Hey everyone! This will be my first portfolio post on this website. I wanted to show how far I've come and how much work I've put towards LoP roblox game through the years I've been on their team. I've done 2D and 3D artwork(and more) for that game, but I will only be showcasing the 3D models I have made. Lets get started! Starting out wayyyy back when, when I first began working for the team! At this time, I was a Trial. The images for preview may not be the best but theyre all I've had of the old work and WIP screenshots.
At this point, I was still getting the "hang of" sculpting, and Roblox's Engine had only just begun Beta experimentation with mesh models in the engine.
Blehh!! Ugly, right? Well- that was the best I could do at that time. Everything looks like mushy clay here, and theres not much detail even without maps. I mean- it had a low poly count- but that was at the cost of detail. No Bueno folks.
Here's a screenshot of my initial unwrap!! The layout in the image isnt final, and this is not the model in our game. You know what really sucks about this model? Not only does it look like mush, but theres' unnecessary verts AND its textures cannot be asymmetrical. No personality!
Back then, I had only just began learning how to use substance painter. Here's our mascot Ikran skin, on what the staff love to joke as a "Banshee Snake". (get it? its because the missing wings make it look like a snake!)
Side track time! Here and there I would get bored of focusing on one project (like the Ikran model) for too long, and I would often bounce around from model to model. Here's what I did next.
Shown above is a Dev- Conceptual Fan-Plant! It's supposed to be a carnivorous Fly-trap that could eat players who roam too close. Isn't that a cool idea? Anyways, the blob next to it is an unfinished bush. Kekeke.
After modeling the base mesh for the plant I went through and low-poly modeled the wood-sprites! Oh Eywa, send us your prayers- and make me a better artist!
We named the plant Tim. Don't ask why we did- we don't know why either. But that's the fun of it! You can pet Tim, he doesn't bite(I'm lying).
While Tim looks great (for a Mesh Roblox model at the time), you'll notice how flat he looks! I was going for a stylized approach to texturing him the last time I worked on Tim. He only has a Color texture map! He would not fit in with our current game assets. Tim is rigged, if you're wondering.
I then went on to modeling some leaves, that I thought we could hang around on map walls and caves. Again, theyre quite flat looking and stylized in texture. These models could probably still be used- but I think we will just remake them in the future. :)
After completing the (old) Ikran Model and some plants, I took on the challenge of our next most needed asset. Na'vi Player Characters. Here's my first WIP screenshot, a sculpt of a Na'vi who looks like hes permanently mewing.
I began to refine the Na'vi model, learning more about facial planes and general humanoid facial shapes. I was often studying the Na'vi faces seen in movies and official snapshot work.
I then took on the challenge, of trying to make a 'female' variant from the same sculpted head mesh. While I thought it was "okay" at the time, I can see the many errors and flaws in my old work nowadays. Back then, being able to sculpt these faces was a 'learn as I go' process, and I love learning.
Fast forward a bit, and the Legends of Pandora has a newly appointed 3D Developer on the team, along side me! They re-created the Ikran and made the Viperwolf & Thanator model's, lovingly. In the end, they did not stay on the team with the project. We had permission to recycle/re-use their models, and it was left up to me to improve on them. Here's the showcase!
Above is the original Ikran model(done by the developer who left), in all its glory! However, what irked me at the time was some very minute details- that for me, threw off the immersion. I noticed alot of errors here and there, both anatomy, topology, and for rigging down the line and decided to 'fix' these while giving the model a cleaner appearance.
I started small, biting off only what I could chew. I decided I would work on the head and neck first, and fixed some small details that were inaccurate, and adding plenty more detail. You'll notice the slight bumps, ridges, these were not there until I had added them. I felt the Ikran's skin needed the texture.
Next, I really felt the need to fix the wings and give them the proper anatomical detail accurate to that of the Ikran in the movies. Both hind and fore-wings had these index talons that were long, and had a unique curved shape. I felt the wings needed to be fuller. The thighs and shoulders needed to have muscles to make flight at-least believable.
After working on the Ikran some more, I needed a quick break. I decided to return to the Na'vi once again, to try and take a bite out of the work I knew was going to be inevitably needed of me.
I tried studying human muscle anatomy and then adapting that to what we would see of the Na'vi in the movies. This was a decently bad move. Looking back on it, I attached too much human- anatomy detail to the model before considering important Na'vi differences.
While our current-day Na'vi model is better, and more accurate- it is still incomplete. At the time of making the original Na'vi model, I was going to try to break the model up similar to an R15 Roblox character, and then attach or create an R15 compatible rig. That would have made animations plenty easier.
But this was not an effective method, or even one fit for the game Legends of Pandora is going to be. We planned for first person storyline, so players would need to have some form of animated finger movement. Due to our multiplayer aspects, theres going to be a needed and detailed face and hair rig, too.
After a quick and hard break of working on the Na'vi, it was back to Ikran Development.
