WIP-Night Elf [Nudity] Anatomical C&C

[MadMoogle]

Hi Norman !

Good work so far ! I have a few critics / suggestions to formulate though :

The ears are, for me, to high : on a human ear the bottom of the lobe should align with the nostrils, and the top with the brows (roughly). Also they are too attached to the skull, wich gives a weird look in the from view. Try rotating them outwards.

The side view is good, but I think the front view doesn't quite work. The character looks too round and smooth for a WC III chara : try to sharpen the nose, it's too wide. And also the jaw is maybe too round and smooth, I would make it more square.

Good luck for your application !

[the_WrongChoice]

it's a nice start, i think the face just lacks defenition so far, and maybe eyes are a bit too high, mouth looks strange...

[Augh]

Yeah a raw wire or smoothed isoline really helps ppl analyse ;) I think there's a good start and the ears are very Blizzard, but as WC said the face is a little undefined atm, there's a softof vague almond shaped outline that generally tends to happen if one is trying to avoid a lantern jaw (like with an elf or young woman, usually). I would try and check some of the elf and particularly dryad hero (wc3) arts by Blizzard and really take a look at the jaws, a lot of them have a surprising amount of blockiness/strength in them.

I would try and get some more certainty in the brow area too if possible.

Keep it up, getting just to this "basically there" stage is the hardest part for me T_T everyone else seems to manage somehow haha. Good luck with the tweaks.
Cheers!

[CosmoHorizon]

Hey Augh, i saw your Archangel earlier and i've been following through with the progress, it's a pretty amazing piece of work.

My reference material is done on paper, and i have virtually no reference when i'm modelling her, i did what i feel is aethestically correct. That's the reason why i'm looking for a good anatomy guide or face topology study.....

What do you guys mean by "define", i understands tthe bit with the mouth and ear...and i'll fix them as soon as i have time, but i don't quite understand what is meant by "define".

Are you implying that my current model is like in a basic form? So that it does not have "character" or "individuality" if so to speak?

I'll get the wire up by tonight, but i'll just ask a silly question. How do you actually get the wireframe in render just like you do if you check "edged face" in the viewport?

Thanks for the feedback cuz i'll be felling pretty down if i have to bump my own thread :thumbsup:

[CosmoHorizon]

Ok, before i go off, these are the original poly without smoothing, taken directly from the view ports
Front
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/WIPFront.jpg
Side
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/WIPSidejpg.jpg

And yeah, that's about all at the moment. Looking forward to more great critique!

Thanks heaps guys, i'll be feeling pretty down if i had to bump my own post. Cheers!

P.S How come i cant edit my avatar =/.........

[mjkennedy]

Okay, I have a few crits. As aforementioned, the ears and eyes are too high. They should both be brought down, so that the lobes line up with the bottom of the nostrils, and the eyes stay where they currently are in relation to the ears.

Secondly, from profile view, the head looks horizontally squished. Your ears should be moved back further away from the eyes, and the jawline should continue back further as well. I suggest getting a photo referrence, if for nothing else then a rough guide.

Finally, as far as topology is concerned, you've got some decent egde loops goin around the eyes, but you need to get some edge loops around the mouth as well. That is of course really only if you're planning on animating it. Either way, still a good practice.

Hope this helps some,

Matt

[oron]

Yep the ears are too high.. and too short.. try to do them much longer :)

[CosmoHorizon]

Ok.....so tweak eyes and ears....

Are the size of the features anatomically accurate? Are they in proportion?

Thanks for the feedback, but i'm a little caught up with schoolwork....i might not be able to work on her too much in the next couple of weeks...but i'll try my best

[Eonwe]

In my opinion the head in the side view looks too flat....
It looks as if someone has hit the back of her head with a huge stave ^^
You only have to pull out the back of her head a bit

[CosmoHorizon]

SOOOOO........Like this? Blue lines marks the recommended changes. I have lowered the eyes and enlarged the ears a little bit, but do i have the lower the top of the head a little bit or is it fine as it is now?
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/WIPSidechg.jpg

[CosmoHorizon]

After modification.....
Front
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/WIPF2.gif
Side
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/WIPS2.gif

Lowered the eyes and ears and tweaked the size a little bit.....that's all for tonight, waiting for some C&C. Cheers!

EDIT: STUPID FREAKING MATHS!! CANT WORK ON HER ANYMORE FOR THE NEXT COUPLE OF DAYS

[Augh]

Mental note; recrit this, thank Cosmo for words, answer questions about definition, post isoline render info - when not half tripping from lack of sleep o_o

I'll be back man haha, very spacey at this end, but I hate to pass on questions I can actually help with. I'll return with editness. I was gonna drop that eye level crit on you till I saw it was covered, nice work tweakin so far :)

zzzz... =_=

[Eonwe]

hmm....I think the head should look more like this

[mjkennedy]

hmm....I think the head should look more like this

yeah, like this... except those ears and that jaw line still needs to be pulled back futher towards the rear of the head.

