Page 5 – Reallusion Magazine

The Expert Guide to Stylized ZBrush Expressions for Salvador Dali

January 26, 2024April 19, 2024 enocburgos1 Comment

*Using Character Creator ZBrush Face Tools for Fully Expressive 3D Facial Animation*

Using Character Creator ZBrush Face Tools for Stylized ZBrush Expressions

Embark on a sculpting journey with Óscar Fernández, a digital sculptor specializing in 3D printing and collectibles. Join him as he unveils a groundbreaking workflow for effortlessly crafting expressive facial expressions for his Salvador Dalí with ZBrush with Character Creator.

Discover professional results without the complexity of traditional approaches, thanks to the revolutionary Character Creator ZBrush Face Tools. Elevate your artistic process and unleash your creativity with Óscar’s innovative techniques to dive into the world of digital sculpting like never before!

DIGITAL 3D SCULPTOR ÓSCAR FERNÁNDEZ

Hi artists! My name is Óscar Fernández, I am a digital sculptor. My work usually centers on figures for 3D printing or collectibles. I’d like to demonstrate a workflow for creating Stylized ZBrush Expressions, achieving professional results without complex technical processes. This method avoids starting from scratch or using traditional approaches.

For ZBrush enthusiasts like us, the system presented below is revolutionary. We only need to focus on the artistic process because the Character Creator ZBrush Face Tools handle everything else seamlessly.

INITIAL IDEA / REFERENCES / SKETCHES

This time, we are going to take an icon of universal art: Salvador Dalí.

To try to push the capabilities of Face Tools to the limit. I will make a caricature of the character, so the first thing is to start with a graphic documentation. I will start by doing a search for real Dalí photos. Since I am not a very good draftsman, I have also looked for references to some caricatures to analyze. I’m looking for the most representative face deformations and thus make my own version.

To try to push the capabilities of Face Tools to the limit. To create a caricature of the character, I begin with graphic documentation, searching for real Dalí photos. As I’m not a proficient draftsman, I also seek references from caricatures. Analyzing representative face deformations guides me in crafting my unique version.

Searching for real Salvador Dalí photos to analyze representative face deformations for crafting my unique stylized version.

I know, I know… it’s not wonderful, but at least I now have a direction to start working on my model.

Round eyes with small pupils to emphasize the painter’s eccentric point. I think about well-defined lips and his characteristic mustache be to make the character perfectly recognizable and also likeable.

If all goes well, the 3D version will improve throughout the process.

DESIGNING THE BASE FROM CHARACTER CREATOR

Our project will start by using a base model of Character Creator (CC4). The mesh of this model provides us with a universal topology, perfect for animation and of course for sculpture.

Once the model is loaded, we can go to the Materials tab. There we will lower the intensity of the textures to zero and focus only on the volumes.

Loading Character Creator model to and lowering texture intensity

I am going to continue creating the base of our character from the “morphs” tab. We will use the combination of two CC4 characters to give a cartoon appearance to the body of our model. I will also load some eyes and teeth in accordance with the style. Lastly, I will load the neutral wrinkle set. Everything ready, we’re going to ZBrush!!

Using Character Creator morphs to quickly reach cartoonish appearance

TRANSFER THE MODEL TO ZBRUSH

Once the base of our model is configured in Character Creator (CC), we will use the ZBrush Face Tools button. This is to transfer the character to ZBrush. We will open the first window of the tool and we begin the configuration:

Using the ZBrush Face Tools inside Character Creator

This is the first time we send the character to ZBrush, we will select “Create New” in the Action field.

The next field corresponds to the number of subdivision levels in ZBrush. When the Normal, Diffuse and Cavity maps are subsequently created. The level 6 will correspond to a 2K resolution and level 7 to a 4K resolution. In my case, 6 levels will be enough… We check the “Normal Details” box and finally “GoZ” to send the character to ZBrush.

Once the model has been loaded we will only see the head. Since this tool is focused on the character’s face work. We go to Zplugin and open ZBrush Face Tools.

Before starting to work I am going to configure my project: the background color, the canvas size, some rendering parameters. I will save my file as a project in both ZBrush and Character Creator.

HEAD MODELING IN ZBRUSH

In the plug-in panel we can activate the “Range” option to load a texture. This will enable us to see both the topology of the mesh and the regions that will be affected by the different expressions.

Using CC to observe the mesh topology regions that will be affected by different expressions

Mesh topology regions that will be affected by facial expressions

If you are a “traditional” digital sculptor you must keep in mind that we are already starting from a perfect topology. So it is very important to try to respect directions of the loops to obtain optimal results. We are going to avoid using brushes that “add material”. Brushes like all the Clay variants or those that deform the topology too much like Pinch, Snake Hook, etc…

The idea is to work at subdivision level 1 to achieve the basic shape. And work with brushes like Move or DamStandard. These are to deform the mesh little by little. While always looking for smooth lines in those loops that we mentioned.

If the low poly mesh works, then the high poly will generate very smooth and continuous lines that will work perfectly when deformed in the expressions.

FINISHING THE FACE: HAIR / EYEBROWS / MUSTACHE

For the hair and eyebrows, I simply made a mask in the corresponding area, I used Extract to generate the mesh and, after making the basic shape, I used ZRemesher to have a neat mesh in which I can subdivide a couple of times and add some detail with the “Slash 2” brush.

Once this is done, I only have to adjust the position of the teeth and tongue and I have everything ready to send the character back to CC4 and check how it behaves. To carry out this process, just click on “Update to Character Creator”

BACK TO CHARACTER CREATOR

Selecting CC3+ Base model

** Before updating your ZBrush model back to CC, make sure the CC3+ model is selected in CC. Selecting any other mesh or props will trigger a pop-up in CC and cancel the update process.

Updating from ZBrush to Character Creator

When you press the “Update to Character Creator” button, a window will open that may be a little scary at first, but now we will see that it is incredibly easy to understand.

So far we have only worked on the base of our character, so we are going to deactivate the entire section corresponding to expressions… well, this is much simpler!

For now, we have only worked on the base, so it is the only button that we are going to keep active and within the base we have modified the head, tongue, teeth and eyes, so we activate them as well.

GENERATE NORMAL MAP

With this configuration, what we are going to send to Character Creator is the information corresponding to subdivision level 1, but as we have sculpted using higher levels to achieve the final result, we are also going to activate “Details>Normal”: this will generate the normal Map we mentioned before, this way we will have all the details in our model and we can also adjust its intensity in Character Creator. We will not activate “Cavity>Blend” since it would generate a cavity map that is not necessary in our case but works great for realistic models.

Comparing base character to stylized one

ZBrush begins to send all the information to Character Creator and when finished we can return to CC, where, once again, we do not have to worry about anything; We press “Update” and the automatic process continues.

Here we can see the original base mesh and the modified model in ZBrush.

SEND HAIR, EYEBROWS, MUSTACHE

Now we are also going to send the hair, eyebrows and mustache. To do this we just have to hide all the subtools by clicking on the little eye icon and press “Visible” to send them to Character Creator.

In Character Creator, we configure these parts as Accessories and click Update. Maybe we need to make some adjustments to the position.

Attribute panel to click Hair, Eyebrows, Beard

In order for each of these accessories to become a real part of our character’s face, we just have to go to the attributes panel, click Create Hair, Eyebrows, Beard and select the type of behavior for each of them.

Verify that each facial feature behaves as expected

Once configured, in the facial editor, we can verify that each of them already behaves as we would expect.

If we want to modify this behavior we can go to “Assign Conformable Regions” in the case of hair or “Facial Hair Vertex Assignment” in the case of mustache and define the vertices that will influence each of these elements and thus have absolute control of the deformation of both when modifying the expressions.

Testing the facial expressions with Character Creator Edit Facial Panel

TEXTURING SKIN WITH POLYPAINT

We continue with the customization of our character, in this case we are going to texture the skin using Polypaint. We are simply going to apply the colors on the SkinShade material progressively until we get the appearance we want and finally we send it back to Character Creator using “Update to Character Creator”

Select “Polypaint>Diffuse” in the Base Texture options — Select **“Polypaint>Diffuse”** in the Base Texture options

Once again, logic will guide our decisions, so if we have only changed the Polypaint.

We will only select “Polypaint>Diffuse” in the Base Texture options and since we have only changed the Polypaint of the head, we will only select “head” in the Base Texture options to send to Character Creator.

