HARDCORE MODELING!: 80's Cartoon: She-Ra

#140

Thanks a lot for all your support and encouragement, guys! It’s much appreciated! I hope you wont be disappointed with the final result.

         I'll reply to your final image posts, write more here and post more images probably some time tomorrow. 
      
      While I wont be able to fully texture her on time, I still have at least a cartoon-style shaded Maya-MR beauty-render, maybe even with some Shave-Hair to finish. To be on the safe side, since you never know what might happen, I fired up ZB, applied one of my favorite Matcaps (Weathered Bronze by BGEN) and  here's my tentative final entry:
         
         [b]Original Interpretation: She-Ra Princess of Power[/b]
               
               ARTIST NAME:
                 Felix Lahme
               
                 ORIGINAL CONCEPT ART:
                 Posting just one reference image seems unfair to all the artists who contributed to my inspiration, so please look in the wip thread listed below for all my references.
               
               BEAUTY RENDER:
               
               [img]http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/sheRaBeautyAngleSmall-1.jpg[/img]
               (I am still working on a proper Maya/MR beauty render, so this one is just a placeholder for now)
               
               [HIREZ RENDER LINK](http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/sheRaBeautyAngleLarge-1.jpg)
               
               The above image is kinda far away, so here's a little closer for more detail:
               
               [img]http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/sheRaFaceCloseBgenWeatheredBronz-1.jpg[/img]
               
              ORTHOGRAPHIC RENDERS
               
               Front:
               [img]http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/sheRaOrthoFrontBgenWeatheredBron-1.jpg[/img]
               
               Back:
               [img]http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/sheRaOrthoBackBgenWeatheredBronz-1.jpg[/img]
               
               Right:
               [img]http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/sheRaOrthoRightBgenWeatheredBron-1.jpg[/img]
               
               Left:
               [img]http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/sheRaOrthoLeftBgenWeatheredBronz-1.jpg[/img]
               
               Top:
               [img]http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/sheRaOrthoTopBgenDarkBronze-1.jpg[/img]
               
               Bottom:  
               This one is basically an upskirt-shot, so for multiple reasons, I took the  liberty to omit it.
               
                 WIREFRAMES:
               
               [img]http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/sheRaFullWires-1.jpg[/img]
               
             [img]http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/sheRaFaceCloseWires-1.jpg[/img]
             (These are placeholders as well until I get a proper wireframe render set up in Maya.)
               
                 WIP THREAD
                 [http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=208&t=735356&page=1](http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=208&t=735356&page=1)
               
                 SOFTWARE USED:
                 Maya with NEX & Syflex and numerous essential custom Mel-scripts and plug-ins, Mudbox, headus UVLayout and ZBrush for Matcap renders.  Weathered Bronze Matcap by BGEN.

Edit:For the beauty render in the following post, I used Mental Ray and PS for the cover comp.

                 TIME: 
                 I lost track, but it must easily be in excess of 100 to 150 hours.
               
                 DESCRIPTION:
                 My intention was to recreate She-Ra in her classic pose, as she might possibly appear in a live-action movie. This doesn't mean I was going for a photo-realistic replica with truly battle-ready outfit, but rather tried to put together a somewhat realistic model with a costume functional enough that it could actually be built by costumers and prop-artists and be relatively casually worn by an actress without imparing her ability to act. Also I tried to stay as true as possible to the challenge of modeling and hence everything you see in the renders, right down to the eyebrows and lashes (no PaintFX or Shave-Conversions) is modeled geometry. Only the body was sculpted after modeling a detailed base and except the eyeballs, which have a rather crude iris-texture on them, the whole model has basic shaders applied only, no textures yet.
               
               This has been great fun and a tremendous amount of outstanding work has been produced by all participants! 
               
                 Cheers and congrats to everybody for their individual achievment! :)
#141

Yay she’s up :slight_smile:

Congrats on getting this done Felix, you must be relieved now and very nice it is too. If there’s only one small crit and that is the hands look slightly out, apart from that seeing it all put together has been a test in my patience :slight_smile:

PS. Nice legs…

edit

I’d love to see this animated since you took some time to rig her :wink:

#142

Thanks a lot, Scott! :slight_smile:

  What exactly do you mean with "the hands look slightly out"? Maybe I can still fix it.
  
  I was really hoping I could animate her, at least getting into that pose, but the Maya skinning is so f-ed up in some places, I don't think its worth the time and effort to attempt to fix it to my satisfaction. But I am strongly considering redoing all that in XSI. I'm not making any promises though, as I have other projects in line that have a much higher priority after this deadline.
  
