The Phantom (Superhero)

My final model for the quarter, it's been a wild ride at school this go around. I decided to model the phantom for 2 reasons. I really like the hero(personality and abilities + purple suit). the second reason was because I wanted to see how much I have improved over the years, as I have modeled the phantom once before. (see here) I initially started out sculpting the initial parts of the body with spheres, but for some reason i couldn't get anything going so I started with a base mesh.

I found a base mesh I had modeled in 3dsmax before I had started using zbrush and decided to go with that. I was pressed for time, so I use zremesher for retopology except for the head which was done in Topogun(Time did not permit me to do 100% manual retopo). My biggest regret as parts of the mesh do not necessarily match up. I have since learned a better workflow I will implement for my next character.

I did quick unwraping in zbrush, but brought them into 3dsmax and made sure ALL the subtools used one UV space. Lots of goZ back and forth.

Once that was done I polypainted in zbrush:

Yay progress:

"Beast" creature concept

Another model that was done this quarter. (Wrapped up completion about a few days ago) The initial design of this creature was intended to be more of a carnivorous herbivore (yes, you read correctly) but as time went on it really started to bother me, so I ended up starting over, a decision I do not regret.

Final render, composited in Photoshop:

For this creature I decided to start with Zspheres:

I used ZRemesher and some guides  to generate a loy poly mesh, then reprojected the details, finished the sculpt and polypainted the model.

Quick posing was done using Zbrushes transpose master:

"Mantis"

Another model I did for school this quarter. I started out modeling different parts of the body out of various primitive objects(spheres and cylinders).

Final image:

I decided to use Zremesher for retopology. I have been relying heavily on if for recent projects. personally I prefer manual retopology using topogun. In this model the head was retopologized in topogun, then I brought it all together in 3dsmax.

Ankylosaurus

Another dinosaur, and many more to come. If you watch the time lapse video you'll notice I had a rough start with the head, so I eventually started it over. As far as the number of toes on its limbs are concerned scientists are still unsure how many they had(Wikipedia). I decided to stick with four.

Process:
The process was similar to what I've done in the pas., Mostly starting with spheres for separated parts of the body,with the exception of using Zspheres for the limbs.

"Joey's Alien"

This project presented a unique challenge for me. This is the first of 6 models I have to complete this quarter (That's six in 10 weeks). I was doing this for a friend of mine at school +Joseph Frederick (http://www.foejred.com/) He provided me with the brief story of the alien and his game and I took it from there. I started with zspheres to quickly come up with a base mesh. You'll notice that the zphere mesh has no head. This is because i sculpted several different heads to show my friend Joey for approval.

 I modeled about 11 different heads, but it came down to two, and Joey wanted a hybrid between the 2.

Once the new hybrid head was approved (above middle) I went on to finish the sculpt.

I modeled a little scene for the character. Posing was done using the Zbrush transpose master:

You may have noticed his nut sack shrunk greatly, thank +Joseph Frederick  for that :P

Purple Alien

This was more of a quick sketch. The entire modeling and texturing process was done in a single day. With some Photoshop composting done the following day. This guy (or gal?) is somewhat enigmatic. I thought it to be "funny" looking, but at the same time you can't be so sure if this thing is a threat to humans. i wasn't too sure about the color of the eyes. initially they were blue, but in the final result I ended up going with green.

"horned rex"

The first model for the new semester that began about 3 weeks ago. The decision behind this model was purely nostalgic, as it was one of my earliest organic models I made. The initial mesh had lots of anatomical errors, so I used GOZ constantly to go between 3dsmax ans Zbrush to fix the problems.

"Moray"

Well, the final project of the quarter(for one of my classes at least). The original design of this guy was much slimmer and was more of a sprinter who could run down his prey. The design was not very functional, so I decided to start over and ended up with this. I began sculpting the individual pieces of this guy, that seems to work out for me sometimes even more so that generating a mesh from Zspheres. Eventually I merge all the necessary pieces together before using dynamesh.

Retopology was fun to say the least. I believe this was my first asymmetrical model. I started out in topogun with the head, torso and up to around the elbows. I then applied symmetry and asymmetrically retopologized the human arm. The eel hand was a quick remesh in Zbrush. Finally, I merged both OBJs in 3dsmax before sending it back to Zbrush to reproject details and finish out the sculpt. To be honest I'm not sure why I went with another moray eel centric design, must have been the look one of the eels gave me at the aquarium, stuck with me.

Retopology(Topogun)

Polypaint process:

That look...