By sending the color information to Character Creator, it gives us the option of also applying those values to the body so, despite having painted only the face, the coherence between one and the other is perfect. After adjusting the scene’s lighting parameters a bit, everything now looks perfect so it’s time to go back to ZBrush and start the really important part of this workflow.

ADJUSTING EXPRESSIONS IN CHARACTER CREATOR

Actually, what FACE TOOLS does automatically is create a series of layers that will produce different deformations in the mesh to generate the expressions. The goal is that we can create personalized wrinkles for each of our characters in an individual and creative way and thus provide them with a unique personality.

In the expressions section of the plugin we see that we have 13 base expressions that we can work on. Subsequently, these expressions will be combined in Character Creator and gradually merged creating infinite results as we will see later.

At the beginning, we have loaded the “Neutral Wrinkles” pack in our model, so when you press each of the buttons, in addition to the deformation of the mesh corresponding to each expression, certain wrinkles also appear that already add personality to our model. We can use these wrinkles as a guide or smooth the mesh at each of the subdivision levels so that they disappear completely and do our work from scratch. To have a reference of how the eyebrows are going to behave, I am going to paint them directly on the skin.

I’ll start with the “Eyebrow Raise” expression. As we already saw when creating the base of our character, it is best to work on the lowest subdivision level while looking for the shapes and increasing to define details, although always trying to follow the direction of the topology when generating the wrinkles.

UPDATE TO CHARACTER CREATOR

In the “Update to Character Creator” window we will only mark the update of the expressions/wrinkles, and activate the buttons to generate the corresponding morph and the normal map for the wrinkles.

Since we are going to generate our own custom wrinkles by Sculpting in ZBrush, we will deactivate the “Normal” box since this option is focused on controlling the generic wrinkle packs.

We could make all the wrinkles and finally export again to Character Creator but in my case I am going to do it one by one and we will see the difference. Every time I update, I will select the corresponding wrinkle.

13 BASE EXPRESSIONS

Here we can see the ZBrush expressions version after having modeled the wrinkles. In addition to sculpting the expressions, we can also apply a different Polypaint to each of them to highlight areas or apply some type of color variation.

Those 13 expressions that we modeled in ZBrush correspond to the 13 regions of influence that we see in the CC Wrinkles Panel, so now we are going to see the difference between the generic version and the customized version based precisely on those 13 regions.

Brow Raise Expression with Character Creator

Brow Drop Expression with Character Creator — Brow Raise Expression with Character Creator

COMPLETING CHARACTER AND CLOTHING

I couldn’t resist doing the full character, since if we combine facial expressions with body language, we will gain a lot of expressiveness.

I created the garments in ZBrush quickly, creating the UV’s and painting or texturing directly in this software.

Completing Salvador Dalí Character and Clothing

By having the UV’s we only have to generate normal and diffuse maps so that it is applied directly in CC and we see it textured.

By pressing “Visible” button we will send it to Character Creator.

Once in CC, only select the garment, press the transfer weights button, choose the corresponding template and make any subsequent adjustments to the weights if necessary. Our Character is now complete!!

CREATING OUR CUSTOM EXPRESSIONS

As you have seen, everything we have done so far has been artistic processes since the entire technical part is completely automated by the tool… we have left behind all the repetitive, boring actions that are far from the creative process.

The next thing will be even more fun, we are going to create unique expressions for our character.

We go to “Edit Facial” within the “Motion Pose” panel and we can start defining our expressions.

When creating expressions we have 3 options:

The first option is “Muscles”, a super intuitive editor in which we will select a region and just move the mouse in the desired direction for it to deform. In this editor, in addition to modifying the regions of the face, we can be even more precise by accessing the eyes, mouth or tongue panel.

Adjusting Facial Profile

CHOOSING PREDEFINED EXPRESSIONS

The second method would consist of choosing one of the predefined expressions from the “Expressions” option. The list is huge and we would have our expression in just one click.

Testing Facial Profile

Adjusting Facial Profile

The expressions are divided into 6 categories and some extra that Character Creator provides us:

Happiness
Sadness
Anger
Disgust
Fear
Surprise

Finally, we will have the option to modify each region using sliders with total precision.

The best of all is we can combine these 3 systems to create our expression.

For example, we can start with a predefined expression. Then select and modify the position of a muscle group and finally make some fine adjustments using the sliders.

Below, I show you the expressions I created along with the body pose.

Generic vs. Custom Expression 1 — Generic vs. Custom Expression

Generic vs. Custom Expression 2 — Generic vs. Custom Expression

MY CONCLUSIONS

I think that throughout this year Reallusion has clearly been on the side of the artists. They are giving us tools so that creative people can invest their time in. Allowing us to create and not waste effort in technical, boring and repetitive processes.

When it comes to posing characters, the introduction of the Character Creator Pose Tools seems like a real revolution. As we can create them completely from scratch and take them to Character Creator. To make dynamic poses in a super natural, intuitive and even fun way.

Now, with the introduction of CC Face Tools, it is true that we depend on a base mesh. But they have a perfect topology, and we can push it to the limit and it still performs great.

We can give each of our characters a unique personality through the 13 customizable expressions in ZBrush. And then take advantage of the power of CC’s expression tools to have absolute precision in facial gestures.

In addition to increasing productivity. I think I could summarize the use of these tools as something that we were all looking forward to!

WE’RE GOING TO ENJOY!

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Follow Óscar Fernández:

ArtStation:
https://www.artstation.com/oscargrafias

YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/@Oscargrafias/videos

Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/oscarfernandez_3dart/

Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/oscargrafias/

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This article is also featured on CG Ghannel.

Learning

Creating Simple Audiences with Crowd Sim

January 24, 2024January 24, 2024 WarLordLeave a comment

The new crowd simulator in iClone is one of the most exciting additions to an application that is already packed with exciting tools and features. Open the tool, drag-and-drop some necessary assets from the Content Manager or an Explore window, generate one-click placement over and over until you like what you see then Deploy Actors and you have a crowd.

As a freelancer, I have worked with several crowd generators and while most of them did a decent job, all of them fell short in one way or another. One was too restrictive in features. Another was like a cyber wrestling match trying to get custom assets imported. You never knew who was going to win that match either.

Other simulators were very complicated and time-consuming or involved prohibitive pricing models affordable only in some cases to high revenue-earning animators. Small shops, a lot of freelancers, and hobbyists were on the outside looking in, wishing they could get their hands on such tools when Reallusion introduced their 8.4 upgrade to iClone with the Crowd Sim tool in the free update.

The Crowd Sim is, like most iClone tools, easy to use with a small learning curve. No nodes, just assets, computer-aided placement, and orientation of those assets with paths, terrains, props, or volumes.

A clear view of the Boxing Match crowd used in the main article graphic. 3D characters upfront with 3D stadium seating and 2D photographic crowd.

Generating multiple, animation-driven characters is a snap with this tool. CC4 can optimize and decimate characters down to as little as 800K for use in the distant background while optimizing mid-range characters at around 7000K.

And yes, you can easily use your custom content. If the content was created outside of the iClone/CC4 environment you can use the auto-rigging features of CC4 to make it compatible with iClone motions and editing.

SEATED AUDIENCE CROWD

For a lot of events like sports, theatre, or movie screenings the audience would be primarily a sitting crowd. Creating a sitting audience is simple but requires a little tweaking depending on the dimensions of the bleachers or seats in use. If, like the one in my example below are not tall enough you can still tweak the position, camera angle or scale of the bleachers if necessary. Not all props like this are created to character scale so you adapt as best you can by tweaking the positioning of the actors after placement or using camera angle to conceal any problems.

STANDING AUDIENCE CROWDS

Standing crowds, particularly at sporting events or concerts can be rowdy crowds at times so I used motions from the Emotes Pack along with characters from the Casual section of the Modern People Sampler in generating the standing crowd. This pack also has multiple material options for more character variations. This produced a lively crowd very quickly. I have found these two packs to be very useful for generating realistic crowds.

You can use custom assets to make a crowd that fits your needs like a futuristic cyberpunk crowd or a period of time like the Victorian age.

SITTING AND STANDING CROWDS

Mixed audiences, standing, and seating, is another crowd type that may require a little tweaking to get the results you want. I started with the sitting crowd made earlier and replaced the sitting motions with standing motions in the popup dialog while using the spacing slider to position the added characters. This can take a little patience until you get something usable and then you can tweak it after the fact if needed.