I began working on sculpting out more refined details on more of the mesh. The Torso was completely re-sculpted (many parts of the model were) and given more anatomical detail. Things like its ribcage, shoulder blade definition, wrinkles under the neck, and more were all added. Look at those soft scales!
I ended up completing the rest of the sculpt super fast, and before I knew it- I began to do some normal map (PBR) texture baking onto some low-poly mesh. The image on the left is a mesh under 1k triangles, and has the torso portion of the mesh baked onto it! Isn't it neat how it creates the illusion of detail?
While I worked on the Ikran and Na'vi models, I tried to make my own direhorse (which we did not use, due to me procrastinating and not quite liking the results). Heres a snapshot of the only head sculpt.
My workflow isn't super duper slow after a certain point, so it did not take long for me to Retopologize the entire sclupted mesh parts of the high poly ikran model. I created a quick test rig, too! Heres some images and video showcasing :D
Above is a video of (almost) the completely low poly mesh of the Ikran model. After I had taken this video, I did a bit of optimization and got rid of many edge loops and faces that weren't really all that needed for a game on Roblox.
Being who I am, and being as passionate as I was with the project, I was laying out UV Maps as I was Rigging the model.
To the left is a test pose of the FK Rig, as I was working on the mesh with the UV Layout at the time.
The wings stretch beautifully, the Ikrans facial expressions show accurate roar, I am still decently proud of my progress thus far on such a large project.
The Rigging of the Ikran model was an incredibly intricate and 'janky' process. There were many bugs, and errors on both Blenders' side as well as mistakes I made.
Rigging the Ikran with an accurate IK rig took me weeks of on and off progress. I genuinely took breaks and returned with fresh eyes to try again.
Eventually it all snapped together in my brain, like pieces of a puzzle interlocking. I had a 90% functional IK rig with constraints and great bone weight paints. I was able to organize the rig, save, and model and send it off to some of our animators for testing.
Animation to the left is not mine.
As I was finishing up the Ikran I took a break from the massive project, while my animators had fun playing around with the mostly-complete rig and gave me feedback on how to change it for the better. I was patient, because I cannot lie- the Ikran rig was another huge learning barrier. Even though the barrier had been broken, I needed a break from the effort it took for me to get where I was.
Remember the Ex-Developer I had mentioned? Well, a large majority of their models had poor topology ontop of other issues- which made the models difficult to texture, animate properly, and even generally work with.
I decided to fix that.
I began redoing the Viperwolf.
The Viperwolf, admittedly was not as difficult of a fixer upper as the Ikran. This may be due to the Ikran's multiple sets of wings, or the large anatomical inaccuracies that needed equally scaled fixes. Alas, the Viperwolf was an easier re-do and I took about a few weeks sculpting, retopologizing and making the test FK rig.
While the Viperwolf received adequate amounts of attention, I eventually decided it was time to give my other adoring models some love. The Viperwolf was put on pause needing a finished rig,retopo, and sculpt details.
It was back to working on the Ikran, after feedback from our animators. Luckily there were no major fixes but a few minor weight paint errors on smaller bones.
I was given the green light with the current IK rig as shown on the right. It includes controllers and constraints, so that animators don't need to waste time on each individual bone when working.
The Ikran model received its full normal map bake. It was time to see it in its full glory!
Below I will show you the sculpt compared to the lowpoly baked game-ready model. Play 'Spot the Difference' with me!
If it wasn't obvious or it was too hard to guess, the bottom image with the muted cyan color is the game-ready model! Some parts like the talon have less texture detail (and verts) because they wont be seen up-close or often, if at all.
I started to work on some skins on the new model- though I was weary of how I should draw them. Crisp, Realistic? It was a hard choice. Some skins have more of a drawn on less-crisp edge to the colors, and others smear in a more realistic blend.
We had grown a community by now, and started opening contests and free entries to have custom Ikran Skins on the in-game models. Below are some community skins.
Eventually the Ikran was given some placeholder animations (by me) and placed in our Showcase Experience within roblox.
Now the Ikran model is just about complete, by my standards. Ive made a few renders to showcase skin variations & advertise our project more. I've begun to swap my attention over to other models that we need completed.
Above are some skin variation renders including their placeholder names.
To the left is a render I've used to showcase our game using a screenshot of one of our maps & our logo.
I finshed reopologizing the viperwolf sculpt after I added all of the necessary detail. Above is not the final tri-count as the hands and feet were not retopologized yet, just decimated.
To the left is the lowpoly viperwolf model, in its base pose. Below is an example of testing the expressiveness that can be given and applied to roblox models who do have a facial rig. This sort of deformation was a bit new to me at the time.
With this new experimentational rig I have been trying to create a bit of snarl deformation within the muzzle, squinting within the main eye, and furrow within the brow. I wont be able to create the level of quality that I ideally would like but I think for the lowpoly aim, its current WIP is great progress.
While I did bake the textures on the completed low poly mesh for the Viperwolf, at the time of typing this I don't have available screenshots to showcase the work. My next projects and work are on two different things: The Pitchmocker model, a conceptual Fan/Dev- created model & Making the direhorse more optimized. The Direhorse High-Poly Sculpt was made by a lovely artist on our team, named "Artist" LOL!
