Mechanical Marvel - Initial & Developed Sketches

Mechanical Marvel - Initial & Developed Sketches

Mechanical Marvel - Extended Research

Mechanical Marvel - Extended Research

Silhouette Designs

To better aid my future designs such as developed sketches and the final Photoshop concept I needed to start looking at more outlets for me to sample, test and experiment to see what would help. One of these is character silhouettes. These help rough-up some designs and give quick inspiration for later. 

Here are my silhouette character designs...

Texture Experiments

To better aid the look of my final Photoshop concept, I needed to execute a look/feel of a Robot/Mecha by experimenting with some textures in Photoshop. Not only will this be good practice for my Photoshop concept but will help me better understand what does/does not work texture-wise. 

Here are the texture experiments I did...

For these I drew up some basic silhouettes and filling in those silhouettes with metal and robot textures whilst painting over them with a colour scheme that fitted the textures. For example, the first one is black, white and grey so I used those colours when I painted over it.

Mechanical Marvel - Final Photoshop Concept

Mechanical Marvel -  Final Photoshop Concept

Now that I have completed my research, initial and developed ideas. As well as some practice methods such as artist interpretation, texture experiments and mechanical bits, I feel as though I am ready to move onward to the final Photoshop concept piece. Which I'll then take from Photoshop to Maya.

Once I had the general design down and done. I needed to ensure that this would stand out from the background to stop any future colour-mixing or confusion. So within the outline I took a darker shade of the grey and filled in the outline that colour. After this I would add a drop shadow for realism. 

As mentioned, I decided to add a drop shadow just to give the concept piece a little bit of realism and just an extra added effect. As Chris mentioned it is better to add this since it does not make it out as if the design is not just floating in mid-air with nothing around or behind it.



























The completed concept piece needed more than this so what I needed to do was add more realistic features and artist details so that it wasn't so broad and bland. So, what I did was then add a few paint strokes and highlights on the right-hand side (where my lightsource would be) and later, textures.

The last step to having this be fully finished was textures. I wanted scuffed and scratched metal since this would help out the design massively and give it the look and feel that I wanted. So with the help of Google I got various metal textures and using the overlay (blend mode) I layered multiple metal textures over the outline and backdrop to finally complete the Photoshop concept piece.

Here is a GIF of the full process in screenshots

Mechanical Marvel - Artist Interpretation

Mechanical Marvel -  Artist Interpretation

As part of the research phase we were tasked with doing an 'Artist Interpretation' where we take an artist of the same medium (digital, modelling, traditional) and attempt to follow their workflow and replicate their work. This is all to better our understanding of how others work and how this can benefit us just as well. So I needed to find an artist to do an interpretation from.

I found 'dasAdam' otherwise known know as Adam Wesierski who is a 3D modeller and digital artist who has done various pieces based around the idea and concept of Robots and Mechas. I felt that this suited the theme of mechanical marvel very, very well. Therefore I decide to use his work. 

As you can see from the screenshot, following Adam's workflow this is the result of my artist interpretation. I learn't various techniques and skills such as utilizing the polygon lasso tool in Photoshop as well as minimalistic colour palettes and finally the opacity tool.

Mechanical Marvel - Keyframing and Animation

Mechanical Marvel -  Keyframing and Animation

The last part before I finalize the entire model and add fully render textures was to animate. How I did this was referring back to the pivot point I set at the ball-joint and circle (curve polygon) earlier. What I did was set the total keyframes in my timeline and set them to (50) frames. From here I went right-click > object mode and then selected the entire upper body of my model. My method was to rotate the entire upper body as though my Mecha/Robot is looking around, saving a keyframe for every turn I make whilst using the rotate tool. Here was my first attempt without ambient occlusion. 

I knew I needed to insert more frames frequently to get a smoother result. In addition to that there is no lighting or added environment effects at all so beyond the blinn material set on the model itself, it have no lighting or effects which in all honesty looks awful, so I had to change that. 

How I did this was added ambient occlusion, which gives the model more of a professional and realistic look. How I did this was by using the mentalray render engine in Maya and tweaked the settings to what I wanted and or needed it to look like. 

I set up spotlights and cameras throughout my scene to really highlight the features of the model I wanted to been seen in full detail for the final render. Here is what the scene set up with the spotlights and cameras looked like...

Here was the result with the spotlights, camera perspectives and ambient occlusion looked like. I personally am really happy with the outcome and wouldn't have changed anything.

As you can see the result in comparison to my first attempt is drastically better. It has depth to field, soft shadows, light reflectivity and of course, ambient lighting. Below I put a screenshot of my original (first attempt without ambient lighting) side by side the model rendered with it. 

Knowing what and how to fully render with the correct lighting and settings I could now focus on tweaking and altering my animation as I needed to. This means smoothing the frames of which I did but I also changed the animation slightly too. Instead of right to left, left to right it does a full 360 degree turn now. I felt this suited it more and showed off the full extent of the model.

This is what it looks like... 

Once I fixed all of the frames and their timing and once I added the tweaked ambient lighting settings my model was ready to be rendered and a completed animation. Here is the result...

