Creating a Warrior Character: Part 4

In the forth part of the "Warrior" series you'll learn how to use ZBrush's masking and brush features to quickly create hair for the character. You'll then begin work on the accessories using a combination of ZBrush's extract functionality and Maya. Continue on after the jump!

Step 1

This is where we left off in the last part of the series. In this part I'm going to start by sculpting the hair.

Step 2

Create a mask where you want the hair by pressing 'Cntrl' and dragging on that area. You can use ‘Alt’ to remove parts of the mask while creating it.

Step 3

Press 'Cntrl' and click on the canvas to invert the mask, from ‘deformation’ in the tool menu. increase the ‘Inflate’ amount.

Step 4

Now you can Smooth out the hard edges by using the ‘Smooth’ option found in the Deformation options of the tools menu.

Step 5

Click on the ‘Lightbox’ button above the canvas, and go to Brushes> Slash, and select the ‘Slash2’ brush.

Step 6

Turn on LazyMouse from the Stroke menu and set the LazyRadius to 20 (you can also turn it on using ‘L’on the keyboard.)

Step 7

Now create strokes for creating hair, as shown below in the image below.

Step 8

After adding all the strokes in the hair area, select the ‘Standard brush’, then select ‘Alpha 36’. Turn LazyMouse On again and set the ‘LazySteps‘ to .02

Step 9

Now add more strokes to the hair area for creating finer hair strands.

Here’s the back side of the hair.

Step 10

For creating the belts, create a mask in the desired area as shown in the image below.

Step 11

Once you’ve made the mask, click on the ‘BlurMask’ option first, and then ‘SharpenMask’ under "Masking" in the Tools menu. By doing this the edges of mask will be smoothed.

Step 12

Now go to Tool> Subtool, and set the thick value to .01. Then click on the ‘Extract’ button. This will extract the mesh out of the masked area, as a new subtool.

Step 13

This extracted piece doesn't have a proper meshflow,  so we need to fix this using the ‘Topology’ tool. Make sure the extracted Subtool is selected (in the subtool menu) and click on the ‘Clone’ button in the tool menu.

Step 14

Now fix the meshflow of this object using the Topology tool (this was explained in ‘Part 2’ of this tutorial series.) It should look somewhat like the image below.

Step 15

Now select the Body mesh from tools.

Step 16

Click on the ‘Append’ button in the subtool menu. The newly fixed belt will get added as a new subtool.

Step 17

Now select the extracted subtool and click on the ‘Delete’ button. The Subtool which we’ve extracted in step 11 will now be deleted.

Step 18

Follow the same process (steps from 11 to 16) to create the character's briefs.

Step 19

Here are the extracted briefs.

Step 20

And here are the Brief topology, fixed using the topology tool.

Step 21

Mask for creating the second belt and belts on the thigh, remember to follow steps 11 to 16 to create these.

Step 22

Belts extracted with fixed topology.

Step 23

Now select all the subtools and export as an .Obj. Export the body at a higher level (i.e., level 2.)

Step 24

Import all the subtools in Maya.

Step 25

Now I’m going to add some thickness to the belts. Go to the fFace component, select all the faces and ‘Extrude’ them.

Step 26

Add extra loops at the edges to keep the edges sharp. You can check the edge sharpness by pressing ‘3’ on the keyboard.

Step 27

Follow the same steps for the second belt, thigh belts and briefs.

Step 28

Now Select the two side faces on both sides of the belt, and extrude them.

Step 29

Add an extra edge loop to maintain sharp edges. Check the edge sharpness by pressing ‘3’ on the keyboard.

Step 30

To create the shoes, export the body from Zbrush at the lowest sub-division level and import it into Maya.

Step 31

Select the faces on the leg where the shoes should be, as shown in the image below.

Step 32

Shift+Right click on the canvas and select ‘Duplicate Face’ from the menu.

Step 33

The Selected faces from the body will be duplicated, which we are going to use to create the shoe.

