HARDCORE MODELING!: Stan Winston Tribute: <<Ghost: MAYOR GHOUL>>

#1


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Hi everyone, hope I’m not late to the party. First post on the forum. I saw what the HCR mini was and I couldn’t help but be a part of it. Looking at the body of Stan Winston’s work, Ghosts really stood out to me so I’ll be modeling the Mayor Ghoul(Michael Jackson) from the shortfilm/long format music vid. Hi res ref was hard to find online, but I found a descent quality qt of the movie and pulled several ref stills from it.

I going to attempt the bust of this charater.

Here’s a closer shot of the head. So far…

#2

hello welcome to the forum :slight_smile:

i hope you have lots of fun

cheers,
andrew

#3

Update. I spent some time on constructing the face. Also created a proxy to get an idea of how the overall shape of the head is coming out. Still need to block out the back of the head, but it’s coming along. :slight_smile:

#4

Latest Update. I did some stitching around the eyes and mouth and reworked some of where my loops ended. I got the face to a point I’m pretty comfortable with. On to the ear and rest of the head. The pics should show kinda where I came from since the last post.

#5

Ok… So my latest update. not to much really. I attached the face I built to the back of the head and pretty much ronded out the form. I’ll tweak that some more after I get the ear modeled and attacthed.

Alright, so for the ear… I’m kinda in a tough spot. The closest thing to a profile of the make up effects being worn by MJ shows up at the end credits.

As you can see the prob is 1) the rolling end credits and 2) the hand of one of the makeup effects artist obsuring the ear.:shrug:

#6

Decided to try and model the ear from this pic

I know it’s not a true profile but it’ll have to do I guess. I can shape it around a bit then connect it to the head when done. Hope my idea works out ok :wip:

#7

You may have started a little late, but you’re off to a great start.

#8

Thanks. I appreciate the compliment :slight_smile:

#9

Having too much fun with this but I do have to catch at least a few z’s. Here’s a few pic of the ear starting with the rough trace. I extruded a poly plane to get the profile then kept on stitching edges as I went along .

Then what i ended up with…

I think I’m at a descent point before stitching onto the head. Just need to position and do a little sculpting to get to match the reference still a bit better. Make the tip more pointy perhaps. That’s that for now

#10

Also thought I’d post a link to the vid for anyone not familiar with this short film Stan Winston directed. :slight_smile: http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xuu4o_michael-jackson-ghost_music
Just a heads up. It’s a long vid. The bulk of my ref is coming from 27:35-28:25

#11

awesome job so far - I loved that video and song as a matter of fact…

#12

Thanks :slight_smile: Yeah that vid’s really cool. Stan and company did an amazing job. There was one thing I thought was pretty creepy though. I never thought hearing Mike raise his voice could be so unsettling. “Hello! Game Time!”:scream: I like the songs too. ha…

#13

Hey, this a pretty good start. Very clean topology on the ears.
Keep going.

-Kris

#14

Thanks much:) , ears are pretty tricky for me so I appreciate it. I should have an update soon with the ear attached. Back to it…

#15

Here’s my most recent update. I started by postitioning and sizing the ear

then knocking a hole on the head where the ear was going and stitching

Several of the edges didn’t line up well from the ear to the head so I had to rework somethings.Too many points on the outer edges of the ear. I added some loops to the main head and took away some I could get away with from the ear to fix it. I Think it came out alright. I also built out the rest of the neck and did some sculpting to shape it.

Next up are the teeth(something basic), hair, and part of the torso, but necessarily in that order. I haven’t really messed with hair in Maya. Not sure how difficult that might be so I’ll stick with modeling it for now.

#16

My latest updates . I started blocking out the torso for Mayor Ghoul.

More updates soon :slight_smile:

#17

got some more work on the torso done.:slight_smile: It’s starting to shape up a bit. I still have to get the arms built and other accessories like the suspenders. Then there’s that arm with the mirror that burst out of his chest like in the reference pictures below.

This is going to be the basic gesture I’m going for in the final. The only difference is He’ll have the ghoul head instead of the normal face of the mayor. Cheers

#18

Very nice! It’s nice to see a good character model being done without ZB. You have really done well with the forms, and volumes of the face, which is when allot of modelers resort to ZB to get these results.

Anyway, looking forward to seeing this whole character brought together.

#19

Thanks much Steven! :slight_smile: yeah I try to do as much as I can with the model in maya first. I try to build a good mesh in there. Once I get something i like I still do take it to Zbrush for sculpting though.

update - I put in more work on torso, mostly building the arms refining the shirt and jacket. Also some basic joints for posing the mesh before exporting to Zbrsuh later.

I think I mentioned I was only going to model the bust of the character, but a pal of mine pointed out that once I put on the arms and go below a certain point on the torso it’s technically not a bust any more. :eek: Oops. Oh well, I got carried away. I also posted a pic without the overlaying jacket mesh to show how I approached the shirt underneath. Suspenders and such still in progress:) Critiques and questions welcome. Cheers

#20

Hello all, I’ve got a few updates. :smiley:

I spent time finishing off the suspenders and building some of the extra props/pieces needed for the final. That includes the arm that Stan had burst out of Michael’s stomach:p, the mirror the arm is holding, and a pedestal for the model.


The funny looking crown on his head is the “in progress” hair. :wip: The shirt and tie will be adjusted to wrap around the arm with the mirror like in the movie. ALso there’s the hair to complete and the rest of the body needs to be posed into the gesture I’m going for. That should wrap up the modeling part before I take it to ZB… for sculpting. Chugging along. Crit and ?uestions welcome. Take care all…