I tried a NavMesh, but it couldn’t produce one that was usable on that type of bleacher mesh. The NavMesh seems more suited towards solid props without the pipe framing as it could only pick up bits and pieces of the seating surfaces. A solid mesh, blocky bleacher works better. Rescaled stairs can work in a pinch.

ACTOR GROUPS FOR AUDIENCES

Actor Groups are more powerful than you may think. They are a fantastic addition in that you can create your own groups as a Base group and use that base group in creating a Preset with a large actor pool that you can fill with other actors for more variations when you drag in the custom group.

CUSTOM BASE ACTOR GROUP

A custom base group will contain the same character makeup each time we load it which is why it is a base. It can be used in creating a preset that randomizes the group of actors each time it is loaded. Below is loading a simple base group I created for a test.

CUSTOM PRESET ACTOR GROUP

Dragging in or loading a custom Preset Actor Group will trigger a popup menu that allows for control over the randomization of the group actors. As shown in the video below you have the option of using the preset as it is when you drag it in or randomizing the actors even though they will be random each time they are loaded.

LOADING A BASE ACTOR GROUP FOR EDITING

An Actor Group is a project file, and you can build the group over time while saving it to test, use, or come back to later just like a project file. In my test, I created a bleacher-based crowd of random sitting characters. Then I saved the custom Actor Group as described in Kai’s video later down in this article. This is simply pressing the save button in the Actor Group Settings popup used when creating the group.

Loading an Actor Group for editing is different. You do not drag and drop the original Preset group into the workspace. Instead, you load the Actor Group via the Actor Group Setting dialog. This will repopulate the scene with actors and props. Don’t be confused, this is the same file that you can drag and drop but you need to load it with the Actor Group Settings popup for editing.

TIP: For Editing purposes load the file you saved using the Actor Group Setting popup menu. Loading the original present Actor Group into the workspace will only load the saved group with no popup window or editing. This is demonstrated in the video below.

Kai has a great tutorial on creating the different custom Actor Groups. This covers how to create a base group and presets and random Actor Groups.

With Actor Groups I can fill a scene quickly. Especially the immediate area in front of the camera. Depending on the type of group the characters will be different each time I load or drag and drop the custom Actor Group into the scene. Being able to add props like benches and accessories like phones or purses makes for fast deployments of multiple Actor Groups that can breathe life into an otherwise empty scene.

Actor Groups are a powerful addition to iClone that can be as simple as drag and drop or when tweaked they can include custom characters and motions. We can even use Motion Director motions when the need arises.

SUMMARY

Audience-type crowds, sitting, standing, or mixed are simple examples of how to get started with the Crowd Sim tool. They also represent just a small selection of the types of crowds we can now create with this new tool. An audience is as varied as any crowd and the more variation we can throw in the better the crowd will look but, unless it’s Lord of the Rings, it’s not all about how many characters we can stuff into a scene.

It’s really about the proper use of characters in a given area, within the view of the camera. Sell the immediate area to the viewer and the midrange to background elements will fall into place as the viewer’s mind will fill in a lot of information, more implied than seen if properly done.

Animation doesn’t need to mimic real life, but it does need filler. Empty scenes have long been a problem in animation from the early days of cell-animated cartoons to current 3D projects. With iClone’s Crowd Sim tool, those empty scenes can be a thing of the past.

REALLUSION MANUAL

Accessing Crowd Generator
Crowd Generator UI
Deploying Actors
Applying Motions to Actors
Applying iMD to Actors
What are the Types of Actor Groups

REALLUSION COURSES

Keyword Search “Crowd Sim”

HIGHLIGHTED TUTORIALS
Crowd Sim: Crowd Generation
Crowd Sim: Customize & Expand

MD McCallum – WarLord

Digital Artist MD “Mike” McCallum, aka WarLord, is a longtime iClone user. Having authored free tutorials for iClone in its early years and selected to write the iClone Beginners Guide from Packt Publishing in 2011, he was fortunate enough to meet and exchange tricks and tips with users from all over the world and loves to share this information with other users. He has authored hundreds of articles on iClone and digital art in general while reviewing some of the most popular software and hardware in the world. He has been published in many of the leading 3D online and print magazines while staying true to his biggest passion, 3D animation. For more information click here.

WARLORD’s WORKSHOP

Learning

Cloning myself with a 3D head generator: Headshot 2 plugin walkthrough

January 19, 2024April 8, 2024 ericchangreallusionLeave a comment

Erik Larson (Libertas)

Born in Chicago, Libertas started out with a passion for filmmaking at an early age. Ever since he fell in love with the AAA game Assassin’s Creed, he started making videos about it. You can find more of those videos on his channel Libertas Video. He also creates a series of Assassin’s Creed-inspired micro-short films, like “Modern Assasin Training Session.”

Libertas admits to always dreaming bigger than his shoestring budget could afford. Even still, he loves creating characters and their costumes to see them come alive, especially in his YouTube short films. Outside of his day job as the Director 3D of a creative company. And his is also a sole 3D generalist at his company, Libertas Video. He spends his free time dreaming crafting new characters, costumes, and props for his digital actors.

Challenges I Had To Face Prior to Headshot 2

I am no stranger to creating short films. Whether that involves writing scripts, developing costumes, stepping into characters, or bringing it all together. However, many of my productions were always limited — whether it was the number of people I had access to or the locations where I could shoot. It was disappointing to have an idea of what I wanted to create but be limited by what was available. Now that I have modernized my arsenal of tools, these challenges have become a relic of the past.

My 3D workflow using Headshot 2

3D scanning my own head

The first thing I did was scan my face using the Kiri Engine. I took about 30 photos of myself. They were uploaded and stitched together to create a highly detailed representation of my face. After downloading the high-resolution file created from the scans, I imported it into Blender.

Refining the sculpt in Blender

I had to do some cleanup on this file, so I merged the overlapping vertices and entered “Sculpt Mode”. I primarily used the “Smooth Brush” to remove any odd jagged edges, many of which were caused by the stubbles of my unshaven face. The cleaner we can make this model at this stage, the easier it will be for us later on. After cleaning up the head model, I scaled it down to life-size and exported it as an FBX file.

Importing FBX into Character Creator

I imported the FBX head into Character Creator (CC), ensuring that everything was properly oriented, and linked the diffuse map to the model. Then, I began using Headshot 2. The plugin includes a mesh functionality that requires you to match up predefined points in sequential order on your model, as seen on the Character Creator forehead. You can also add additional points to achieve even more accuracy — to the hairline, for instance. Once this process is complete, I can generate the head and start refining the mesh.

I usually find that the base is good, but when using the “Sculpt” brush, I often need to project or smooth the mesh a little more to increase its accuracy. I also had to work more cautiously on my head sculpt due to some additional challenges stemming from my own face. In particular, the facial hair doesn’t convert well, so I had to use the “Clone” brush to essentially recreate the mouth and the chin. This process took some finesse, but eventually, I achieved something workable. Besides that, the refining phase can take as long or as little time as you want; it all depends on how accurate you want the final result to be. In just a few short minutes, we have a head that is strikingly similar to what was scanned.

Using Headshot 2 and aligning the head morphs

From there, I have a lot of creative control over the face. I like to make a few further refinements using the thousand-plus morphs included with the plugin. Things like fixing my lips and my chin may seem minor, but when it comes to faces, sometimes the smallest details are the most important aspects in achieving a realistic likeness. I then take it a step further by adding hair from the “Hair Builder” content pack, enabling the inclusion of facial hair. Additionally, I enhance the normal maps with the SkinGen Premium plugin for more intricate details. Realistic wrinkle maps from the Dynamic Wrinkles and Wrinkle Essentials extension packs further contribute to lifelike features.

“If you find yourself on the fence as to whether or not you want to buy this plugin I would say go for it — especially if you’re going to be able to utilize that mesh functionality.”
Erik Larson, CEO of Libertas Video

While these are all additional plugins, I find that they significantly enhance your character, taking it to the next level. Personally, I create my own hair in Blender and design the bandana in Marvelous Designer, importing them back into Character Creator 4. The end results are uncanny: It’s enjoyable to witness my family and friends react to the resemblance, which, I believe, opens up numerous opportunities for individuals in the gaming or film industry.