Mechanical Marvel - Adding Details & Minor features

Mechanical Marvel -  Adding Details & Minor features

Now that I have a completed, yet basic model I needed to make it more visually pleasing before I animate and texture to fully complete my model. How did I do this? After a short period of researching basic robots I decided to add pipes/tubes and rivets. Both of these are subtle, simple yet effective details that make a Robot or Mecha look more authentic, which is what I wanted.

The rivets are basic sphere polygons and the pipes are cylinder polygons. Once I added all the rivets and pipes I wanted as with all my other components I combined and grouped them to their areas whether that be the upper body (arms, shoulders etc) and the lower body (lower-guard, legs etc).

 Here is the basic, finished model with all pipes and rivets added...

Lastly, I wanted to double-check before animating and texturing how my finished model looked compared to my Photoshop concept piece. Reason being is because I didn't want to look back and realize that I completely took the original design and went crazy with it and didn't keep it authentic. 

Also, I have a GIF of a full orthographic turnaround of my model in Maya with only materials added.

Mechanical Marvel - Modelling the Upperbody and Arms

From Photoshop to Maya - Modelling the Upperbody and Arms

Now I needed to model the upper body of my Mecha/Robot. In order to do so I needed to do so I needed to finish the ball-joint 'mechanism' that connects both the lower and upper segment together. How I did so was by using a basic cylinder polygon grouped and combined with a circle (curve polygon) - which I then set a pivot point to for animation purposes later. However for the actual upper body modelling I took one simple cube polygon of which I dragged the two front-facing, upper vertex's backward to make this almost Rhombus looking shape that would be the bottom base for it.

From this point what I did both to save time and to create the best, symmetrical and authentic looking Mecha/Robot that stayed within the guidelines of my original concept piece was to duplicate the bottom-base polygon and scale them down until I reached the head/top section of the upper body. I made minor alterations to the other sections of the upper body to avoid over-using the same polygon. These changes included bevels, creases to make it a lot smoother rather than a basic hard, matte look.

In the screenshot above, you can see I have added two pauldrons/shoulders which will be the base shapes to hold the spaulders/extended shoulders which will prop and arms or cannons. This is where I felt my design started to come to life and really look like the Photoshop concept piece. I also modelled the centre and head of the design which I mentioned previously. Not only this but I also added blinn materials onto all of these polygons to give it a more metallic and sheen-like finish until I begin to add my own textures to the model later on.

One risk/challenge I came across throughout this creative process was the lack in orthographic drawings for my Mecha/Robot. Since I didn't have this I had to really think about what was/was not needed in my design so that when I came to model I could avoid specific things that weren't essential and served not functional or realistic purposes. So that is what I did, below I have a screenshot that shows the areas on my Photoshop concept I was not going to model as I felt they weren't needed.

As you can see I cut off a lot of extra, pointless parts. I felt they just weren't needed and I wanted to be efficient with my time especially with the entire modelling process since that would take a while.

The next part was the spaulders which had their own unique design. Reason being is due to the fact that the spaulders didn't have anything on them in the original design. What I added was drastic enough to change my concept piece design entirely, however it did add a small 'something' to the design. The reason I did this was because I didn't want a completely bland final model.

The next step was the arm/cannons. These were going to hang down from the spaulders and were simple to put together since I wasn't going to have any animation on these. They were also very simple in terms of actual modelling. The cannons are comprised of three cubes and one cylinder that have bevel and creased edges for aesthetic purposes. Once I created one, all I had to do was mirror it.























The ideas for both the arm/cannons and rocket spaulders came from military equipment weapons during my research phase. The spaulders had a humvee tow missle and the arm cannons are a shelled-out grenade launcher. I chose these since they look appealing and say within context of the design.

By this stage, my model is complete. The next stages are to add details and features to the model.

Mechanical Marvel - First stages of Modelling

Mechanical Marvel - First stages of Modelling

I now have a finished final Photoshop concept piece and need to begin modelling. Firstly, I needed to get a base for my model and did so by using the basic primitive polygons such as the cube, sphere and cylinder. In addition to these tools I used some curve polygons such as a basic circle and more. After setting my project settings and all the basic necessities I took a basic cube and using the scale, rotate and extrude tools, I created a lower body base that I thought resembled my Photoshop piece well. 

That was where I started, here is where I ended (the lower body base I created)

I am at an ideal start but I needed to exclude all the extra and unnecessary parts that don't serve a purpose in the model in terms of functionality. So what I did about this was move onto the next limbs on the model which are the legs. How I did this was by creating another cube polygon and shifting the vertex's until I was happy with the outcome. Here are the results of that... 

The majority of the leg is the same polygon just duplicated multiple times and had alterations in terms of size, angle, and placement. As much as 90% of the work for the leg is done, there were no talons to hold and support the weight of the leg. So how I went about adding those was taking the top section of the leg and then duplicating that and then decreasing the width of it. 

Once I had a leg I was happy with that resembled my concept piece all I did was highlight and select the entire first leg and then mirror that onto the other side of the lower body.After I grouped and combined all of those polygons together to minimize issues later onward. 

