The Artist

Roumen Filipov
roumenfilipov.com

Roumen Filipov is a 3D
generalist born in Bulgaria,
currently living in Brazil.
His specialty is making 3D
characters for film and the
advertising agency.
3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character

Character ZTool

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 CHAPTER 01 | Modeling in ZBrush

Improve your ZBrush workflow Head sculpt progress

by following Roumen Filipov’s
tutorial advice…
This is the first of a series of four tutorials
covering the production of a stylized 3D
character using ZBrush and 3ds Max, from the
initial blocking to the final render and post-
production. In this first phase, we will look at
the creation and blocking of a full character in
ZBrush without worrying about mesh topology
and integrity.

During the process, I’ll be showing techniques

for organic and hard-surface modeling using
ZBrush’s internal tools like DynaMesh and
ZRemesher, smart ways to use the primitive
geometries to create accessories and details
in the clothes, and also some tricks to deform
the mesh without hours of sculpting and
polishing. The aim is to define the forms
and proportions of the character as quickly
as possible, just to use as reference for
subsequent production in another software,
like 3ds Max, where the mesh will be ready for
texturing, rendering and posing.

The character will be a steampunk pest The process of sculpting the ears
exterminator girl with an athletic figure and
all her equipment ready for the job. Now, let’s
have fun!

01 Sculpting the head and eyes from

primitive spheres: Every time I sculpt
a character, I prefer starting with the head since I
consider it to be the most significant and difficult
part of sculpting. It’s no use having a body with
perfect anatomy and all the details in place if
the face is not the most expressive part and Building up the body
as pleasant as possible. I usually start with a
primitive Sphere3D in ZBrush and, with the help
of DynaMesh, sculpt each facial detail to achieve
a shape that suits me. For the eyes, I usually
use two primitive spheres with the pupil subtly
marked to help position the eyelids.

02 Adding the ears: Some of the most

delicate parts of the body, such as ears
and fingers, are easier to sculpt separately and
then merge with the main mesh using DynaMesh.
In the case of the ear, I generally start with a
sphere, scale it in the Y axis using the Transpose
tool, planify one side by dragging the first axis of
the Transpose, and then sculpt the basic shape
and position of the ear to the head. Once properly
positioned, I merge the ears and body SubTools
03 Sculpting the body: To sculpt the
body I generally use a structure formed
by ZSpheres and converted to a mesh. I start by
‘A’ and then ‘Make Polymesh3D’ in the Tools
tab. Then I start sculpting until I reach the final
form shown in the image. To join the head with
and turn on DynaMesh, causing the contact creating a ZSphere at the base of the neck and the body, I merge both the SubTools and apply
zone between the two objects to join and form then creating all the body parts from it. After the DynaMesh with a reasonable amount of
one continuous mesh. Finally, I give some final creating the structure in a pleasing proportion, subdivision so I don’t lose any of the details from
touches to remove the intersection mark. I convert the ZSpheres to a mesh by pressing any part.

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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character

04 Sculpting the hair: Every time I make

a character, I usually sculpt geometry
to block out the hairstyle, even if it is completely
Hair sculpting steps

thrown away later to create it from scratch using

hair and fur tools. Hair blocking is important
because it helps define the silhouette of the head
and the character’s face. To sculpt the hairstyle,
I add a SubTool with a primitive sphere and start
adding DynaMesh divisions, then refining until
I get a nice result. Some artists prefer to use
ZBrush’s FiberMesh to create the hair, but I stick
with the geometry because of the speed with
which you can get the desired result.

05 Extracting the cloth mesh: Now that

the body is finished, it’s time to start
creating the base mesh to sculpt the clothes.
Some clothes can be sculpted directly onto the
body, such as the shirt, though some others that
are not as close to the skin should be sculpted
into separate SubTools. To create new meshes
without using primitives, I usually create a mask
over the portion of the body that the clothes will
cover, then use the Extract tool (in the SubTools
tab) with ‘S Smt’ set to 0 and ‘Thick’ set to 0.01 as
a base. Finally, I apply some final sculpting to the
extracted mesh to mimic the natural behavior of
the garment.

06 Finishing the cloth piece: The problem

with using the Extract tool to create
multiple garments is that after some time, your
The mesh extracting process

file will be quite slow and heavy. It will be very

difficult to work with and will consume a lot of
hard disk space. To resolve this issue I usually
use the ZBrush’s automatic retopology tool,
ZRemesher. Simply select the desired SubTool
and click the ZRemesher button, then repeat
the process to reach a reasonable polygon
count, while of course keeping the volume and
silhouette of the original mesh.

