This six-part tutorial is written for beginner
/ intermediate users of Lightwave 6.x / 7.x.
It deals with modeling a simple character,
texturing it, setting up bones, and exporting
the boned animation to morph targets, suitable
for many game engines. It does not try to
go into enormous depth in any one of these
areas -- for more information on any topic,
read the manuals. I tend to use Paint Shop
Pro (PSP) and Aura a lot, but the 2D parts
of this can be completed in Photoshop just
as readily.
You can access
the files I refer to in these tutorials by
downloading this zip file. It contains all versions of the objects and
scenes, and the LW Game Object Test engine
by Darren Reid (LWView.exe). It does not include
the really big images -- specifically, the
UVunwrap images are not included -- for reasons
of bandwidth. Whenever the tutorial tells you
to load or copy a file from my project folder,
look for it in the zip file, (instead of on
the "I" drive -- unless you are a student at
NBCC Miramichi).
Before we
begin building Janet, I'm assuming that you
have created simple front and side sketches
of the model you want to build, and have scanned
them / cleaned them up. Begin as follows:
Create
a project folder; I called mine "Janet" with
subfolders called images, objects, and
scenes.
Scan
the front and side sketches of the character.
In
PSP, trim them so that you don't have a
lot of excess background stuff. Since scans
are often enormous, scale the images down,
if you haven't already, to a resolution
between 512 and 1024 lines.
Push
the background (the area around your sketch)
of each image to a neutral grey (128),
so that you don't get visual confusion
when we use them as modeling templates.
Save
these files into your project folder.
Now we're ready to work.
Part One -- Box Modeling
the Body
Open Modeler, and press "o" to open the General Options panel. Set
the content directory to the project folder
we made (above). My content directory is
shown in the illustration below -- yours
will be different of course.
- Press "d" to access the
Display Options
panel.
On the "Backdrop" tab,
shown above, load the two drawings we prepped
in the previous steps -- be sure to put the
front sketch in Viewport #3, and the side
one in Viewport #4.
Set
the "Size" value to the height the image
should be. In my case, my character will
be about 1.2 meters tall, but my image
has a bit of fuzz around the edge, and
a few centimeters of hair, so I have set
my size to 1.4 meters. The first center
value controls the "Y" position of the
image, so I've set mine to 700mm -- or
half the height of the image. This way,
my character will be created with her feet
on the ground. Be sure to set both of your
images so that they match up. Increase
the "Image Resolution" setting until it
is bigger than the resolution of your scans,
if possible.
Note: In most of the
screen shots below, I have hidden the
sketch template -- use your template
sketch for each step of this tutorial,
to ensure that your model matches up
with your design.
Since my Janet design is very simplistic, I started by making a
box which roughly fits the space of her
upper torso, using the settings shown below,
and then I hit <tab> to convert it
to a sub patch, as seen below right.
Once
you've converted the box to a sub patch,
you will probably need to resize it a bit
to get it to match up with the shape of
the torso in the sketch you're using for
a template. Use whatever tools you want
for this, but avoid making edits in the
front / back view, as that will disrupt
the symmetry of the object, making our
job harder.
Of course, I then immediately named the surfaces of the new shape
by pressing "q", as shown below.
Now,
select the polygon on the bottom of the
box, and bevel it downwards to make the
lower torso. Use the stretch and move tools
(etc) as needed to shape it to the sketch,
again, keeping everything symmetrical in
the front view.
Bevel once more, and then use the stretch tool, centering it on
the "0" origin line in the front view,
to squeeze the selected polygon into the
crotch shape, as shown below.
Select
the four polygons which adjoin this one
(just press ] to select adjoining) and
rename them as "Janet_Jeans".
Now, let's turn on "Symmetry" mode. Click on the "Modes" button
at the bottom of the Modeler screen, and
choose "Symmetry On/Off", as shown below.
Note: In case you've had difficulty at this point, I've saved my model as "Janet_01.lwo" in my project folder, which
is saved in this week's folder.
Now
try making a polygon selection on either
side of the model -- the other side should
automatically select for you! If it does
not seem to work this way for you, it may
be that you've knocked your model out of
symmetry in one of the previous steps.
Select the two polygons on either side of the crotch polygon we
just made, as shown below.
Now
bevel these polygons out a ways to make
the hips. You can use the Move, Rotate,
and Size tools as usual (along with most
other Modeler tools) but when you edit
in the Front / Back view, stay on the right
of the origin line -- the left side will
mirror your every move.
Bevel again, and make the upper leg. You should now have something
like the image below.
The
crotch needed some adjustment -- I moved
the crotch polygon down a bit, and tweaked
the hip profile.
Now, with the two polygons at the ends of the legs selected again
(as shown above) bevel out a few more sections,
to get down past the knee, as shown below.
Since my Janet has jeans that end at the knee, I will now bevel
inwards and up inside the knee (an inset,
and a negative shift), as shown below.
It's
now time to rename the selected polygons
again -- this time, I'm calling them "Janet_legs",
and picking an appropriate colour -- the
image above shows the result of this change.
Now
use the select adjoining feature (]) to
select the whole leg (both of them should
get selected) and rotate the leg out a
bit, by rotating at the point indicated
below.
Note:
Part of the reason for spreading the
legs is to simplify bone setups, and
part is because we don't want any points
to cross the origin. Huh? If your
knees are quite close together, check
to make sure that all the points for
each side of the body are on the same
side of the origin line as the leg --
otherwise you symmetry operations can
get all whacky. Correct the problem if
you see it happening, before it becomes
a thorn in your side.
Bevel
several more times to make the lower leg,
as shown below. Use the Move, Rotate, and
Size tools whenever necessary to make the
resulting shape follow your body's design.
Note that the bottom edge of the jeans looks unnaturally flared -- I did this on purpose,
as I intend to wiggle those edges around
later, just to make the bottom edge of
the jeans look a bit irregular.
Rename
the two polygons on the ends of the legs "Janet_Shoes".
Now bevel out and up, as shown below, to make a small depression
where the feet go into the shoes.
Bevel
again, this time outwards (negative inset)
with no shift, to make the top of the shoe's
walls.
Bevel
again, out a bit and down, to make the
outside of the show, as shown below. Again,
you will need to do some Move / Rotate
/ Scale / Drag / etc. operations to get
the shape you want (matching your sketches).
Bevel
once more, and take the selection down
to the top of the shoe's sole.
Rename
the selection ("Janet_Shoes_soles"), and
bevel once more to give the sole thickness.
Now deselect, and select the two polygons on the front of the shoe,
as shown below. The other foot should select
automatically.
Now,
we can't use Bevel for this, since it splits
the polygons when more than one is selected,
so we'll use Smooth Shift (in the Multiply
menu, near Bevel, or <shift f>).
With
Smooth Shift, it is best to use it by simply
turning it on, clicking once in any viewport
with the left mouse button, and then turning
it off. Now use the Move / Rotate / Scale
tools to drag your new section out to the
position you want it to occupy. With just
a bit of tweaking, you should be able to
get something like the image below. Make
sure to follow your own design sketches.
Note
that I've not put any detail into this
shoe, such as laces or eyelets -- we'll
do all that with a texture map, if we have
time to get to that level of detail.
We're
done with the feet. I've saved this
version of my object as "Janet_03.lwo",
for your reference. Before we proceed
to the head and arms, let's tweak the
body a bit. If you look at the side profile,
you may find that our single-minded concentration
on the front / back view has left the
body looking a bit linear in profile.
First off, the bum. My sketch was not so great in this area, and
I now see that my character lacks enough
of a bum. To correct this, I selected the
polygon shown on the left, below, and scaled
it a bit, as shown on the right below.
A bit of similar reshaping of the torso polygons, and I had the
shape shown below.
This
will do to solve the shape of the torso
problem, but it makes it apparent that
the surface dividing line for my pants-meets-torso
is not adequate, so I'll cut a new one*.
Note*
we could have avoided this with a
single UV, but this gives us more control,
and does not require us to build a complex
UV map.
Select the band of polygons above the jeans, as shown below.
Now
choose Construct / Bandsaw, and turn on "Divide" before
you hit "Ok". This should split the torso
right around the middle of the band.
You should now have 8 polygons selected -- deselect the top four,
and scale the bottom four as needed to
get the desired shape.
Run
around as needed, fine tuning, until your
body has the shape you want. The shape
shown below is enough like my sketch that
I'm satisfied with it so far. I've saved
it as "Janet_05.lwo".
It's time
to take a break. I'll pick this up in Part
Two: Arms and Head
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Tutorials LightWave 3D Modeling and Animating "Janet the Surf Punk" Qui Jan 27, 2011 8:48 pm
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