The screenshot above shows a completed basic model of the lower body of my Mecha/Robot. Later on in the creative process I'll add minor details to give it a little more realism and some general aesthetics but for now, that'll do. The next step is to connect the lower and upper bodies together, however I need to include some animation within this too. How? My idea was to have a ball-joint that connects the two segments together and this would allow for the upper body to rotate and look around.

Not only would this serve as a binding of the two segments but also this would account for the animation expected of us later on. How I have done this is firstly by comparing this too my concept piece so I know where and what needs to be there for this too look and work as it should.

I tried to make sure I was keeping along the same lines with my model and making sure I wasn't straying too far from the look of my concept piece. Although I did encounter some challenges such as having no orthographic drawings to model from, I was literally modelling from this perspective the entire time. So I had to remove a lot of unwanted parts that were simply pointless being there...

Here is what I didn't bother/wanted to include into my Maya model...

Not only were these unappealing to look at but in terms of realism and functionality they serve no purpose at all. In addition to that, I would've spent if not wasted time modelling parts that aren't useful toward the design at all. Although I did make a fair few alterations towards the actual design itself, I did my best to stay along the same lines throughout this creative process.

Mechanical Marvel - Introduction & Practice Exercise (Modelling)

Mechanical Marvel - Introduction & Practice Exercise (Modelling)

•  For this exercise and in order to give us some practice in Maya, we were given the task of taking a silhouette image and then using the extrude tools and general use of faces, vertex's and edges to model the image we chose. How I started this was firstly by creating a project and a directory for my project so anything such as textures, source images and what not. Then I needed to import my image and I did so by creating a free image plane and this allows the image proportions to remain exact when you import it. This means no stretching or messed up aspect ratios of the image. From this stage, I generated a standard cube to begin modelling.

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• From this I started to connect vertex's and edges in order to make this one whole object that I can end up separating and altering to fit the silhouette image and this is what I did. After a couple of attempts and alterations, I finally got it done. 

• For the next step I needed too make sure that all the sizes and edges were aligned with the original silhouette to by clicking the wire frame or x-ray key I was able to see completely through my model to ensure the edges aligned.  

• Now to add more depth and realism to my controller I needed to add extra features such as buttons, bumpers etc. So I began modelling those assets onto the controller which I will from there I'll be able to materials and textures onto to add more realism. 

• This is the end result of my controller once all buttons and materials were added on. I was pleased with this overall since this is my first attempt at using Maya properly and in more detail on a custom silhouette. I added various materials onto the individual assets and even change the opacity on some to create more realism. This was all apart of the introduction lesson on Maya. 

Mechanical Marvel - Understanding Textures & Maps in Maya

Mechanical Marvel - Understanding Textures & Maps in Maya 

• In this lesson as part of better understanding Maya and modelling in order to create as realistic of models as we possibly could, we had to understand textures and map-types for Maya. Chris tasked us with answering a set of questions in relation to what, how and why we use certain maps for textures.

• This is my raw .TGA file of the bump map I'll use in Maya. This is to show & teach us how to use bump maps in Maya which are essentially maps that identify and exhibit bumps, or bevels and work with materials such as Blinn to show use of light and shadow.

• This is the colour/diffuse map this is really what the title says, it uses light, environment and material assets to show different uses and examples of light. Depending on the colour, angle and use of light on the diffuse map. It of course also allows you to show light on a model.

• This is a transparency map. This literally just enables you to make an area of a full model transparent. You can make individual assets transparent but not sections. This map allows you to do that. Depending on how the colours are laid out and on what polygon too. 

• This is a specular map. Specular maps are like reflective materials but reflective materials just mirror the environment around them and don't have any realism or use of light at all. Specular maps keep that mirror-like effect but also use light and reflect the environment around it.

Testing these out in Maya 

• Here is the diffuse map in Maya. I took a flat rectangle and from this assigned a blinn material and from there in the colour and/or diffuse open opened the .TGA file of my diffuse map. This is the first example of colour I've used in Maya. 

• Here is the diffuse map that has then been bump mapped in Photoshop and following the same method, brought into Maya with a blinn material which emphasizes the lighting effects on a bump map and allows you to truly see how this comes into use for games/film.

• Here is the specular map in Maya, as you can see from certain angles the light hits the coloured areas better than the standalone blinn. Reason being is because of the reflective properties specular maps have by default. At other angles the shadows are shown, which unlike blinn materials or reflective maps where they don't capture both light and shadow.

• Transparency maps basically make the darkest colour on your TGA file translucent, so depending on what colours/shades you pick depends on what will be transparent. Here you can see the actual polygon is a full square, but all you can see is the two squares which in the TGA where initially white. As mentioned, the lightest colours will be opaque and the darkest ones will not be. You can alter colours so that colour is actually visible on the parts you want. 

• As you can tell from this side perspective you can see it still keeps the polygons original properties, as in it isn't entirely transparent and only seems to be from a perspective or angle which is good. Because the means it is perspective-specific. Which I could utilize for my final model very well, I feel. But I'll have to practice more. As with all of these maps.