a game model and the model mesh had to be 3000 triangles in poly-count with textures of 1024 x 1024 pixels.

I've worked with old school models and textures for quite a while now, so, for me, a texture of 1024 x 1024 in relation to 3000 polygons seemed disproportionately huge. On this texture, I could draw a huge amount of detail, but the silhouette of the model would look very poor (for robots of course).

I decided not to use the standard rules as all participants of the competition did. I like to by-pass rules and use methods that others do not even think about.

I wanted to go old school, using a model of 3000 triangles without a normal bump map - similar to the next-gen model with a large number of polygons and normal bump. Why did I come up with this approach? It was my personal contest. I tend to complicate tasks, yet still meet the same deadline as all other participants.

3D sketch

So I began the 3D sketch:

- I started with ZSpheres
- I made a base mesh
- I made a sketch of the human body
- I sculpted the basic parts which were drawn in the last sketch

The stages of 3D sketching

The stages of 3D sketching

- I did retopology

After retopology

After retopology

- I did a more detailed sketch in ZBrush
- I made the final retopology and final detail in Maya

Stages of retopology on the details of the leg

Stages of retopology on the details of the leg

The final high polygon model

The final high polygon model

Presented above is the final texture of my Technomage. I used 3 textures; color, specular and alpha. I did not create glow as a separate texture.

I had to do correct topology to burn textures correctly from high-poly to low-poly. I then used xNormal for baking textures. This is a great program! After, I opened my black-and-white texture in Photoshop to paint iron, rubber, and glass. Finally I painted ornaments and added scratches.

This picture shows a grid of the character. I did some parts plane with transparency to save the density of the grid

This picture shows a grid of the character. I did some parts plane with transparency to save the density of the grid

After I applied the texture to the model

After I applied the texture to the model

I made a simple setup of my Technomage and a very simple test animation. I set up the light to see how the character will look in motion.

In this video you can see Technomage in real time in viewport of Maya

The Technomage looking awesome from different angles

The Technomage looking awesome from different angles

Menacing yet majestic, the final image of Pavel's Technomage

Menacing yet majestic, the final image of Pavel's Technomage

You can find more of my works in my blog
I hope this making of was interesting for you!

Related links

http://goodatom.blogspot.com
www.dominancewar.com
www.xnormal.net

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