My guess is you're getting too "Squinchy" over things. You see something that needs to be done with your model, but you're doing it in little tiny incruments! Go over board! Dont be affraid to move points around! If it doesnt work out, you can always reload the file, and if it does, then you've accomplished what you wanted in half the time! At least that's what works for me...

Matt

[CosmoHorizon]

Bugger school work, let's do this instead...
I did the recommended tweaking, and then i come to a strage situation where it looks OK in the view ports, but it just appeared very odd once i rendered it. I'm not entirely sure if it's due to the weird shadow casting (you can see in the brows area in my 2nd render)

1st
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/perspective1.jpg
2nd
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/perspective2.jpg
3rd
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/perspective3.jpg

I know i'm missing the innards of the eyes...whatever they are called....but just something seems wrong, and i'm not entirely sure how to fix em. All these renders looks perfectly fine in the viewports, but once i rendered it, it's just missing some critical elements....

Problems i spotted
1. Chin appeares a little sharp in 1, but not in 2&3....
2. The ear in the 3rd has a little bit of a "lump" or "bend" on it, which i didn't see from the other views.
3. Brows in the 2nd one, but it's probably the shadow due to global illumination...if some one can help me set up the lighting, it'll be awesome

From purely looking at them, 3rd render is actually quite "pretty", but the other 2 seems awkward some how.

Augh mate, take your time, i'm very glad to have people like you and WrongChoice giving me feedbacks :thumbsup:

Looking forward to some more C&C! Thanks people!

[Eonwe]

1. I think the chin is too sharp, also in the 2 and 3 render....
2.then mend it ! ;)
3.don't know....which software do you use?

there are some other little misakes:
4.over the Nose there is a strange stripe.
5.an other thing which looks weird.....the head is too flat...maybe she got a heavy blow
on her head.... ;) you should change that!

[CosmoHorizon]

Yeah I know, i posted just before i went to bed last night :D
Later today i should have time to do that, making the changest and make the chin smoother. I believe this is then 2nd time someone said my head is too flat..how to fix that?

BTW, I use Max 7, so if some one can direct me to a scene lighting guide, i'll be most grateful

[CosmoHorizon]

Well, i did some tweaking to fix the lumps on ear, made the bit between the cheek and nose little more smooth and with some general move-the-vertex-around job and i decided to chuck on a small rotation animation....

EDIT OLD LINK REMOVED, Check later post for updated animation

I noticed a bit of a lump on the back of the head and i have fixed it already, but that was after i uploaded...and for some strang reason, it takes around 20min to upload a 2meg file onto my ISP's webspace.....so, ignore the lumps for the time being

Also, i cant get animation bar to go beyond 100 frames, so i only did 1/2 rotation

[Eonwe]

it was good that you posted the movie, it is much easier now to see what 's wrong ;)
I think you noticed that she looks
much better in the side view, right ?
In the side view it does not look as if the head is too flat.
The reason for that is in my opinion that the eyes are too wide.
Try to make the eyes smaller and set them a bit lower.
And maybe make the forehead a bit higher,too.
the seccond mistake I recognized is that the mouth lies to deep.

I saw your concept just now and I really like it! :)
You should use it as a reference!
Because the nightelf in the picture has more personallity, too

Sorry about the lighting, I use Maya and I am not familliar with Max...

[xcvbnm]

Cosmo,
You badly need a photo reference.
I feel that most of the features are wrongly placed. Here is attached a paintover to show what I feel should be the looks......

[CosmoHorizon]

wow, i did not realise that it's sooooo far out of proportion....

I couldn't find any good photo reference, so i'm wondering if you guys can direct me to some free reference picture (anything besides www.3d.sk (http://www.3d.sk)) i'll go an tweak now....i'll update before i go off to work today

P.S. The reason i didn't use my concept as as a ref is because i just got it scanned, the school's drum scanner is being a b**tch lately, and the tech support is just a bunch of overpaid lazy asses....

[Master Of Sweep Picking]

Hi!, I am working in a night elf too!, I have it almost finished, but I have some problems with those big elfish ears, I liked the way you did the ears, so I want to ask you if you can post a front and left image of your head, that would be very helpful to me.
Keep the good work!

[CosmoHorizon]

Hey man, so some more NE lover eh?
I just got back from work, was hoping to finish tweaking this morning, but couldn't. =/
EDIT
Front
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/WIP2Front.jpg
Side
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/WIP2Side.jpg
The back of the head is lost to the shadow, her head is much "thicker" than that (unlike before :p )

[silentsamurai]

You're off to a nice start, but yeah the proportions do look a little off. Check out an anatomy book, since the human body isn't going to be that much different. Your elf just needs to be a bit more lithe (slender). Yeah, pay heed to what others have told you thus far too.

