Iron Man--Recently Resurrected

[gschumsky]

Btw I let Hal Hickel from ILM know about the excellent job you're doing. He's been working on the film as a lead.

 

 

Keep up the good work.

[LeeAnderson]

Thanks Gerald, Robert, Bill, Stian, Mike and Rodney! Those were some pretty shiny reviews!

 

As far as the background, maybe show it so it looks like he walked through the wall (Iron Man shaped hole). Man there are so many possibilities, I don't know where to begin.

 

That's a good start, thanks for the suggestion Mark!

 

 

Lee,this keeps getting better by the hour.Have you thought of doing IBL or HDRI as a lighting solution?I'll be honest i don't know anything in this area,but i'm sure it will add a certain something to the lighting of the character.

No doubt the finished image will rock,all i ask (being a bit cheeky here) is that you might do a render suitable for a desktop image as i would certainly like this on my computer.

 

Thanks Jay, and don't worry I plan on doing a wallpaper as soon as I come up with a background! I sort of have my own version of IBL going on in the image as it is now, I'm sure the real stuff could look better, but we'll see...

 

WOW!!! It looks like like Robert Downey JR. has some serious competition. I showed your pic to a friend who is a serious Iron-Man comic freak and he was truly impressed. Keep up the great work. (How about an action pose so I can use "Shellhead" as my windows wallpaper? )

 

Thanks, glad to know that Iron Man fans appreciate it! As soon as the background is done, the wallpaper is yours!

 

Btw I let Hal Hickel from ILM know about the excellent job you're doing. He's been working on the film as a lead.

Keep up the good work.

 

Alright Greg, no fair teasing! The whole purpose of me doing an update was because of this little post. Are you serious? (I hope this isn't a really cruel joke) If it isn't, I need LOTS of details, please? That made my day/week/first 20 years.

 

UPDATE

 

I updated the detailing textures a little bit (note the multi-colored wires), before this is over, I'll probably end up unwrapping all of him and making the armor worn.

 

 

Thanks everybody!

 

Lee

[the_black_mage]

B-E-A-utiful man!!!

 

the worn looks sounds like a good idea!

[gschumsky]

Btw I let Hal Hickel from ILM know about the excellent job you're doing. He's been working on the film as a lead.

Keep up the good work.

 

Alright Greg, no fair teasing! The whole purpose of me doing an update was because of this little post. Are you serious? (I hope this isn't a really cruel joke) If it isn't, I need LOTS of details, please? That made my day/week/first 20 years.

 

 

 

Nope. Not kidding. I think shellhead looks great, and thought Hal would like to take a look.

 

 

Greg

[LeeAnderson]

Thanks Mage!

 

UPDATE

 

Well, the model is now textured (at least mostly )

 

 

 

 

 

 

I also updated the lighting:

 

 

I'm not sure if this lighting setup showcases the model like I'm sure it could...any thoughts?

 

Lee

[rusty]

Totally Awesome! All you can say!

 

Rusty

[LeeAnderson]

Thanks a lot Rusty!

 

Another quick update for today (man, I love Saturday)

 

I desaturated the textures and made some specularity maps (noted especially in the tarnish on the face).

 

 

I also changed the lighting around dramitically in the final image to something I like a lot more.

 

 

Now, on to the background! Thanks a lot for all of your kind words!

 

Lee

[NancyGormezano]

Amazing job.

[Tralfaz]

This is so freakin' amazing!! I am glad I got a plastic cover for my keyboard, 'cause I am drooling all over it right now looking at the renders!

 

I haven't read Iron Man comics since I was a kid (many, many, many moons ago) and never did understand this, but didn't Tony Stark need the suit to keep him alive? If so, why did the suit never show when he was wearing his street clothes?

 

Al

[Dhar]

I'm speechless. You are one heck of a talented modeler. Great job.

[entity]

I'm in AWE!!! Exellent work! Are your reflections blended, they seem to be dulling the nice punch the red metal is giving in the other renders. It is one hell of a great rendition of a character.

[Zaryin]

Beautiful! Man, you have got to post some of those maps just so we can take a look at them. Excellent!

[LeeAnderson]

Thanks Dhar, you da man!

 

I haven't read Iron Man comics since I was a kid (many, many, many moons ago) and never did understand this, but didn't Tony Stark need the suit to keep him alive? If so, why did the suit never show when he was wearing his street clothes?

 

Thanks to you to Al...you know, from what I've seen from the new movie (I really don't know that much about him either ) it looks like it's just the chest piece he needs to survive.

 

I'm in AWE!!! Exellent work! Are your reflections blended, they seem to be dulling the nice punch the red metal is giving in the other renders. It is one hell of a great rendition of a character.

 

That's a big compliment coming from you Rich! The reflections aren't blended, the effect you're seeing is caused by my texture maps. The "punch" of the old red is nice, but I don't think it would have fit as well into the world that I'm putting him in.

 

Beautiful! Man, you have got to post some of those maps just so we can take a look at them. Excellent!

 

Thanks Jeff! The maps really aren't all that exciting... I guess I could let you take a peek though.

 

UPDATE

 

Well, I thought I'd give you guys a quick preview of what the background is shaping out to be...

 

 

I decided to go with a construction type area that looks like it's just been busted apart. The ground map needs LOTS of work, the shadows need to be softened and I'll be modeling in rocks, pipes, the rest of the fence, maybe a chain and whatever else one would find at a place like this.

 

Comments and critiques would be great

 

Thanks everybody!

 

Lee

[Dhar]

and whatever else one would find at a place like this.

 

One of those big and nasty hydraulic jack hammers

[nixie]

That looks Amazing!

 

Alot of respect on the texturing/lighting, Very moody.

 

I think the ground could be less flat though, I know you have yet to texture it but i think the geometry itself could be a little more random.

 

nice image though.

[Darkwing]

Um, ust one question, it always seems, spotty to me. Are you using multi-pass? Or is it meant to be that way?

[LeeAnderson]

One of those big and nasty hydraulic jack hammers

 

Good call, Dhar! I just got some reference on my computer for it.

 

Alot of respect on the texturing/lighting, Very moody.

I think the ground could be less flat though, I know you have yet to texture it but i think the geometry itself could be a little more random.

 

Thanks, and I agree about the ground. I'm hoping that adding more details will improve this, but if not, then I'll have to model some more.

 

 

Um, ust one question, it always seems, spotty to me. Are you using multi-pass? Or is it meant to be that way?

 

That was just a screencap from A:M, the finished render will have 16X16 multipass activated

 

UPDATE

 

Here's a quick update on the background, I'm ready for this beast to be done! I added details to the fence, cleaned up the ground map and added a quick sky matte.

 

 

Would I be overstepping my bounds if I said this looks like a snowy facility, or should it still be in the city?

 

Also, After I rendered this, I noticed that Iron Man's pose somehow got tweaked--so the lighting on him will look more like the last two pictures.

 

Here's a closeup on the fence

 

 

Thanks for looking!

 

Lee

[pming]

Hiya.

 

Very nice! The only thing I'd change is perhaps some more dramatic lighting and pose. Then do a final render to get rid of all the jaggies and 'white dot reflections'.

[Dhar]

Sweet

 

I like the pose, very "Boris Vallejo"-ish where the hero is always in manly, symetrical pose while the women more curvey and dramatic. I agree about the lighting, maybe a spot light from one of those halogen construction lights? - I don't know, you seem to have a better eye for this stuff than I do.

 

Great job man.

[largento]

You know what might be fun to add as a bit of detail in the background would be some pieces of armor from one of Iron Man's villains, as if he'd just finished defeating one of them (maybe Titanium Man or the Crimson Dynamo.) Not that many people would recognize them, but it'd be cool to the ones who did.

[LeeAnderson]

Hiya.

Very nice! The only thing I'd change is perhaps some more dramatic lighting and pose. Then do a final render to get rid of all the jaggies and 'white dot reflections'.

 

Thanks--lighting and the pose are probably the weakest points right now... I wonder what he could be doing though.

 

I like the pose, very "Boris Vallejo"-ish where the hero is always in manly, symetrical pose while the women more curvey and dramatic.

 

Dhar, that's the best compliment I could ever get! Boris is by far my favorite fantasy artist. I was looking at some of his artwork when I was rendering this last image! He and his wife(?) Julie Bell are so good!

 

 

You know what might be fun to add as a bit of detail in the background would be some pieces of armor from one of Iron Man's villains, as if he'd just finished defeating one of them (maybe Titanium Man or the Crimson Dynamo.) Not that many people would recognize them, but it'd be cool to the ones who did.

 

Awesome idea Mark! Maybe I could put some one or two chunks around his feet...that would add some story to the picture.

 

 

Lee

[aen916]

Again, awesome work! Thanks for the wallpaper shot

[GDblEK]

I must say, like everyone else here, most excellent piece. I personally can hope to aspire to this level of detail and realism. This forum seems to have been inspirational for you and giving you some driving force to move this project farther along.

[LeeAnderson]

No problem Andy, there's a better one coming up:

 

I must say, like everyone else here, most excellent piece. I personally can hope to aspire to this level of detail and realism. This forum seems to have been inspirational for you and giving you some driving force to move this project farther along.

 

You bet, it always has been! Getting feedback helps keep my projects out of animation limbo.

 

Well, I rendered a high-res version to see what could be improved (I also played around with my background matte). Here's what I see:

 

 

1. Add stones/pebbles around the front

 

2. Put Dhar's jackhammer in the back left to cover up some ground texture pattens.

 

3. Maybe some curled sheet metal in the back right to cover the same problem.

 

4.Crimson Dynamo aromor?

 

5. More stuff behind the fence.

 

Basically it needs more stuff. See anything else, any ideas? Let me know!

 

Lee

[Fuchur]

Wow, wow, wow, wow.....

There the aliasing goes and god that it is good

 

VERYVERY Cool rendering... I am very impressed...

 

*Fuchur*

[Dhar]

Mmmm... delish

 

I have a jackhammer?

[ypoissant]

This is looking very good. A well balanced composition and lighting. Bravo.

[agep]

Amazing. Your work is truly inspirational!

[John Bigboote]

Progressing well!

 

That is some Hollywood calibre stuff! Are you going to animate him?

[Zaryin]

Wow, all I can say is I hope one day I can make a scene that comes close to this. Great!

[Darkwing]

Everyone is standing around and suddenly here this strange tinkling noise, like liquid dropping, they all look down at darkwing and go "Aw man, did you really have to do that?" and I go, hell ya, that model was worth it!!!

[LeeAnderson]

Wow, thanks for the positive response everyone! Yves, Stian, Jeff, Matt--you guys are like my heroes, thanks for making my day!

 

Oh and thanks for the great compliment Darkwing...just be sure to clean up afterwords.

 

Mmmm... delish

 

I have a jackhammer?

 

 

Yep, you do now, I made it this morning:

 

 

More to come!

 

Lee

[Eric2575]

Nothing I can say that hasn't been said, so I'll chime in - BRAVO!!!

 

Lee, this is superb, everything about it!

[robcat2075]

Wonderful scene. Put it over at CGtalk if no one has suggested it yet.

[rusty]

No problem Andy, there's a better one coming up:

 

I must say, like everyone else here, most excellent piece. I personally can hope to aspire to this level of detail and realism. This forum seems to have been inspirational for you and giving you some driving force to move this project farther along.

 

You bet, it always has been! Getting feedback helps keep my projects out of animation limbo.

 

Well, I rendered a high-res version to see what could be improved (I also played around with my background matte). Here's what I see:

 

 

1. Add stones/pebbles around the front

 

2. Put Dhar's jackhammer in the back left to cover up some ground texture pattens.

 

3. Maybe some curled sheet metal in the back right to cover the same problem.

 

4.Crimson Dynamo aromor?

 

5. More stuff behind the fence.

 

Basically it needs more stuff. See anything else, any ideas? Let me know!

 

Lee

 

That is awesome. Whether you add clutter or not.

 

Rusty

[3DArtZ]

that is pretty sick!

Great great work!

 

Mike Fitz

www.3dartz.com

[JohnArtbox]

Fantastic Lee.

The eyes feel a little low to me, but that's being nitpicky. I've never spent anything like this amount of time and complexity on a model.

Beautiful

[MattWBradbury]

There are several problems I see with your rendering, like if you look at foot it's all... just kidding. Nice work.

[itsjustme]

Top notch! That's as good as anything I've ever seen, Lee.

[Paul Forwood]

Wonderful stuff, Lee!

[LeeAnderson]

Thanks for the compliments Eric, Paul, Rusty, David and Mike! I don't know if it quite deserves it, but thanks the same!

 

Wonderful scene. Put it over at CGtalk if no one has suggested it yet.

 

Thanks Robert, I'm planning on it! Hopefully it'll get some good attention!

 

Fantastic Lee.

The eyes feel a little low to me, but that's being nitpicky. I've never spent anything like this amount of time and complexity on a model.

Beautiful

 

Thanks John! I think the problem in the eyes is being caused by perspective. Looking back on it, the forehead might be a little too high... Well, I'm not sure if I want to mess with it too much.

 

There are several problems I see with your rendering, like if you look at foot it's all... just kidding. Nice work.

 

You had me going Matt!

 

UPDATE

 

Well, this could be the last update. Here's the finished render:

 

 

1600 X 1280 (wallpaper size )

Multipass 16 X 16

AO, Relfections, Patch counts well into the 100,000's (yes, I modeled the pebbles)

Time: 4 hr 24 m

 

And the wire:

 

 

If you have critiques on the model itself this is the WRONG time to give them What I need advice on is post stuff. Do I need to do any post? So far, all I did was correct one black spot on Iron Man's face, the rest is straight from A:M. I'm thinking I'll call it good though, and post it to CGTalk. Just wanted to ask your opinions first.

 

Thanks, couldn't have finished it without all of your support!

 

Lee

[MattWBradbury]

As far as post, I would suggest darkening the areas around the character to create more of a contrast between the environment and the Iron Man. What I did was create basically an egg shaped gradient which which was applied under a multiply filter. I then lightened up some of the city lights using an overlay. The ending result puts much more emphasis on the character. The ground before was taking a lot of the attention away from the center. The background X shape works really well. I don't know if that was intentional or not, but it's a good feature in the composition. Here's the post I came up with:

 

 

If you have tabbed browsing, you can easily open both images and switch between them quickly to see the changes. A lot of the changes totally depend on the mood you were going after, and since it is your piece of art, you should make the final decision.

[LeeAnderson]

As far as post, I would suggest darkening the areas around the character to create more of a contrast between the environment and the Iron Man. What I did was create basically an egg shaped gradient which which was applied under a multiply filter. I then lightened up some of the city lights using an overlay. The ending result puts much more emphasis on the character. The ground before was taking a lot of the attention away from the center.

 

Wow, Matt, that looks great! I'll probably end up using a lot of your ideas. The city lights seem a little too muted still, but I see the look that you were going for. Thanks a lot!

 

The background X shape works really well. I don't know if that was intentional or not, but it's a good feature in the composition.

 

You bet it was intentional! I spent a lot of time thinking about this. Just about every object in here has a symmetrical answer. The "X" shape you're referring is to make the eyes "fall" towards Iron Man and then he holds up the center. Thanks for noticing!

 

Lee

[MattWBradbury]

I had the lights a lot brighter in the version before I posted, but it took too much attention away from the center again, so I dimmed them slightly.

[LeeAnderson]

I had the lights a lot brighter in the version before I posted, but it took too much attention away from the center again, so I dimmed them slightly.

 

Ahh...I see, how about this one...best of both worlds? I took a few of your suggestions but then traced over the character in white and added it as a multiply.

 

EDIT: changed just a little bit...I can't stop playing with it!

 

 

Lee

[MattWBradbury]

I was actually going to do that. I guess I was being lazy. Everything looks good except for the background behind his shins. When the tone is similar across that area, it makes the background look like a poster, or it looks like it is lacking in depth. Try lighting the area just behind where he's standing and see if that works better. I think the problem may be the slight halo effect I can see around his legs.

 

I'll see if I can bring it out.

[MattWBradbury]

This one is pretty close to yours, but with a little more back lighting.

 

 

Though I like the effect you got off of the rocks in front, so more highlights could be added to those specific groups.

 

Legs:

 

Role Model:

 

Oh man... that seems really lame.

[LeeAnderson]

Wow Matt! Between the two of us we're bound to come up with something good--I'll play around with it more tomorrow. I agree about the highlights in back, they do look better, the backlit effect was nice as well.

 

The Role Model is pure awesomeness--fix that up a little more...add a bad print shop border and there you go

Lee

[Animatorkid]

I'm a comic book nut. An you did one heck of a job on it. I am very very impressed. An more pumped about modeling.

[JohnArtbox]

Hi Lee

reduced the saturation and added bloom, grain, and some volumetric light(2d) .