07 Boot modeling: For hard-surface

or hybrid objects it’s easier to take
advantage of the various primitive geometries
that ZBrush offers. To model the boot, for
example, I select the Cylinder3D tool and edit the
settings in the Initialize tab to get a good mesh to
start sculpting. Then I click on ‘Make Polymesh3D’
and start sculpting the boot, adding DynaMesh
subdivisions. Remember that the Initialize tab
disappears if you add the primitive as new
SubTool; therefore, configure what you need in a
new tool and then add the mesh as a SubTool in
the main ZTool.

08 Other uses for primitives: Another

example of how to use primitives is in
the case of objects formed by closed pieces like
rings and chains. There are several ways to create

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 CHAPTER 01 | Modeling in ZBrush

ZRemesher configuration

Modeling the boots

this type of object. You could draw the shape

Modeling extra clothing accessories
as a mask on a 3D plane and extract it as a new
SubTool, as was done with some of the clothes.
However, in this case, I prefer to use the Ring3D
primitive and deform it with the Move brush until
I achieve the desired shape. After it’s finished, I
just position the object with the Transpose tool,
duplicate the SubTool and press the Mirror option
in the Deformations tab.

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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
09 Cloth detailing: To help define the look
of the character a little better, always
add the essential detail to distinguish between
different types of material such as skin, metals
and fabrics. To model the shirt underneath the
overalls, I draw a mask where the clothing covers
the body and use the Inflate deformation to
extrude the edges. To finish the details, I usually
use the Clay Buildup, Slash3, Standard, Inflate
Examples of deformations
Hard-surface blocking technique
8 | 3DTOTAL.COM
and Clay brushes. It is important to always keep
a ZTool saved with the original character’s body;
it will be essential later for the correct retopology
and modeling of other objects close to it.
10 Blocking the spray tank: At this
stage, ZBrush primitives are used to
block the spray tank that the character carries.
Analyzing some steampunk references, I notice
the presence of gas tanks with various tubes
and valves, so I decide to make a large, heavy
tank with some smoking rusty pipes and various
screws and welded metal. To create the pipes, I
use masks and the Transpose tool to get them
in the desired form, applying DynaMesh for finer
details. The main tank is basically made of a
cylinder with the ends inflated and smoothed
using the Smooth brush.
 CHAPTER 01 | Modeling in ZBrush

Refining tools for the spray tank

Extracting the exterminator’s gas mask

11 Finishing the spray tank: After finishing
the blocking of the basic parts, I use
some techniques and additional primitives to
finalize the spray tank. At the blocking step,
remember that what matters is the volume and
silhouette of the character and its accessories;
there’s no need to add time-consuming details
such as handles and screws yet. In the case of
the tank, I just use masks to inflate some details,
and test out features such as welding in the pump
part using Clay Buildup.

12 Making the gas mask: To model the

character’s gas mask, I decide to use
the same technique used to extract the clothes,
this time masking the covered region of her face
and extracting it with the same configuration
as before. When this is done, I sculpt into the
extracted mesh the volumes of the lenses and
filter, and then apply DynaMesh to reconfigure
the mesh. One thing that eases the process is to
sculpt the inner and outer parts of the mask to
prevent DynaMesh from creating holes due to
mesh intersections.

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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character

13 Finishing the gas mask: As the mask

is a hybrid object with both organic
and hard-surface forms, it may require a little
more detail, mostly because it’s an object that
can create a totally different tone depending
on whether the character is wearing it or not.
Following the steampunk style, I decide to sculpt
a few divisions as if it was made of metal plates,
with exaggerated screws joining them together.
Sometimes it’s easier to create hard-surface
details through alphas using the DragRect brush
mode (for the breathing filter, for example). I use
both DragRect with alphas and sculpting to create
the mask.

14 Blocking the utility belt: This

accessory is important because it’s made
of several smaller pieces forming a utility belt. In
addition to the spray tank, it might be interesting
for the character to have formulas and portable
insecticides for more precise work.

For this, I decide to model three tools separately

from primitives: tubes with poisons, an
insecticide can and pockets for other related stuff.
After that, I extract a belt mesh from the body
and insert the objects as new SubTools, finishing
by using the Transpose tool to rearrange them in
scale and position.

