Do you think the same methodology for the face translates equally for the rest of the body?
Absolutely. The form should follow skeletal structure and the flow should follow the muscle layout. If you don’t have a background in traditional art (including plenty of figure drawing classes), you should check out the Loomis books at Fine Art.sk. And if you’re really into doing characters, one of the best investments you can make is in the high-res figure images at 3D.sk.
Cheers!
Steve
I did do a set of my own reference photos of my friends to use, except that I did really well on the head stuff for this guy and later discovered that I missed a back and side shot of the body!
Just remember, Andrew, that I’ve got way too many splines in my spline cage. Compare mine to Larry’s or tejani’s and you’ll see that mine would get really confusing in 3d space.
A while ago I was working on a figure using box-modeling. I reached that frustrating point where I realized that I needed to re-do the shoulder section to get the correct muscle flow. So on a background layer as a guide I started drawing out rough shapes in splines and then pulling the points to wrap around my model in 3d space. This was where I started to get a feel for using splines. Moving spline points to fit an existing model in 3d space on a separate layer was a good exercise without worrying about correct 4-sided patches. I know that sounds sort of backwards but it worked in a weird sort of way.
Alright.
Well, I’m going to start on a head model tonight when I get home.
I will post my progress.
But I really want to try spline. It seems easy and you can get some great results!!
Originally posted by AndrewE
[B]So how far should I do the profile?Past mid way?
What scares me away from spline modeling is all of those points and lines and posistioning them all in a 3D world.
BAH!
I’m soo scared when I see stuff like that. [/B]
Positioning points and polys in 3D is the most basic common thing to all forms of modeling. The reason most people try point by point is because those are the most basic primitives in any 3D program. It also happens to be the most tedious method for the same reason.
The hardest part about modeling heads isnt pushing and pulling points, polys or splines in 3D but knowing WHERE to put those things. This is what I mentioned before about an experienced artist KNOWING where things go and a new artist LEARNING where things go. This is not a just a problem in 3D but in any medium. You have to learn the anatomy ie. where things go.
The easiest way to figure out where things go is to load some reference images into modeler as a background. If you have a good front and side view then you have pretty much what you need to place a point in 3D at the right location. The front view will supply an X-Y coord and the side view will suppy a Y-Z coord.
What I do is create what I call critical points ie. points laid down on particular facial “landmarks” that define the proportions for that head. Those would be things like the tip of the nose, base of the nose, bridge of the nose, wing of the nostril, corners of the mouth, tip of the lip, tip of the chin etc. etc. etc.
Once I do this I select every couple of points and hit ctrl p (Make spline) so that I end up with a bunch of points with straight splines in between.
After that I add control points along those straight splines and pull them out to create the CONTOURS in between those critical points (Points that define the PROPORTIONS).
Generally I use 3 control points in between the points where splines intersect each other. This keeps me from having to think about it too much (because if you think too much then youre not creating or producing). It also gives me a consistant flow to things. I can look at the flow of the splines and the flow between those control points and easily visualize the form like I can with sketch on paper.
This process goes very fast. In reality spline modeling is the ultimate point by point method becuase you use VERY few points to define a head. Instead of you having to lay down every single row of points and tweak every single one thee splines do that for you. The spline curves define where points will go and in what direction. This also holds true for the points that will be created in between each spline - they will be the average of all the spline surrounding that patch. This means that 16 points can control the form and flow of hundreds of points. The bottom line is that manipulating 16 points is MUCH faster then manipulating potentially hundreds of points.
Another nice thing about splines in Lightwave is that I can mix splines into pretty much any other technique. I can take a head that was partially modeled point by point or the box method and select points directly off those polys, create splines and patch them so the new polys match right in. This has helped me on many occassions to repair areas where polys were messed up, to alter a face or parts of a face and keep a nice flow, or to build in structures and details into exisiting geometry that would be very difficult to do otherwise.
In my experience I have found that most people modeling in Lightwave dont use splines or use them in very limited ways. Most dont get them and move on to something else and in the process ignore one of LWs most powerful modeling tools. 
:drool:
That’s Beautiful man!
But seriously, I’m going to try and do it up.
I want to model an black guy. Just because the proportions and everything are amazing. I love their faces.
I hope saying that doesn’t make me racist…
But yeah, I’m going to need you help a lot Larry.
By the way, do you use MSN or ICQ?
Heres an example of a very simple spline cage for the front half of a torso. Its dead simple and it took me literally 10 minutes to set up the cage and another 5 to patch and tweak.
Again what I like about this method its like sketching on paper. I can try different configurations quickly and like that sketch, get a good idea very quickly. When I patch it I end up with very nice meshes with a great flow to them. It makes detailing them a lot more fun because I dont have to fight the mesh nearly as much.
Andrew,
The idea behind modeling is to start with a primitive that most closely resembles the finished product. What Im doing with splines is to create that primitive. For me the real modeling starts after I patch the splines.
What I used to do is something like Dugg posted for reference. I would take that image and trace lines over it with a colored pencil to determine where to put splines. After awhile I didnt have to do that anymore as I learned from experience where to hook splines up and how they would behave when patched.
As you learn the basics and beyond you can skip more and more of the basic steps and just get into it.
All of the techniques people have mentioned I use at some point. For instance I may use extender to extend part of the torso down. I may create a poly in the hole where the arms would go and smooth shift out the arm. In the end, I dont rely on one particular way to model to get it done. Again, this is because Ive pretty much used every modeling technique thats out there at some point. When I started off using Lightwave years ago, point by point or poly by poly was literally about the only way to model. Later splines were introduced and that was about the only way to model anything organic. When SubDs were first introduced in Lightwave it was another thing to figure out how to use. In the beginning many people hated metaform and then metanurbs because they couldnt figure out the proper way to use them.
