Skip to main content

My First Anthropomorphic Character with Reallusion's Character Creator 3 (Pipeline) & Reviving My TETAnimations YouTube Channel

Skateboarding Cage Monster - Heelflip.

Reallusion's Character Creator 3 is a pretty incredible application for creating any kind of human digital 3D character quickly. Its power comes from the way it can totally deform a standard human base template character into a seemingly infinite number of body types and shapes.

While I wouldn't recommended it as a your only 3D character sculpting tool, it is very powerful with just how much you can edit a character's form at the vertex/mesh level.

I've experimented a little with CC3's Edit mesh functions, mostly using it to hide areas of an object I don't want seen. Bat Storm's cape is a good example where I used the ability to hide vertices to completely remove the assassin's hood from the neckline up.

Just on a whim I wondered if I could create my Cage Monster character entirely in CC3 (with exception to his skin textures which I edited in Krita). The character is basically a stylised human body with a monster head. Anthropomorphic, if you consider the monster to be some kind of animal creature.

Reviving My TET Animations Channel & Creating a Monster

Cage Monster, Cartoon Animator 4 Version.
Cage Monster, Cartoon Animator 4 Version.
My TET Animations YouTube Channel is where I post my completed animations, which is very infrequent these days. It's a channel that I would like to make more content for, in particular to support some of the articles I write for this blog, such as my software reviews, tutorials, hints and tips, as well as my finished animations.

In the video below I discuss my ideas for the channel and ask you, the viewer (and you the reader of this blog), what kind of animation and video related topics you'd like me to focus on. 

At the same time, from about the 5:03 minute mark, you can watch me talk about, and work on, my Cage Monster Character in CC3.


I won't go on too much about my thoughts on reviving the channel but if you do have any suggestions of topics you'd like me to cover both on the channel and in this blog (especially if you decided to subscribe to this blog) please let me know in the comments below.

The sculpt for my Cage Monster started with a character morph called Jimmy, from Cgartifex, which I dressed in some appropriate clothes from various iClone packs (I think the shoes, hat, and fringe are also by Cgartifex).

Most of the head sculpt was done simply by adjusting various face sliders, and baking the mesh a couple of times so I could exaggerate the features more.

The nose was the only part that I literally edited the mesh directly since the character's nose isn't anything you would see on a human.

I did scale the head smaller than I initially made it. I also made the hands, legs, and feet slightly larger. I didn't go for the oversize feet of the 2D version because it would make it harder to animate the character doing complex skateboard tricks with bigger feet.

As previously mentioned the face texture was created in Krita, with a bit of trial and error to get all the features placed right. Though it helped greatly that I simply drew on top of the original human face texture.

Finally the character's fringe is an existing toon fringe prop that I used the edit mesh feature to hide strands that I didn't want, and to resize and move the three that I did. The fringe texture I also recolored and added white highlights.

The various stages of developing my Cage Monster as a 3D character.
The various stages of developing my Cage Monster as a 3D character.
Top left: Original Base. Middle Left: Head Sculpt.
Bottom Left: Editing the Mesh. Right: Finished character.

The last thing I did was to use the Edit Mesh feature to edit the proportions of the skateboard prop. For some reason no one ever seems to draw or model a skateboard correctly if they're not a skater themselves.

The existing skateboard prop I used was excellently modelled for the trucks and wheels but then it all fell apart with the deck being too long and wide, completely flat, and had these tiny little nose and tail kicks.

My revised Skateboard.
My revised Skateboard.
I shortened it, lined up the deck edges with the wheels, added some concave, and lined up the trucks more accurately with the nose and kick tails. I didn't adjust the kicks themselves though. They weren't great but I could live with it. I finished it off with a texture graphic of one of my own skateboards.

Overall I'm happy with the final character's likeness to the original 2D design. There is definitely room to refine the character but as a first attempt it does show just how far away from a human face you can get with CC3.

If you are interested in Reallusion's Character Creator 3, the Pipeline version is a standalone software that can be used to develop characters for other platforms such as game engines and more. But you can also use it to create characters for illustration, animation, whatever you can think of really, as well.

Comments

  1. The transformation from the 2D character to 3D is very good! I noticed your Batman from a previous blog and was curious what are the steps to take a character from Muvizu into Character Creator and even tweak the character?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks for your comment. I'm not sure if you can actually export a character from Muvizu into Character Creator? My Batman/Bat Storm character was made entirely from body morphs within Character Creator (Specifically body morphs by Tokomotion). I didn't use any exported character from Muvizu.

      The only item shared with my Muvizu character was the custom ears I created and imported into Muvizu and Character creator as an FBX file.

      Delete

Post a Comment

This blog is monitored by a real human. Generic or unrelated spam comments with links to sites of dubious relativity may be DELETED.

I welcome, read, and respond to genuine comments relating to each post. If your comment isn't that save me some time by not posting it.

