“Character walkthrough – part 1 ” by Julian Johnson-Mortimer
Hello there, Welcome to my tutorial. This one I will be sort of a guide how I go about modeling a head, I’m not sure if I will be covering anything new seeing as theirs all ready so many great modeling tutorials out their.
But I will just go though how I will be creating a new character, starting from the concept stage then to the modeling.
Right the character I will be making is called Alastor Moody (AKA Mad-Eye Moody, he’s a interesting character from the fourth Harry Potter book.
I will paste in some text from the book for people who have not heard of him, to get the idea of the character.
Who is he?
Name: Alastor Moody Nickname: Mad-Eye, because of his magic eye, who can see even through the walls… and the invisible cloaks
Job: he was an Auror (a dark wizard catcher), but he is retired now. In Goblet of Fire he’s the new professor of Hogwarts in Defense Against the Dark Arts.
Except from CHAPTER ELEVEN
“Mad-Eye Moody?” said George thoughtfully, spreading marmalade on his toast. “Isn’t he that nutter -” “Your father thinks very highly of Mad-Eye Moody,” said Mrs. Weasley sternly. “Yeah, well, Dad collects plugs, doesn’t he?” said Fred quietly as Mrs. Weasley left the room. “Birds of a feather. . .” “Moody was a great wizard in his time,” said Bill. “He’s an old friend of Dumbledore’s, isn’t he?” said Charlie. “Dumbledore’s not what you’d call normal, though, is he?” said Fred. “I mean, I know he’s a genius and everything.. .” “Who is Mad-Eye?” asked Harry. “He’s retired, used to work at the Ministry,” said Charlie. “I met him once when Dad took me into work with him. He was an Auror – one of the best. . . a Dark wizard catcher,” he added, seeing Harry’s blank look “Half the cells in Azkaban are full because of him. He made himself loads of enemies, though. . . the families of people he caught, mainly. . . and I heard he’s been getting really paranoid in his old age. Doesn’t trust anyone anymore. Sees Dark wizards everywhere.”
Except from CHAPTER TWELVE
A man stood in the doorway, leaning upon a long staff, shrouded in a black traveling cloak. Every head in the Great Hall swiveled toward the stranger, suddenly brightly illuminated by a fork of lightning that flashed across the ceiling. He lowered his hood, shook out a long mane of grizzled, dark gray hair, then began to walk up toward the teachers? table. A dull chunk echoed through the Hall on his every other step. He reached the end of the top table, turned right, and limped heavily toward Dumbledore. Another flash of lightning crossed the ceiling. Hermione gasped.
The lightning had thrown the man?s face into sharp relief, and it was a face unlike any Harry had ever seen. It looked as though it had been carved out of weathered wood by someone who had only the vaguest idea of what human faces are supposed to look like, and was none too skilled with a chisel. Every inch of skin seemed to be scarred. The mouth looked like a diagonal gash, and a large chunk of the nose was missing. But it was the man?s eyes that made him frightening. One of them was small, dark, and beady. The other was large, round as a coin, and a vivid, electric blue. The blue eye was moving ceaselessly, without blinking, and was rolling up, down, and from side to side, quite independently of the normal eye – and then it rolled right over, pointing into the back of the man?s head, so that all they could see was whiteness. The stranger reached Dumbledore. He stretched out a hand that was as badly scarred as his face, and Dumbhedore shook it, muttering words Harry couldn?t hear. He seemed to be making some inquiry of the stranger, who shook his head unsmilingly and replied in an undertone. Dumbledore nodded and gestured the man to the empty seat on his right-hand side. The stranger sat down, shook his mane of dark gray hair out of his face, pulled a plate of sausages toward him, raised it to what was left of his nose, and sniffed it. He then took a small knife out of his pocket, speared a sausage on the end of it, and began to eat. His normal eye was fixed upon the sausages, but the blue eye was still darting restlessly around in its socket, taking in the Hall and the students. ?May I introduce our new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher?? said Dumbledore brightly into the silence. ?Professor Moody.? It was usual for new staff members to be greeted with applause, but none of the staff or students chapped except Dumbledore and Hagrid, who both put their hands together and applauded, but the sound echoed dismally into the silence, and they stopped fairly quickly. Everyone else seemed too transfixed by Moody?s bizarre appearance to do more than stare at him. ?Moody?? Harry muttered to Ron. ?Mad-Eye Moody? The one your dad went to help this morning??.
I’ve chosen this character because it should be interesting and a challenge, the main features I have to think about is his face as described in the text his face is very heavily scared, he’s quite old retirement age, a chuck of his nose missing and of course a large blue eye
before starting any concept sketches myself I had a look around the net to see if anyone had tried sketching him to give me a idea.
I found a few sketches that helped these are by Tealin Raintree taken from his site.
Like all my work I will be going for a realistic looking character so I’m going to tone down a few of his features. The diagonal shaped mouth I don’t think is going to work and the size and colour of his blue false eye I will probably reduce.
Now because I’m going for realism I’m going to actually base him on a actors face, now after thinking who would be good for the part.
Some one with mad stareing eyes, and who can look quite menacing plus also show kindness, plus also quite old, in the same age range. I came up with Tom Baker, those who have never heard of him he’s a old English actor.
I had a look on the net for photos of him and as many different facial expressions as possible.
Now I’m tempted just to start modeling right away, but its best to do some sketches first, theirs a few things to think about just how badly scared do I want his face, (most of the scaring will be done when texturing). plus a part of his nose is missing, it does not say what part. So I need a think a little, I want the face to look quite disturbing when first viewed by someone.
Here’s one sketch I’ve done, I’m still not sure how I going to do his nose I’m going to start modeling and try different ideas ones I’ve modeled the nose.
I guess I should load up Maya and see what a happens.
Right now for the actual modeling, I will be modeling him in polygons as I’ve said before there’s already many good modeling lessons out their and all are slightly different. I can’t explain things as well a properly trained 3d artist would, I can only just show you how I would go about my a making a head.
One of the best polygon modeling tutorials is by Dave komorowski any one learning should read it, he’s a expert on his edge loops and can explain about them far better then I can.
Right just before I start, below I’ve attached a picture, look at the lines i’ve drawn we want our polygons to follow the contours of the lines, this will make it easy to create skin wrinkles in the right places and the face expressions will deform well.
For making a head you want good references as many different facial expressions and and a front and side view if you can get them. unfortunately I have not been able to find a perfect front and side view of tom baker.
Below I’ve attached the reference picture I will be using, I put all the useful poses and expressions on to one picture for easy viewing. More references of different people you can find on site
I will also be uploading the base mesh in stages up to a certain point, this is because I will be modeling unaided with no front or side pictures and will be difficult for a beginner to get the basic shape of the head.
One last thing I need to think about is, I’m trying to model a man of about 65 to 70 here and most of the pictures I am using are younger. So at the beginning I will be working off some of the older pictures and using the younger ones to make facial expression later on. It should not be to difficult I just need to capture his mad stareing eyes and smile.
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