Art: Hacker character ('Drake')

[avaer]

Description: A hacker from Zone 0. He waits for drop storms to attract a drop hunter, then snipes them out of the sky with his arsenal of hacked guns. He steals their drops, then uses the drop hunter’s reputation to sell the stolen goods for Silk. He also works jobs for the Zero Syndicate, a lighthearted lulz group funded by ransomware. He has a small platoon of henchmen that he can call in to perform his dirty work and to guard his stash.

He uses an arsenal of guns, most commonly SMGs.

Can be based on Kanji model for the face style and possibly the hair. I don't know whether or not our Kanji rendition is a good place to start.

Kanji was purchased and should be in the GDrive. It seems to not be on booth anymore but it is a non-downloadable from Vroid Hub.

https://booth.pm/en/items/1880254 https://hub.vroid.com/en/characters/8708676096431470179/models/3441778242791612085

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The main thing here seems like having a cool jacket, with some sort of cool collar, and being a male, orange (opposite colors), more evil version of Scillia.

[GaladWarder]

Awesome - I can work with that! Will be fun to make a more 'evil' character.

With the guns, are they straight-up SMG's, or are they needing to be slightly cartooned/stylized, kind of like the earlier rifle models Dream made? Not sure how literal the weapons in this universe need to be.

Using Kanji as a base should work well, I think he just needs a bit of clothing design to make him look more dangerous and less 'petulant'.

[Vianvolaeus]

Seems the creator pulled everything from their booth, but some of their models including this one is on sketchfab for viewing only (https://sketchfab.com/kasamoto)

Just gonna throw this out there as well - we can have floating holsters and rigs for weapons and things like that, a bit like the original model that was originally concepted from did.

[avaer]

With the guns, are they straight-up SMG's, or are they needing to be slightly cartooned/stylized, kind of like the earlier rifle models Dream made? Not sure how literal the weapons in this universe need to be.

Lorewise, these weapons (unlike the sword and scissors) are made inside the world by random people, so if it's something a modeler would model it makes logical sense.

It's mostly about consistency with the chara (e.g. in texture style), and consistency with other weapons. In which case IMO they make more sense cartoony.

Just gonna throw this out there as well - we can have floating holsters and rigs for weapons and things like that, a bit like the original model that was originally concepted from did.

Yes, that's similar to the vibe I was thinking. The idea I had is somewhat like Neo, where they are both SMGs, and come with tactical holsters at the side and perhaps extra magazines.

It could also float more outwards, like Kanji.

[GaladWarder]

Took a pass at this, here's a V1:

[avaer]

It's capturing the right themes, the animated showdown would be very fun.

:D 👍

IMO the look is a bit too feminine/Japanese fashion, and we should take the hood off. There's nothing stylistic wrong with any of that, but I'd like to increase the delta to Scilly. One way to do that would be prominent spiky masculine hair.

I'm thinking mainly in terms of the showdown -- the poses and faces in these concepts should have a parallel.

Gear like this feels a bit too inelegant to be used in combat. Control equipment does feel appropriate, but it would be more small and simple, for controlling the breathing mask, rather than a computer attached to your waist. I think these characters can canonically just pull out their tablet computers at any time so having extra computers equipped would be redundant.

The more I think about it, IMO we just need a remixed version of the first reference. Different hair (less impossible/cartoony), different pose, different gear arrangement, but in the same vein. But the source material feels appropriate and has all of the elements.

[GaladWarder]

Cool, no problem! I'll take another pass at it tomorrow, this all makes sense to me!

[GaladWarder]

Took another pass at this; leaned more heavily on the ingredients in the initial reference art posted, just changing the style and fleshing out the details.

Can't get the image to upload, so here's a Drive link: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1jODYW3KWmpBpuVtH1P1ioTxLXMbaMmgu&authuser=GaladDota%40yahoo.com&usp=drive_fs

[avaer]

Looks great! I don't have any design changes to recommend. We should just sketch this with similar line/color fidelity to the Scillia concept -- I think that's the format we should have all of the characters in, cartoony and flat, bordering on the line of western vs anime, because that is a good ground truth for artistic interpretations.

[avaer]

This pose wouldn't be wrong, but I imagine this character would be more likely to have an angry/focused expression rather than a curious one.

