How do I make a smooth human face?
-
Hi everyone,
I did a little searching but didn't find much concerning how to make a smooth human face. I saw the following model:
And I was wondering how that user got such a smooth 3D face. I thought perhaps starting with a sphere, turning on hidden geometry and manipulating endpoints, but I'm not sure how you would get such a smooth looking model. I suppose then turning off the geometry would smooth the model... Even so, I don't understand how you would start creating a face. Anyone have any advice or know of tutorials? Thanks!
-Neal
-
its probably an import model built in some other modeler you might also wanna take a look at this : http://www.sketchucation.com/forums/scf/viewtopic.php?f=253&t=9224&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&hilit=subdivide+smooth
-
owstopit,
If you're going to try this with SketchUp's native tool-set, you can 'sculpt' a surface as described here:
How can I tweak/sculpt models with the SketchUp tools?Otherwise, read up on how to use SubSmooth and FFD:
Making 'toons... (An enlightening discussion.)Taff
-
The Warehouse model is a Poser import, that's why it's 5MB. A usable figure in SU (one that you can actually use, perhaps with a few others, in a setting...until such time as SU gets high-poly support) is only 200-300Kb.
Human figures, especially faces, are probably the most difficult things of all to model in SketchUp. I ought to know, I've made literally hundreds of them...probably more than anyone else on Earth. Link.
You can do it all in SU, using Subdivide and Smooth etc, but even I tend to start the process much higher poly in another app like Max, before bringing the mesh into SketchUp and optimising it. It's fairly straightforward editing a face in SU, but actually starting one is a different matter. Also, it's not simply a matter of smoothing the mesh, once in SU. If you smooth all the edges you end up with a formless, pneumatic bulk. You need to know which edges to leave unsmoothed...such as around the major features or muscle groups...in order to give some detail. The best way to do this is to select the entire mesh and smooth it to something slightly in excess of 90 degrees...but with all the checkboxes unchecked. This will get rid of all the edge lines but still leave the model facetted. You then have to run over the face using the Eraser with Ctrl held down in order to smooth stuff like the cheeks and forehead, while leaving the lips, jaw line etc still relatively angular. -
Wow Alan!
Another one of your hidden talents.
You must have have spent many man hours crafting all those human models.
They all look top notch.
If you ever find any spare time (unlikely I know) a small tutorial on this process would be very much appreciated.Regards
Mr S -
Well, many years of life-drawing at Liverpool Art College helped somewhat, but as to the actual construction method, it's all a question of doing things in a modular way...having a battery of body parts to choose from and edit.
Editing parts, such as adjusting the angle of an elbow or knee, is perfectly possible in SU, as the link further back up the thread shows. You can do this whether it's bare flesh or clothed. It can get a little messy if the angles get extreme, but nothing that a little subsequent vertex-pushing or re-stitching can't deal with.As for building stuff in SU from scratch, Justin (MonsterZero) has made some excellent videos on his blog.
I use exactly the same techniques when modelling in SU, but then polyreduce, as clients often need many such models in their grander scheme, so they need to be as low-poly as possible. -
hello
i use Art-cam to Model/sculpt faces or anything organic, it is an expensive program at around five grand but i use it commercially and it was provided by the company..however there is a forum for art-cam users who will sculpt for you ...other than that there is an app called mud-box from alias and also there is z brush from pixologic..all these programs require some extensive work coming to a usable workflow but if you are artistic they are the bees knees, and a real compliment to a wacom.
mud-box is about the most versatile for freeform organics in a simple fashion
z brush is a steep but rewarding learning curve and art-cam is the type of software used by industry for routing wood or metal but is hight field technology or is "flat" 2.5D ..mud-box is 3D
there are apps geared more to animation then Modeling in which the mesh is manipulable like hexagon or maya, or any other "subdivision modeler"like studio max ..cheetah for mac.. They normally require the use of bones and constraints that move the mesh in scale and dimension giving the "movement" through animated key frames.
Google virtual clay or subdivision modeling look also at sensible technologies ...awsome.......for me anyway
Advertisement