Modeling ourselves (21/10/2013)

For today's session we started to put the photographs of ourselves onto Photoshop and use them as reference in order to model ourselves.

After positioning my photos next to one another I used the ruler tool in order to get each position of the face correct as seen below. This is similar to the technique used for drawing faces in art e.g. using lines to determine the position of the eyes and mouth.
I was advised to separate all my photos and then organise them into different groups e.g. the head, body and hands. Thus, when I go to model certain areas of the face it will be easier to judge each side of myself, therefore making the model more detailed and accurate 

Creating a plane I added a texture of my faces to it in order to see the basis of my face. I was also advised to keep the grid up in order to act as another measurement tool, (similar to the ruler tool from Photoshop) and switch Realistic to Shaded in order to avoid having shadows pop up on my textures.

The lecturer then showed us examples of 3D faces and how they should be modeled in order to be well animated.
He then mentioned that 3D models are rounded around the sides of the face and the nose, but flat under the eyes. This may seem odd, but actually, by not making a face look completely round you avoid the head looking balloon like. Although, I may wish to use a similar technique in order to create my face in the style of a 'One Piece' character.

Before continuing, I used the technique shown last week in order to make the textures have a far greater definition.
Then, using 'Planes', we started to create our eyes with the above in mind.

The lecturer recommended that I use a 'spider web' technique in order to correctly model the eye e.g. model your planes after an expanding spider's web so as to get the correct curves.
From doing this technique, I can already see a noticeable improvement.  

I then started to try and create the roundness of the face around the eye as seen below, making sure to attach my two previously separate pieces.

I then continued to try and model the rest of the face as seen below.

At the end of the session, I used the 'Mirror' tool in order to see what I had done so far on both sides of the face.

Overall, I am still very excited to be working on a 3D model of myself, but I recognise that I still have a lot to work on. Therefore, I am glad I decided to go with a stylised look, as I feel if I was meant to be creating a realistic person then it wouldn't work.