You can add yourself, your spouse, or your friends into a world that you’ve created. For those working on fan projects, odds are there are sculpts of your favorite characters available for import and utilization in Character Creator and iClone. For films, a digital double can perform incredible stunts, and with Headshot, it can all be achieved rapidly.

Fixing the head mesh

After several head scans and testing out this plug-in, you can then attach it to one of the standard Character Creator 4 bodies, or a body already present in your scene. I highly recommend unticking the checkbox for keeping the neck shape, unless you’re working on a more stylized character where the neck’s appearance is crucial. I’ve found that transferring the neck shape can lead to unintended consequences, and it’s relatively easy to reconfigure using morph sliders. Once you’ve selected the body you want, after a short while, you’ll have a complete character. During the process, Character Creator 4 bakes the diffuse map and normal map for use with your character, attempting to match the skin tones as best as it can.

However, based on my experience with the plugin, I discovered that additional refinements are necessary with morph sliders after the creation process. The sculpt on my head created a few issues I’ll delve into shortly. Typically, I’ve noticed that the eyes tend to start a bit small and occasionally at odd angles. It’s also crucial to pay particular attention to how the neck translates. While it may appear fine by itself, in my initial models, I noticed that the neck geometry affected the clothing on the character. For instance, scanned hoodies seemed distorted, giving the impression of a shrunken neck, even if it appeared fine in the viewport.

After I stopped using the option to maintain the neck shape, I haven’t experienced any of these issues. Other than that, the way my face was scanned caused a few problems for this stage of the process. I didn’t scan my face in optimal lighting. All was done in my kitchen at night, resulting in harsh lighting that affected my diffuse map. Additionally, the scan didn’t accurately capture my facial hair, impacting how the normal map was baked. Consequently, I had to rectify these textures in Photoshop by reducing highlights and shadows for a smoother, more even appearance. I also had to smooth out the normal map to diminish the bumpiness on my chin.

Conclusion: My Experience with Headshot 2

After turning myself into a digital avatar, I can fight a ninja. I can be the captain of a pirate ship, or parkour over the rooftops of a medieval city. And all that can be possible with the use of Headshot 2 in Character Creator.

I absolutely recommend this plugin. The original headshot was already a staple asset, but using Headshot 2 takes it to the next level. What would have taken me hours before now only takes minutes. It’s incredible to see those basic models come together so quickly, allowing for a smoother transition to the next step and enabling me to be more creative.

The real treat is taking the models and harnessing all the power that Character Creator 4 offers, from extended facial profiles to dynamic wrinkles. Utilizing SkinGen to add even more details like tattoos or scars gives you an incredible amount of control at your fingertips. So, if you find yourself on the fence as to whether or not you want to buy this plugin I would say go for it — especially if you’re going to be able to utilize that mesh functionality. It will save you a significant amount of time and effort, ultimately leading to better results overall in 3D scanning my head.

Learning

12 Reasons why Character Creator is the Best 3D Character Maker

January 18, 2024January 18, 2024 WarLordLeave a comment

Creating a 3D character used to be and still can be a tedious, difficult, time-consuming effort. Particularly when you must create everything from clothing to accessories, texturing, UV mapping and then there are the bones.

From big bones to little finger and toe digits, they all must be rigged to near perfection to avoid distortion in the character or its movements.

I have always held good character modelers in high esteem as their creations are the most likely to be front and center of any animation or game. It takes skill, boatloads of it, and experience, something we don’t all have the luxury of possessing. By the time we get good enough at all the skills needed… that creative spark might have long died.

If all you want to do is tell a story, then a unique 3D character that will not appear in other people’s productions can be a problem. The good thing is it’s a problem that Character Creator 4 (CC4) can solve. It has the base meshes and performs skinning, as well as other aspects of 3D character creation for use in animation and still image rendering.

Let’s explore the reasons why Character Creator 4 allows you to spend more time to being creative while eliminating the frustration of being hung up in the technical aspects and problems of creating unique 3D characters.

Ease of use
Quad topology optimized for morph and animation
Auto-rigging for any humanoid models
Create animated characters from facial photos and 3D models
One mesh transform to all possible character shapes
Ultra-realistic human skin synthesis
Custom expression morphs with ease
Ultra-realistic real-time human rendering
Robust ZBrush integration (GoZ, Face Tools, Pose Tools)
Modular asset system & smart gallery
Professional production pipeline
Real-time feedback

EASE OF USE

CC4, like its cousin iClone, is a drag-and-drop interface with multiple ways of bringing in 3D assets such as your own character meshes, custom clothing, and accessories including hair and beards. Everything about Character Creator 4, like iClone, revolves around the concept of visual and practical simplicity. You can drag and drop from an Explorer window or from the Content Manager. You can also double-click items in the Content Manager to load them into the workspace. We are given the choice for more flexibility.

Drag & drop contents easily in Character Creator 4

While mesh editing is available it is not necessary as CC4 has multitudes of sliders to control the look and form of different body parts. There are sliders for the Body, Head, Actor Parts, and CC Teeth. Each of these sections has subsections of sliders available. One great feature of these sliders is that they are not locked at zero or 100 percent. You can input numbers directly into the input box if you wish to exceed those amounts. Mesh distortion will occur if you push it too far but at least Reallusion gives us the choice to override the slider stops.

You can see in the above image that I have overridden the Head Scale Slider by manually inputting the number into the box.

With the sliders, you can add body mass like muscle or make the body thinner, arms longer, legs shorter as well as scale. And keep in mind that you can blend all of these sliders, including Male and Female on the same character for further modification. Even the CC Teeth have a lot of morph sliders including even more if you have the Headshot plugin. You can also make your own custom sliders for more flexibility.

In my experience, the Character Creator 4 sliders are much more complex and functional than any of the other sliders I have used in other applications. For my use, there is no match for the sheer amount of sliders and control that CC4 gives us.

QUAD TOPOLOGY OPTIMIZED FOR MORPH AND ANIMATION

Good, clean topology is a must for any 3D character to perform without vertex or rigging distortions. In the early days triangles (tris) were the only game in town but now the industry practices have changed to a smoother, more quad-based topology. Triangles are still necessary in certain parts of the mesh but the spacing of quads makes for a more workable mesh as the reduced number of triangles leaves fewer edges to collide or collapse on each other during a movement.

Retopology itself became a skill, almost an art form, to smooth base meshes and clean up any unsightly mishmash of vertices. It eventually became a part of most pipelines with allotted time and budgets that could make expenses rise.

CC4 has taken care of that by providing a smooth, quad-based mesh that can retain flexibility at lower poly counts. Below is an image of the base mesh 35K down to a highly decimated and optimized mesh of 800 tris. You must have good topology in the original mesh for good optimization in decimated meshes.

Learn more: CC3+ Base Model

From Left: Original Male Base CC4 Mesh 35K, ActorCore 17K, LOD1 7K, LOD2 800 Tris

AUTO-RIGGING FOR ANY HUMANOID 3D MODELS

When importing a custom mesh that is already skinned, CC4 gives us the option to use AccuRIG for a new skeleton or to match bones in a characterization process until enough bones become available to create a functional 3D character. If we import a mesh only then AccuRIG will put the bones in based on the initial location of markers placed early in the process.

AccuRIG has a short learning curve. It provides symmetrical placement of markers and bone hierarchy selection to move items like markers one time for each side (arms, legs, hands) or entire rows of fingers (knuckle markers).

It’s a great tool for creating crowd-simulation characters too. Combined with the Optimize and Decimate tool you can create very low poly crowd characters for use as filler or background characters. It can create characters from 17K ActorCore specs to midrange characters around 7K (LOD 1) and distant characters at 800 tris (LOD2) as mentioned earlier. Plus, you have a custom option to create your own optimization settings.

AccuRIG by itself is a major tool that saves time, frustration, and headaches allowing you to concentrate on being creative instead of technical.

Learn more: AccuRIG Advanced

Non-CC4 Character Rigged with AccuRIG to accept iClone Motions

CREATE ANIMATED 3D CHARACTERS FROM FACIAL PHOTOS AND 3D MODELS

Headshot was an extremely powerful image-to-face tool in its debut with features that allowed us to not only use images but also have sculpting tools for fine-tuning if needed. It even provided a hair mesh in the auto version or more direct control in the Pro version depending on which button you pushed as you entered the plug-in. In a world of AI image generators, this plug-in is a great addition to the toolbox.