  Cheers!
  
  PS: Glad you like her legs! ;)

PPS: The above post and the voting thread would not accept more images and since I have two more angles, I thought I might as well post them now rather than later.

#143

caught the final, Hot. How can I get her number!

#144

Well I haven’t posted here in a while because I simply had nothing to say besides “looks good” “Looks great” and “Looks awesome” as a response to your wip posts. Lol to be honest it made me feel monotonous. However now that she’s up, I got some crits.

  1. her hair is too “plane” like

  2. no one in real life is that sexy.

  3. on the back shot, she’s not bending over enough :wink:

Lol looks incredible Felix. I really appreciate the effort you put into just about every single aspect of this model and that really shines through in the these latest “Renders”

I’m sorry it’s a bit late but something just stuck out at me in these latest posts. I find that her expression isn’t cohesive with her pose. In other words she has a very powerful pose, but the expression on her face looks a bit vacant. Almost like she’s looking beyond the sword and thinking of something completely different. This is, I must admit, hypocritical on my part because my Smurfs don’t come near the quality of this piece, but there it is anyway. Reminds me of a quote:

“If you can’t do it, Teach it” - unknown

All in all, you may not know, but you’ve inspired me to pay much more attention to detail than I currently do on my models. I’ve now seen dynamically what kinds of results can be achieved doing this.

On a side note, I was a chef for 15 years before abandoning such a chaotic lifestyle for something more stable such as 3D (lol). It may be hard to associate the two, but as a cook I would put a lot of love and effort into every step of a recipe or meal, and the quality of the food would really stand out on your pallet because of this. Food, in my opinion, is a beautiful art that uses a different medium to express itself, Playing on your sense of taste rather than your sense of sight; yet equally as inspiring.

I can’t wait to see the finished piece on saturday AM.

-Rage

#145

I can’t quite put my finger on it, no pun intended. But I think the thumb looks a little bit thin, maybe the fingers are slightly thin too! I’m no master of anatomy, but to me :-

Hand diagram

Maybe it’s the Proximal Phalanges that are too long!? I could be talking out my @ss.

Fantastic work and glad you got her this far :slight_smile:

PS. I am a leg man!

#146

Can’t speak for Felix, but my assumption is that the planar hair is deliberate (i.e. alpha mapped hair).

The only thing that stands out to me is that the sword feels too big (unless you intend it to be a two-hander, but I always though her sword was like a bastard sword or something). Just nit-picky though; it looks fantastic man. I’m glad you got finished!

#147

Yes indeed. Although I was not being serious on those 3 crits. You can’t tell, of course, but I had a wry grin on my face when I wrote them and was only poking some fun at Felix.

-Rage

#148

hahaha Oops! DAMN THE INTERNET! DAMN IT TO HELL! :smiley:

#149

It looks wanderfull.

I know how much work you did on this one, i followed all the thread from the start. I congratulate you on a pretty amazing job you finally accomplished.

I just have to agree that there is something in the pose on the head and her expression that ist not quite convincing, its not that its totally bad, but just dont seem to inspire much.
I see her head to static, almost correctly posed, maybe you can rotate it a little bit to one side, and maybe make her with an amazed expression as she is calling for the “power” to came to her call.

Congratulations and hope to see its finished in a realistic render maybe in a later time.

#150

Thanks a lot for all the last minute comments and critiques, guys! I’ll reply more in-depth later, 'cause right now I am dead-tired, just want to post these images, be done with it and go straight to bed. :wink:

    Here's my beauty render:
    
    [img]http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/SheRaFinalSpoofCover600x800v2EditA.jpg[/img]
    [](http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/SheRaFinalSpoofCover1200x1600.jpg)[HighRes Image Link](http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/SheRaFinalSpoofCover1200x1600v2E-1.jpg)   
  
    Wireframe Render:
    
    [img]http://i219.photobucket.com/albums/cc280/Tuxedoknek/HMC%2019%20She-Ra/BeautyRenderWires600x800Fixed.jpg[/img]
    
    
    I'll comment more later, now I'm off to bed.
    
    Cheers and g'night everybody!
#151

barbie doll She-Ra?:argh: peace :). that looks cool. excuse a newbie but how’d you do the skin?I’m doing my first human model and I’m having a hard time figuring out what to do for the texture…

#152

Superdupercool =P

Im glad to see you got the time to finish her!
She looks just as beautiful as I expected =P

Must say It has been great fun to read your walkthroughs!
In the next challange I take part in i´ll try to be more like you and share more of my work, just felt i had too little time to spare this time… :confused:
And if I slack away again, then please slap me!! :wink:

It´s an HONOR to be a part of your beauty render!! =)

All the best /Jonas

#153

Man, you’re still catching me online, correcting my typos and linking errors, so I might as well answer that one now.

