3D Model Contest - Pappenheimer

To be honest, I'm feeling quite shy. I find this contest a great idea. And I'm quite good in animating and modelling with the MED. And it is a shame that I didn't post a more in modelling in this forum.

I have no sketch to start with - normally I don't start with a sketch. Normally I have an idea of a shape in my mind, and build it right in MED with the primitives or vertices or polygons. That was a good way to start with MED because - as you all Know - in ancient times there was no way to put an image in the background of the views of the MED.

Although I do not have much time - I hope this post gives me an audience, some clapping hands, some critics on ugly results, some questions... in short: somethings that gives me the drive to go on with the charakter until it has a good skin and good animations useful to everybody.

My next post should show a sketch. Okay, I'll find one.

To be honest, if concept art is not part of your process - it is not essential. What the WIP aspect is refering to is ensuring that new modelers are able to learn from more expieranced modelers processes, and also to make sure it is not a piece which was completed in the past.

Good to see the competition start stepping forward. I hope it gets pretty furious towards the end.

Okay, here is a first sketch:



A "hero or villian" - no! My way should be always the difficult one : I want to make both: a model that works as well as a hero as it works as a villian.

Hmm... second:



Just for fun first was made with paint,second "edited" with photoshop

Next: later, tomorrow or -

Here are the next results:



The 3D view of MED doesn't show it very good. It seems to be very different to the sketches. But it isn't. Not that much!

I'm back again!

If all the others follow fuxerx's example, I have areal chance to win!

I improved the head a little:


The skin is from a modified photograph - in reality a woman's face.



As you see one could use it without hair. The hair is formed from a sphere.

The following pics show you the body.

I already had a model that I only needed to modify to get the right shape for the 'hero/villian'. The model is somehow a prototype for human models.
I built it on my own, and I want to show you how to manage to build a human model with MED.

Now I want to show you how I deal with MED to make my models. They are not as breathtaking as some others of this contest but... let's have a look and tell me what you think:

First you place some points in the top view. In the other views they stay at one level, it's the level of the origin.


You use the traingle tool to connect the points(vertices), do it clockwise, so the polygon will show the face against you.(I hope my english isn't ununderstandable)


When you finished the faces then you have to switch to the triangle mode.


Click the extrude button, and a window will open. You need a figure higher than zero point. What does 'extrude'? - It's better to try and examine it on one's own than explaining it.


In our case it extruded the wrong direction, it extruded inside out... hm ...outside in - you won't see any faces outside the model if you would go on this way.


With minus you can change the direction of the extruding.



Extrude distance: 4.00:


Click the extrude button, and 'return'. And again...



A very first and very simple leg:


Doubling the leg in three steps, only possible because they are still simple because symmetrical in itself, look at the trousers for the doubling of a more developed shape:
copy:


paste:


restricted move:


Thus restricted, the legs won't differ in their height.


Now you may have an idea why I extruded so often: I mainly changed the shape of the leg while scaling every single 'level' of the point/vertex cycles.


Female (a modification through 'rotate at mouseposition'):


Trousers:


To look on the framerange isn't necessary at this step of modelling, it is important for animating when you have more than one frame.


One poor example of how to use the most powerful tool of the MED(it is the MED's main animation tool) 'rotate at mouseposition': you only have to choose - and choose it carefully - the anglepoint, then click and hold and move the mouse pointer up or down.


At this place just an example of a video editing software with a great solution how to manage the framerange.
1 Position of the current frame
2 Start and end position of the chosen frame range
3 Other marks to show what has happen to special ranges of frames


The more complex trousers:

Doubled(copy, paste, move restricted, AND mirrored and flipped normals(only possible in triangle mode))

I don't remember if I doubled the highest points or if I put some points through the 'vertex creator' before I moved them to there places, and conected them to polygons. It depends on the shapes you have and the shapes you need to add.

The feet/shoes still have no bottom, but there is no need to explain how to manage that... ?

Now that is what I like to see. A lot of people probably would not take the time to create there faces via vertices (most MED models I have seen just use a default primative). Good show.

Thank you!

It is not already as it should. The pics are not totally self-explaining. I will add some notes as soon as possible.

Wow, nice job. This will certainly be of a certain help when I start throwing vertices around.

Two thumbs up

Pappenheimer, you of all the contestants deserve huge applause for working and showing the mystical art of MED Modelling.
Well done.
Cheers.

Excellent!!! really good tut!!
PS: If you want me to give it life, just take good screenies and send them to me via email (info@gushh.com.ar) i will give it life with flash mx, with pause, stop, play, back, forward buttons too. What do you think about it? I think it sounds good and it will help to improve quality. And BTW the tut will have a more pro look and it will explain even better!. i could host it too.. i have np.

Cya all!
Check out my signature its true. Cya

hey,
i'd like to thank u for that tutorial.
first i sucked in Med and now i am improving

thank u,
-Scary_man

http://www.virtualworlds.silicondragons.com/files/downloads/tutorials/tutorial/pappenheimermedtut01.pdf

All nicely packaged for your reading enjoyment.

Thank you all for your kind replies. It's great if I can help you with my this work because there has been so much advices and tutorials at the forum that helped me! (For example related to 'skinning in MED' I saw two contributions from Marty Bee that helped me out in things that I never would have find out if he didn't show it.)

@ myrlyn68:

That's a great job! In the second half there is a displacement of text and pics. I'm going to edit my post to make there relations more visible. The drawback is that I now see the small mistakes and uglyness in some details of my 'tutorial'. But perfectionism often stops me before finishing anything at all. So I think I go on with my 'tutorial' as fragmented and unperfekt as I started. And maybe, afterwards I tweak it to make it more presentable.


So, if there are further questions to gaps of this part of tutorial post it - I will look what I can do. Gaps that I already recognized are: - - too many.

We will see. I'll add explanations as early as I can.

I think I know what you are talking about, I will correct it shortly, and update the file. As you update it, don't worry too much, I'll make sure the "offline" version reflects the changes (usually within one day or so).

Most of it is apparent from the pictures, and your words explain it quite well too. Should be very helpful for those who come after you.

@ GuShH:

Thank you for your offer! How do you think should that flash thing work, until now I didn't make any explanations related to animation - that doughtless would improve through moving pictures?
Or, do you imagine it as a kind of 'video book'? If the last - feel free to try it with the shown pictures.

Host is no problem to me at the moment.

Relating to how I'm going on: to me it's the easiest way to go on like I began.

If you miss something in the tutorial - as everyone you are wellcome to tell me.

First a few pics, afterwards a few explanations, perhaps... hm... shure!

Okey, explanations now: I was searching for the best and fastest way to build a face in MED. Because my problem related to the contest is: I didn't build my model from the very ground. My philosophy 'Don't do anything that is already done' leads me to use models as a sort of prefabs. I add and tweak a little here a little there to complete the model to fullfill my imagination of his proper shape.

BUT this is against the contest rules! - - So, I was looking for short ways to build a face (as the most difficult part of a model) from the single pixel or from the modificating of a sphere or cube. Uuh! Maybe, I show you the results later.
In short: I had to investigate the roots of my models face: the face that I modificated until I got my 'hero/villian'. The following pictures are the mute witnesses(?) of the dicovered history.


This three pictures show a mesh that I found in a free download package years ago.
The fourth has exactly the same mesh only modificated with move and perhaps scale.
The red marked polygons show the most important parts of a more or less detailed head. It is not a line, it is a chain of squares. To me this seems to be the right start to get a well done head/face.


Look at the red marked faces(polygons) to get the improvements I did.

Mainly I deleted the faces that I wanted to 'expand',and copied the 'neighbour vertices', and moved them a little, and replaced the few faces with the triangling tool through a few more faces


The twenty pics underneath(?) are because of the range of variaty of one mesh only by scaling certain vertices, so simple that one could make it ingame through script. Remember 'Addy' where you can choose the faces shape and look in the beginning of this edutainment software.


Twinkle twinkle little eye to show me if you fit for animating emotions with the mesh...


Head scaled up to a helmet...


Single modification: Eyes and cheeks are simultaniously scaled.


Restricted horizontal scaled. Same shape, different skins.


What a lovely woman!


Same shape, first flat shaded, second skinned and goroud shaded.


What a simple made skin. Do you like her face, too?


The first four pictures excluded all this pictures show faces of the same mesh! That's the reason that I believe: take a given polycount, and you need for a human face you only need one mesh that you can modify with a few steps to get its unic characterization.
The following faces have a few polygons more; for example for the nose and the eyelids - and they are connected with the back of the head, ears, the rest of the body...


Her...

...and his face - with the same mesh.


Just because of the eyelid...


To win the contest I have to build a new model from scretch! I thought about a model fully build and skinned and animated in one day. Don't know if the idea is totally mad.

First I will add pics with explanations of how to connect different bodyparts to a perfect body. Then I have to found out how to make fast and good skinmeshes, and how to paint them fast. Animating at last shouldn't be a problem - it's my favourite subject.

Tutorial-alike - the second!

Wanna see how I made this head from 'lines of points', in MED?


Here are the pictures, some self-explaining, some not:

The principle of simplification is to take the face from the SIDEVIEW as a landscape with counter lines or cross-sections.

1 First the 'horizontal' line along the middle of the bridge of the nose,
2 second the line between nose and eye,
3 third right through the eye,
4 then 'outside' the eye. We make only a one half of the face.

The disadvantage of this 'strategie' is that you have to have a good visual imagination and an artistical praxis in human proportions.

(The better and more intuitiv way for non-artists is the later explaint way beginning with the FRONTVIEW onto the human face.)

As one can see in the topview, I made the points in four steps as well the created points keep in line of the origin, so I shifted them with the vertical restricted move tool.

Because the 'nose line' gives the most characterizing shape, I draw it first and within this I decide where and much points have to be placed. The other lines should have a similar count of points for getting a more or less regular net of triangles.

Doubled and shifted and connected middle line.


I mark the lines of points that I want to connect next, to have less risk to confuse them with the others in the sideview.



It is not the easiest way to make a face in MED. I remembered an easier way - after I did all this work.

If you are interested, I can add the other pictures of the way from the half face to the head.

It includes methods of tweaking and of mirroring the half, sewing it with it counterpart, and connecting the face with the prefab sphere to get the whole head.

The easier method:

Pictures say more than thausend words !


The pictures with points are not substantial different, they shall visualize what the marked points are for.

Start with the eye. I placed the points in the succession of how good I could imaginate their places.


Then the bridge of the nose and the forehead.

Mouth.

Chin.

Shape of the face's 'rim'.

Root of the nose.

Cheek points between nose and 'rim', well placed to get a reasonable net of triangles.



I build the triangles in the succession of how good I could image their places as I did before with the Points.


To get an early impression of how it looks I shifted the different parts relating to their heights (the face taken as a landscape). Only estimated, not absolute places!




The 3D-VIEW shows that there were not enough points in the area aside/under the mouth; I had to integrate some more.

What you cannot see: the half face had been doubled, mirrored (flipped normals) and after some tweaking of the single points with the move tool and turn tool. The second half has been deleted and through doubling, mirroring etc. replaced, to get a symmetrical shape.

Thanks fo putting up all these pictures of your work at each step. I especially like the way you have shown clearly how you've positioned the points. Well done.

Though a picture may be worth more than a thousand words, I do feel a few words of explanation would make it easier to follow IMO.

Quote:

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Though a picture may be worth more than a thousand words, I do feel a few words of explanation would make it easier to follow IMO.

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You are right - that's why I am going to add the explanations step by step as I find time. I posted the pictures first because I was driven by the unresistable wish to show the results from my 'MED researchs' .