Headshot 2 has now arrived and allows us to import a head mesh to a fully rigged CC4 body. This includes openings for the eyes, nose, and mouth. It’s a very easy way to anthropomorphize animals to a bipedal character with access to iClone motions, poses, and facial features. It’s also an easy way to create stylized 3D characters.

Learn more: Headshot

ONE MESH TRANSFORM TO ALL POSSIBLE 3D CHARACTER SHAPES

Ah morphs… the thing that evens the playing field for all of us mere mortals against those super talented character artists. With the mere movement of a slider, we can alter the details of a 3D character. Use enough sliders and you have created a character unique from the base mesh. Add in your own custom morphs for even more unique 3D characters and create your own custom morph sliders.

Learn more: Morph for Modeling

ULTRA-REALISTIC HUMAN SKIN SYNTHESIS

These two features have brought the level of realism to new heights. Using mapping like normal and height, Skin Gen adds a lot of detail from big scars to small skin details without hogging resources or slowing down your device. Unlike mesh-level detail which requires a lot of computing resources, Skin Gen relies on the mapping channels to add a high level of detail that makes your CC4-created characters more lifelike but nimble.

The most recent feature, Dynamic Wrinkles allows your character’s face to use wrinkles in the proper areas with user control for how much or how little. Need a furrowed brow or an intense frown? You’ll get that along with wrinkles that appear and move with the skin in a natural manner. While we have long had the ability to add intense expressions, they did not involve wrinkles that move dynamically with the face until now.

At its basic level, you do not have to do much except enable the wrinkles for the character. While you can do much more including custom wrinkle maps you can still do quite a lot with just basic features.

Learn more: Dynamic Wrinkle System

CUSTOM EXPRESSION MORPHS WITH EASE

Located within the Facial Profile Editor is the Edit Expressions button which activates the panel of morph sliders to enhance a character’s expression. CC4 provides standard and extended facial profiles. The Edit Expressions editor allows the use of individual morph sliders to increase or decrease the amount of expression like lift in the eyebrows.

Outside of the morph sliders, there are several expression tools available including Edit Mesh, Open Modify Morph, GoZ (expressions), and the Proportion editor.

Learn more: Facial Expression Morph

ULTRA-REALISTIC REAL-TIME HUMAN RENDERING

With CC4 you have a choice of Physical Based Rendering (PBR) or Digital Human Shader that can improve the realism of your characters. You can even mix shaders within a character such as the skin being Digital Human Shader while the clothing can be PBR or Traditional shaders or any combination as CC4 gives you versatility.

Learn more: Digital Human Shader

ROBUST ZBRUSH INTEGRATION (GoZ, Face Tools, and Pose Tools)

ZBrush is one of the most innovative and powerful mesh creation tools on the planet. For pure creative purposes, this high-powered digital sculpting software ranks at the top and is a must-have tool for many 3D digital artists. ZBrush has industry-leading tools that allow for the creation of complex meshes and the optimization of those meshes to make them practical in a 3D environment.

CC4 has been a part of GoZ integration for some time now and it has an even more robust GoZ function for its new Face Tools plug-in. It is very easy to move back and forth between a CC4 character and ZBrush with a lot of included preset morphs to alter the look of your 3D character.

There is also the free ZBrush Pose tools to use CC4 to effortlessly pose your ZBrush character creations.

Learn more: ZBrush Pipeline

MODULAR ASSET SYSTEM & SMART GALLERY

CC4 takes advantage of the same modular asset system in iClone such as hair, clothing, and accessories for your 3D character. These items are interchangeable within the iClone/CC4 pipeline and are available to other CC4 characters.

The Smart Gallery helps you to keep up with all your new characters and stock or purchased assets by providing a visual, searchable database of your 3D assets that work with CC4 or iClone. You can add custom locations for 3D assets stored outside of your CC4 installation too. Of course, you can also just drag and drop any CC4 assets directly into the workspace from an explorer window.

Learn more: Smart Content Management

PROFESSIONAL PRODUCTION PIPELINE

Don’t let the subtitle scare you. While it can turn out professional-level work, you don’t have to be a professional to use it. Nor do you have to be a pro to benefit from its powerful tools and pipeline-friendly direct and indirect export features.

As mentioned earlier CC4 is already tied into the ZBrush pipeline. Its industry-standard FBX, USD, and OBJ exporting allow for easy interaction with other 3D software.

OBJ for modern and legacy applications. USD for hassle-free import into the Nvidia Omniverse pipeline including their machinima tool for high-level rendering. BVH for motion files and the industry-standard FBX for import into just about any 3D application. You can even upload your creations to Sketchfab with little effort.

Learn more: Pipeline

REALTIME FEEDBACK

Being a close cousin of iClone, CC4 provides realtime visuals as you work. You don’t have to stop and render out a still image or part of a video to see what you are working on. While other applications can provide some level of realtime visualization they are generally in a more muted, simplified manner without revealing the true look of your work. The final render then fills in the blanks but with CC4, like iClone, you get instant visual feedback to guide you through the creation process.

Also, like iClone, with CC4, what you see is what you get. You will see what you are working on as it happens.

SUMMATION

When it comes down to the bottom line, Character Creator 4 offers a wide array of powerful tools to morph, shape, and blend a character that can fit your needs as an animator whether you are a beginner or a pro.

REALLUSION RESOURCES

AccuRIG
Morphs
Wrinkle System
Expression Editor
Digital Human Shader
Smart Gallery
GoZ – ZBrush

CHARACTER CREATOR MANUAL

AccuRIG
Morphs
Wrinkle System
Expression Editor
Digital Human Shader
Smart Gallery Plug-in
GoZ (ZBrush)

MD McCallum – WarLord

Digital Artist MD “Mike” McCallum, aka WarLord, is a longtime iClone user. Having authored free tutorials for iClone in its early years and selected to write the iClone Beginners Guide from Packt Publishing in 2011, he was fortunate enough to meet and exchange tricks and tips with users from all over the world and loves to share this information with other users. He has authored hundreds of articles on iClone and digital art in general while reviewing some of the most popular software and hardware in the world. He has been published in many of the leading 3D online and print magazines while staying true to his biggest passion, 3D animation. For more information click here.

WarLord’s Workshop

Featured Story

The Preferred 2D Animation Software for Solo Animators

January 16, 2024March 29, 2024 enocburgos2 Comments

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Using Cartoon Animator 2D Animation for Music Videos, Live Streaming, and More

“The fact that Cartoon Animator integrates smoothly with Clip Studio Paint, my drawing software of choice, really allows me to have great looking artwork for my animations, and the motions really saves me a lot of time. I use the walking motions all the time! Why spend hours to make your character walk if you can simply drag and drop premade motions and make your character walk within seconds.”
Eon de Bruin – 2D Animator and Developer

2D Animator Eon de Bruin

Eon de Bruin is an animator and developer, who has been working for a number of years with Cartoon Animator (CTA). Consequently, Eon chose CTA as his preferred 2D animation software because it streamlines his work process as a solo animator, and it also speeds up his production time without reducing the quality of his output. In his recent interview with Reallusion, Eon talks about his passion for his work and what he loves most about Cartoon Animator as it can be used by just about anyone.

Tell us about your work with Cartoon Animator 2D Software

I have my own streaming platform called Tween Xstream, and I use Cartoon Animator for all my 2D animation work. So far I have numerous animated TV shows that I have created, as well as one music video.

Why choose Cartoon Animator as platform to create your 2D content?

Since I have a streaming platform, I need to release new videos regularly. That means that I need software that is easy to use, and has the ability to create animations fast without compromising on quality. The fact that Cartoon Animator integrates smoothly with Clip Studio Paint, my drawing software of choice, really allows me to have great looking artwork for my animations, and the motions really saves me a lot of time. I use the walking motions all the time! Why spend hours to make your character walk if you can simply drag and drop premade motions and make your character walk within seconds.

Favorite Genre or Theme to work with 2D Animation

I am old school, so artwork that I love is your classic Disney look, but genres I enjoy is cartoon I grew up with like Looney Tunes, Animaniacs, etc. I love the humour of these shows. For my streaming platform, I try to bring in these styles and humour. My show “The Greatest Story” was inspired by the Disney look, and my show “Don’t be A Fool” was inspired by Looney Tunes humour.

