DF-21 Forums

[The MAZZTer]

Actually the Dark Forces WAXs were created from 3D renders. At least the stormtroopers were.

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[Patrick Haslow]

Yes, but they clearly had a lot of pixel overpaint, and I am sure a Q3 style model has very little in common visually with those used for DF. If you render out a model to a 60 pixel high image, its going to look weird without going in and re-creating detail in image editing software.

[waxonator]

Most of the sprites were hand-drawn. I think that element should be kept.

[Tsophika]

Most character WAXs (possibly excluding Sewerbug) were fairly simple models that hold up pretty well to the low resolution. 2D was used to add color and effects, like the Phase 1's glowing eyes, the Officer's laser blast to the chest and the Phase 3's rocket launchers. As Patrick commented, I can see areas (like the stormtrooper's shoulder seam) where contrast may have been tweaked to further the detail. Boba Fett is inconsistent in his coloring and has a blue outline due to saturation being ramped up at some point. To illustrate:

[Tsophika]

I did find time over the weekend to start my Katarn model. My goal is to create a realistic interpretation while staying true to the original artwork. Here is the facial rough:

[Gez]

I think the lower jaw and chin need to be a bit smaller. Kyle has a triangular face.

[Barry Brien]

I think it's perfect. Great work.

[Patrick Haslow]

Nice work. It looks like Kyle, but he looks like he has aged about 20 years. Might want to give him a bit of a facelift and smooth out some of those more pronounced wrinkles.

[Barry Brien]

I don't know about that. He doesn't seem to have any wrinkles that aren't on the original artwork.
I'm glad to see the proportions of his ridiculously big body have been fixed as well.
Actually, what age is Kyle meant to be in DF? I always assumed he was mid 30s, roughly the same age has Han Solo.

[Patrick Haslow]

Haha, well I am 37 and I hope I don't look that aged!

The thing about that original artwork is that it was altered with a 256 color palette, and as a result some details appear harsher than they are. Also it was obviously not created with much reliance on photo reference, so as a result it has some inaccuracies. Tsophika has picked up on this too (note the difference in the amount of space between the right eye and the ear). Other areas I think are too pronounced, like the wrinkle from the right corner of the mouth to the side of the nose.

Don't get me wrong, its a nice piece of modeling for sure, and I doubt any of it will matter when reduced down to the resolution of a WAX!

[Barry Brien]

So will the cutscenes be getting an overhall as well?

[sheepandshepherd]

Nice work, this is pretty awesome for an early draft. I agree that his face should be a little more triangular though - the forehead does seem a bit too high as well.
As far as the aging - most of it looks about accurate. The only thing I'd change is the cheeks. They look more weathered than in the screenshot, probably due to the 256-color shading.
You might also want to change the eyes - they look squished in.

[Tsophika]

[Barry Brien]

So did you make this from scratch, or work off a template? What program did you use? I'd love to give it a try some time.

[The MAZZTer]

[Tsophika]

I model from scratch. This involves first creating a lower-rez base mesh in Maya. That's imported to Zbrush where I sculpt in higher subdivisions with a Wacom tablet. The final high-rez Zbrush model is exported as a displacement map and applied back in Maya, where the rigging, skinning, shading, animation and rendering is done.

Zbrush is a fantastic tool which is now integrated into ILM's production pipeline. It really offers something different from polygonal or spline-based modeling, and it's very intuitive if you've ever done traditional clay sculpting.

BTW, here's a VERY old animation I did with someone's else's model. This is maybe 5-6 years old.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EiXpGnGvxWI

[tnoyce]

Nice work.

I wish I had the aptitude for doing graphics like this.

I'm lucky these days if I can draw a stick figure..

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Tim Noyce

[Barry Brien]

Thats amazing.

[Tsophika]

Refined quite a bit. Hair detail and bangs will come later in the form of alpha maps.

[Emon]

WOW, fantastic! You should think about porting it to Jedi Knight, too. Shred18 in the JK community knows a thing or two about that. Not too hard with the 3DO export script for 3dsmax.

[Barry Brien]

Astounding work. I am so bowled over by that. Wow!

[waxonator]

This is great stuff you guys. I hope, eventually, all the cutscenes would be redone with high quality models.

[Weregoose]

Let me just toss this word out here: "résumé"

[lucius]

Excellent work! I look forward to seeing the results.

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[waxonator]

Why not use the live-action Kyle as reference instead of old man vanilla Kyle?

[klasodeth]

Because this isn't Jedi Knight.

Seriously though, I'd want any new assets to match the flavor of the original game, so I like the fact that Tsophika is basing his work off the Dark Forces Kyle. Of course, it doesn't help that I feel Jedi Knight was a step in the wrong direction. I always thought of Kyle Katarn as being somewhat reminiscent of Han Solo, so I didn't like LucasArts' decision to make him force sensitive. I think they should have created a completely different character for that purpose.

[waxonator]

This isn't about DF vs JK. I'm talking about facial structure, using a real person as reference. He can keep the same expression, hairstyle, ect.

[klasodeth]

[waxonator]

The Jedi Outcast Kyle is based off the Jedi Knight Kyle. The Dark Forces Kyle sticks out like a sore thumb. Continuity anyone?

[Weregoose]

If someone were to do an up-to-date version of Dr. No, do you think he would fire Sean Connery and replace him with Daniel Craig?

Anyway, we have somewhat of a look-alike in Jacques Brel. If we could get a head-on view of Katarn, it might help with the search.