King Size
Picture: http://www.e338.com/downloads/def_front_3k.jpg and also

http://www.e338.com/downloads/def_top_1600.jpg

Hi folks.

Long time
no post...

Soooooooooooooo,
what is it that you're looking at?

The
answer is, a mish mash of R&D, Previz, and personnal experimentations on a
subject that doesn't really is, well - you might say - my cup of tea. Realism !

Another
picture...

I've been
thinking of having a tattoo for years and years now. Obviously I wanted to draw
it by myself and I recently felt like I was ready for that.

As soon
as i found a crazy guy capable (technicaly) of doing something really precise,
I started the design process. We also discused the way we'd work together. I
asked the man about placement, tricky areas, streches, etc...

Very
early in this process, I decided I'd use what I know in CG for placement,
simulation, and later on, unfold and generation of the final layout in 2D. I
explained him my vision of the process, and although he was confused about what
I was talking, we both agreed it was a freakin' cool idea! Eh !

Since I
wanted to do something really precise regarding the anatomy, I felt I could use
a little help in order to be as close as possible to the reality.

My work
at the moment consists in doing characters for a videoGame company, Quantic
Dream, and to do so, after the casting is done, we use 3D scanners of the faces
as a guideline for the modelling process.

I asked
my fella Thierry, character supervisor there, if we could manage a scan session
of my body and he said yeah ( I told you he's cool right?).

Using these
patches of scan, i rebuilt the entire mesh and then i created a neat geometry
on top.

After a
month, I came back to Arnaud, the tattoo artist, with the design, and a rough
preview in 3D to see what the placement was. He started to cry, considering the
amount of work he'd have to go through. then he said to me how long it might
take, and it was my turn to cry.

He drew a
simplier version of it (the main lines), and he printed patches of carbon paper
to do the placement before starting the butcher work.

The first
session was a tough call, since he had to do the lines in one shot. I spent
around 4.5h on the chair.

I go
there regularly to fill the stuff with black ink. When this first pass will be
achieved, we'll do the same with the grey ink.

I could
have stopped here, but i felt it was about freaking time to do a proper render
to see how this would really look in the end. Realism isn't a motivation and/or
a goal for me. I always use 3D as a starting point for illustration, and this
whole texturing/shading stuff is a pain in the ass to me, although, I confess,
it can be exciting (what if i was a masochist in the end??? Neh! I can't be !
).

I used
zbrush 3 to create the highres geometry (neh, i didn't project scan details onto low res... we're talking about sculptinh here ;) ).

I felt it
could be good for me to have something to show in this particular field, so I
did my best to push the render as far as I could.

The
textures are not really highres, far from that. Except the bump and
displacement, which are 4k, the rest was done in 2K only (for the face AND the
body).

Rendering
was done in Maya, with SSS, MentalRay, blahblah.. the basic stuff. I did a bit
of FUR (gosh I hate that) as well.

I think
this is all very close to the reality, I didn't try to improve the real me
though CG. This is my head, my shrimp body... Damn !

Hope
you'll enjoy... the process, the design, whatever.

Next
stage is not in my hands at the moment. A friend of mine, very talented
character rigger at Framestore, is currently working on a skeletton, rig, and
muscle simulation, so I can finally manage an animation and a reel.

Eyes are
closed, yup ! Felt like it was OK at this stage to let them stay this way. I'll
work on it for the animation but for now i'm done.

Back to
illustration. Back to silkscreen. No more 3D nitpicking appart from the job.
hahaha.

Cheers to
you all.