Character- Marine w.i.p. (first human please help)

[theabyss]

Ha, TheAbyss responding to the ReflectingAbyss ! :)

The head is looking good so far - but something seems to be wrong with flow of the higher arms/elbows and with the knees.
Do you work with a picture reference?

[ReflectingAbyss]

Haha, yeah, that is pretty hillarious.

Yeah- I'm using an image from 3d.sk as reference
I edited it a little bit. Not a vast difference- but I figured I might as well post

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y224/reflectingabyss/frontbody.jpg
http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y224/reflectingabyss/3d%20Studio%20Max/guy.jpg

[ReflectingAbyss]

Update on the model- I guess now I'll get to texturing?
2,994 tris out of a 3,000 tri limit

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y224/reflectingabyss/3d%20Studio%20Max/Usmarine.jpg

[Tronno]

Ballistic helmets are much larger than that. Yours looks more like a skull cap.

http://www.google.com/images?svnum=10&hl=en&lr=&safe=off&q=pasgt+helmet&btnG=Search

[utchamp]

Looks good... can't wait for the textures, but must agree about the helmet.

[ReflectingAbyss]

Thanks, I'll fix that asap! I appreciate the link too- I was'nt sure of the terminology for the helmet and could'nt really find any good images just by looking up marine.

[vince22]

-move the eyes to the centre of the head, little too high, plus it will make the helmet feel proportionaly bigger.

[ReflectingAbyss]

I took the advice given and I've started texturing. Here is my work so far-

I realize the helmet strap is wrong- I've been trying to find a good image of the correct kind of strap... until then, this will do

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y224/reflectingabyss/3d%20Studio%20Max/wip.jpg

[novaprospekt]

uh, the texture looks great. but you need to get smoothing groups on there, you can't predict how they will work until you try it.
i usually model with smoothing on so i can spot errors when they occur.

[ReflectingAbyss]

I'm not exactly sure how smoothing groups work... this is my first time working in 3d Studio Max, I'm usually a Maya person.

I found the meshsmooth and turbosmooth options and they work ok, I can post a picture of that tommorrow, it shows a lot more detail.

I'll also try to look up some information on smoothing groups and see what I can do in terms of that. Out of curiosity, do you know if there's anything like the smooth proxy option in Maya in 3d studio Max? I'm a big fan of using that but I havn't figure out a way to do it in Max.

[PeterZbinden]

I think you missunderstand the meaning of smothinggroups.

Meshsmooth and turbosmooth are smothing the object in a geometric way.
They make 4,16... polys out of each quad and then round it so the mesh looks smoother. This is used, as you propably know, for still pictures or cg movies and stuff but it increases the polycount alot, so not the normal way you should be going to make realtime models.

Smoothing groups define if the edge of a polygon to the next polygon is hard or soft. This means if you have a group of polys in the same smoothinggroup the edges will be soft.
For your head, you can see that all of your polys have hard edges to the other polys. so select all the polys you want to have in one group and go to this menu:
http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/6194/sguv5.jpg
which is found on the right where your tools are and you scroll down the list.
the mesh should be a editabel poly or editabel mesh and the polygons have to be selected.

Each of these numbers represent a smothing group, so pushing on of these buttons will apply the polys to that group.
You can also apply them to multiple groups to make different effects. play around with it and find out how it works.
This method does not increas the polycount.
There are also different ways you can do this but this one gives you alot of controll over it and seems to be the best for me.

[ReflectingAbyss]

Thanks PeterZbinden :) I was able to find the smooth groups and tried that. I might still need to mess with it- I assigned a lot of different smooth groups but I also tried a bit too hard to make everything look even.

The helmet needs some work- and I still need to find a good reference of the current helmet straps. I spent most of my day today trying to find reference images for the vest :\ But here is what I've done so far on the face- with smoothing groups.

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y224/reflectingabyss/3d%20Studio%20Max/Usmarine-1.jpg

[ReflectingAbyss]

It needs a few touch ups :\ but here's an update.

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y224/reflectingabyss/3d%20Studio%20Max/marine.png

I forgot to mention- this will be used in a military simulation program that views the models much like the view you get in the sims.

Also- I wanted to say thanks for the help so far with this.

[Cyborgguineapig]

Pretty good for a first. One thing I find odd with your character are the legs. They seem to thin at the thigh region and bow a little looking at it from the front.

[ReflectingAbyss]

Ack- I wish I had seen that comment sooner. It must've slipped by me.
Thanks though- I'll see what I can do.

There were a couple mo-cap files provided to us, so I tested it out on the guy...
http://www.youtube.com/v/wpqyWlfbg8A (http://www.youtube.com/v/cCIWVjAzPWI)
Fun times

I need to do something about that texture :\

[SwarM22]

Looks good. Only thing about it that kinda bugs me is the helmet. Looks a little small like its hugging his head. Other than that great job.

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