Cartoon Animator software is easy and enjoyable

I find Cartoon Animator very easy and enjoyable! The fact that I can open up Cartoon Animator with a press of a button and create, or adjust characters again is such a time saver and very convenient.

Favorite Cartoon Animator Tools and Features

There are many features, but for me to create animations fast for my streaming platform, I need a few things from an animation software. It should have a very neat user interface that is easy to understand, and easy to find functions when you need them. A well organised interface plays a big part in working fast. You don’t want the interface be a stumbling block when your creative juices flow. You just want to work. Other tools that I love about Cartoon Animator is the motions. And if I need something, I can easily go to the Reallusion Marketplace. To animate water ripple effects for me will take hours or days. But a quick purchase and dropping it in my projects again saves me so much time.

Advice for Aspiring developers considering to sell their art in the 2D Marketplace

It is important to know that there are three types of animators:

The first animator is the one that creates everything themselves. From characters, scenes, props and FX.
The second animator is the one that loves telling stories through animations, but can’t draw.
The third animator is someone who can draw, but doesn’t have the time to sit down and create characters, backdrops

If you can create content for the marketplace, then you are of GREAT help for those animators who can’t draw, or don’t have the time to create their own characters or scenes.

What drew your attention to Cartoon Animator?

I found that Cartoon Animator was easy to use and it saves so much time without compromising on production quality.

Future plans with Cartoon Animator and Current Projects

So far I have created TV shows and music videos with Cartoon Animator and will continue to do so, but I also have a shortfilm in the pipeline.

My recent show was “Godly Princess” where I actually combined live actors inside a cartoon world. This was really challenging but also great fun. It again shows what you can do with cartoon Animator.

Follow Eon de Bruin:

Website:
https://www,startanimating.com/

YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/@startanimating695

Tween XStream Streaming platform
https://www.za.tweenxstream.com/

Learning

iClone Physics for Beginners

January 11, 2024January 10, 2024 WarLordLeave a comment

Physics. A bland subject for a lot of us mere mortals but an exciting addition to 3D animation. If you watch just about any action movie then you’ve seen 3D-based physics at work. Physics provides a simulation of what could happen from toppling skyscrapers in a metro area to huge rockslides and any kind of destruction that would be dangerous or impossible to recreate in live action. Another giveaway is the associated tons of debris that fly everywhere causing even more destruction and debris.

Back in the old days, they used to blow things up when needed and still do in many instances. However, if, like a lot of indie productions there is a tight budget then physics can add that extra punch that is impossible to keyframe on a major scale like a disaster. The first time I saw physics I didn’t realize that was what I was seeing. I was blown away by the incredible animation, the sheer number of moving parts, and how could it have been keyframed manually.

Note that only some of the center fractured pieces have been selected for the simulation. You can select any or all pieces of a fractured prop.

It didn’t take long to discover it was physics. It was new and the first time I saw a sphere bounce like a ball on the floor and do so naturally with no manual keyframing, I was hooked. I’m not saying physics produces a perfect simulation every time. In fact, you may be doing yourself a dis-service if you don’t run several simulations, keeping the versions you liked. Running a simulation is easy, the trick is in setting it up. Getting it to mimic real-life events as closely as possible is the key.

The thing about physics is you don’t have to be an Einstein to use it. You don’t have to know how it works any more than you do your air conditioning or appliances. You can just use it once you understand a few concepts and terms.

In this instance, a dummy prop (ball) was used to trigger the bridge collapse as the timing was off using the character as the trigger.

3D iClone Physics Basics

Dynamic: Always active. Will drop, roll, bounce, and collide with other physics objects. If you burst through a wall, then the object going through the wall will be dynamic (unless it has transform animation) with Bounding meshes to detect collisions with other physics-enabled objects. These bounding meshes can be simple primitives or complex self-meshes depending on the selection.

Frozen: Objects will remain in place until impacted by a dynamic object.

Kinematic: Animated objects will retain their transform animations during the simulation to allow for things like animating a rock through a window.

Static: Objects will remain in place but will be part of the simulation so that pieces won’t penetrate them during the simulation.

PHYSICS PROPERTIES OF OBJECTS

Mass: The “weight” given to an object to differentiate between an object made of glass versus one made of concrete. While these terms are not used in iClone there is a slider to give or take weight from this attribute.

Friction: Not what you experience with your mother-in-law. That’s tension… which is more associated with a good story instead of physics. Friction in this case is another way of keeping things under control so objects don’t slide around like they are on ice or greased surface. According to the manual, it is “the resistance forces of a surface. An object with higher friction can move slower or a ball can start rolling”.

Damping: Just what it says. It dampens or slows down the simulation to keep things from running away or the simulation being too unrealistic. A little bit of slider goes a long way here.

Elasticity: The bouncing force of an object.

BOUNDING MESHES

Without bounding meshes collision wouldn’t be possible. In early physics, we used simple dummies like a rectangular block attached to a vehicle but invisible to the render. As physics matured, we can now select the object itself as the bounding mesh with a Self-Mesh attribute that mimics the object’s shape. If you experience computational power problems, you can choose a simple bounding mesh like a block from a menu choice or you can always use the old-fashioned dummies which may provide better visual queues in some instances.

Bounding types available are Box, Sphere, Capsule, Convex or Self meshes. Convex is similar to a self-mesh that saves on computational overhead.

CONSTRAINTS

Another must-have tool for certain simulations. They do just as they describe, they constrain or tie two physics-enabled objects together.

All the above are part of Rigid Body simulations versus Softcloth simulations like clothing which we’ll not get into here as that would take an entire article by itself.

BOUNCING BALL

This is sort of the “hello world” equivalent of programming or scripting. It is a simple simulation of bouncing a physics-enabled spherical object on a physics-enabled plane (floor). It’s an effective demonstration of what can be done versus trying to keyframe the same motion. It’s not even a contest at this point. Keyframing is not feasible in this situation or cost-effective versus physics.

FALLING CANS

In this example the can props are set to Frozen along with the base prop the cans are sitting on. This will force the items to interact with the physics dummy that will collide with the base triggering the explosion of cans. We can use dampening and differing mass settings to control how the simulation reacts from the explosion of cans to falling in a more controlled manner. The ball dummy had a transform animation that would make it collide with the base the cans sit on. I set this dummy to Kinematic to retain the transform animation while providing physics interaction as a rigid body.

TRUCK CRASHING THROUGH WALL

In this demonstration, you can see how the entire wall has been cell fractured but I have only selected some of the pieces in the middle to apply physics too. This is a simple method of controlling the area of interaction without using the static setting on the remaining pieces. This does run the risk of physics-enabled pieces penetrating non-physics pieces.

COLLAPSING ROCK BRIDGE

Below only the rock bridge itself is physics-enabled. The rock bridge is also a separate prop from the rest of the cave. I did run into one problem in that as soon as the Character touched the first part of the bridge it all started to collapse and the character was running on air midway across the bridge. To solve this problem I added a physics-enabled ball prop and animated it to move across the bridge and trigger the collapse after the character was partway across the bridge. A little timing work and it looks like the bridge was collapsing from under him.

Below is a look at the physics dummy that triggered the bridge collapse for better timing.

TIP: Be sure to TEXTURE your props BEFORE you fracture them while the prop is in one piece.

BLENDER CELL FRACTURE

This will show you how to fracture if you have never done it before but keep in mind that I am not a Blender expert and I highly recommend this older but to-the-point fracture tutorial from Mr. Cheebs. In my demo above I used subdivision but Mr. Cheebs shows you how to really do some fracturing with all the available techniques including the Annotation Pencil that allows us to draw where we want things to shatter.

A BIT OF DESTRUCTIBLE PROPS HISTORY

Around 14 years ago I introduced destructible props to iClone. At the time I was working with my long-time 3D tool, 3DS Max, in fracturing objects and using the Havoc physics engine to simulate the destruction and dispersal of debris. It became somewhat of an obsession, and I became proficient at 3D physics-based destruction.

iClone didn’t have physics at the time so I never gave much thought to bringing my other 3D work to iClone. After all, it was a 32-bit, low-poly application back then. While working with the Rayfire plugin I noticed something that had escaped me in earlier work and that was when I finished the simulation 3DS Max had created keyframes in the timeline.

