This blog shows the process behind the creation of Noir, my first development project.
Lecturers:
- Neil Gallagher
- Eden Anthony (Asst)
- Malcom Armstrong
- Wayne Robson
Software’s Used:
- Autodesk Maya 2023.2
- Character Creator 5
- Maxon Zbrush
- Substance Painter
- Substance Sampler
- Marvelous Designer
I continued by modelling the Clothing and the Fedora in Maya using symmetry. The UV’s were unwrapped so that they could be imported into Marvelous Designer as UV’s to patterns.
Embedded below is a Marvelous designer screenshot. They were then simulated to generate the wrinkles.
Attached below are their respective UV’s.
Texturing
Moving on I continued to texture using one of my own techniques covering both the sub-dermal and epidermal layers in substance painter, I tried sampling the freckles as textures and they dint work out quite so well. The sbsar material I created covers both the layers and has SSS and its weights, this technique is supported in the pbr-metal-rough rather than the alpha blend.
Once all the layers are set I adjusted them using paint layers rather than painting directly on the mask as it lets you layer the masks. A screenshot of the layers is presented here, both in its folder structure and the expanded view. The pores and wrinkles were done in Zbrush and baked in, it is subtle but represents what young female skin looks like with less blemishes less dry skin and more smoothness. Shown below are the layers and the passes including Diffuse, Roughness, Normal, Scattering Weights and Scattering color.
The SSS and color is setup based on muscle density and parts that reveal or are more closer to the bone if that is the right way to put it. I did also focus on blood flow like her breasts have more blood flow than her shoulders and clavicle. No additional brushes were used.
A variety of sourced alphas that capture each and every texture and feel. This enables better specular and bump details with accurate real life results simulating skin stretch and relax.
I personally prefer the Flipped Normals eye kit I have used it before as well, it adapts well to pretty much every model and the eyes aren’t a main focus here because of the shadow being cast by the fedora. Although I would love to feature her eyes.
Moving on to the textures for the clothing I went for a more subtle look, initially I dint know what would work best for the coat, would it be the wool or the leather. But then I did realize that two of my classmates did own long coats one in leather and one in wool and the leather wraps around the body more. Shown below are the renders for the clothing with the stitches and its in I-ray.
The normal map does not display as much from this point of view hence the reason why it is not being show. A couple of things I have done here, I haven’t created footwear because it is a mid-shot and its in black and white. This render is to show how the entire pipeline works and is being optimized. Moving on to Rigging.
Rigging
To be fair I am not a great rigging artist but I have to thank Malcom for the time he did set apart from his busy schedule to help me out with fixing the clothing, same goes to his students who were helpful as well. Although I was told it isn’t industry practice to use Advanced Skeleton I ended up using it anyway as it was the only option that enabled and made exporting to unreal engine a breeze. Shown below is a snapshot of the rig.
The body is quite well done apart from the N number of joints that make this hard to weight but thankfully Malcom recommended that I use a wrap deformer just to fix the issue and it did work. Moving on to lighting and rendering. There’s one person in particular who has inspired me to look into lighting techniques called Jahirul Amin (JA) from Cave Academy. I ended up creating my own Lighting setup called ReinLock in Unreal engine 5.7. My github is linked here and in the footer as well. Full disclosure the lighting setup isn’t perfect.
Lighting
The lighting setup is set into 6 levels that are each different from one another. You may have a look into the file hosted so that you can play around with it and modify it till it works in ways best suited to your needs. A special thanks to Wayne Robson on the feedback for the lighting setup. Levels and renders are shown below. Should you use it, consider the setup as a base (the setup is provided as-is) CC0
Paul is property of Cave Digital Academy – https://caveacademy.com/
Xgen - Grooming
I will proceed with the Xgen once I have a clear understanding of how Alembic works and how I can make hair dynamic, prevent collision with the body and clothes as I intend to do a longer hairstyle. More importantly due to technical limitations I am unable to get a good output from Houdini. The groom process will continue in upcoming sessions. Attached below is my progress so far. Also it is worth while noticing that not a strand nor spline is in symmetry all of them are unique with variation’s just like in the eyebrows. Same goes for the eyelashes.
Render (No-Xgen)
The renders were done in unreal engine 5.7.1 and is using reinLock, my prime focus was on model optimization, Uv’s textures and pipleine scripts that could optimize both the modelling and Texturing pipeline. Lighting consists of three area lights and two spot lights.
Stats
Test Render
Second render setup
Final render setup
With filters and editing.
Scripts and Tools.
For this very project I ended up using my own script’s all of which are in beta and still require polishing. I would like to thank the members of 3DHit who have shown me it isn’t just relevant to focus on functionality but the UI aspect of it as well. The tools presented here are well documented and are setup as releases should you need to look into the code. For the time being I will not be improving the UI, I will be using the beta for this project and will do a proper release with all the notes and reviews covered so that it looks more refined and polished.
Demo Here
The tools include:
Revention
Revention lets you save files with suffixes based on your file use be it modeling, texturing, rigging, simulation etc. It also allows you to setup time intervals for the auto save and a custom path. The caveat being you will end up with a lot of iterations so choose your auto-save time wisely. You will end up with a base file and an untouched variation of your file with all the updated progress.
ThumbTac –
This script is use to set the pivot point as it turn out to be a major issue in all of the PC’s at the University where grouping geo by default does not set pivot to origin, which it should on a clean install of maya. The script analyzes the bounding box of the geo and then creates locators that enable you to change pivot on click. Still a caveat being you can t use it in an animation pipeline or on the animation file in itself. As it would delete the keyframes. Image attached below.
As you can clearly see that the script focuses on the bounding box as demonstrated on this sphere. Clicking clears up the script and then the additional locators and GEO added removed.
Umbra – A subtle hint to Excalibur from war-frame well balanced optimized.
Character QA. Read Github
My reactions (80lv)
Now I would like to demonstrate my pipeline and its flexibility over an article that was featured in 80lv back in 2018. Although old it does cover a few aspects that were still relevant back then and now. Here is my breakdown.
The facial topology including the face’s contour and the smile muscle eye-line and nose definition. Images show below both wire-frame and highlights.
The eye contour and lips as opposed to the ones featured in the article aren’t overly exaggerated and mimic real life facial data.
For the look-development I started off from scratch creating a modular Smart Material in substance that allows the texture artist to paint and layer masks using paint sub layers allowing both projection, color and SSS painting. The details in Zbrush aren’t uniform as shown in the article as skin in itself is complicated and the feel, look and stretch of pores vary from area to area. The images shown below serve as adequate insight to this process.
The lip wrinkles and their variation as they are not painted in symmetry. The exaggerated normal’s that allow adjustment in direct relation to the lighting and the rendering engine. The SSS and the custom painted weights that were done separately in their respective modes that allow a clean export, and the fact that the maps will be well named.
The rigging is basically done in Advanced skeleton since it is an entire character rather than just a bust, it enables the entire character to be posed with the option to be rebuilt and iterated along with the option to switch from game engine to VFx and enables the rebuilding and modding of the bones while it maintains their weights.
The pipeline being stable versions of the DCC’s with no experimental features, with the provision for animation. The rig and the clothing that allows dynamic folds because of the option to shift from UV to patterns in maya and in marvelous designer – from patterns to UV’s for retopo.
The option to render in levels enables the rendering artist to compare between shape and form, evaluation of detail and thus communicating personality and function.
Maps in 4K and 2K enabling faster load times and detail optimised for engines or Vfx renderers like Arnold.
The lights are setup as area and point lights but enable modularity for the end user, being the character/rendering artist.
Pipeline tools expand the productions functionality by helping incrementally save files and keeping files organized while following naming conventions.
This includes pivot point adjustment’s, auto-save, unwanted history, color and UV sets check although they have to be used in specific times of the pipeline before animation.
Conclusion
What this project has taught me is that in the limited time that I have and being self taught I could get my hands dirty diving into each aspect of the pipeline. I believe this enabled me to adapt and be flexible more that just being a Technical artist. Characters tell stories, Textures tell stories and a clean pipeline and the necessary tools make it a breeze. Personally I believe I can push it more but I am content so far.
References:
- CAVE Academy (2023). Maya Character Look Dev and Lighting Rig 1003. [online] Caveacademy.com. Available at: https://caveacademy.com/product/maya-character-look-development-and-lighting-rig-1003/ [Accessed 10 Sept. 2025].
- Cave Academy, (n.d.). Unreal Character Look Dev and Lighting Turntable Project 1001. [online] Available at: https://caveacademy.com/product/unreal-character-look-dev-and-lighting-turntable-project/.