See the details in their work? Amazing!! Just this Direhorse alone is super anatomically identical to the Direhorse' in the movies.
I did not change anything with their original sculpt, with the exception of mesh glitches.
I started out with some manual retopology. See those beautiful squares? This was not my final work- those bunches of squares on the legs were evened out in the end. Minimal triangles were used on the mesh for good animation deformation.
Just as with the Ikran, as soon as the retopology was complete- the UV's for the direhorse were mapped out and its placeholder rig was made.
WOOOO the detail!?
The finished Direhorse model is barely over 10k Triangles.
The Direhorse currently has a few different texture variations, though I'm not considering them "official" currently. While the textures do seem 'realistic' due to the PBR Maps I feel like the albedo, or flat-color map is missing lots of needed details.
I haven't returned to working on the Direhorse, yet- so these snapshots are the latest stuff! You can see a small animation of the direhorse on my home page.
Wowza! Much work! So far, you've seen my progress as I worked on the Ikran, Na'vi, Viperwolf, and Direhorse! Next, we can take a look at more Na'vi progress alongside a custom dev-creature! Dev-Creatures are non-cannon fauna that a developer has made and got green-lit. Anytime these creatures are made, the the Development team has to follow specific limitations, to keep the creature atleast looking realistic to Pandora.
Ohmygosh we get to look at one of my favorite non-Cannon creatures for the game! The Pitchmocker is such a cutie-patootie. The Staff member who created them, told me they would move similar to a ferret with threatening displays using its arms when frightened. Cool enough, the Pitchmocker can mimick the sounds of almost all creatures on Pandora, and has its own unique noises!
When working on the pitchmocker, I started out with some basic sculpting shapes, trying to acheive the over-all bodily silhouette before refining major details.
After I felt that the overall shape was right, I began landmarking those major details- the ribcage, thigh muscles, face wrinkles, eye lids, gills, ear markings. I like to leave complexities like paws and feet for last, as a finishing touch :)
One of the hardest things to work on with the Pitchmocker model, was the eye axis & appearance from different angles. It was hard to create the right shape and appearance that matched the original Concept Art reference as closely as possible.
But!! I think we're getting there :D
Here is where I have currently left off on with the Pitchmocker. Im using a pretty rainbow shader to help accentuate the details and depth within the model.
I've changed the ear shape a bit to make it less flat plane-shaped, giving it more 3- dimensional definition. Along with this I've mapped out the chest mucles and more of the rib cage from underneath. I've made the gills deeper, refined the thighs and front arm muscles, and started out on the paws for the Pitchmocker.
Before long, the Pitchmocker will be a cutie-patootie players can see in-game!
After giving the Pitchmocker a bit of a starting ground, I decided I needed to pull my big-girl pants up and work more on the Na'vi model. We really need a customized player model!!
Originally I started out working on my original head mesh as shown way-back when- and tried adding some dreadlocks. The image shown is entirely incomplete and took me like, 5 minutes to do. I didn't like the apperance of the original head model mesh anymore, and spontaneously went through the process of creating a completely new one.
The new head mesh has multiple different visible variations.
Once I had sculpted some fitting ears onto the new Na'vi head mesh, and gave it variations- I thought it needed a body to go with it! I streamed my progress within our community discord server- to the public and to our supporters(who get early-access to updates). Over the course of two IRL days, within my freetime I got the Na'vi body models to where they are now. While theyre still incomplete- I feel that where they are currently at is a great placeholder point.
After I felt that I had reached a good-enough stopping point on the model I started to work on extra-customizations. You see, we've already planned for player's to be able to change their eye colors, skin tone, stripe patterns, and associated tribal race in the Character Creator. But, we want our game to be unique, immersive and feel like a fitting game to that of the universe and movie franchise.
Our Player Characters are going to have multitudes of hair styles to choose from, (and if we can will it- potentially some inter-changable hair pieces to make your own hair-style!) aswell as different assets for customizable outfits and tools. While we are aiming for unique-ness, we are also aiming for optimization so every mesh piece will be as low poly as possible while maintaining the necessary detail.
While I only have a screenshot of the neural queue-braid complete, we have alot of good ideas and models in the works for Na'vi hair, so I hope youll stick around- or maybe even join our discord to see more!
Oh and 'Artist', our Developer- had sculpted the Hexapede and I'm currently in the process of retopologizing it as lowpoly as possible (2k tris or significantly less). I can't wait to come back to my blog in the future to show you guys more.
I am so thankful for having the Developer team, Staff, and Founders to work with. I am so happy that they have chosen me, and feel like I have experienced something many will not, having been able to work along-side them.
Current-Day I am now a Co-Founder for the game. I lead the Development team into any projects specializing with the models and assets, level design and map layout, or anything to do with our multiplayer aspects(we have a planned story line campaign mode). Thank YOU, for reading this- and sticking around to read about me blabbering on about my work. I hope you enjoyed!
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