If anything generated keyframes there was a chance of getting it into iClone and working with the baked-in physics which did work as expected but it also crashed iClone often. Reallusion saw the demo and reached out to me for a project file. Soon after an update made destructible props run smoother without crashing. That taught me how much Reallusion pays attention to what other users are doing with their software.

CLOSING

For some users Rigid Body physics is not as sexy as Soft Body physics like clothing or hair. It is, however, a powerful animation tool that opens the door to a world of new opportunities to better showcase your work. Rigid body physics is overlooked in iClone as an easy tool to add a touch of eye candy to an animated scene. In the future, there will be more articles and tutorials on using physics in iClone.

REALLUSION COURSES

Rigid Body

Rampa Tinling

Making a Chain with iClone Physics

MANUAL

Properties of a Rigid Body

The Basic Workflow of Using Constraints

Physics Concepts

Physics Settings for Characters

The Rigid Body Simulation

MD McCallum – WarLord

Digital Artist MD “Mike” McCallum, aka WarLord, is a longtime iClone user. Having authored free tutorials for iClone in its early years and selected to write the iClone Beginners Guide from Packt Publishing in 2011, he was fortunate enough to meet and exchange tricks and tips with users from all over the world and loves to share this information with other users. He has authored hundreds of articles on iClone and digital art in general while reviewing some of the most popular software and hardware in the world. He has been published in many of the leading 3D online and print magazines while staying true to his biggest passion, 3D animation. For more information click here.

WarLord’s Workshop

Featured Story

YouTuber reimagines new level of realism for game with iClone

January 9, 2024February 2, 2024 enocburgosLeave a comment

Popular YouTuber FairTX uses iClone to reimagine Escape from Tarkov game

Introduction

Self-taught 3D artist and video producer – FairTX (Dimitri) is a dynamic content creator and gaming enthusiast whose YouTube channel has become a thriving hub for over 222,000 subscribers eager to embark on the adrenaline-fueled journey of Escape from Tarkov. With a captivating storytelling approach, FairTX goes beyond the typical gaming experience, weaving narratives that elevate his videos into immersive storytelling adventures.

Undoubtedly, what sets FairTX apart is not just his mastery of the game; rather, it is his ability to transport his audience into the heart of the action, creating a connection that goes beyond the pixels on the screen. As a dedicated storyteller, Dimitri transforms each video into a chapter of his creative journey, inviting subscribers to join him in the captivating world of Escape from Tarkov. With a keen eye for strategy, precision, and an unwavering passion for the gaming experience, FairTX provides a unique blend of entertainment and expertise.

Using iClone to generate idle motions for game characters

Using iClone to reimagine game

Driven by a passion for authenticity and a desire to elevate the gaming experience, Dimitri embarked on a groundbreaking endeavor within the realm of Escape from Tarkov. Frustrated by the unnatural, robotic movements of AI characters in the game, he took matters into his own hands. Armed with the powerful character animation tools from iClone, he undertook the ambitious task of redesigning every aspect of the AI characters’ animations.

From crafting intricate idle patrols to realistic consumption animations, seamless transitions between actions, and dynamic combat stances, Dimitri meticulously redefined the movements with iClone 3D animation software to bring a new level of realism to the virtual battlefield.

Adjusting game character facial expressions with iClone

iClone Edit Motion Layer for correcting game character transitions

iClone for Game Developers

In a captivating video, he shares his creative process, taking the audience on a mesmerizing journey through the production. This innovative approach not only showcases Dimitri’s dedication to authenticity but also empowers fellow gamers. Furthermore, it encourages them to reimagine their own gaming experiences through the power of iClone character animation for gaming. https://www.reallusion.com/iclone/game/

Escape from Tarkov game reimagined with iClone 8

Reimagine your games by learning to characterize your own avatars with iClone. Moreover, you can also employ Character Creator, and your favorite 3D engines like Blender.

Characterize game avatars with Character Creator for use in Blender

Follow FairTX:

YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/c/fairTX

Patreon:
https://www.patreon.com/fairTX

Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/fairtx_

Learning

Simplifying Props with Extract Mesh in CC4

January 5, 2024February 1, 2024 WarLordLeave a comment

We are going to take a look at an easy-to-miss feature of Character Creator 4, the Extract Mesh tool. This tool is in CC4 instead of iClone which might keep it off the radar for some new users. Extract Mesh allows us to do several things from extracting bodysuits and armor to reworking props for animation purposes including being able to rotate the wheels of a car prop that was one piece upon download.

One of the biggest obstacles for beginners, especially on a budget as so many of us are these days, is the lack of props to use in production or learning. There are plenty of free props available and we’ll use one today from Sketchfab, but you need to understand that when you download free props and other free 3D assets from the internet they might not be licensed for commercial use or your intended use.

These free props are great to learn with or demo with, but it would be a real disaster to create a viral hit that could not be monetized due to copyright infringement because of improper licensing. Even using Sketchfab content you need to be aware and knowledgeable of the type of Creative Commons licenses appropriate for the situation.

To be safe for a final, commercial, widely distributed project you might want to stick to 3d assets of your creation or assets purchased from a reputable marketplace with clear licensing policies like the Reallusion Content store or Marketplace. It’s best to learn of these things now because they can lead to real problems with real consequences for your project.

With that said, I rely on free assets for tutorials so anyone who wants to follow along can do so but I would not include these assets in a commercial project without proper licensing and very good reason to do so.

THE SKETCHFAB MODEL

In this case, we are using a Fortnight plane, “biplane Fortnite vehicle” by that kid is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution, which has an internal skeleton but you’ll soon see why it can be a bit difficult to use. With this in mind, I will extract the propeller and wheels as separate objects so we can easily animate (spin)them.

This is an excellent model that weighs in at a little over 25K triangle count in Character Creator 4. It is lightweight, nicely textured and has an internal skeleton that can be used for animation. The problem is that there are so many bones, some seemingly going to no mesh, that it is a visual mess.

You can drill down using the search function but even then, you have to play around with different parts to find out which one actually moves the part in question. I would guess there were a lot of dummies used in the making of this model and they didn’t import well into FBX format or CC4.

As you can see from the above image (CC4) the rigging is an absolute nightmare. A convoluted hot mess that may hurt the eyes with prolonged exposure! Seriously though, this happens with models, particularly those with a lot of moving parts for animation. Where this all went wrong is anyone’s guess but probably in the export phase. Or it may be the way CC4 sees it after import, but it can make life difficult, and animation has enough of these difficult moments without creating more of them.

So, what we are going to do is forget about all those bones and simply extract the meshes we want to animate, in this case, the tires and propeller.

THERE IS A SHORT VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE END OF THIS OVERVIEW.

EXTRACTION

The first step is to select the plane mesh and then select Edit Mesh from the CC4 Modify menu. From there select the Element tab (which allows us to select entire sections of a model depending on how it was built) and click on the propeller Nose Cone.

As mentioned in the video tutorial for this article, this plane has a strange problem that makes it difficult to center the prop blades as the one-click matrix on the pivot menu panel will not bring the pivot to the true center. For anything to rotate properly, the pivot must be at its true center otherwise it will wobble around instead of spin. For this reason, I am extracting the nose cone first then the blades.

Press the Extract Mesh button to extract the propeller nose cone from the rest of the mesh. The nose cone has a properly centered pivot so it will rotate easily. We will use this later to connect the blades, which will then rotate properly around the center pivot. Close Edit Mesh, then select the extracted mesh in the Scene Manager and press the Convert to Sub-item button on the modify menu.

Next up select the mesh and go to Element again then select one of the prop blades the extract that selection.

HIERARCHY – THE PROCESS OF ATTACHING

Next, we need to DETACH the nose cone from the plane mesh. Select the nose cone and press the DETACH button on the Modify menu. Do the same for the propeller blades, DETACH them from the plane. If we did not detach the nose cone first then we could not have parented the blades to it because any item attached will not show up in an attachment panel, only the bones will show up.

By attaching the BLADES to the NOSE CONE in the next step we have parented the blades to the nose cone which means the blades inherit the characteristics of the nose cone like the properly centered pivot for smooth rotation. Now we attach the NOSE CONE to the plane, and you have just established a simple hierarchy of two objects with the cone being the parent. There is more about this in the video tutorial.