I like both jackets, which do seem like they could be the same brand as Scillia's.

[avaer]

I think this is good enough to restart the modeling, though MC comes first.

[GaladWarder]

Done in similar line/color style to the Scilia concept - I'm not totally sold on the colors and values, but they are masked so they can be changed extremely easily.

[GaladWarder]

Ortho sheet finished. A few notes:

• Used the Vroid base for Kanji to work off of, almost all proportions match either exactly or are very close
• The side ortho is not 100% accurate; some of those forms are too complex to accurately visualize in 2d. I got them as close as I can, but there will be some variance there to make the geo work.
• The front orthos should be very accurate, they are all gridded out and transferred from the perspective view.
• The eyes have been changed to look more 'evil', but I tried to keep the changes minimal to not break blendshapes.

[avaer]

Hm I don’t think the jacket should pop back like that. I think it should feel more like it is hanging down rather than than it being stuck out via wire, though it is ok to keep it large and bulky.

In the concept, my interpretation was that the jacket was blowing in the wind but would probably drop down otherwise.

[avaer]

I think there’s a lot of opportunity to add interesting color to reach Scillia’s complexity.

We could use orange to accent the dark in some geometric design, rather than making it the bulk color. Also I think the orange could be brighter.

The pants and jacket should probably have different and more interesting colors, like some sort of leather on the jacket and camo on the pants. It’s slightly too clean otherwise. The brand could still be 0x.

[avaer]

Evil is fine, but the eyes should be more opened/larger like Scillia’s. I was able to get quite good eyes out of the original kanji. Will post what I think are appropriate expressions.

[avaer]

[GaladWarder]

Hm I don’t think the jacket should pop back like that. I think it should feel more like it is hanging down rather than than it being stuck out via wire, though it is ok to keep it large and bulky.

Correct - these are modelling orthos, so it's been stuck out like that purely for modeling purposes. Once it's rigged, it will hang naturally.

I think there’s a lot of opportunity to add interesting color to reach Scillia’s complexity. We could use orange to accent the dark in some geometric design, rather than making it the bulk color. Also I think the orange could be brighter. The pants and jacket should probably have different and more interesting colors, like some sort of leather on the jacket and camo on the pants. It’s slightly too clean otherwise. The brand could still be 0x.

Agreed, I'm not sold on the colors. I plan to circle back around on them and do some iteration to get them feeling better. I think all the patterning is working, so there's enough there to model from though. As long as you're happy with the base design, the colors are easily tweaked.

I was able to get quite good eyes out of the original kanji. Will post what I think are appropriate expressions.

I based the proportions off of the original Kanji, so if you are happy with the eyes as they are on the actual model, I'd propose we just keep them. No reason to reinvent the wheel if it's working, plus I assume it'll make Vian's life much easier than doing a facial redesign.

[avaer]

Ok thank you that clears it up.

I don’t have any other comments, we could model it.

[avaer]

@madjin also expressed interest in kitbashing here.

[madjin]

Current pureref for character Drake:

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/641036402829819914/875768028783054878/drake.pur

[avaer]

Modeling progress:

[avaer]

Other than the jacket conforming to the body, it's mostly the coloring that needs work; the original overpaint did not have strong colors yet, and that is slightly weakened in this model's lighting.

[Vianvolaeus]

Updated textures following 'poison frog' input previously.

Modelled holster, midway on textures.

Mostly finished on other accessories.

Made an extra texture set for the jeans - one has fake 'skin' showing through the tears but is one uniform model, the other has opacity for showing an actual body underneath.

[Vianvolaeus]

speckling / digi effect that's only really noticable up close, so it works as detail without making it too hard to draw / recall from memory:

Similar idea for the rear jacket:

Pistol, previously done:

Belt / label / flair

Don't think we have a set font yet, so picked one that matches the concept

[Vianvolaeus]

Full mat pass. Rigging mostly done for body, need to match rear jacket up to main armature

label from belt is seperately rigged, will use collisions

Can remove a lot of underlying body geo once we're confirmed on things, should reduce poly count a fair bit

[avaer]

Great work on the materials and body!

I’m feeling we’re not quite evil/mischievous enough on this one. The model feels soft and inviting character wise, like if Drake had a younger brother who was nice and clean.

