Zbrush - Portrait Study

This week's assignment was to choose a celebrity and create a portrait study. I chose to sculpt Regi Watts. Early in class I noticed that everyone was choosing bald white guys (since they're purely sculpting) so I chose to take a completely opposite approach by picking the hairball you see below. I started the mesh by sculpting out his basic features/proportions while also keeping in mind that he would be 80% hair.

 Reference Images:

I really enjoyed the sculpting part of this assignment. Between getting the nose just right and cutting in those wrinkles, it was the least troublesome for me. Fibermesh, initially, presented itself as a difficulty. But 3 fibermesh subtools later and I was getting the hang of it. However, I still want to get better control of the "groom" brushes.

My biggest issue with this assignment was spotlight. I just couldn't get the textures the quality that I desired. I spent at least a third of the assignment finagling and researching additional tutorials to help me in any way possible. It wasn't until class that I realized that it was my texture image resolution that was the issue. For the next version of this guy I plan on re-spotlighting and painting over in zbrush to get the texture just right.

Render Sheet (WIP):

Zbrush Hand Study

This week our assignment was another anatomy study with the choices either being a hand or foot study. I chose to do a hand for several reason. One, I'm awful at drawing these guys and I knew that if I was to successfully pull this off in 3D I would need to really analyze this deeper than I had before. Two, it would be a lot easier to pair up a hand to my previous arm sculpt than a foot haha. Below are some of the references I collected, which included medical illustrations, gesture/construction drawings, and 3D renders.

Reference:

Once again, I cannot express how important the sketching phase is for me when it comes to working in 3D. After doing a fair share of research I found some really informative ways to go about creating hands. My biggest take aways were:

1.) Locate major forms. Don't be afraid to simplify shapes!

2.) The hand is composed of wave-like gestures. Prevent stiffness by having fingers curving.

3.) Identify major angles. Ex: The thumb and pinky (when spread) intersect to form a 90 degree angle.

Pre-Sketches/Exploration:

Overall, the assignment was very similar to the arm study, except with its own sets of challenges. The biggest frustration for me was maintaining the finger tip shapes, while also giving them a more natural shape. This assignment really made me realize how powerful the standard brush is. I would say about 90% of the sculpt was just done with that alone. I also was able to focus on to really dig in there and carve out some details.

Final Presentation Sheet: