zBrush Alien Head

The Alien Head was a texturing exercise using zBrush and Maya and taught us how to texture models in zBrush, take the textures created into Photoshop for editing and then place those onto a low poly model in Maya.

We were given a high poly alien head zBrush tool. When opened in zBrush it looked like this:

We were then given a tutorial on how to use the brushes and Spotlight tool to allow us to paint onto the model using photos. After using various photos from different animals (as seen below), the result in seen after the references.

 

This mesh was then exported along with the texture and placed into Photoshop for editing.

Seen above is the Diffuse of the texture. I decided to change the eye used from the original in zBrush. This is a useful feature of putting the texture into Photoshop first.

This is the Diffuse with the AO map applied on top for simulated shadows. This is now ready to be used as a diffuse in Maya on the low poly.

Along with the Diffuse, I used the High Poly and Low Poly to create a normal map to be applied to the Low Poly in Maya to create definition.

The final Low Poly Maya render is seen below.

Cottage Pt 2

The next piece was the front of the house. Starting with some base materials (Plaster, Wood and Brick)

I baked out an AO from the high poly and applied it on the diffuse.

Then, by isolating each individual layer, I baked a normal map with varying details and overlaid them on top of the original High/Low poly normal.

Below is the result alongside the door.

The same process was used on the rest of the building (pillars, side panels and roof) to result in the following:

Cottage Pt 1

The cottage was an interesting texture assignment. The assets were given to us and were already UV mapped. The first part of the model to texture was the door.

I started with a wood texture that can tile along with some worn metal for the handle. I added some dark lines across the wood where the door is placed to achieve a plank effect.

Next, I applied some patterns to the borders of the door. These will later be normal mapped so no FX were applied to achieve an emboss.

I baked out an AO from the high poly using xNormal and multiplied this over the diffuse for shadow simulation.

Along side this I added hinges to the side with a outer glow to simulate shadow and applied a moss decal along the bottom of the wood to show wear.

Finally, I baked out several normal maps and overlaid them to give variations in detail across the model which gave it a nice effect of grooves in the wood and scratches on the metal.

Photo Manipulation Pt 2

The 2nd part of the task was to edit a scene with various other images. 

This is the original image, firstly I began adding some simple details and removing those I didn't want.

I added some moss along the base of the wall and duplicated one of the window panes across to the one with the label on to remove it. It required a slight colour correction to match.

I then took a crack decal and applied that to the floor and wall along with a smashed pane of glass. Finally I took a different door that looked grimy to fit the moss and replaced it over the old door and resized the signs to fit.

Photo Manipulation Pt 1

Using the Photoshop tools and an image provided, we were assigned the task of replacing the sky with another and colour balancing the picture to make it look as though it was the original.

This is the original image. By using the channel panel (specifically the blue channel), I created a mask of the sky which allowed me to manipulate it without damaging the original image. 

I then chose a picture with a sky and went with the one below. 

By placing this in the layer mask of the original layer and colour balancing the original layer to the colour of the sky in the 2nd image, it made it seem as it was an original picture.

Tiling Textures Pt 2

After the brick tile texture, we had to create a Sci-Fi floor that can tile.

Starting with a grey fill, I overlapped 2 circles and took the center of it, filled it with black and rotated it 45 degrees. This gave me a single tread that could be repeated across the floor as seen below:

This would be the middle portion of the floor. The next portion was the outer edge. I added some 'Caution Stripes' to the edges and added a texture on top with overlay applied. This texture was also applied to the middle portion.

The final stage was to create a center piece.

This portion has alpha applied in the white gaps to allow light to pass through them like a mesh floor.

Normal maps were then applied to these and assigned to 3 separate planes in Maya. This was then duplicated and a simple corridor model was built around the floor. The result is below:

Tiling Textures Pt 1

The point of this task was to take a regular texture and change it into a texture that can be repeated across a model seamlessly.

Our first task was to make a brick texture tile.

This was my starting texture. Using a high pass filter, I removed some detail but balanced the light. I then offset it by half of its dimensions to see the seams and started cloning out the edges to make it seamlessly repeat.

Shown is the result:

After this, I converted it to greyscale and adjusted the balance slightly to give a shine to the cobbles on a Specular map.

Finally, I used the specular as a heightmap for xNormal and converted it to a normal map.