Step 34

Zoom in to the toe area and select the face between the toes, as shown in the image below and delete them.

Step 35

Merge the vertices to close the holes.

Step 36

Follow the same process for the other toes and this is what you should end up with.

Step 37

Follow the same process for creating the other shoe or just duplicate it and set the ‘X’ scale to -1.

Step 38

These are the two Lowpoly guns I’ve already created in Maya.

Step 39

I Import the first gun and adjust it as shown below in the image.

Step 40

I then Import the second gun and adjust it's position on right thigh as shown.

Step 41

Now model a 'side pad' on the left side of the body, as shown below in the image.

Step 42

Duplicate it, scale down the copy and place it on top. Then Create one more.

Do the same for the right side of the body.

Step 43

For modeling the dark grey part on the briefs, create the largest piece first and use it to create the other two, as shown.

Step 44

Now I’m going to create a cloth piece wrapped around the hand. Select the body and click on the ‘Make live’ button in the status line of Maya (highlighted in the image below.)

Step 45

The mesh will now look like it does in the image below, and whatever you create or translate will automatically be snapped to the mesh.

Step 46

Shift Right-click on the canvas, and select the ‘Create Polygon Tool’ from the menu.

Step 47

By clicking four times on the hand create a face with four sides.

Step 48

Select the edge, extrude and move it as shown in the image below.

Step 49

After extruding it a few more times. Keep adjusting the edges, the edges will automatically be snapped to the hand since 'make live' is turned on.

Step 50

This is what we get by following the same process, and working around the arm several times.

Step 51

Select all the faces and extrude them to give it some thickness.

Step 52

Create a simple holster for the thigh gun.

Step 53

Select all the newly created accessories, and export them as an .Obj.

Step 54

Import them back into Zbrush.

Step 55

All the accessories we have imported into zbrush will be one subtool. For sculpting the details, we need to split the accessories into different subtools. Press ‘Shift+Cntrl’ and drag on the cloth area.

Step 56

Now click on the ‘Split Hidden’ in the subtools panel. The cloth piece will be separated as a separate subtool.

Step 57

Divide the cloth a few times by pressing ‘Cntrl+D’ and then sculpt it as shown in the image below.

Step 58

While sculpting, if the mesh has is very thin, the backside faces will also be affected. To avoid this, go to the Brush menu> Auto masking and turn on the ‘BackfaceMask’ option.

Step 59

Now Separate the Holster part as a separate subtool and divide it. Adjust it so that it covers the whole gun as shown.

Step 60

Click on the Lightbox button and go to Brushes> Stitch brush and select the ‘Stitch3’ brush.

Step 61

Using this brush, sculpt the ‘stitching’ for the holster as shown.

Step 62

Now go to Noise in the surface section of the Tool menu, and turn the Noise option on. Adjust the settings as shown below to create a textured surface.

Step 63

When done with the settings, click on the ‘Apply To Mesh’ button. This will apply the noise to the holster mesh.

Step 64

This is how the holster will look.

Step 65

Now select "Plane3D" from the tool palette and convert it to ‘Polymesh 3d’ from the tool menu. Increase the polycount by pressing ‘Cntrl+D’ on the keyboard.

Step 66

Select the Standard brush and alpha 48. Then turn ‘Lazymouse’ on, and set the ‘Lazystep’ to 0.1

Step 67

Give a vertical Stroke on the plane as shown below in the image. To keep the stroke straight use the ‘Shift’ key on the keyboard.

Step 68

Now select ‘MRGBZGrabber’ from the 2.5 brushes, if Zbrush asks to exit Edit/transform mode, select ‘Switch’. This brush creates an ‘Alpha’ by defining the region on the canvas. With this brush selected, drag across the stroke we’ve created.

Step 69

Select the ‘Standard’ brush again, select the newly created alpha and set the settings for the ‘Lazymouse’ as shown in the image below.

Step 70

Finally to complete this part of the tutorial. Create stitches on the chest belts using this brush, and add noise to the surface, as was shown in step 62.