[Eonwe]

yes, that looks better, but still far away from the perfect proportions!
I recogniced that in the front view she looks a bit like an alien because of this
triangle - like shape of her face.Not only the chin was too sharp, the area around the mouth isn't wide enough, too!
About the reference:
Why don't you search in goole after a famous actress or so?
The picture won't be very sharp but anyway it is enough to see only the right proportions.
I did the same for my Nightelf :D
But he isn't done yet as well :cry:

[CosmoHorizon]

This is the rotating animation (i decided to use 1 iteration wire, 2 iterations are messy)
EDIT: OLD CLIP REMOVED CHECK THREAD FOR UPDATE

How do you get the time bar to go beyond 100 frames?

[CosmoHorizon]

I'm beginning to hate this auto shadow thingy, a white background give too much a contrast, but a black background, the edge of my wire gets chopped.....
Right now i fixed it through a rather lame way.....

NOOB IN NEED OF LIGHTING GUIDE!!!

[CosmoHorizon]

OK, some not-so-obvious tweaks i did after school work....
No post saying "Head too FFFFLLLAAAATT" or "WRONG PROPORTION DOOD!!" so i guess it's like in a getting-there stage at the moment?
Anyways, here are some renders in perspective
1
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/2persp1.jpg
2
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/2persp2.jpg
3
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/2persp3.jpg

Well, that's all for tonight, waiting for someone to jump out and bash me with a fist-full of critiques and comments. Cheers!

[Eonwe]

After getting the right proportions (I think they are pretty good now,
but I can't really see it, you should send also a front and a side view :) )
you have to eliminate the not-so-big-but-although-important mistakes.....
One of the most important is the mouth, it looks a bit weird.
I suggest to redo it completly...here on this forum there were some very good video tutorial
about ears, mouth, eyes, nose and mouth not so long ago.
Maybe you find this, I am sure it would be a great help!

[luciferous]

looking nice.. to help with animation though I suggest making more loops around her mouth, otherwise when she opens her mouth itll deform strangely

[CosmoHorizon]

After getting the right proportions (I think they are pretty good now,
but I can't really see it, you should send also a front and a side view :) )
you have to eliminate the not-so-big-but-although-important mistakes.....
One of the most important is the mouth, it looks a bit weird.
I suggest to redo it completly...here on this forum there were some very good video tutorial
about ears, mouth, eyes, nose and mouth not so long ago.
Maybe you find this, I am sure it would be a great help!

Redo completely? Err....
Anyway, i did my model with the guidence provided from this thread (http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=249393&page=1&pp=15). It's a modelling timelapse, it doesn't have the connecting bit, but i pretty much worked my way around that.

I'll fix up the mouth, but i don't think i'll be animating her at all, all she will do is probably "pose", so does that mean it's preferred to have the edge loops anyway?

[CosmoHorizon]

OOKay....the edge loops are added, and here is the front and side as requested
Front
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/3WIPF.jpg
Side
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/3WIPS.jpg

Come to think of it, the new edge loops arn't that much of a trouble and actually helped me kill one of my triangle....

Maybe i should post the close-up of the mouth....?

[Eonwe]

Maybe i should post the close-up of the mouth....?
Would be nice :)

[CosmoHorizon]

OK, straight to the point, close ups
Front
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/closeup1.jpg
Side
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/closeup2.jpg
Perspective
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/closeup3.jpg

Looking forward to some paint-overs and screams of "YOU GOT THAT WRONG NOOB!!!"

[CosmoHorizon]

Eye close up
1
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/eye1.jpg
2
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/eye2.jpg

Looking for some tutorial as to how to detail an eye....the brows and the other details. I won't be animating her, so don't worry about morphing.
BTW, the brows tutorial on 3DTotal.com is not what i'm looking for....when i apply the gradient map, the tip of the brows are still there....so probably a shaq hair tutorial?
Also, the bit between the nose and the eyes...(whatever they are called) what is the best way to make that?

[CosmoHorizon]

Updated MOV file...did some tweaking today, got too much other work to take care of and couldn't start on texturing the eyeball....

Is my model ready to be textured or is it still in the "getting there" stage?

Anyways, here's the updated mov file
Get it here (approx 3.0 megs) (http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/mov2.mov)
EDIT: Forgot to mention, i also chucked on the brows i made following the TUT from 3dtotal.com
Cheers!

