Character artists are the driving force that fills three-dimensional worlds with people, animals, magical creatures, and everything else that breathes life into a chosen setting. They represent a kind of transit station where all the paths of pre-production converge, and the concept art is transformed into a real and concrete 3D model. Next, animators take the baton. The success of the project will depend on how well the artist does their work. Listed below are the steps to create a 3D Character and some tips to help you through them.
The main stages of creating 3D characters
When creating a playable character for a video game, it is important to understand the overall concept of the character. To do this, gather as many references as possible to know who and how you are going to create. In addition, it is much more fun to work on the playable character when you know its backstory and what makes it unique. Let’s have a closer look at each step of 3D character production.
Concept
It’s much better to work on a playable character when you know their history and background. By understanding a character’s story before you start creating them, you’ll be able to develop them more fully and create a more believable and captivating character. Concept artists will be able to give the primary look to your unborn game characters and set the tone for their further development.
Blocking
To create a 3D model of your desired character, you will need to start with primitive forms. These basic geometric shapes will provide the foundation for your character’s form. Once you have combined the primitive forms into the desired character form, you will have a good idea of what your character will look like. Keep in mind that you can always make adjustments to primitive forms to fine-tune your character’s form. With a little patience and creativity, you will be able to create a 3D model that is truly unique.
Sculpting
The process of creating a 3D character can be compared to sculpting. When you start, you have a smooth model that doesn’t have the features yet. The artist needs to create them by adding and subtracting material until the desired result is achieved. This can be a very time-consuming process, but it’s important to take your time and get the details right. After all, the characters you create will be brought to life on the screen and they need to look believable.
Creating a retopology
The topology of the game character is a surface structure that defines the model’s visual characteristics. In other words, it determines how the character will look. Most often, the topology of the 3D model is created using polygon modeling. This means that the character is made up of a series of interconnected polygons. Because polygons can have multiple angles, it is essential to choose a shape that allows you to easily edit and animate individual pieces of the shape. For example, a character with a lot of right angles will be harder to animate than one with more organic shapes.
UV unwrapping
The process of UV unwrapping is essential for anyone who wants to create accurate textures for 3D models. Without a UV map, it would be very difficult to know where to place your textures on a 3D object. UV unwrapping essentially “unfolds” the mesh of a 3D object so that you can create a flattened 2D texture that fits the object. This process can be quite tedious, but it is essential for creating realistic textures. With a UV map, you can easily wrap any texture around your 3D object and be confident that it will fit correctly. UV unwrapping is an essential tool for anyone who wants to create realistic textures for their 3D models.
Baking
Baking is the process of transferring detail from a high poly mesh to a low poly mesh and saving it in a texture file. This allows you to have a high level of detail from the high poly mesh without the expensive performance costs. In the baking process, the information of the high poly mesh is transferred onto the low poly mesh and saved into a texture. The most common maps that are baked are normal maps, world space normals, IDs, Ambient Occlusions, Curvatures, Positions, Thicknesses, and Emissives. Each map provides different information that can be useful in different ways.
- Normal maps are used to create the illusion of extra detail on a low poly mesh by giving it bumps and dents that match the high poly mesh.
- World space normals are used to create effects like caustics and environment reflections. IDs can be used for material assignments or object selections in engines.
- Ambient Occlusions are used to create shadows in places where two surfaces meet. Curvatures can be used for edge detection or bevels.
- Positions can be used for placing objects in 3D space.
- Thicknesses can be used for Rim Lights or other volumetric effects.
- Emissives can be used for lights or glow-in-the-dark materials. As you can see, there are many uses for baked textures and each one provides different information that can be utilized in different ways to improve your 3D models.
Texturing 3D models
Assuming you have a 3D model of clothing items, texturing would be giving that clothing item fabric textures like cotton, wool, or denim. You can also add different colors to the textures. MIP texturing is a method that uses multiple copies of a single texture image with different levels of detail. This means that close up, the fabric looks very realistic and detailed, but from far away it looks more like a solid color.
Rigging and skinning
3D character animation is a complex process that involves creating a character skeleton and then skinning it. The rigging process involves creating a character skeleton, which is necessary to animate a separate skeleton or bone in the future and thus make the 3D model of a person move. After rigging, skinning comes. Skinning is a crucial step in the animation process, as it gives the character its final shape and allows for smooth and realistic movement.
Lighting
A well-lit 3D model can convey a sense of time and place, helping to set the mood and atmosphere of a scene. Lighting can also be used to highlight important details or to create a sense of depth and dimensionality. In addition, lighting can be used to guide the viewer’s eye, directing their attention to the most important elements of a scene. Effective lighting is an essential tool for any 3D artist, and by learning to use lighting effectively, you can take your renders to the next level.
Rendering
3D rendering is the process of creating a scene for a 3D model and converting it into a 2D image. Artists adjust the illumination of the scene, the direction of the camera, and the texture of the frame to create a realistic image. Some 3D artists use separate hardware for rendering, which allows them to continue work with another modeling on the main computer while the rendering takes hours on the secondary one. This is a useful lifehack for optimizing your workflow. By using separate hardware for rendering, you can maximize your productivity by working on two tasks simultaneously.