Make Overs
It's been a pretty wild couple of weeks. Last time I posted I mentioned wanting to redo the main character due to many people not realizing she was a woman. And so over President's Day weekend I did what Abe Lincoln would have wanted me to do and hit the ground running making changes to my character. What first started as tweaking some shapes on the rig turned into a ground up remodeling and retexturing for not only the character but all of her props as well. Now that it's done, I think it was well worth the effort. The main character was the first thing I made almost a year and a half ago, and since then I've learned so much about so many different things, and applied all of that to the new rebuild.
When I first created her model, I had her more stylized and based off the drawings I originally made and my Fiancee finalized. The style was a little more simplistic, aiming for solid, chunky shapes and a more unambitious approach. But as I began to make the monsters and the environment the art style began to evolve, and I had realized that the look had shifted towards a slightly more realistic tone. So when I decided it would be beneficial to go back to adjust the main character, I thought it would be the perfect time to apply these style adjustments to her. As a result, not only did I incorporate more feminine shapes and aspects to her character, but I also toned back some of her more cartoony elements, like her giant feet, for example. I also repainted every aspect of her character from scratch. Substance Painted had a few updates since I used it back in 2018, and I had a much better understanding of how to use its more advanced features. As a result, I was able to get a higher degree of textural fidelity for the character.
Her rifle was another aspect of her character that people reacted too differently than I anticipated. Her original rifle is a modified M1 Garand. I chose that gun because I always liked it's shape and historical value. But a good number of people called it out as being specifically an M1, and while they enjoyed that detail, I didn't want it to seem like this took place in the same world as our own. So I modified the rifle, combining it with a Lee Enfield mk2, and festooning some additional adornments to it to break up the silhouette and add to the rifles in-universe story. Having the gun be a bolt action rifle is more fitting with the technology of the universe of this story. I also wanted to the gun to have an air of sophistication to it, as it's something that has a lot of sentimental value to the main character.
Her revolver was actually the first thing I ever modeled for this project, probably back in 2013 or 2014. Back then it was a vaguely similar but also completely different idea. However, looking at it now, it's far too chunky and unrealistic. While I made it her revolver to reuse the design, I don't think it's very fitting for the universe any longer. Her new revolver I based on a combination of WWI revolvers and guns from the wild west, which fit the period much better. I also made it so it lacked the rifle's fancier aspects, as this gun is more of a faithful companion that the main character has always had. It may even end up getting our character out of a jam as the story progresses...
Lastly we have the face, which is still a work in progress. Since the character wears her helmet for the first half of the short, I'll revisit the face at a later date. I did, however, repaint her skin. I made new hair for her a while back, but I gave it a fresh coat as well. This is another example of the style changing. Originally I wanted all of the hair to be modeled from a solid block, as though it were cut from wood, and her face to have a painterly look to it. However, I was never really satisfied with what I had done, and adopted a still styled but more grounded approach to the hair, skin, and brows. I also made some tweaks to the shape of her face to give it a bit more femininity, with some helpful input from my Fiancee. Her face is now slightly elongated and sharper, with more pronounced cheeks and lips. Her eyes are also more circular. There's still a lot of work to be done on the face. I still need to really dial in the facial blend shapes for maximum appeal, and then I need to go back into the rig and install a system of facial bones for extra tweaking and smoothing. But that will all happen well later when I need it.
It was a sizable undertaking, but I'm so glad I did it. Using what I learned I'll probably go back and improve the textures on the villain as well. But, that's all for the future. For now all I need to focus on is rigging a couple of skeletons and then finally I can move on to animation. Well, I can move on the layout, I suppose. But soon I'll be out of preproduction and into regular production once more.