Building a Games Character Model in Maya Technical Paper By Adam Webb

The process of turning a 2d Turnarounds into a 3D model. Maya is the main tool for this process alongside Photo shop.

1.

Draw the Turnabouts - The First step is to draw a series of turnabouts and for this particular model I produced a drawing for each section instead of the whole character to refine details.

Figure 1 Shoe Turnarounds

2.

Using Photoshop to get guides accurate Take the side and front profiles for each drawing and get them accurately to the same size

Use the guide and rulers tool or check the settings in image size to keep scales the same. Once the guides are ready, import them into Maya by selecting the orthographic menu in panels then select import image. Begin with shoes and then repeat for each section when each individual part of the model has been made.

Figure 2 Guides imported into Maya

Figure 2 Guides imported into Maya

3.

Make the Model Click create in the top tabs to drop it down, then select polygon primitives. Click on cube and then go into the channels on the right side of the screen In the cube shape option, change the sub diversion settings to 2 then delete half of the cube.

Use the spilt polygon tool and split edge tool in the Edit Mesh option to divide the shape and then right click the cube to vertices, then use the front and side views by pressing space bar and selecting them alternatively and matching the model to the drawing.

As this is a Game model, the ploy faces need to be reasonably low so click the heads on display in the Display menu, then tick the poly count option. If the faces are too high then return to the Edit Mesh menu and either use the Delete or Merge vertex/edge tool. This model is allowed triangles as well as four sided shape faces.

Figure 3 Poly Count Display

Repeat for each section and slowly build the individual pieces and save them as separate files so each piece can be edited if needed.

Figure 4 Shoes Modelled

Figure 5 Torso Modelled

4.

Bring the Model Together Select the file menu and import option to bring each individual piece into the workspace

Use guides for a Human body to start getting the perspective of each section correct Move each section into place and then chose the Mesh tab and click on combine to form the pieces into one model geometry and use the merge vertex/ edge tool to connect them up properly Finally click the Normals Tab and Use the smooth, harden and set normal edge to gain the right ratio of smooth and hard edges across the model.
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Figure 6 Normals Settings

Figure 7 Finished Model