Ive been thru every change and addition to Lightwave and Ive been modeling characters long before Lightwave was on the PC or Mac. This gives me a bit of insight that many LW users dont have.
Heres a few characters I modeled with splines for a video game I worked on a LONG time ago for the 3DO game system when it was first released. These were done with LW 3.0 when it was only on the Amiga. I was also just learning to model characters and learn splines at the same time.
Im pretty sure this is the first characters I modeled. I traced them off background artwork supplied by the concept artist. Both were modeled using Splines in LW 3.0 when LW was only on the Amiga.
If youre interested in really learning splines from the ground up I have a new series of CDs that are almost done called The Organic Modeling Series. Check my webpage.
When I got a bit more familiar with human-like or human proportions I was able to build these characters for the same video game using splines. Again, all LW 3.0
Oh and my ICQ # is 9835218
That’s still really amazing.
But yeah, I’m totally looking forward to spline modeling a head. Then just box model the body.
Cool stuff man!
Originally posted by AndrewE
[B]I want to model an black guy. Just because the proportions and everything are amazing. I love their faces.I hope saying that doesn’t make me racist…[/B]
LOL why would that make you a racist?
I worked on an African man earlier this year (http://leigh.cgcommunity.com/images/taziyah_01.JPG) so if you need any help feel free to ask
Both when Andrew said, “Why am I so dumb” and the “hope that doesn’t make me a racist” I thought, definitely another fellow Canadian. It is a GREAT country but we are very quick to put ourselves down or worry we may have offended anyone.
Buddy, I love your fire and enthusiasm for learning this stuff.
Originally posted by Leigh
I worked on an African man earlier this year
My wife says that ideas have a sort of karma and that it’s not uncommon for multiple people to get the same idea around the same time. I’m started modeling my first African American woman this week:
Andrew, Larry is an amazing teacher and his courses are some of the best in the industry. And to boot, he’s a really nice guy. But don’t rule out learning how to box model. The things you’ll learn in doing so will only benefit you elsewhere.
Cheers!
Steve
Originally posted by Leigh
[B]LOL why would that make you a racist?I worked on an African man earlier this year (http://leigh.cgcommunity.com/images/taziyah_01.JPG) so if you need any help feel free to ask
[/B]
SERIOUSLY!?!?!??!
AWESOME!
I have a UV Texture assignment due in 2 weeks.
I’m thinking about modeling my own head. But I don’t really have the time to do a good one.
So what I think I am going to do is use the LW preset african male. And just do one hella good job on texturing.
What program do you use Leigh?
I’m really going to need help and direction!!!
Like what tool to use where, etc.
And did you get your article published and on the selves that you were doing for a mag about texturing a head?
Dugg:
Thank you very much! I try to learn as much as I can at once. That’s my very quality about me, once I get interested in something I have to become an expert, no if’s ands or but’s, I gotta be a MASTER!
That’s just me though, I gotta know stuff, I love 3D soo much, and I can’t believe I have had such a turnout with this thread, seriously. It makes me soo happy that people in this industry are in it together.
Steve:
Larry is amazing! Simply put, he put a lot time in this thread and I can’t thank him enough! He’s already tought me soo much.
I want to learn point to point, just because I haven’t really focused on that method, I’ve stayed relatively close to box modeling because it’s fast, it does a good job sometimes. And it helps in my strict time schedule I have for school and pleasure.
But I want to learn as much as I can! I can’t wait until I have 5 years under my bealt!
Thanks a lot guys! And please, keep them coming.
P.S. I totally agree with a higher being of thought with humans, it’s like a library of knowledge that we can access through our sleep. And once somebody makes a discovery it’s only days in our heads that something turn’s on inside!
Originally posted by Steve Warner
[B]
Andrew, Larry is an amazing teacher and his courses are some of the best in the industry. And to boot, he’s a really nice guy.Cheers!
Steve [/B]
Thanks Steve! Nice job btw.
Andrew,
I would focus on two things, mastering a technique and really learning about the structure of faces.
Heres one of the first characters I ever made using box modeling. It was when Metaform was introduced and before LW had realtime SubDs. This was done strictly by using bevels. Cuts had to be done by using polys in the background layer because there was no bandsaw or plane belt splitter at the time. I didnt finish the texturing but this was done before LW also had UV mapping.
These next characters were done when realtime SubDs were first introduced and I got the hang of using SMOOTH SHIFT. This is a frame from an animation I did using FK because IK was pretty new to LW.
The nice thing for me was not having been forced to try and learn mulitple tools and technques at the same time. Learning LW from its roots gave me a chance to master various tools and techniques one at a time. In my charcter course I teach at least 3 different methods of character modeling.
usually i use polygon modeling, forming a very basic shape for the head, following main loops etc…then i use classical box modeling tools, smooth shift, bandsaw, bevel, knife…this my modeling heads method
I feel so much like a fanboy in this thread.
BUT OMG! Bernard is amazing!
I saw him a little while ago back on here, and the texturing you had going for him was simply AMAZING!
Please, show more!
And yeah, what’s the best program for texturing?
I will use photoshop because I love it. But what makes me timid is that when I use photoshop, I don’t know all the tools and what brush to use here and so on and so forth.
And when I make my bump UV it looks terrible when I apply it. The lines look all anti-aliased and so on and so forth.
But yeah, Please, anyone, step in and smack me around with your knowledge of texturing faces!
http://www.simplylightwave.com
They have 3 free head modeling videos. Worth looking at for people who haven’t seen them.
