Zbrush - W.I.P Gun alien Dude

Following on from the last posting I added some more bits and bobs to my guy and reposed him. I pulled his hood down because you he just looks better that way.

Yeah, yeah, yeah I know the bullet ejector slot shouldn't be on that side but I only intend to render the image from the opposite angle and it was much easier to sculpt a gun with symmetry on!
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Tough Alien Guy W.I.P

I got so bored with my 'zombie hunter' character that I ignored him for as long as I could! I went back this morning and had a look and decided I was still bored with him...and then got the idea to take the base shape of him and start making a different (slightly more interesting) character instead.

Why the long face?
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Another Zbrush screenshot showing this tough alien-ish guy in a more combat fatigues look.
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Maybe he looks better with the hood down?
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I like working on two characters at once so that if I get bored of one then I have another to move onto until I can come back to the other one later and see it with fresh eyes.
I decided to give this fella a military style clothing  because  he has the kind of face that suits that look. But I'm still not sure and think he could look equally good in a shirt and tie or casual gear.

Clothes tests with Marvelous Designer

I've been messing around with 3d clothing simulator Marvelous Designer (that's actually how it's spelled btw). 

One of the main reasons why many of my  characters  are naked or shown from the neck up is  that  I am  absolutely  terrible at  sculpting  clothing! What I like about Marvelous Designer is that you import your mesh, and actually create clothes based on real-world patterns. What I don't like is the finicky way it works - that and that fact that I have zero  knowledge  of understanding patterns.

Below is a test I did making cargo pants and a a top which I exported as an OBJ and imported to Zbrush for posing. Now, I cheated a bit (a lot!) with the top  because  I just slightly altered a pattern that is freely available from the Marvelous Designer downloads section. That's why the top looks pretty good and the pants look...hmmmm........

Top and pants made with Marvelous Designer. Hat and shoes courtesy of my bad sculpting in Zbrush!
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If I can just get my head around pattern design and adjust to the Marvelous Designer interface then it could really help me make some more decent-ish looking clothing for my characters.

Zbrush Zombie Hunter Guy WIP

In my previous post I spoke about making a zombie hunter type dude but I couldn't really get into the 'character' of him.

I left the idea to one side for a good many days until I came across an image of some racist twat called Richard Schmidt I read about in some news headlines about a nutter who'd amassed a large collection of firearms and ammo and who had lists of people he didn't like. Now Richard sounds like a complete knobhead but what drew my attention  was the great picture of him wearing a superman tshirt. I'm not sure if that was his police mugshot, but it was a great photo - well lit and the guy's face would totally suit a zombie hunter type!

Head is too small and modeling is rough and sketchy but ideas are starting to come together at last!
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So I finally got a bit of direction on where to take my zbrush guy. He wouldn't be a bland 'hero' type as I first envisage (and was bored with) but a crazed loony with a habitual hatred for the undead. He would be a racist towards zombies!

I needed to see how he might look in colour so I added a quick and dirty  camouflage pattern on top of my sketch. This zbrush mesh is slightly more refined than the previous image and I'm starting to see the placement of pouches and accessories a bit better. This guy needs to be well  equipped but lithe enough to be able to move about relatively freely and evade zombies!  
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My zbrush annotated doodle may be as rough as a badgers behind at the moment - it's too clean, pristine and lacking a whole lot of detail - but the seed of what I need to make a cool model work is kinda there. I'm thinking 'suvivalist military-meets-racist suburban fantasist' as the tone for my zombie hunter. Based on the sketch above, he'll need to be made more down-and-dirty. I'll also work on the face to make him resemble 'ol chubby Richard whackjob a bit more too.