Popular posts from this blog

Inochi2D - Free Open Source 2D VTuber Avatar Rigging and Puppeteering Software (Part 1)

Inochi2D Creator - Free Open Source VTuber Software. If you've been looking for a way to live perform as a 2D cartoon avatar on camera, whether it be for a live stream or for pre-recorded content like educational videos, then VTuber software is a low cost (or even no cost) option worth looking into. In my previous post, How to Become a VTuber - 2D and 3D Software for Creating and Controlling Your Avatar , I took a brief look at the relatively new but completely free and open source Inochi2D  which I thought showed great potential for my own needs of creating a live performance character rig for my own TET Avatar that I use for all my promotional materials. While it is possible to live perform my character using Cartoon Animator itself, Reallusion's MotionLive2D capture system isn't great - with lip sync in particular. More importantly though, I can't exactly teach people how to use Cartoon Animator if I'm using Cartoon Animator to control my Avatar. What is Inochi2D

Moho 14 Released - Still the Best 2D Animation Software for Indy Animators on a Budget

Moho 14 Released. Regular readers know I am a Reallusion, Cartoon Animator advocate through and through. Hands down I would recommend Cartoon Animator 5 first over Lost Marble's Moho 14 to anyone who is just starting in 2D animation, is a team of one, or just needs to animate as quickly as possible. However, feature for feature, Moho is, arguably, the best 2D animation software for the rest of us who can't justify a Toon Boom Harmony , or Adobe Creative Cloud subscription (and even with their applications Moho is very competitive on features). You can get started with Moho Debut for just USD$59.99 which is a cut down version of Moho Pro but it still has the most essential features needed for 2D animation. While Moho Pro is a whopping USD$399.99 (Cartoon Animator, which only has one version, is just USD$149.00) upgrades to new version numbers come down to a quarter of the price at USD$99.00. Even though Reallusion just released features like Motion Pilot Puppet Animation and

Wonder Unit Storyboarder - Free Storyboarding Software for People Who Can (or Can't) Draw

Wonder Unit Storyboarder.  As an independent and solo animator I'm always tempted to try and skip storyboarding my animated shorts because they're usually only single scene sketch comedy type jokes. As a result I have many unfinished projects that kind of petered out due to having no clear finishing line. Storyboarding your productions, no matter how small, gives you a step by step guide of every shot that needs to be completed (no planning shots as you animate). It also allows you to create an animatic that gives you a rough preview of the finished production. In short, you shouldn't skip storyboards as they, generally, increase the chance of the project being completed. Disclaimer - I'm Not a Fan of Storyboarder Upfront, Wonder Unit's Storyboarder  is not my preferred storyboarding software. However it's completely free, has a number of very compelling featu

The Ultimate Independent Animator's App and Resource List 2019-2023 - Animation and Video Life

Image created with Cartoon Animator 4. Being an independent animator is not like a studio animation job. There's so much more to do that is indirectly related to the actual task of animating. Over the years I've sought out many apps, tools, and services that can help me achieve that one single task, expressing myself through animation. Below is my Ultimate Independent Animator's Resource List for 2019-2022. It started out as a list of free or low cost apps that could help you in every stage of producing either 2D or 3D animation, and then just kind of grew from there. You may not have been looking for a Time Management App as much as you needed something to get you started in 3D animation but when those commissioned projects start coming in you'll have a head start on maximizing your time. All the apps and services on this list had to meet two main criteria: They had to be useful and relevant to an Indy Animator/artist. The base app/service had to be US$

Artbreeder - Using AI created Character and Background Content in your Animations

A selection of User/AI generated images from Artbreeder. If you're looking for an endless supply of 2D character and background images for your animations then Artbreeder , an online Artificial Intelligence (AI) that generates image mash-ups you can tweak as much as you like, could be the ultimate content library. What is Artbreeder? Artbreeder is free to use though there are various paid plans, that give you additional features, such as higher resolution download images or more settings to play with. All images created on the site are Public Domain (CC0 License) and can be used in commercial projects. Using Artbreeder's online app you can generate head shot portraits, full body characters, landscapes, and other scenes simply by choosing two or more existing images to mash together then, using a series of sliders, to select which traits from each image you wish to lean toward in the final image. Photo Comparison - Top is my original uploaded photo. Bottom is Artbreeder's ap

2D Animation Side Hustle - Deciding What to Sell in the Reallusion 2D Marketplace, Your USP, and Keeping Customers Coming Back

I n part three of my 2D Animation Side Hustle series on selling in the Reallusion 2D Marketplace I look at deciding what to sell, your unique selling proposition (USP), and look at a key strategy to keep people coming back to your store. If you missed part one on  Starting Your Side Hustle  and whether you can earn real money, or part two on  Niches and how to find ones in demand , I highly recommend you read them for a more complete picture of selling in the Reallusion 2D Marketplace. Deciding What To Sell The Reallusion 2D Marketplace is divided into four broad categories; Actors, Scenes, Motions, and Special FX. Each of these are also divided into further sub categories. Interestingly in the Marketplace Menu it lists how many items are available for each category, making it easy to see which may be under served and could present an opportunity. Reallusion 2D Marketplace Category Menu shows how many items are available in each category and could be a clue to what is being under serv

Can You Learn Reallusion's Cartoon Animator 5 for Free Using Their 137 Official YouTube Video Tutorials Sorted Into a Logical Learning Order?

Or you could just buy The Lazy Animator Beginner's Guide to Cartoon Animator . While Reallusion's Cartoon Animator is one of the easiest 2D animation studios to get up and running with quickly, learning it from all of the official, free, video tutorials can be more overwhelming than helpful. With more than 137 videos totaling more than 28 and a half hours of tutorials, spread across three generations of the software (Cartoon Animator 3 through 5) it's hard to know if what you're learning is a current or legacy feature that you either need to know or can be skipped. Many of the official tutorials only teach specific features of the software and don't relate at all to previous or later tutorials. As a result there are many features either not mentioned or are hard to find. To make your learning easier, on this page, I've collected together all of the essential, official, free video tutorials and sorted them into a learning order that makes sense. Simply start at