Both kanji and initial reference feel more gritty and dangerous, but I think it’s mostly in the face and hair; blond hair could work here and would be distinct, and the hair shape could be flattened more (contrasting with scillia’s messiness). The eyes could also use adjustment to something more unique and less friendly — if it’s not already could it be taken from kanji?

[avaer]

Also, I think there should be two holsters (or more) rather than just the one.

We could also add additional guns or katanas on the back or side to make the character rougher.

[avaer]

Those are just some suggestions to add edginess; if Grant wanted to concept some head tweaks that would be helpful too.

[Vianvolaeus]

Head's a direct pull from the old Kanji remake. I think those are good points, will implement and explore. Agreed on the double holsters, had intended on it but wasn't sure for dual pistols or a machine-pistol & SMG match like the concept.

Considering a boot blade or set of kunai blades as an addition

[Vianvolaeus]

Head is obviously unchanged, will require a revisit but I've got some ideas flowing on that front already. Wanted to nail down some of the additional assets first and figure out potential placements, etc.

Sourced and made a couple of hairstyles I'll be trying tomorrow.

[GaladWarder]

Happy to take a crack at some other heads/faces too if needed; sounds like you have some plans though so I don't wanna step on toes. Just @ me if you need another pass on that and I'll get it to you asap @Vianvolaeus !

[Vianvolaeus]

Happy to either way, even if it's just minor adjustments to the existing or any pointers/feedback 👍

[Vianvolaeus]

okay - few things to follow. Firstly is adjusted face geo. Much more of a serious, less soft and rounded look.

New hair! There's also a blonde color material:

New facial geo results in a more smug, mocking expression set.

Made a variant of the jacket which darkens the greyscale. Brings the color count down and I think it works better as a match. It's a slightly more specular material still with less grain and fabric patterning, so it doesn't completely blend in intentionally, but I think it looks more consistent.

Shotgun / alt weapon could go behind the back, Should help not having absolute belt overload or nightmare rigging, since this can be affixed to the lower body.

Black vs blonde in action pose

With proper collision setup, I'm confident we can have the arm of the body influence the jacket arm, which would be great for animations / poses like this in-engine. It currently doesn't use many bones (nearly the same as a normal arm / spine setup), so it shouldn't be bad for performance.

Lastly: the way the materials have been setup means we can actively use pathtracing for production material eg. renders, animations, promos, etc. These aren't too difficult to do retroactively with existing posed content for stills. Animations will obviously take a multiplicative factor longer.

Will x-post to hero image issue (#1443):

[avaer]

This looks really high quality, especially the body/gear, but my gut says we need another take on the hair and jacket.

It’s gotten pretty dark cyberpunk and increasingly far from my impression of how this character is supposed to behave in the script (a more intelligent and funny Gary, mildly threatening, glad to play pranks and troll, but not uncomfortable to be around).

The hair might benefit from being less crazy, and the eyes could be more of a trickster rather than a soldier. And now that it’s shown in the model think we can do a better jacket. It does feel like this character should have something on the back but the jacket doesn’t read clean in 3D (there is a lot going on). There must be some other object that would make more intuitive/visceral sense there but my mind is drawing a blank without doing another round on Pinterest.

[Vianvolaeus]

Only thing I can really think and find that's interesting would be something like a shoulder cape, but it feels a bit too cyber and gunslinger esque.

Speaking directly on the pokemon trainer / Gary pointers, looks like one of the pokemon elites in recent years had a cape like this? It's a bit regal , would probably serve better being more basic (and damaged?)

[Vianvolaeus]

Dialed back a bit on the facial geo, made brows less aggressive

Few more hairstyle options... (these are assets - we can change things about them if we need to. coloring is rough since they're all greyscale by default)

[Vianvolaeus]

Side cloak test. Not happy with it, but logging the test nonetheless.

[Vianvolaeus]

Regular cape:

[Vianvolaeus]

alternative with a rear collar-like shape

[Vianvolaeus]

another take on the hair and jacket

Which jacket? The inner one, or the one on the back?

Gonna assume these aren't any good or what's now envisioned, so I suggest we go back to concepting again since it's not visually clear what's actually being desired at this point? It was suggested to make it more edgy and add weapons, etc, which was done, but now it's too cyberpunk as a result? Considering the character at large is the same (added weapons, changed hair / face), I don't think the rest of the design is any more off track now than what was previously OK'd further up.