15 Adding color and basic materials:

Now that we have the blocking of
the model finished, it’s time to create a color
Techniques and tools used to finish the mask

out the materials, I use a slightly reflective metal like the gloves and belt. A good tip is to never
palette and basic materials that can guide the simulating bronze; SkinShade4 for parts like skin, use 100% saturated and vibrant colors, except
texturing and render later. I use a triad of colors eyes and hair; MatCap gray for inorganic parts like in extreme cases like a magical stone in the
with shades of yellow, blue and pink. To plot clothes, and SoftPlastic for less reflective parts character’s armor.

Belt accessories modeled separately

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 CHAPTER 01 | Modeling in ZBrush

Painting and materials details inside ZBrush

The Artist

Roumen Filipov
roumenfilipov.com

11
3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character

Scene files

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 CHAPTER 02 | UVing with 3ds Max

Improve your ZBrush workflow Decimation Master workflow and 3ds Max setup
by following Roumen Filipov’s
tutorial advice…
This is the second of a series of four tutorials
covering the production of a stylized 3D
character of a steampunk pest exterminator
girl using ZBrush and 3ds Max, from the
initial blocking to the final render and post-
production. In this second part, we will look at
the modeling and retopology of the sculpted
mesh done in the previous tutorial as well as
UV mapping techniques, all inside 3ds Max.

During the process, I’ll be showing how to

mix 3D sculpting with the awesome polygon
modeling tools present in 3ds Max in order
to achieve every aspect of the final topology,
without losing silhouette and shape of the
character. This tutorial will also show some
workflows using modifiers to improve our
modeling speed, the benefits of instancing
geometry, and finally some tricks using the
native UV mapping tools in 3ds Max in order to
prepare the mesh for displacement sculpting
and texturing.

Now let’s have some fun!

01 Preparing the sculpted mesh: Before

starting to work in 3ds Max, the sculpted
mesh needs to be prepared to be exported from
ZBrush. The problem between the two softwares
is that 3ds Max can’t handle the amount of
polygons displayed in ZBrush, so the first step is
to use the Decimation Master plugin to reduce
the polygon count without losing details.
This depends on your video card, so testing is
necessary, but in my case a little less than 600k
is okay for smooth performance. After importing
Process of retopology using the PolyDraw tool
the mesh into 3ds Max, I usually scale the mesh to
something around 1.80 meters tall for lighting and
shading precision in later steps.

02 Using the PolyDraw Tool: The easiest

and most secure way of starting to draw
the new topology over the mesh is to create
any primitive in the scene and add an Edit
Poly modifier to unlock the PolyDraw tool. It’s
a very efficient tool but a little confusing in the
beginning. You need to select a mesh to draw over
by clicking the Pick button, then select Step Build
to start creating vertices. Connect the vertices by
holding Shift and dragging over them with the
left mouse button. To begin with, I always draw
the basic circular loops around the openings of
the face, like the mouth and eyes, as they are the
most important loops for deformation.

13
3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character
Retopologizing the head mesh
Using primitive cylinders and the Conform brush to model the arms
03 Retopology of the head: After making
the circular loops in the face, I start
connecting them using the Extend option in
PolyDraw. To increase mesh density and relax
it locally over the mesh, I manually connect the
edge loops using the Edit Poly modifier and then
use the Conform brushes to stick the new mesh
over the sculpted character, so it follows the
surface along with the drawn polygons. To finish
14 | 3DTOTAL.COM
the head, I connect them in the back and start
dragging edges downwards until reaching the
neck and bust.
04 Building the arms: There are some very
quick ways to build efficient topology
without drawing poly by poly over the sculpted
mesh. One of the best for me is to pose basic
cylinders over the arms and legs, subdivide them
properly and use the Conform brush to make
them follow the surface. After that, I attach the
conformed cylinders to the main topology and
connect them properly. This same process is used
for the hands and fingers, with some adjustments
in PolyDraw afterwards. Any other details like
the insides of the mouth and eye cavities are
modeled using the Edit Poly tools, since they are
not sculpted in the original mesh.
 CHAPTER 02 | UVing with 3ds Max

Cloth modeling details

Process of modeling the boots and other accessories

05 Modeling the clothes: Now that the
required portion of the body has proper
topology, I start creating the clothes using similar
techniques. The difference now is that the cloth
needs to be thick and more precise than the
sculpted version, and this can easily be achieved
using a lot of stacked modifiers adding local and
general modifications to the mesh. Having three
or four Edit Poly modifiers is very useful to go up
and down in the hierarchy, always having in mind
that lower modifiers affect the behavior of all
those above.

