NEXT-GEN Nescot Year 3 HND - Creation of a Character (Skeleton Figurine Model/Board Game Figurine) Design Requirements/ 3D Character artist and insperation

During this project, where we would be 3D printing our models, there were many restrictions that we had to abide by.

The purpose of why we needed to 3D print these models was because we were required to create a character that could be used in a boardgame, aka, a figurine.


However, before beginning to model, I drew an image of a skeleton that I used as both a piece of concept art and as directions for how I would pose and create the model. I also took lots of inspiration from 'Warhammer' models such as the "skeleton warriors".

Another part of my inspiration was a 3D artist named 'Dmitry Parkin' who has worked on many different games, for example: 'Metro Exodus' and creates many different beasts, monsters and undead creatures such as zombies and skeletons.

His work is incredibly detailed in both design, modelling and texture. Using a multitude of different softwares including (but not limited to) Maya, Zbrush, Substance Painter, Softimage, 3DCoat, Photoshop and Mol3D. He creates a basic shape of the character in a modelling software such as Maya before then using a mix of sculpting applications to sculpt the finer details like skin, armour affects and even in some cases hair, as seen in his 'Orc Gladiator Timelapse' video.

I was inspired by his work on an undead soldier, covered in armour, appearing old and shriviled (almost bone), giving me the idea to create a skeletal soldier for my figurine.

During the model's creation, we were told to use the 'Sandstone' printing material which needed joints and small parts to be at least "2mm (supported) and 3mm (unsupported)" (cubed) in size and was required to be textured as a model and optionally as a figurine. However, due to the high amount of detail on my model I could use the 'Plastic' printing material which enabled parts to be at least "0.3mm (supported) and 0.6mm (unsupported)" (cubed) in size, allowing for much more detail at the cost of losing the ability to print with textures.

Alongside this, we were given a height restriction for our models. This height restriction was "75mm", because we were creating smaller models rather than larger models, due to the size of the 3D printer. It led to many of the aforementioned restrictions becoming a hinderance during the modelling process. It caused me to need to recreate or edit many parts of the model.

Therefore, because of these restrictions, I needed to re-create many parts of my model after the initial version was finished. I did this because the ribcage and other parts of the model were too thin and needed to be scaled appropriately. Ultimately, my final design differed from my first due to the changes that I made by filling the gaps in both the ribcage and pelvis and the addition of clothing over most of the ribcage.