In terms of back attachments or props, if it's not exclusively visual flair then we need to lean into the character more, which will need some prop design and thought put into it first rather than shotgunning it, so we can make something visually cohesive.

Character is driven by a motivation to collect silk, so we could reference something in world - stolen silk fountain pieces, broken origin tablet, etc.

Could also reference something else in the character - zero syndicate might be a good thing to flesh out as it can be referenced in other lore and environments

[Vianvolaeus]

Just a rough idea based on that, having some kind of zero syndicate logo on a small flaired cape. It's suggesting they're representing something, but with a minimalistic logo it's not too intrusive to the rest of the design.

[GaladWarder]

Took a swing at a few other options for facial redesign as discussed in the meeting.

The top row are what I would consider 'minor' changes - proportion and shape changes that only slightly alter the feel and expression.

The bottom row are 'major' changes - changes that will read as a completely different character.

I used the tousled hair that Via uploaded earlier; I think it's the best for a sort of 'trickster youth' vibe.

A few other things to consider - I think that the 'cyberpunk' vibe is coming mostly from colors and lighting; I would propose messing with those first before considering any large redesigns of the meshes. Another thing that could be useful would be playing with the proportions of the accessories - such as weapons. Making them 15% larger, for example, will kick it out of the 'cyberpunk' vibe and into stylization.

In a similar vein, we could try just cutting the sleeves from the current jacket over the shoulder - looking at the screenshots I think that's what is messing with the 'epic' feel. I was using them to break silhouette in 2D but I think that was an error on my part - it only breaks it correctly from a few angles. If the sleeves are removed it will feel more like a shoulder cape, which I think may work well without losing any shape language.

Just a thought, may be worth trying if it's fast. I really liked the ideas brought up in the meeting too - tying it more into the lore - so if that's the direction we want to go I will happily take a concept pass at it, just let me know what you need @Vianvolaeus

[Vianvolaeus]

Testing with rolled up / short sleeves on the old jacket, bit more volume on it, with the above hair. Don't think it's working, going to focus on back item ideas since head isn't confirmed yet.

[Vianvolaeus]

Multires'd a cloak for more detail.

Found the (wonderfully convoluted) way of bringing custom fonts into Substance Painter, so we can bring anything in.

I've picked out this one in particular since a) very stylized, glyph like - reminds me of the proposed street icons b) the 0 and 'o' character resemble the unicode missing/unsupported character square, while still retaining the zero shape, it's a little obtuse. Thought it has a good tie in with the idea of a disruptive shadow / hacker group.

[Vianvolaeus]

syndicate-ZERO might be a bit more stylized and interesting - rather than [Zero]-[Syndicate] ('syndicate representing zero'), it reads as syndicate (number) zero - out of bounds, invalid, etc

[Vianvolaeus]

Gives a nice rounded triangular shaped silhouette in which the shotgun can be hidden from direct view

[Vianvolaeus]

We do have other jacket colors if we want lighter variations to avoid being too dark overall:

[Vianvolaeus]

@GaladWarder, if you're not busy, any potential input on other backpack options would be great, i'm drawing blanks on other ideas. Thank you for the face orthos!

[Vianvolaeus]

some of the faces, hopefully will help picking one out since I'm still blocked on that.

These are fast but destructive edits - shapekeys broken intentionally just to get a visual out.

[GaladWarder]

I really liked your idea of having a piece of the Origin Tablets on his back, the original concepts all had some little chunks missing from them, and I think it makes sense. The origin-zero shawl thing looks pretty slick too; I like the material on it especially.

I was thinking about this more last night, and another thought I had would be what if he had like a stylized 'hacking rig' as a backpack? Terminal with keyboard, maybe an interesting looking jack to connect to hardware, antennae, etc... Kind of like the Gargoyles in Snow Crash. That would give an interesting silhouette and also keep to the vibe of the character.

I'll be able to make some concepts if you need, but it may be a day or so; I'm working on the hero images currently and they're gonna take up a good chunk of time, I think. I could make a slot tomorrow morning to come up with some backpack ideas though if you need visuals, just let me know!