06 Modeling the hard-surface

accessories: Some parts of the
character are easier to model from scratch in 3ds
Max in order to achieve hard-surface precision.
For the boots, I model everything from a box
primitive, using the Conform brush for the upper
part. After the basic shape is done, I model the
belts and buckles separately. The rest of the
props and accessories are made using similar
techniques, always leaving identical meshes like
The spray tank’s modeling process
the pockets on the belt as instances; this will
make future changes faster to make on all the
models simultaneously.

07 Modeling the tank: There’s no point in

doing retopology of an object based on
primitive shapes. To model the spray tank I start
by blocking a sphere and a capsule primitive over
the sculpted mesh, then start subdividing the
meshes and extracting other parts from the same.
I make the pipes using primitive cylinders, adding
thickness at the end using a Shell modifier.
Everything is attached at the end in order to
unwrap the mesh later.

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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character

Bolts distributed using the Spacing tool

08 Distributing the bolts: Some repeated

details, such as bolts and clips, are
always easier to model once and duplicate using
Final models of the spray tank

instanced geometry. There are some ways to

easily position repeated models along surfaces;
in the case of the bolts, I extract some Splines
from the tank mesh then use them as target
shapes in 3ds Max’s Spacing Tool to make the
instances follow. In other cases, when the number
of meshes is bigger and more random, it’s better
to use tools like the Object Paint, Array, Particle
Flow or even instanced geometry in the Hair And
Fur modifier.

09 Finishing the spray tank models: As

described in the first tutorial, the spray
tank had no need to be blocked in ZBrush since
it’s a separate part and does not influence the
overall shape and silhouette of the character. It’s
always good to remember that the whole process
is not necessarily linear, and if the artist feels the
need to go back and redo some stuff, they can
definitely do it with no fear. I create the spray tank
model using a line shape with thickness, then
converting it to an Editable Poly and extracting
the other meshes from it.

10 Modeling the eye: The last model

that deserves special attention in the
character is also one of the most important of
all: the eyes. A character can look either dead or
alive through the eyes’ appearance, so precision
is important here. I always model the eye with a
large pupil so it can easily be dilated later without
losing iris details. To behave realistically, I model
an external sphere to add refraction and distort for displacement sculpting and texturing by the Quick Peel button combined with Relax in the
the sclera. unwrapping all of the relevant parts in 3ds Tools tab.
Max. I usually begin with the most organic and

11 Unwrapping the body: Now that

we have a proper topology for
deformation and rendering, it’s time to prepare
complicated parts like the body. I use a workflow
based on making the mesh planar, cutting where
I want it to be opened and then unfolding it using
It’s always good to cut the mesh in areas less
visible or with strategic texture transitions, like the
sides of the fingers and the back of the head.

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 CHAPTER 02 | UVing with 3ds Max

Eye modeling process

UV layouts of the head and hands

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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character

12 Unwrapping the clothes: It’s important

to know what kind of object you are
unwrapping and how the shader will behave to
UV islands of the shirt

speed up further steps and avoid headaches like

correcting seams and distortions on the texture.
Clothes are the most common case of objects
with bad shading due to chaotic UVs, thus I
always cut the mesh and arrange the UV islands
so that the fabric texture follows the cloth panels
like it would be before being stitched.

13 Unwrapping the belt: Some stuff like

belts and cloth strips are always boring
to unwrap, even in more advanced UV software,
but 3ds Max have a very good specific tool just for
The belt’s UVs
this case. When it comes to long cloth pieces that
need to have a straight fabric flow, all the edges
must be aligned horizontally or vertically. You
can automatically achieve this just by selecting a
perpendicular loop to the direction you want to
unwrap, and clicking the ‘Unfold Strip from Loop’
button in the Wrap tab from the Unwrap UVW
modifier. It will make an instant straight UV island.

14 Unwrapping the spray tank: There are

some more complex objects with too
many elements to unfold one by one in a single
mesh. A workaround I use for this is to break the
model down into several similar meshes and
unwrap them separately. After each mesh has its
UVs completed, I attach them in one single model
and then use the automatic pack options in the
Arrange Elements tab located in the side bar of
the UV Editor. I set the padding to a very low value

Spray tank UV layout

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 CHAPTER 02 | UVing with 3ds Max

Applying a checkered UV to the character

The Artist

Roumen Filipov
roumenfilipov.com

and turn on Rotate, then finish by clicking the an eye open for any UV distortions in the more most critical ones. To visualize them, always have
Pack Normalize button to rearrange the UVs into visible areas. a good checker texture to hand to see if all the
one tile. squares are well distributed. The standard black
It’s almost impossible to have a zero-percent and white checker in 3ds Max is usually not very

15 Finishing the UVs: During and after

each unwrapping, you must always keep
distorted UV without breaking the mesh into
dozens of islands, but you can try to hide the
precise, so you can create your own with more
information to visualize it better.

