My fervent love for character art, 2023 - Hai Qin
This is my entry for The Rookies Awards 2023. Enjoy!
My fervent love for character art, 2023 - Hai Qin
*Psst...*
Now that I've got your attention, let me introduce myself briefly ;)
My name is Hai Qin, just turned 18 few days ago (happy birthday to me!) and graduated high school. 3D has been my passion for years and it hasn't changed! I'm currently looking for career opportunities and open for commissions at the moment.
I lov-
...what's that? You're here for my artwork? Alright, grab some popcorn, scroll along and enjoy!
The Portrait of Violet Evergarden
The one I spent the longest producing out of all...
Cinematic Shot
Character
Outfit
Workflow (The Portrait of Violet Evergdarden)
I'll briefly show you how I make the piece in these sections.
Modeling/Sculpting
The head is sculpted in ZBrush.
I tailored and simulated the outfit in Marvelous Designer.
I rendered the shots with Arnold for Maya.
Texturing
The outfit and the head are both textured in Substance Painter. Both are meticulously hand painted.
Grooming
I groom the hair with Xgen for Maya. I placed and sculpted the guides and used various modifiers to achieve a certain look of the hair.
Post-processing
I added dust particles in Photoshop.
I also did some simple color correcting and color grading.
Had enough? Let's move on!
The Portrait of Henry
The coolest character I have ever created
Still shots
Turntable
Right click -> Loop (RIP video quality)
Close-ups
Cinematic shot
Turntable
Right click -> Loop (...again)
Various lighting scenarios
Workflow (The Portrait of Henry)
The boring part... There are still more after this I promise!
Modeling/Sculpting
Sculpted in ZBrush, I used alphas to create the skin details. I exported the final mesh at a low resolution with displacement maps. (some used as utility maps in the texturing phase)
Grooming
I used XGen in Maya for simpler grooms like eye brows, eye lashes and beard.
For the scalp hair on the other hand, I found Ornatrix (an external plugin) to be much better at creating a complex groom like this. (and less buggy ;)
Clothing simulation
I utilized Marvelous Designer for all clothing simulation, and then export it to ZBrush for further refinement.
Texturing
I found Substance Painter to be useful for creating all kinds of texture and very intuitive. The design is very human. I used it to paint the skin color, along with some maps such as the glossiness, normal, subsurface scattering (aka SSS) and hair distribution map. I also used it for the textures of the clothing.
Rendering
I used Vray for Maya to render everything.
Post-processing
Some basic Photoshop actions.
The Portrait of Mr. Richard (Remake)
...yee-haw!
Renders
Workflow (The Portrait of Mr. Richard Remake)
Ah, here we go again...
Comparison
The original version VS the deluxe version VS the ultra deluxe version
...don't mind the changing eye color. We don't talk about those.
Modeling/Sculpting
The head is sculpted in ZBrush and I used alphas for the skin details. Exported it out at low resolution with displacement maps.
For the hat on the other hand, most of it is modeled in Blender with ZBrush for refinement.
Texturing
My dear Substance Painter strikes again! I used it to paint skin colors and some other maps as well.
Clothing Simulation
I used Marvelous Designer to simulate the clothes and it's pretty much done!
Grooming
I used Ornatrix (Maya) for the vellus hair and the scalp hair.
Rendering
Rendered with Vray for Maya.
And at last...
Nobody expects The Spani-
*Ahem*
Nobody expects hardsurface modeling in a character artist's portfolio!
Lamborghini Aventador LP 700-4
Workflow (Lamborghini Aventador LP700-4)
Modeling
I first used subdivision surface to block out the car and then I retopologized with optimal topology for close-up rendering with minimal polycount.
Car body polycount: 35K vertices
Texturing
I used procedural materials for the car body. Substance Painter for everything else.
Rendering
Rendered with Blender Cycles and post-processed using Photoshop.
Conclusion
Ah, finally! It's been a really really long post and I'm glad that you made it to the end! I appreciate your dedication (note that you're one of the few people) and I hope that you would leave a comment down below as well to let me know what you think.
Special thanks to everyone when I sought for feedback and opinions and otherwise I wouldn't have made it this far.
And lastly, thanks to you, too! I hope we can thrive together as a community and maybe we'll work together someday!
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