Finishing Up

At this time I have a month left in the contest still but would like to work on something else for a bit before then, there are a few things I'd like to polish still regarding shaders but for now here are some screenshots and videos. I grabbed some more poses from Mixamo and adjusted them to Katarn's weapons. I also worked more on the skin and hair shader to make them feel more realistic and lastly I worked on some lighting sets. The Marmoset viewer is using 1K textures due to size limits, it is hosted on ArtStation, but it is a good way to check out the model and get an idea for the textures.

Also! For fun I am getting this into Unreal with some simple animations so hopefully I can show that off at some point too!

This post will be updated as I get new screenshots so this will represent what will be in my final submission.

Base and Blendshapes

For this update I created a base for Kyle as well as a blendshape for his face to get an expression. I will continue to update the expression and I'd like to work more on the skin an hair shaders.

Adjusting Materials and Skinning

Started to clean up some of the skinning from Mixamo to better work with my geometry. Also tried to improve the hair and skin materials a bit and moved the hair UV's over to sparser hair cards. Still some more rig clean up to do and then I will start working on the base and lighting!

Testing Poses

Started testing some poses from Mixamo, I have plans to make a base and add force powers, primarily lighting. One of my favorite things about Kyle's character is that he doesn't discern the differences between the Dark and Light sides of the force so I would like to show that in a static pose if I can! This pose is super WIP, it's nicely revealing some weighting problems that will be easier to fix now and it's helping me visualize what I want final shots to look like and what I need to do to shape those up.

Swing Dancing

Here are some updated screenshots, some anatomy fixes based on feedback and a closeup of the head in Marmoset:

Threw Kyle into Mixamo and picked a fun dance, might use this rig as a bsae, some of the weights are off but it's giving a better start than Maya's skinning

Added Hands and re-styled hair

Hands are in a good spot for now! Redid the hair to match the style of the later Jedi Knight games, not a fan of the hair-style but it fits the character to me, gonna check on some modeling stuff and then move on to some simple rigging to get posing

Haircards and Marmoset

Trying out Marmoset, most of my work lately has been focused on hair cards, I think I have tried every program on my machine to make them. Still not happy with the hair right now or the face really but I'll keep working on it, hands are next and more tweaking of the head to come

Body Post-Feedback

After getting some feedback I update some of the overall forms of the body and worked a bit more on the folds: 

Full body Sans-Head and Hands

Update on clothing and accessories, not quite happy with the boot textures but for now it'll work! Head and hands are up next!

Belt work and Combining Stuff

Worked on Katarn's belt today, getting some things together in sketchfab just to see how everything looks

A Start on Kyle

A start on Kyle Katarn, using my variety of refs. Hair is temporary and will be replaced with cards, and boots/accessories to come! 

Modeling1.jpg

Retrogasm Art Contest Start

The Retrogasm Art Contest is run by Jon Troy Nickel and Layna Lazar (https://www.facebook.com/groups/RetrogasmArtCompetition) the goal of the contest is to pick a "Retro Character" and bring it up to modern day game standards. Any character is fair game as long as it is from the first 6 generations of consoles. For this contest I chose to update Kyle Katarn, the protagonist from some of my favorite childhood games, The Jedi Knight series. My design of the character will mix some of the elements from the games and some from the live-action actor used for cutscenes. Here are some of the screenshots I am using as reference: