Earlier, I have
modeled objects that were never animated. However, this time I had to model a
human. It was of utmost importance to maintain the topography so that the when Lilly or George are animating them there are no inappropriate deformations.
So, I saw several
tutorials on Digital Tutors that would help me through with this.
Hair- I saw a tutorial of Maya Hair that seemed quite
fascinating. I did give it a try. So, I started modelling with a NURBS sphere
for the hair shape. Somehow, I was not getting around to even developing a
basic shape. Then, Kieran showed me how he had modelled hair from polygon in
his undergraduate project. That sort of helped. I started with a polygon sphere
and then changed its shape bit by bit. The major changes for the hair were its
pony-tail and the band that ties it. The pony-tail that I had modelled earlier
was rigid-looking and the band was a separated piece of polygon. The ridges in
the hair-shape were also deep so I had to reduce that. Now, the pony-tail looks
fluffier and realistic.
Earmuffs- The ear-muffs were a last-minute addition. I used
a NURBS sphere to model it first but later on moved to the most reliable method
of modelling- polygon. It was modelled really quickly but looks smashing
nevertheless.
Face- Modelling the human-face was the biggest challenge of
all. If the topology was in any way not correct then the animation would not
touch the audience. The eye-socket area was a challenge because the tutorial
that I had initially followed was that of an alien (Haha!). Later, Lilly found
me a tutorial for creating a young girl. So, following the alien tutorial I had
created the eye-lids separately. Here, the eye-lids are a part of the face
mesh.
Apparently, the
mouth-area was the most time-consuming part. Different people had different
opinion on the shape of the lips. I modelled it several times. Finally I
settled on just a basic shape. Then, it was important that the lines edges from
the eyes merged with the mouth area so that the deformation wouldn’t look
unrealistic.
The modelling of the
ears was very basic. However, it was later of no use as we added an ear-muff.
Eyes, Eye-lashes, Eyebrows- As mentioned earlier, I had
referred to the Alien making tutorial, thus, the eye was modelled according to
how the alien might look! I modelled a fresh pair from the other tutorial that
Lilly sent me. The new eyes not only look befitting our your character but also
has beautiful eye-lashes that add to her look. The eyebrows were modelled
separately so that the character could be more expressive. Also the eyebrows
were trimmed and tweaked to look more appropriate.
Teeth-Gum-Tongue- Following a separate tutorial this set of
teeth was modelled. The width of the teeth was changed several times. The end
of the tongue was made to tilt downwards,more in tandem to a real mouth.
Snood- The snood was modelled n number of times. I made the
first one with NURBS Curves and then lofting them to create a wave sort of
material representing the crease of the cloth. Despite it being made by the NURBS
curves, it looked rigid. So, I created a second with another NURBS primitive. I
was going nowhere with the NURBS modelling tools. Finally, I used a Polygon
Tube to model this. All my team mates were pretty happy with the result.
Torso- For the torso it was important that the clothes be
modelled on it and not independent of it. If the clothes were modelled
separately then there would have been one mesh on top of the other. It would
have made weight-painting and rigging difficult. The main challenge was to get
the arm joint and the chest topology correct. After several attempts I got that
correct. Also the crease that divides the sweater from the t-shirt was a
problem. The earlier design had the sweater longer that the t-shirt. So the
sweater-mesh lay over the t-shirt mesh which would have again been a problem
for George. So, then it was decided that the t-shirt would be longer than the
sweater.
Hands- The basic hand shape was blocked pretty much alright.
The detailing of the fingers did not take much time. It was the modelling and
positioning of the thumb that took a lot of tutorial help and time. The palm needed
some fixing too. Most importantly to have equal number of vertex to merge it to
the torso I had to join five vertices to one point. That might have posed a
problem when it was given for animating. Later, Sean advised me to separate the
parts of the body so that the deformation would not be weird. This also solved
the problem of equal number of vertices required to merge the separate meshes.
Lower-Body and Shoes- Topology of the lower body was quite
different because the hip would join at the thighs and the movement of each
would be different. I also had trouble of joining the two pair of legs at
thighs. The vertex of both the mesh would go beyond each other. I had to delete
and join many times to get it right. Also, Sheng suggested that we Lily’s trouser
might have a crease at the side to make it look like she is wearing clothes.
I had a fun time
making the shoes. It was the only part that did not take much time to model.
Plus, there were no changes required to it. It was perfectly made from Day 1.
Finally, I organised the entire scene
details as can be seen in the image below. The Outliner was cleaned and named
properly. Even, different parts of the body meshes were put into different
layers.
