Making Of 'The Basketball Player'

Introduction

Continuing on from the last tutorial about unconventional texturing methods, we put these methods to practice within this tutorial. So read on and enjoy.

Lets Start

Here is a standard videogames texture map. Bear in mind to set your map sizes as squares, this makes recall in real-time game engines easier. 1024 x 1024 pixels tend to be used often for characters in games.

Real-time environments without dynamic lighting require real world light simulations. One trick used in the industry is to set up light objects in your scene around your character. This technique is called texture baking, in 3ds Max, you would select render to texture from Rendering menu, other 3D packages have an equivalence.

The Textporter export map above is perfect for precision, you can see exactly where your polygon faces are. For tone, we will ref the baked texture map in the image below

The environmental lights simulations are now embedded in my map. Take a look at some renders of the basketball player with this baked map as texture.

Posed

It is a general rule to depend heavily on reference photo for texturing. To achieve realistic textures, artists harvest real photographs as a base. They paint in a touches and saturate the picture to create a hand painted overall feel. We do not need to do this here. Our baked texture map is actually perfect for cartoon character textures.

As you can see from the posed character baked textures work. Some artists actually simply apply block colours as overlay over the baked map. This is what it would look like.

Block colours in normal layers.

Colours in blended layers.

These layers would still need adjusting and some details are still required even if we intend to use block colours. Nonetheless, let us take a look at what these simply colour applications could look like.

The flat tones over the baked map rendered to scene. I will not use this method for our tutorial, as I want a much richer tone and texture. But this demonstrates how baked textures work.

Note: A novel technique used by some artists is to create a high poly model with all folds and seams modeled. This is similar to normal displacement maps- you might call it a cheaper technique. The scene is then lit and texture baked to a map. I will use this technique to do the number 34 on our player's jersey.

For our Basketball player, I will use the baked texture mainly for reference.

Our metal ball experiment will pay dividend now. We are simply replicating our metal ball methods. I started with the medium colour tone as base. With the use of the selection tool, I mark out darker tone areas (using the baked map as guide).

I use a large airbrush size to gently paint in the area. I tend to use very low brush opacity/pressure settings.

With carefully set wind blur I already have my shape. Sometimes, I shade only one side so I can duplicate the layer>horizontal flip the shift to the other-side. Set wind blur at an angle to simulate the natural shape of the torso. The opacity of the layer is lowered for a subtle touch.

I will now abandon the baked texture for my own little trick learnt from painting comic books for 2000AD. The shape of the underside of the breasts and ribcage selected. This creates a strong torso illusion. In real life, the torso does not do this unless a person lifts up their ribcage. Gently apply wind blur. This time set vertically at 90 degrees.

Remember, I am using the wind blur filter to achieve a level of consistency impossible manual blending.

Do not worry about any apparent artifacts or aliasing right now. This is only the first tone over the base colour.

For the back of the player, repeat the shading process performed on the front.

Now let us do some detail work. Note that though our textures appear simple, attention to minute detail is what will make our textures plausible. Exaggeration is an absolute requirement when texturing for games, the sum total of understated and exaggerated detail creates the whole.

Here, I will pick out folds from the underarm area and create bevels. Remember to set a wind blur angle that corresponds plausibly with natural folds. Attend to detail, gently highlight the parts were two clothes meet and fold.

I proceed to paint a darker shade to cut out breast parts, seam lines and seam tension.

I have painted the blue trimmings in exactly the same way.

Check out those seam lines.

The trick is to subtly suggest the detail. Too much texturing on a flat surface will deliver diminishing returns. That is why some characters in some games look like they have been 'painted on'. Carefully balance suggestion with detail. Preview the texture on the character to determine if your works. Excessive work tends to stretch on the model. An accumulation of overwork will make your work look amateurish.

I have blocked out the base colours for the other parts. Naturally, I should move on to the shorts. Instead, I will do the jersey number, just to keep myself fresh.

How I did the Text

I am aware of two methods. The first is to create text in Photoshop, the second is to create it in a 3D program.

Creating text for our style in Photoshop

Our text would be quite simple, as it is not supported by geometry in our model. With the use of Layer styles we will subtly apply bevel, Embossing and Drop Shadow to imply a raised surface. Too much detail will look wrong without support from geometry.

I make a copy of my text, which now contains graduated tone to simulate lighting (lighter at the top), it is then rasterised. The rasterised copy is turned into an overlay layer, beveled and embossed. Remember to adjust the shadow mode colour.

The rasterised layer is duplicated. A double layer creates an intense/saturated tone.

Select the text and stroke it on a third layer.

Turn the layer into an overlay layer in the blender mode

Then double it. You may need to adjust the colours in the colour adjust menu.

Creating text for our style in 3D

Create your text in 3D, colour the polygons and light the scene (Fig33). Export as a Targa file so that an alpha layer is automatically created. This is for easy masking/selection for pasting into your texture map.

I will choose one later.

Back to his shorts

One of the tricks with masking (and there are several) is to invert a selection. This time I am shading the outside of the mask with a darker shade.

Again I have motion blurred it and drawn nowhither selection to mimic seam tension.

Shade with a large airbrush size accordingly.



I have wind blurred it and reduced the opacity of the layer so that the folds are subtle suggestions rather than hard drawn lines.

Socks

Keeping our lines and tones consistent, clinical yet soft and warm is my aim here. So I have drawn the lines on our sock using stroked lines.

With the use of the Layer style blending options, I have embossed and blurred our lines. There are other screen and normal layers for the other tones.

So far.

Shirt Edges

I pointed out earlier on that attention to detail is the secret of convincing textures. The trick is to make it look simple and uncluttered. Adding an extra dark shade around the edges creates a more 3D feel to the cloth wrapped around our basketball player.

Using the textporter map, select the outer edges of the jersey. Select>modify>contract the selection, shade and blur slightly. Remember to use large airbrush sizes for consistency.

Shoes

You may have noticed that I create folders for my layer sets. It makes it easier to organize those hundreds of layers. You will never have to go searching endlessly for that layer again.

Using the textporter map as my guide, I can create the shoe details. You can see above how making selections then reducing them, inverting them and making another larger inverted selection can create varied masks for painting.

I have used here more or less the same techniques in this tutorial to paint the shoes.

Skin

One of the trickiest elements to paint is skin. I will the baked map as guide for form. It will be useful for detailing the nose, eyes and ears. I do not use photographs for the base, as I want a none-realistic look.

As usually I start with a mid tone base colour. Using the baked map as a guide, I select my eyebrow and shade in. After you have burred it to soften the lines, copy the layer and horizontal flip the layer. Move into position and layer merge with the first eyebrow.

All my tones are done using masks and broad brushes. There are painted on one side, layer copied and flipped. This way, I have exact tones on both sides of the face.

Do not be tempted to add too many highlights, as the face will look made-up with face powder on the model. Tame the tones with motion blur filters at different angles on the on separate layers.

After merging the layers according to groups; mid tones, light tones, dark tones etc. I now add the final highlight. Again, I paint within masks with a large airbrush size.

I gently motion blur my layers adjusting opacity levels to get gentle tones with character. The character comes from using masks and wind blur filters.

I constantly check with my model the results of each stage of my process. Here is the final output. There is a specular map here which accounts for the yellow shine on his face.

Final clean layer

Adding Noise

This texture map is done but a gentle noise filter added to the map will give the map a fluffy warm touch. As usual, I add only a touch, barely visible yet felt. I want to avoid any obvious stretching. Stretch on a skinned and animated character will occur if the noise clearly visible.

Final map with noise



Clean Map & Noise Map

In our close-ups, you will notice no artifacts, hand movements, inconsistencies or harsh lines. Everything is gentle, warm and soft: perfect for caricatures in this style.

Making up my mind about that text

this...

...or that?

Final

Fig. 064

Fig. 064

There are no Photoshop retouchings in these renders.

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