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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character

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 CHAPTER 03 | Adding displacement detail

See how Roumen Filipov

brings a character to life with
small details…
This is the third of a series of four tutorials
covering the production of a stylized 3D
character of a steampunk pest exterminator
girl using ZBrush and 3ds Max, from the
initial blocking to the final render and post-
production. In this third phase, we will sculpt
the displacement details like pores and cloth
wrinkles, then finish the texturing process
using Photoshop, with some composite and
mask blending tricks in 3ds Max.

During the process, I’ll be showing how to

reproduce fine details in ZBrush, then I’ll
show how to correctly set up and export
displacement and normal maps to reproduce Creating skin pores and wrinkles in ZBrush
the same information on a low-poly mesh in
3ds Max. This tutorial will also show you how
to quickly create textures and other maps like
specular, bump and dirt masks in order to set
up semi-realistic materials in V-Ray.

Now let’s have some fun!

01 Sculpting the skin details: Now that

we have our model fully retopologized
and with proper UVs, it’s time to send it back to
ZBrush for some displacement detailing. I always
start with the skin since it’s the most tricky and
delicate surface to work with. At first, you should
look out for imperfections left from the sculpting
process and even re-sculpt some detail that has
been lost in the new topology.

Multi Map Exporter setup and differences

between displacement bit depth

Detailed cloth in ZBrush and stitch alphas

As soon as I have my model subdivided and
ready, I start to sculpt the most delicate wrinkles
around the eyes, mouth, hands and neck. Finally,
I use the Standard brush with the stroke on
DragRect to spread some pores and very fine
wrinkle alphas all over the body. It’s important to
look very carefully at how you distribute the size
and direction of pores. One thing that’s good to
remember during this whole process is that every
detail needs to be twice as strong as the other
surfaces, because SSS (subsurface scattering)
kind of ‘eats’ a large part of it, even with good
reflections in the shader.
production-friendly, so I keep with sculpting the
old way. The secret for me is to always observe
what places in the body inflict more tension on
the cloth and try to sculpt all the folds coming
from those spots. The result is always some kind
of generic but believable fabric behavior over the
body. If the character’s clothes are too loose and
hanging from the body, I usually pose the base
mesh first and then sculpt the folds according to
the pose, but in this case, the generic cloth over
the body will work fine, even in more extreme
poses. The stitches are all made using the stitch
brush with the alphas shown in the picture.

02 Detailing cloth in ZBrush: Clothes are

usually tricky to make. You’ll see a lot
of artists using different workflows nowadays
in order to avoid having to sculpt folds and
wrinkles, but not all of them are very practical and
03 Exporting Maps from ZBrush: I
see a lot of people discussing correct
displacement map exporting in ZBrush, and
I’ll show you what I’ve found to be the best
workflow regarding quality and rendering speed.

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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character

Setup of VRayDisplacement in 3ds Max

Before anything, the final result in 3ds Max will

depend directly on how your mesh behaves.
If you have many stars in your topology and
some odd distribution of polygons, this may
screw up the displacement. That’s why I always
export two types of maps in TIFF format: 32-bit
displacements with mid 0, and 16-bit with mid 0.5
setup. The first is obviously much more accurate
and I use it with VRayDisplacement modifier, but
the second is for using a non-scale-dependent
workflow with the displace modifier in 3ds Max. I
also use the 16-bit version to help add details to
the texture. In the image you can see my setup for
exporting the maps and mesh.

04 Using VRayDisplacement in 3ds

Max: Now that our displacement maps
are properly exported and our new meshes
are imported in 3ds Max, it’s time to reproduce
the sculpted details directly in the render. First
you should check if all the vertices are split
using the Unwrap UVW modifier – this method
helps to avoid wrong distribution of details
after subdividing the mesh. After this, add the Skin Polypainting in ZBrush
VRayDisplacement modifier and follow the
settings shown in the image. It’s important to
apply the displacement map using a VRayHDRI
shader, since it’s made especially for handling
Space option to ‘None’. Another important setting
is to set the Texmap min and max to -1 and 1, in
order to tell the displacement to add negative
05 Painting the skin colors: I usually
paint most of the textures directly
in Photoshop, but for the skin I use a mixed
32-bit images, and make sure you set the Color and positive deformation to the mesh. workflow of Polypaint in ZBrush with some

