The Gnomon Workshop

Introduction to Character Modeling

with Mark Dedecker

Description

In this title, Mark Dedecker guides you through the initial stages of establishing an organized pipeline for modeling and sculpting a Next-Gen or Film character. Mark starts with a deceptively simple concept design and then guides you through the process of blocking out and understanding the technical and artistic needs for realizing this character. From there, he rough sculpts in ZBrush and brings back and forth into Maya, comparing and interchanging them. Special attention is paid to creating realistic forms and silhouettes and how to take them from an "ugly" rough to a nice piece ready for the next stages of re-surfacing UVs and so on.

Duration: 234 minutes

Format: SD 1024x768

Chapter List

Software Used

IMAGE GALLERY

Image Gallery

Personal Website

Mark Dedecker

Asset lead at Deluxe Entertainment

Mark Dedecker has worked as the lead character artist at Gentle Giant Studios and Ignition Entertainment, specializing in high and low resolution modeling and texturing for film and game characters. Currently a freelance character artist and Gnomon School instructor, Mark has worked on numerous films, games and collectibles. Some of Mark's work can be seen in Golden Axe, Iron Man, Species: The Awakening; and his digital double work has been on films such as The Hulk, 10,000 BC andThe Watchmen. Mark's bust of Spiderman 3's "Venom" was featured on the June 2007 cover of Toy Fare magazine. Mark graduated from Gnomon School of Visual Effects in 2006.

"I had the good luck to work with Mark Dedecker professionally for three years when we were both with Gentle Giant Studios. Mark is a great artist who brings so much character to all his sculpts. I am always thrilled by the sense of life and personality in each of his works. Mark is one of those digital sculptors who is just as happy sculpting the flexed heroic figure as the beautiful subtleties of the aged or corpulent form. His abilities to communicate humor and persona in a variety of different physiques was always fun to see. Mark is also gifted with the ability to break down and understand the sometimes highly technical process of bringing a character from sculpture into a game. Never losing sight of the art Mark always seems to bring the highest quality to each project we undertook. Mark was always able to seamlessly move from sculpting a lifelike dynamic character, to creating highly detailed costume and weapons, to taking all those beautiful assets and making them work inside someone else's engine. I'm happy to have had the chance to work with Mark and I am excite for those who now have the chance to learn from his unique and powerful techniques."
- Scott Spencer
Creature Designer - Weta Workshop