Demonstration of Attachment Hierarchy

THE WHEELS – TWO EXTRACTIONS

The front wheels need to be extracted in one step while the tail dragger wheel is extracted in another step. The main front wheels have a proper pivot centered between both wheels so we do not need to extract each wheel individually as we can rotate them as one object. The tail wheel will be extracted separately using the same method as the nose cone or blades above. Select the mesh, extract the mesh, and Convert to Sub-item just like in the earlier steps.

FINAL RESULTS

By now you should have the blades and nose cone as one prop, the main landing gear as one prop and the tail dragger as one prop. These can be easily animated on the timeline rotating the propeller or wheels between two keyframes. As I wrote earlier, see the accompanying video tutorial for a more in-depth step-by-step guide.

REALLUSION COURSES AND TUTORIALS

Character Creator 4 – Separating Prop Elements

Separating External Content as CC4 Clothes and Accessories

CHARACTER CREATOR 4 MANUAL

Extracting Meshes to Create Sub-Props

Click for more information on Prop Editing in Character Creator 4

MD McCallum – WarLord

Digital Artist MD “Mike” McCallum, aka WarLord, is a longtime iClone user. Having authored free tutorials for iClone in its early years and selected to write the iClone Beginners Guide from Packt Publishing in 2011, he was fortunate enough to meet and exchange tricks and tips with users from all over the world and loves to share this information with other users. He has authored hundreds of articles on iClone and digital art in general while reviewing some of the most popular software and hardware in the world. He has been published in many of the leading 3D online and print magazines while staying true to his biggest passion, 3D animation. For more information click here.

WarLord’s workshop

Learning

Prop Distributor – New Scatter Tool

December 31, 2023January 3, 2024 WarLordLeave a comment

One of the best things to come along in 3D work was the scatter script. It didn’t matter what tool you were using as long as it could read a script of some sort because somewhere out there someone was going to create that script, share it, and make our 3D life a lot easier. In time these scripts became tools that were incorporated into many leading and very expensive 3D applications like Maya and 3DS Max.

Before the scatter tool became a thing everything was done manually. Back in the early days even duplicating a prop might not have been possible depending on the software application you were using. In that case, props and particularly characters had to be imported one at a time and then placed in the scene. Direct drag-and-drop was another major improvement.

As iClone and computational power have improved, we are able to add a lot more 3D items into a scene, but we were back to spending a lot of time building and less time animating. The more our computational power could handle the more we piled in. How many of us have NOT locked up a computer? No matter how much tech improves, we will always push it past its point of no return. It’s what we do.

Now Reallusion has introduced the Prop Distributor tool released with the crowd sim which is a major addition by itself. This is basically a scatter tool with the ability to drag and drop items directly to the pop-up window to populate the scene. Make some choices, push some buttons and you are done. This is the main point of any scatter tool. Populate a scene with items and do so very quickly with as many options as possible.

Demonstration of the Prop Distributor. Items can be dragged and dropped from the Content Manager or an Explorer Window.

Over the years I have used a lot of crowd simulators and scatter tools. Being a grunt in the animation trenches means you find ways to cut down on repetitive tasks and the Prop Distributor is Reallusion’s way of giving us a time-saving and powerful scatter tool.

The tool is straightforward and easy to use like most tools Reallusion provides and it has the very small learning curve that we’ve come to expect from iClone. Like a lot of users, I dive in first and then read the manual. Or I watch a tutorial as I’m diving in then go to the manual to find all the things that weren’t covered in the tutorial.

This is a big change for me as I used to not even know a manual existed. iClone has matured far beyond that stage so reading up on new features makes sure I don’t miss anything or do something the hard way when iClone has a shortcut for it. That’s right… read the manual. You’ll be glad you spent those extra minutes being educated on new features. It’s hard to cover everything in a video tutorial anyway.

REALMS (RANGE OPTIONS)

Not just landscapes or terrain but realms. These are objects (props) you pick to use the scatter tool on (my apology for referring to the Prop Distributor as the scatter tool. I’ve been trained on that word for ages and, more importantly, I can type it easier. It’s more like a scatter tool on steroids). Upward-facing surfaces will serve as the distribution areas. Height map terrains do NOT work with this tool.

So just about anything with an upward-facing flat surface can be populated with the scatter tool. You can orient the props to other angles, and it will populate the upward-facing surfaces according to the angle. The distribution will follow surfaces like rolling terrains but keep in mind that a terrain must be selected from the Scene Manager. You will need to select it in the Scene Manager with the scatter tool range option.

You can have “floating” props that aren’t attached to anything that will populate with the scatter tool in a few clicks. There is an option for Random or Formation placement. Controls include Amount, Spacing, Orientation, Random Orientation, and Scale.

DISTRIBUTION POOL

This is where we drag and drop the assets we want to scatter. There are Add Props, Delete Selected Props, Reset, and Ratio. Most of it is self-explanatory with the Ratio for each prop (default is 1) set to a number like 5 meaning there will be one of those props scattered for every five of the props set to 1. It’s hard to explain here but you’ll quickly grasp it when you try it out.

SCATTERING PROPS ON A NAVMESH

What is a NavMesh? From the manual:

iClone provide NavMesh feature for you to distribute props, deploy actors or animate actors within the NavMesh with the Motion Director feature. You can trim a NavMesh’s shape with props by different NavMesh setups, including Static, Dynamic, Passable and Impassable. Furthermore, you can split pedestrian flows with Avoidance and Barrier volumes.

This is another method of placement that, with some thought, can be used in many circumstances including tabletops and pedestals. A NavMesh is generated by iClone, so prop placement becomes critical as it takes props into consideration when creating the NavMesh from the scene.

SCATTER ON NAVMESH

Below you see an image on the left showing the blue NavMesh and the impassable box props used for the borders. You set props to one of four states in the Scene Manager with static, dynamic, impassable, and passable options.

SCATTER ON PATH OR WALKWAY

We can also use a path or walkway to scatter props. In the example below I used two paths, one for each lane to place the traffic cones. I used a path but widened it out after the fact so we could see it in the example image.

I used the formation setting with equal spacing and it was done in a snap. This will also be great on curving walkways or streets as it will adapt to the curve. The example below demonstrates using a path to place streetlights down the center of a curving road.

USING PARTICLES WITH PROP DISTRIBUTOR

The Prop Distributor will work with particles but there is a caveat that the particle MUST be attached to a dummy like a low poly cube and saved out as a prop. The Prop Distributor can then see the dummies with the attached particle. You can also attach multiple particles to a dummy. Both legacy and Popcorn FX particles worked with this simple method. By attaching and saving out particles to dummies as you need them, you will have them to use in future projects.

As shown below, you can get a great start on a scene in a matter of minutes with the scatter tool.

How to Attach a Particle to a Dummy. Items can be dragged and dropped from the Content Manager or an Explorer Window.

Here is another look at a battlefield scene populated with the Distribute Props tool and Crowd tool. The scene size is massive as you can tell by the distance between objects and not cinematic but just imagine what can be done with more time as this was thrown together as a test.

The Distribute Props tool is quick to learn, easy to use, and makes fast work out of placing items either randomly or in formation. Adding street props will be a matter of minutes if not seconds depending on the complexity of the scene.

And speaking of complexity, this tool will easily allow us to overload a scene both aesthetically and in practical terms. Just like any other tool, we don’t want to overuse it as a large, busy crowd could easily distract from the main action of the scene. We want a full scene, but not so full we can’t easily spot the main characters at any given time.

Once again Reallusion has provided a major update with lots of new features and the Distribute Props feature is just one of them. Combine this with the new Crowd Sim feature and we can say goodbye to sparse or empty iClone scenes.

MANUAL

LAUNCHING PROP DISTRIBUTOR

USER INTERFACE FOR PROP DISTRIBUTOR

WORKFLOW FOR DISTRIBUTING PROPS

MANUAL

DISTRIBUTING PROPS ON NAVMESH

DISTRIBUTING PROPS ON WALKWAY

MD McCallum – WarLord

Digital Artist MD “Mike” McCallum, aka WarLord, is a longtime iClone user. Having authored free tutorials for iClone in its early years and selected to write the iClone Beginners Guide from Packt Publishing in 2011, he was fortunate enough to meet and exchange tricks and tips with users from all over the world and loves to share this information with other users. He has authored hundreds of articles on iClone and digital art in general while reviewing some of the most popular software and hardware in the world. He has been published in many of the leading 3D online and print magazines while staying true to his biggest passion, 3D animation. For more information click here.

WARLORDS WORKSHOP