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Maps used to create the skin shader
Maps used to create the eyes shader
CHAPTER 03 | Adding displacement detail
blending of detail maps in Photoshop. Start by
going to the last subdivision of the body model
in ZBrush and, with a very smooth Standard
brush, start painting the basic color regions of
the skin. When you’re finished, export the texture
generated from Polypaint, reset the color and
generate a surface noise using a slightly darker
color. This noise will be added later in order to
create an irregularity effect over the overall skin
tone; you can even play with different hues,
like more green and blue in some regions. This
is more important to me than any of the detail
painting because it removes the flatness of the
skin, which can ruin even the most detailed and
realistic models.
“We need more than a
good texture to reproduce a
believable skin shader in
any renderer”
06 Finishing the skin texture: We need
more than a good texture to reproduce
a believable skin shader in any renderer. In the
image, you can see that I use an additional
normal map and a grayscale bump to make the
pores pop again after the light scatter, followed
by specular map to control the shininess of the
skin in certain areas. To finish the skin texture, I
usually add the bump map along with the 16-bit
displacement over the basic colors in order to
force the pores and other sculpted details to
come out. Since it’s a young girl, you don’t need
to do a very contrasting texture – even a really
smooth result still works in most cases. I’ll share
the skin shader settings at the end of this tutorial.
07 Texturing the eyes : Eyes are usually
the biggest challenge there is when it
comes to making cartoon characters. There are
some things that I usually care about in order to
achieve an organic and alive look when creating
the eye texture:
1. The iris border needs to be darker and with
a smooth transition. Sharp and perfectly
round always kills the look.
2. You can try out higher IOR values in the
external sphere material; sometimes this
reinforces the depth of the character’s look.
3. The sclera of the eye is never fully white. I
always make a gradient of a bright yellow to
a darker pink in the borders.
4. I always make the specular map very
saturated. More vivid reflections in the base
of the iris help to bring the character’s gaze
to life.
5. Always use SSS for the eyes, since they’re an
organic part too.
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3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character

Fabric textures used in

the cloth shaders

08 Texturing the clothes: The secret to

making good cloth shaders, for me,
is to choose a nice fabric texture as a base to
create the bump and diffuse maps. I rarely add
reflections to cloth, only if it’s really visible in
the type of fabric I want to mimic. I usually run
away from very flat and realistic cloth – I really
try to give a quick and exaggerated look to the
fabric, and also try to make the stitch texture not
too tiled. I use many images to make the dirt in
the clothes, but also some texture brushes in
Photoshop with scatter and hue variations. For all
the pockets and leather materials I use a similar
workflow, but with a blurry reflection using the
unsaturated texture as specular map.

09 Texturing the spray tank models: I’ve

developed a very quick shader workflow
for scratched and worn-out metal. I know that
I have to replicate the same shader with little
differences through all the metallic objects, but if Metal shader workflow of the spray tank
I had to paint all the diffuse, specular and bump
textures for each one separately, it would take
a lot of time. So I create a blend of two shaders:
painted metal and rusted metal. For each slot, I
create a composite shader with a base color using
VRayColor, then tile metal textures with different
opacity values on top of it. I use a normal map
of random noise surface over the metal bump
to make it look more irregular. To blend the two
materials, I paint masks in Photoshop for each
object, and then, if I want to apply the same
shader to another object, I just change the mask
and it works fine.

10 Basic shader setup: These are some

examples of how I set up some of my
shaders mentioned before. The red one is my skin
material; it’s basically a VRayBlendMtl composed
of an SSS2 shader for the skin itself and a VRayMtl
with black diffuse in additive mode for realistic
reflections. I always use the GGX BRDF option Setup of the main shaders I used
in all of the shaders – this new V-Ray feature
makes the specular more accurate and detailed. cloth shader with a falloff shader applied in the mimic the roughness of the surface caused by the
The blue material is the basic metal shader I diffuse slot. I use the falloff between the texture microfibers in the cloth, usually not present in
use for all metallic objects. The last one is the and a brighter version of the same in order to leather shaders.

24 | 3DTOTAL.COM
The Artist CHAPTER 03 | Adding displacement detail

TOP TIP
UV Master solution
Sometimes, even with the correct
setup, distortions may occur in some
areas when you apply the maps in
3ds Max. A workaround for this is to
always unwrap the mesh again in UV
Roumen Filipov
Master, checking the ‘Use Existing UV
roumenfilipov.com
seams’. This correctly recalculates
the distance between the edges for
displacement generation.