Well, by the original design, she basically is a Barbie doll with a sword. :wink:

The skin on this one is nothing fancy, just a plain, modified Blinn. There’s no SSS or any texture at all on it. For the lips, I simply applied a different material to the respective faces.

More later…

Nighty night!

#154

oohh lol. man that felt embarrassing to ask. anyway it’s time for the master to sleep:bowdown:. I learned alot looking at the previous pages here :smiley:

#155

mcteapot: Many thanks for the compliment! :slight_smile:

     RageOfAges: Thanks a lot for the entertaining critique. I have to admit, you had me there for a moment, when I was in "serious critique" mode. :D
     
     The hair is indeed intended to be textured, but even for the beauty render, I ran out of time to do it properly.
     
     You might want to take a look at Sofia Vergara, who I loosely based She-Ra's body on. I'm glad I succeeded in making her appeal to you. ;)
     
     You've got one little dirty mind, my friend. 
     
     Regarding the facial expression, I gave this a lot of thought. I did not want to give her the usual "I'm the mighty Thor and am gonna smash you with my hammer once I transform"-expression, as I think that's really stupid and unrealistic comic-book style. Rather, I wanted to take a more realist approach and catch her in the moment transformation, when she's in a world of her own, for the blink of an eye in awe and wonderment at what is happening to her. Now that does result in a somewhat vacant expression, I think. lol  Admittedly, I am not entirely happy with the expression myself, but fixing that appropriately was beyond the time available.
     
     I'm happy to hear my efforts have had that kind of effect on you. :)
     
     I totally agree with you on cooking being one of the highest arts there is! I am an avid "hobby chef" myself and love to create and produce whatever pleases the taste-buds. Good food is such an important part of existence. 
     
     Hope you like my still very unfinished, but for this challenge final entry.
     
     samartin: Many thanks for your input, Scott. Hands are always an issue and for some reason these were particularly unyielding. I think, that's because I was sloppy on the topo when modeling. Anyways, I think the problem you are pointing at, is that the fingers are generally too thin and the lower end of the metacarpals too spread out. I'll definitely fix that in a future version.
     Female legs and butts, that's what its all about, man. There's just way too many silicon-boob-cherishers around these days, especially in CG. ;)
     
     Oberyn: Thanks a lot, Richard! The sword is indeed intended to be a two-hander, much like the one Conan has in the movies.
     
     LMG: Thank you very much for your compliments. I am not 100% happy with the head pose and facial expression myself, but I certainly did not what to give her a comic-book style aggressive or eyes-wide-open-awed mood. I was going more for a dreamy-vacant expression, which I think is what we all would have on our faces in such a transformation moment, since something rather overpowering is happening directly to oneself, almost internally, as opposed to watching something going on on the outside. Everything else, as regularly seen on TV and in the movies, I personally just consider bad acting. If you look real close in the high-res version, you might see what I was trying to get at.
     
     energise: Tack se mücke, Jonas! (most likely not how you write it, but I am guessing you understand) I'm glad you like what you see. I'm looking forward to more insights into your work-flows in the future, as you do produce outstanding results. As you requested, I'm gonna slap you silly with dead "sill" (herring in swedish?), if you don't share! 
I was hoping you wouldn't mind being included in my little "Entertainment Weekly" spoof. Your Skeletor is just too much fun! 
     
     razeverius: I hope my answer was satisfactory for you. If not, let me know. No reason to be embarrassed. 
    
    Naz dorovje and many thanks again to you all.:arteest:
#156

Really like yor final. Skin looks great, concidering its a blinn, you got any reflection on it?.

#157

yeahp it was. now at least i have several ideas for skin textures :D. again congrats and awesome work :applause:

#158

Muchas Gracias, muchachos! :slight_smile:

Airflow: Reflectivity is absolutely minimal on that particular material, so it doesn’t look too waxy.The default Blinn gets the job done for a cartoon-style render, but it really would be nice if one could just add SSS to any random default material for MR, as you can with 3Delight and PRman. Well, you can’t have everything in one Renderer, I guess.

Salute!:arteest:

#159

NIce job!!! learn a lot form your wIP!! Will you be carry on to do her hair?