Characters are one of the most significant aspects of any game. Users identify with the main characters while feeling sympathy or hatred towards others. In a nutshell, an emotional relationship to the game is formed.
If the 3D animation market was valued at 13.75 billion USD in 2018, it is predicted to grow at an 11 percent CAGR between 2019 and 2025. Several significant reasons will affect this expansion, including an emphasis on generating High-Definition (HD) movies, technological breakthroughs in 3D animation technology, and widespread use of 3D animated videos in the industrial sector.
Companies have been increasingly using 3D characters to create stories and market their products in recent years. They are successful at achieving beneficial outcomes, such as increased participation. As a result, 3D animation has emerged as one of the most important modes of communication. That is why 3D characters should be developed with considerable attention and detail.
There is pillars support 3D character production: competent artists with complementary expertise, communication, and tools. Surprisingly, the elaborate, highly detailed 3D models that awe us begin as simple objects like a sphere or a cube. They serve as the primary foundation for developing a model. Using sophisticated digital tools, the artist manipulates this figure, giving it the correct shape and contours.
The golden rule of 3D modeling is to start simple and work your way up. You may make a 3D character in this manner.
The process of creating 3D characters necessitates clear communication between teams: from concept artists to 3D modelers and animators, teammates must be on the same page to produce excellent outcomes. We also think that the best project management standards should be at the heart of every work, especially for large projects.
Let’s take a closer look at beginner-friendly guidance on how to develop a 3D character model, which I write down below.
Stage 1: Concept
Duration – 2 Weeks
Creating a basic idea of the character and defining his appearance. Before you begin constructing a character, consider their backstory and how to visualize it through this individual. To do this, gather as many references as possible to understand who and how you will develop. Plus, it’s a lot more enjoyable to work on a playable character when you know their backstory and what makes them unique.
Stage 2: Blocking
Duration – 1 Week
Building the proportions of the body parts of the future character. You may begin designing your 3D model by merging primitive shapes into the desired character’s form. For example, you may link numerous cubes or cylinders as distinct pieces of the upcoming model. It can help you visualize your character’s appearance.
Stage 3: Sculpting
Duration – 4 Weeks
Development of the most detailed 3D model. When you start sculpting a character, you get a smooth model that lacks distinguishing traits, which must be added by the 3D artist. The sculpting procedure is similar to clay modeling. A sphere is carved for the character’s eyes, cheekbones, and a chin are created, and a long cylinder is transformed into a finger. Material can be added or subtracted.
Stage 4: Retopology
Duration – 1 Week
Reducing the number of polys to the optimal The surface structure that affects the aesthetic qualities of the model is the game character topology. For example, it enlarges the features of the face (mouth, eyes). Furthermore, the correct topology is necessary to animate the model’s constituent pieces.
Polygonal modeling is commonly used to design the topology of a 3D model. Because polygons might have several corners, it is critical to select a form that allows you to quickly alter and animate different elements of a figure.
Stage 5: Unwrapping and Baking
Duration – 3 Days
Transferring a three-dimensional model to a plane surface in order to apply texture, transferring parts from a highpoly model to a lowpoly model. At this point, it is essential to do an unwrap. It will enable you to convert three-dimensional models to a flat surface. It will aid in the application of textures to them. The low poly model is always used to generate the unwrap. The model was exported to UV Layout for final baking and texturing.
There is a toolbag called Marmoset Toolbag application to remove the normal, curvature, and ambient occlusion maps from the high poly model during the baking step. The high and low poly model elements were put into this application in sections and baked in phases.
Stage 6: Rigging and Skinning
The rigging process begins with the construction of the character’s skeleton. This is required in the future in order to animate the skeleton or bones individually and so make a 3D human model move. Typically, software used to model characters and other game assets includes pre-made skeletal examples.
Skinning happens after rigging. This method is typically used for bipedal figures, and its purpose is to bind the model’s skeleton and surface together. In other words, at this point, the skeleton becomes a part of the character, which implies it may now move because animating the model’s surface is impossible.
Stage 7: Rendering
The process by which an artist creates a scenario for a 3D model using computer graphics and converts it to a 2D image is known as 3D rendering. Artists change the lighting of a picture, the camera’s orientation, and the texture of a frame. This picture is then frequently used in advertising and marketing.
Stage 8: Animation
The final phase in character construction is model animation. Artists bring characters to life by animating their body movements and creating facial expressions. Special instruments are frequently utilized to handle various portions of the body when working on facial expressions, gestures, and motions.
You may even animate your character using video references. Furthermore, most studios frequently employ motion capture, which is a technique in which game actors simulate facial emotions and movements on camera, which are then converted to a computer model.
It is frequently impossible for one firm to do all of the game development work on its own, especially during crisis times. As a result, 4CROWS DIGITAL seeks to assist everyone who needs not just material but also a dependable collaboration.
By entrusting us with 3D character modeling or other jobs for game development or game design, you can be confident that you will receive the 3D characters and material you require in a timely and professional manner.
Is this the information you were looking for? Then contact us, and we’ll go through all of the specifics of your project.