25
3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character

Model, Maps &Texture files

26 | 3DTOTAL.COM
 CHAPTER 04 | Posing and rendering

Roumen Filipov shows us how Hair emitter geometries and hair density masks
to bring characters to life with
a simple pose…
This is the last of a series of four tutorials
covering the production of a stylized 3D
character – a steampunk pest exterminator
girl – using ZBrush and 3ds Max, which was
made since the initial blocking until the final
render and post-production. In this fourth
phase, we will learn how to achieve our
desired hairstyle using 3ds Max’s native tools,
and how to set up the render and lighting in
V-Ray. Finally, I’ll mention some quick post-
production tips in Photoshop.
Combing process using Hair and Fur Modifier

During the process, I’ll be showing how to

use the Hair and Fur modifier in 3ds Max,
taking different approaches depending on
how the hair behaves, and also some render
techniques with VRayHairMtl. This tutorial will
also show how to properly pose and render
your character, making it look interesting and
with personality, even in front of a simple
neutral background. I’ll also show how a
simple light rig can achieve great results with
a very small render time even for a 4k image,
and what render elements and tricks I use to
enhance the final look in Photoshop. In this
project I also use Super Simple Rig script,
freely provided by superrune on his website.

Now let’s have some fun!

01 Preparing the hair emitters: We have

finished some good work on the look
development of the character, but here comes the
VRayHairMtl settings
and final render result
hard stuff: hair. I’ll use the Hair and Fur modifier
along with VRayHairMtl to achieve the desired
look, but first we need to prepare the mesh that
will serve as a hair emitter. If we apply the Hair
and Fur modifier to a very dense mesh, we will
likely make 3ds Max crash immediately or, when
it comes to combing, the number of guides will
make your life a nightmare.

First I paint the hair density mask as a black and

white map inside ZBrush, then I apply it to a copy
of the character’s head mesh and delete all the
polygons that are displayed completely black.
This avoids creating useless guides that would
probably make the combing process difficult. I a reference for the overall volume. The Hair and only the second option, and to make it easier, I
also detach some specific polygons that can be Fur modifier works by creating a guide for each divide the hair into a lot of different meshes with
used to generate separated parts, such as the vertex of the base mesh and then creating hair modifiers which I edit separately in order to find
fringe of the hair. strands interpolated between these guides. There the perfect shape.
are two ways to manipulate the guides: you can

02 Combing the hair: Now that our

meshes and masks are ready, it’s time
to begin hairstyling. Before we start, it’s good to
import the sculpted mesh of the hair to use as
model splines and use the ‘Recomb from splines’
option under the Tools rollout, or you can go to
the Styling rollout and click the ‘Style Hair’ option
03 Rendering the hair: This step happens
simultaneously with the previous step,
due to the necessity of rendering the hair in order
to enable the styling brush. For this project, I use to have real feedback on the hairstyle.

27
3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character

First, you should look for the ‘mr Parameters’

Rig locators and full rig built from them
tab in the Hair and Fur modifier and apply a
VrayHairMtl in the slot. This material is made
especially for hair rendering but can be applied
to any geometry as well. You can customize how
the hair looks by changing the colors of overall,
diffuse, specular and transmission but I usually
use the VRayHairInfoTex shader in order to
change the behavior of the strands from root to
tip. As an easy setup for realistic color variation,
I use the ‘Hair&Fur/Alembic Color’ mode in the
output; this makes the material use the built-in
configurations of the Hair and Fur colors. As a
final touch, you can play with the frizz, kink and
flyaway settings in the modifier to get even better
behavior of the hair.

04 Rig basic setup for posing: With all

the look development done, we now
need to pose the character. I usually prefer to
do this using a simple rig solution inside 3ds
Max. You can do it using the Biped system, CAT
(Custom Animation Toolkit) or even custom rigs,
but the best for me is the Super Simple Rig by
superrune. It’s a free rig system and very fast to
set up. All you need to do is open the rig-building
tools, create the rig locators, move them to the
positions of the body joints, and finally just click
the ‘Build Rig’ button to create a fully functional
rig ready for animation. The rig even has a similar
parameters system to those you find in Maya
controllers. It’s important that before you build
the rig, you get the scale of the locators right
in the rigging tools, this helps to create control
shapes and bones in a good size to begin with.
Extra control shapes and resized bones

05 Optimizing the rig: The Super Simple

Rig is great but it don’t do all the work by
itself – some minor adjustments must be done
before skinning the model, especially if you use
the Bones Pro plugin for it. First of all, there are
some control shapes that are hard to select in the
viewport, so you may want to scale them a little
bit or even create new ones, attaching them to
the originals and deleting the old shape inside
the Edit Spline modifier.

