Pedestrian- background character

I have also recently returned to a pedestrian project, in which i created a character who could be typically seen on the streets in England. This was one of the previous renders of how the character used to look.
I wanted the character to be high quality and highly detailed but not be too tri heavy as i wanted it to represent a background pedestrian.

As with my self portrait I found that the problems with this model were based around poor attention to detail and also the poor topology around certain areas including the hood and the shoulder edge loops. Not only will i fix these problems I will also have a massive re haul of the normal maps via z-brush and recreate the skin tones on the face as these are not quite up to scratch.

self portrait

I have recently gone back to my self portrait I feel I am at the beauty shot position. I went back to it as i have never been happy with it it hasn't been as clean a piece as i wanted this time I feel i have made progress and I feel quite proud of what I've created.
this is a render of my old model.

The lack of attention to detail and the mix of photos and baked textures creates an odd effect and doesn't hold up the model as a whole.

This time I have just used baked textures (diffuse and normal) sculpted and created in z-brush as I feel that using photos not only creates a dirty textures but also runs the risk of stretching and smearing.
I have also changed my clothing to a different dress as the previous dress invited error due to the ruffles on the bottom of the skirt.
At this stage I just need to alter the chains and tweak the specularity on the glasses however the rest of it is pretty accurate. I've found during this project that you need to be ruthless with yourself which can be a bit daunting.

This is the final head shot of my self portrait with the altered chain it is rendered with the sss skin shader with diffuse with alpha channel, normal, specular colour, specular level and gloss. Both the diffuse and Normal were created using z brush.
This project has been long and I have gone back to it multiple times however I now feel proud of what I have created and have learned a lot of different techniques since my first attempts.

New coat research

These are some of the best coats I've seen and would suit my characters figure well especially 1 and 3. although I like the asymmetrical shape of 5 it would cover up her top which is something i want her to have on show. I also think keeping the coat lack would ground the character can remove some of the heavy and mismatching colours in my previous poor design.

work flow

This is my work flow and the continuing development of the female character:

Side note, the hip height is wrong and will be something I will fix.

This is a critical analysis that i often do when modeling  I render separate parts and circle different parts that are right and wrong and aim to fix them.

This is a render of the z brush sculpt I used to create the normal and the diffuse map.

I'm pleased with the tonal quality of the skin however having seen the outcome of the coat with the rest of the outfit I feel that it was a design that worked better on paper and doesn't quite work in a 3d form.

I will rethink the coat the colour and shape.

I have recently started to model my character. I always strip model all of my characters it gives me the ultimate control over every aspect of their geometry that I feel i don't get with box modelling.

Here is and early screen grab of my modelling technique.

I always start with the eyes using the line tool i create the basic geometry.
I also use the symmetry modifier and the create tool.
During the later stages of modelling If I unable to alter a model appropriately in max I will import it into z-brush and use its tools to morph the model to how I feel it should look.

This is the bust of my model. This model is un-textured but using the default colors in max I have created a color base for both the diffuse and specular to bake out and use in Photoshop.
When creating a model from scratch I will often create an entire clothes less form and from that clone out the areas I wish to make into clothing I feel this works best as the geometry will all match up and there will be no different densities in the mesh as there would be if I modeled the clothing separately.

i used the above method to create the clothing in this image. I like the form of her body and feel that her curves are appropriate. I will also alter my model after I have collapsed symmetry as at the minute it looks very symmetrical. I also believe that when the stripes are added to the trouser leg it will make it look a-symmetrical.
As a small side note i can see from the above render that the arms are too long I will fix this before i go any further.

Colours -clothing and hair

Having found the ideal clothing designs I will now look into clothing colours, materials and hairstyles all the while bearing in mind her age and style.

These are some of the hairstyle designs i discovered through my research.
i feel that number 4 ( the fringed hairstyle) would be best suited to her.

I have also looked into the clothing colours of my two final ideas.
These are some of my designs.

I thought that the flower leggings looked particularly good until i took into consideration the hairstyle I had chosen for her i feel that the striped leggings not only fit well with the her angular hair but also because they are just down one leg, give her a more interesting look as would the clashing colours.

Female Darker skin tone character

Previously in my work Ive been afraid to add in the details and the imperfections of a characters face, I've been worried i suppose that the imperfections ruin a character. However more recently I've come to terms with the fact that not only are these imperfections necessary for realism's sake but they also add to the characters beauty making them more real and lifelike.With this in mind I will try to install in my character all the imperfections facially and in the clothing so as to make it look as lifelike as possible.

I have begun looking into the possible clothing for my character. I have done this by painting them in grey scale so I can get a feel of the silhouette.

These are some of the basic ideas I have come up with.

I feel that 2 and 4 can be developed further as they stick with what I want this character to be Youthful edgy but retaining her femininity. Whilst 3 and 5 have interesting silhouette's they are too male orientated and make her feel like a tomboy.
I will now develop these two ideas further.

I feel the first one ( as annotated above) has a prom feel and although I feel personally it is quite a pretty idea it would not work with what i am trying to do.
That is the reason I decided on the second idea to add an off the shoulder t shirt and from a previous idea trainers. Which do give the character an interesting twist.

This is the other idea i decided to continue with. As explained in the image the first image where I have added a chunky knit cardigan looses the characters figure entirely and ages her quite a bit as well.
I think that that the second idea is OK but i feel its just not that interesting. However the third idea works well i think she keeps her figure well by cropping the jacket at waist level whilst retaining an interesting image with the added longer front and rolled up sleeves.
Ive also noted that the jacket would benefit from being made from a material such as satin mainly because of the way it falls but also it would look particularly well when it comes to the texturing stage due to the specularity of the material.

Character-Early concepts

Im am currently researching different ethnicities and the small traits that make everyone different whether that be skin colour, tone, facial shape feature size or just body shape in general.
Im going to start by loooking at different ethnicities.
I found that this tutorial from an older edition of imagine fx to be quite useful in understanding the shades in the different skin tones. (It doesnt go into depth about typical facial traits I will research these at a later time.)
http://www.imaginefx.com/02287754333308296399/tutorial.pdf

I will use this tutorial for future reference as I intend to use baking techniques to create my skin tones.

I would like to get to grips with the darker skin tones as I have not yet created a character with this skin tone so I will design and create a 3d model with these attributes.