[Eonwe]

hm, it is a bit difficult to see smaller things in the MOV file because of the wires...
could you post another one without the wires? would be nice :D
But from the things I've seen, have to say its getting much better!
But anyway I wouldn't start to texture... send us a non wired one and then we will see :bounce:

[Drakaran]

not a bad start, but your poly count is twice, maybe three times too high. over large areas, you don't need a lot of polys to make the shape, just careful placement, but even then the ear and mouth and eyes etc have at least twice as many polys as necessary.

to me, this head looks too much like a manachin's, basically a smooth ovoid. to add more features, you have to exaggerate the features more by pulling points and work at following the topography more carefully.

eye- the outside edge needs to be brought sharp instead of rounded. to get the eye lip correct I make everything but the edge and eyeball invis and look at it from a top view and pull polys up snug to the eyeball, then I adjust the lids seperately, usually starting with the inner part of the eye lids. there is a fleshy triangle at the inner corner of the eye.

lips- the profile of the bottom lip needs to be rounder and it's generally 'fuller' than the upper lip. the upper lip seems too full and big, but that's just a general and there is a lot of variation in shapes of lips, but the bottom lips really should be rounder.

good luck with your project. *smile*

[The Laughing Vulcan]

Suggestion:

Pull the back areas of the jaw (nearest the bottom of the ears)out to the sides a bit. Hide all the geometry but the polys making up the jawline itself, and tweak it so you get a triangular shape (with the chin at the top Apex) with slightly curved sides.

Hopefully, this'll help visually balance out her head.

Good luck, and keep us updated! You're getting there! :thumbsup:

[CosmoHorizon]

Thanks for the comment people, I wanted to work on her today but i couldn't.....I'll post the upadate as soon as possible...

P.S. How can you bring down the poly count without completely re-doing the model? Or is it best if i actually do another model with this as a guide?

Honestly, i'm more worried if you tell me everything is fine then something is wrong

[Drakaran]

what I do is look at the curves really carefully and then select two rings of points to weld together. I make too many polys too, so you certainly ain't the only one! *grin* I needed to reduce the polys going over the bridge of the nose and along the cheek. I selected points and welded them together effectively removing the extra poly ring. if you have some kinda Weld Average tool, it makes tweaking the points later much easier. with your head, you might try a Reduce Poly Count type tool or something like that.

I had a lot of problems when I first started modeling cause I though of the points as creating the 'skin' of the object, so I thought that I needed to add more points to make the object smoother. what helped me with modeling was thinking of points as control points that pull the "skin" of the object into the shape I want. if you use points as controls, that means that the larger and smoother you need something, the fewer controllers it takes, it's only when you need fine detail that you need more points to shape. keeping down poly count is crucial when it comes to rigging and morphing.

[CosmoHorizon]

Having trouble finding a ref for the jaw line issue....and i'm not quite understanding what you guys said about the apex of a triangle, so, here goes the screenshot taken directly from the view ports
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/SC.jpg

That's the jaw with smooth....BTW, my model has lost about 50 pounds worth of polys after welding some unseen vertices (Lost around 30 poly in the low res model, and about 4000 after smooth)

[The Laughing Vulcan]

Sorry about confusing you. I was envisioning the shape of the jawline (in bottom or top view) as the 'triangle', as it DOES look triangular in shape from those views. I was referring to the chin itself as the 'apex', as it would form the top 'point' of the pyramid. (again, when viewed from top or bottom view)

To simplify: Look at the polys/patches of the jawline in Top/bottom views. I was suggesting tweaking the sides of the jaw by pulling them out a bit. What I was hoping this would do is to widen out the lower part of the face a bit.

Lemme know if this clarified it any, or if I confused you more... :argh: :D

[CosmoHorizon]

Maybe a little bit of a paint over will help clarify the confusion...
I'll update her tonight, doing some other work ATM. I managed to lose another 15 polys yesterday :)

[CosmoHorizon]

Hi all, i'll like to say, thanks so much for your feedback, but i must put this project on a halt.

Right now, my school has selected me and one of my other friend to enter a comeptition, and we're designing something together, therefore, i must pause my project.

Also, my college exam is coming up, and acquiring a scholarship is quite important for me, so i will need to put all my efforts in my acedemic study.

I swear, i'll finish her once the exam is over, so i'll not close the thread (not like i can anyway).

Look forward to my 2nd WIP thread for the comeptition!

Norman, 24/08/05

[CosmoHorizon]

Before I leave it, the head after some intense tweaking ad weight losing
WAS: Low Poly version: 2212 polys
High Res (2 Iterations): 35424 polys

Now: Low Poly version: 1834 polys
High Res (2 Iterations): 29248 polys

Front
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/4Wipf.jpg
Side
http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/4Wips.jpg

The poly at the junction is a little messed up by the symmetry modifier, but don't worry about it. I left extra poly near the forehead, because i'm intending to use bump/displacement map to create a little extruding symbol there

Finally, the rotation animation without the wires
Get it here (approx 1.3 megs) (http://members.optusnet.com.au/cosmo_horizon/mov3.mov)

Ok, be back to this thread in 3 months...

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