Yo,
Any critique or way to make the model more professional looking. The piece is from some amazing concept art I’ve found online. However after numerous hours my model isn’t matching up or not in the professional sense.
Here is the head/ full body points i’m currently at.
And the lighting render with a different material -
And from the back -
REF USED -
Any comments are welcomed!
Are you trying to copy it 1:1? Or are you just using it for ideas? Because if you’re just borrowing stuff, I don’t know if that concept really sells the tree theme that well to begin with. Looks more like rocks to me. And that would make it a lot harder to work off.
I’m not a professional, so I can’t say what exactly it is lacking to reach that level. But Some of the details look a little to smooth. He’s some kind of creature made out of wood, so I think some rougher edges might help with that. I guess what I am saying is he looks too clean and smooth. Additionally you might want to consider doing some drawings of your own of the character. The reference is cool and all, but I think trying to draw Front/Back/Side T-pose of the character would help.
Alot of the time for me, whenever I notice my work isn’t as good as I want it to be, i go back and do more planning and then I can bring it to where it looks pretty good.
One thing that sticks out for me is the face. In the reference the smile is kind of menacing, but in the model the smile seems kind of goofy. I don’t know how you’d go about fixing this, besides just drawing the face on paper to get a better idea of what you want it to look like.
Like I said, I am not a professional, but I do think most professionals typically have a fair amount of reference work from the Concept Art department when working on these models. It is the Concept Artist’s job to make sure the modelers have ALL the information for the subject matter in question.
This last bit may be bad advice, but when I “finish” a piece of artwork and it doesnt feel right, I sometimes start over completely. Rather than trying to push and pull what has already had hours and hours put into it, it seems better to take everything I learned from the piece I finished by didn’t like and start over. I can usually get to where I was before quicker.
Also, keep at it! In my brief experience with art, it only gets better. You can do it, it might take longer than you want it to, but you can do it. Goodluck!
Mixture of both, for instance the face is a 1:1 but the body aspect changes, as well as the centre of the chest which will encase the gem will be the same. But the thorns are different and different parts of armour are different. I realised the stone/rock base type but wanted it to be more tree/bark resemblance as I will create zpheres around to create vines later.
However without using the alphas and texture brushes I couldn’t in my eyes create a believable sense of bark/wood texture. I’ll update when I’m home from work a piece where I’ve used texture brushes.
Well if you’re going tree I think there are a couple options to sell the wood look a little better. You could take the groot approach and do irregular bark pieces like so,
Or you could go the Ent approach and cover him in moss and mini tree like structures like Treebeard.
Or you could go the old school comic groot with the vines.
But like I said, I don’t see bark shapes in the design. I see like rock or bone shapes. I don’t know if you want to deviate from the design to start building in some tree shapes but design wise I think you could go with big blocky shapes or small little vine shapes.
If you go blocky shapes I would make them flat like just boards of jagged wood like a broken up boardwalk or something like this
You appear to be going small vine shapes but have it all pretty symmetrical. I think it would be easier to just break the symmetry.
Groots back has a bunch of vine shapes but they all are just basically what the muscle structure would look like if exposed and painted tree bark color. So with that in mine you could throw some more anatomy into it to make the body look more natural but your dude has more of an armor look so you’re probably going for that?
I think right now your guy is kinda busy so I would also simplify while building in the shapes.
So basically to summarize.
That’s my take anyway. The head is another thing but I think I would start there. Hopefully that helps.
Wow thanks! Very comprehensive. I’m split now between wanting to create the bark and root style and build it more out and into the form of rocks/stone. I may end up duplicating and taking it both ways. The groot style is excellent but as you said I wanted a bit more armou and defensive style instead of actual skin/body design as it’s overly bulky. I also fear in my eyes I’m going to have to crate their own sub tool vines enveloping the body. Which could also work as armour in a different sense.
Didn’t have a chance to work on it today but I shall be tomorrow and I’ll update you with different snapshots of the styles.
Thanks again for being interested
Sorry I haven’t been updating this I started work on a different project! I had time to re-visit this and look at your idea. The vine ideas look incredible in my mind and the designs showcased in Guardians of the galaxy.
Heres a preview of what I had in mind for the vines 
However I’ll probably change up the sizing of each of them.
I also don’t know whether to keep the chest plate from the previous model and work around it or completely start again on the chest.
Good start. Yeah some variety would go a long way. Especially some long little guys that branch way off the body. I could definitely see the chest plate working in that but you do you sir.
Sorry for my english. You could try asymmetric sculpt the chest piece like root like shape that wrap around the centre. You said the head was 1:1 with concept but face is taking to much space maybe try blocking it out then adding slight detail to get what want before adding the tree texture?
I would have to agree that the texture of the model is a little too smooth to pass for wood. Maybe you could make it a little more gnarly with grainy texture. The mouth might need a little work. Something about the face reminds me of porcelain. A few smaller green tree limbs might make it seem more alive. Overall, great work! Keep it up!