3D Game Art Showcase

Quetzalcoatl

For my first ever ZBrush project, I chose a creature sculpt designed after the Aztec Quetzalcoatl, a mythical feathered snake deity. I pulled reference from the Yucatán rattlesnake for the body and the Ecuadorian quetzal bird for the wings, tail feathers, and red and green color scheme.

I created a block out in Maya that I then imported into Zbrush. I shaped the head, body, and rattle, before reposing the creature into a more dynamic pose.

The biggest challenge I faced with this sculpt was the feathered wings. I decided to model the feathers individually, creating 2 versions of each of the 6 types of feathers that make up a quetzal wing. I then hand placed each feather and molded it to the shape of the wing.

I used surface noise to add the scales to the back of the snake and hand sculpted the scales on the head and neck to better blend the size and shape.

I retopologized my high poly model in Maya using quad draw. From there I imported and baked my high and low poly models in Substance Painter and hand painted the diamond back scale pattern, mouth, and feather textures.

Greek Sci-Fi Helmet

This project was my first foray into hard surface modeling in Zbrush.

Concept Art by Forrest Imel

I created the initial block out in Zbrush and then separated it into the different components. I used Zbrush to polish and refine most of the pieces.

I used Maya to refine the more technically challenging components, like the forehead piece, before reimporting into Zbrush to hand sculpt the lion crest.

I used alphas to add the decorative elements to the final high poly model, which I then projected onto the low poly version using a normal map.

I textured the helmet using Substance Painter.

 Once the initial model was complete I decided to add the cape and clasp to give it a bust-like quality for the final render.