Making Whisker in Blender
I've been working on turning the Milirats characters into actual 3D models. Here's a little look at how Whisker came to life, from a blob to an actual soldier in the Muridian Army.
It's not sophisticated, whatever. I will start with a simple base model, so I can make many other models out of this.
Base model
The initial body model... It lacks a head, it lacks everything.
Every character has to start somewhere, and Whisker began as a fairly simple humanoid form. At that stage, he barely resembled anything recognizable, let alone a rat preparing for war. The idea was to get the general proportions figured out first. Arms, legs, torso, head, all the usual stuff. There's no point in worrying about the little details if the overall silhouette doesn't work. Thanks TF2.
Giving him a head (and an ear)
Now we're getting somewhere. The head is in place, and there's even an ear!
I only made a single ear at this stage because, well, most of these guys are going to wear helmets anyway. You probably won't see much of their ears during actual gameplay. So, in case we have a character that does have their ears exposed, I can just "join" them to the head. The mirror modifier is here, so it speeds things up.
But I kept it in a separate blender file. Even though I am working on Whisker first, this model is rather neutral. It's not meant to resemble any species as of now.
One of the things I'm trying to solve with Milirats is how to make the characters recognizable without making them unnecessarily complex. They need to look good from the camera angles used in the game, and their shapes must remain clearly distinguishable while the character is moving and shooting.
Uniforms, helmets and other military stuff
The uniform is on. He's beginning to resemble an actual Milirats character.
That’s where things started falling into place. I added the helmet, uniform, boots, gear, and everything else.
The design is deliberately chunky and simple because most of them will use gear anyways. I'm not trying to make a photorealistic military
Besides, I have several other characters to make. If every single soldier requires a ridiculous amount of work, I'm going to be modeling until the heat death of the universe.
Then... Blender decided that I wasn't having fun
And then Blender crashed.
I don't know what the hell happened, but the program crashed and all the progress was lost. Just great.
I was constantly spamming CTRL+S, and like, Blender crashed while I was saving, and the file was corrupted... Or so I thought.
Was it a blessing in disguise? Maybe. The model wasn't quite where I wanted it to be, and starting over gave me a chance to reconsider some things. So whatever...
Rebuilding him
Phew.
After reworking the model, I ended up with something I like. The uniform looks more striking, the equipment is properly positioned, and the overall silhouette is closer to what I had envisioned.
There are a lot of things that become more important once a character is meant to be animated and placed in an actual environment. Proportions, silhouette, how the clothes follow the body, and whether the whole thing remains readable under different lighting.
Also, his hands are done! Just the thumb and index finger. The reason is that he'll be holding a weapon most of the time (actually, all the time whatever) so there's no point in making them too detailed. You won't be able to see them up close during normal gameplay.
WELCOME TO THE MURIDIAN ARMY!!!
And there he is! Whisker, now with his face, nose, incisor, and everything.
Welcome to the Muridian Army, Whisker!
This is the version that finally feels like the character I wanted. Keeping the eyes 2D helps a lot, I wanted to model them initially but I deemed that too unnecessary.
Of course, finishing the model doesn't mean the work is over. There are still animations, poses, materials and all the other things needed to get a character working properly in game.
Whisker isn't the only rat in the Muridian army. There are more units to make, each with their own equipment and personality. If I'm going to get Milirats looking the way I want, I'll need a whole roster of these guys. Luckily, with the base model I made, I can make multiple models with different body types, proportions and even gear. As of now I have their names, we have... Whisker, Nail, Boombro, Buzzkill, Target, Ferno, Ratjack, and Flapscurry.
See ya!