Lastly we need to keep in mind that Bones Pro

uses the bones’ size and shape to determine the
initial vertex influence of each one, so go to the
Animation tab in 3ds Max and open the ‘Bone
Tools’ in order to change the size and add side
fins. You can always add extra bones to the rig as
well as controllers; all you need to do is link them influences is usually very bad. For this reason, bone influence by the falloff and strength, and if
to the original rig. I use the Bones Pro plugin, which replaces the you would like to make some fine adjustments,
Skin modifier with a much smoother and quicker there is a weight-painting tool as well.

06 Skinning the character: The skin

modifier inside 3ds Max is really messy
and although you can get really nice results by
painting weights, the initial distribution of bone
workflow. If you apply the modifier and assign the
bones, you’ll see that the result is almost perfect,
especially if you adjusted the bones as shown in
You can convert to a standard skin modifier with
one click inside the Bones Pro preferences and
the previous step. After that, you can edit each the skinning will still behave the same way.

28 | 3DTOTAL.COM
 CHAPTER 04 | Posing and rendering

Bone influence and settings in Bones Pro

29
3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character

07 Posing the character: Now that we

have finished all the hard work, it’s time
to put the rig in action. Posing the character with
Planning of the character’s pose

a nice and functional rig is often very easy and

lets you test many poses, but you need to have
in mind some concepts of body mechanics and
follow some composition rules if you want to
get a nice result. She is a strong and competent
girl that has to fight with some big bugs in her
everyday job, so I choose to put her in a confident
pose, but still showing that holding all that heavy
gear is not an easy task. To make the final image
more interesting, I look at slightly reinforced line
of action, but also use some straight lines to help
guide the eye towards her. Some things I have to
model just for the pose, like the hose connecting
the tank and the spray gun.

08 Lighting setup: Lighting is something

that can give life to the image, or kill
it. I see a lot of renders of incredible models on
the internet, but sometimes they are completely
ruined due the fact that the lights and exposure
are not doing the job. Always think of how you
want a surface to behave in the render: for
example, a metallic object may look completely
bright if you use a light that’s too large for the
specular you want.

For this character, I use a simple three-point

lighting setup, which consists of a key light with
slightly sharp shadows, a big and strong backlight
to make the character pop in front of the dark
background, and a fill light just to lift the black
areas. I always use V-Ray Exposure Control in
the Environment tab so that my renders are not
dependent on the settings of the physical camera.

09 Render setup: What I love about

V-Ray is definitely its speed and ability
to render nice and smooth images without
pushing the hardware too far. Keep an eye for low
reflection/refraction samples on the materials
and samples in VRayLights. These can add a
lot of noise to the render and actually make it
slower. You should always have a VraySampleRate
element selected so you can monitor where the
DMC sampler is having trouble.

For primary and secondary GI solutions, I use

Irradiance and Light Cache with simple presets,
but you can get smooth results with even lower
settings. The ‘Embree’ option really speeds up
the render with no quality loss, especially for Three-point lighting and exposure settings
hair, but always remember to set your dynamic
memory high enough. Lastly, the render elements
I use are just some basic ones like reflection,
refraction, VrayExtraTex with a VRayDirt map for
10 Post-production: Render your images
in at least 16-bit TIFF format if you want
to have good control over color and brightness. I
For this project, I start by adding the ambient
occlusion element as a Multiply layer over the
beauty pass. This will increase the overall contact
the occlusion, and some masks for easy selection usually do the post-production by using the extra area within the image, and cover some light leaks
of different parts of the body in Photoshop. elements to increment my beauty pass. in the model.

30 | 3DTOTAL.COM
 CHAPTER 04 | Posing and rendering

V-Ray render settings

Post-production in Photoshop

After this, I play with local specular and reflection adjustment layers to correct some colors and chromatic aberration, but always take care to not
elements to increase and even change the color values, like Color Balance, Curves and Levels. You add too much distraction around your subject,
and intensity of the metallic objects. I add some can add some subtle effects like lens dirt and the character.

31
The Artist
3DTOTAL EBOOK | Creating a stylized character

TOP TIP
Super Simple Rig
You can find all you need to know
about the rig I used in the tutorial
at this link. It’s totally free, and at
the bottom of the page you can
find instructions about installation,
Roumen Filipov
building the rig and animating with it.
roumenfilipov.com
You will also need the Pen Attribute
Holder modifier from this link.

32 | 3DTOTAL.COM
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