Behind the Scenes: The Windrunner By Alina Khan on November 14, 2024 Behind the Scenes Discover the imagination of Andri Stefanus, an Indonesian self-taught artist, as he details the techniques of bringing a fantastic creature to life.INTRODUCTIONHi, my name is Andri Stefanus, and I'm from Indonesia. I majored in Informatic System Specific Website Application Programming, but it didn't work for me, so I decided to make a turn to become a 3D artist.I am self-taught with mixed training in 3D from YouTube channel tutorials. The majority of YouTube 3D tutorials are just basic, so I just had to explore the rest myself, and it was not a pleasant journey. I made multiple failed personal projects, but here I am, getting better and better.INSPIRATIONI want to show you how I created a 3D dragon model. I named it, The Windrunner. No doubt I'm a big fan of the HBO series Game of Thrones; thats why I was motivated and inspired to create my own dragon.Another reason to make this model is that I had an invitation from this platform to write an article about my artwork, so I enhanced it especially for this.PROCESSMy workflow requires multiple software: ZBrush Substance 3D Painter Blender 4.2 LTS Adobe Photoshop (optional for post-processing) SculptingThe first step is to do research for a basic head. I spent two days searching Google for a lizard-head shape. I just wanted to make sure that I didn't create a dragon head that already existed.So I came across this site to grab this image, and sculpt it in ZBrush, making several changes to the head including the spike and smaller eyes just like the image below. I spent my time shaping the head since a dragon is a unique creature.After I was done and satisfied with the shape of the head, I then continued with the shape of the body (keep in mind that at this point, I was still sculpting with dynamesh until I reached the ZBrush polygon limit).This is the body from the topnotice that the wing is stretched wide open. Most 3D models have a goal to be rigged, so I stretched it wide to control the spread through the rig.This is from the side.Now that I was finished with the basic shape, it was time to make inflated support scales for the chest and support spikes (non-subtool details, i.e., I made spikes and scales subtools as well as support spikes and scales to enhance the details) like the image below.I created custom brushes for the scales and spikes. I used this VDM brush to make the support scales, and dragged the stroke on the surface of the mesh just like the picture above.The same process was used to make the support spikes, which were placed on the back of the dragon like this image below.Now its time for retopology using ZRemesher. This is not a game-res model nor for the movie CGI but for portfolio purposes, so I decided to ZRemesh this. I separated the head and body because of my computer limitation; it couldnt comprehend ultra detail smoothly at 100+ million vertices, and I wanted both the head and body to have the same weight of detail. Most dragon CGI models have close shots of the head, and the head has more details that if I joined it with the body as a whole mesh, it just would not work for me because of my PCs limit to process. If my CPU (Ryzen 7 5700G) can process high poly above 100 million polys smoothly, I wouldn't have to split the head and body, but the rigging would unite them both.Here is the low-res body and head.Okay, now that I have reached the point of an established base model, its time to make details, like claws, scales, spikes, teeth, tongue, eye, gum, and fins.I created 30 subtools for this model to support the details I mentioned above. Have a look at the GIF image below; you'll see that there are so many supporting meshes, like the neck dense with spikes, a fin on the back, and other spikes on the thighs and buttocks. If you notice the end of the neck close to the head, those spikes will mask the seam between the head and the neck.After I was finished with all the details, I put them all on a low-res mesh and exported all the subtools to make UV in Blender.As you can see in the image above, my model has 40 UDIM tiles because the even distribution of textures depends on the texel density. Have a look at this picture below; thats how you know if your UV is in even distribution.In the image above, the checkered texture has the same size across the entire mesh surface; this ensures that any details baked from the high-resolution mesh will be at the same resolution across 40 UV tiles.After I finished creating the UVs, its time for surface detailing. To do that, I re-imported the mesh with UVs into ZBrush and then replaced the old one with the new one that has UVs.Now, for surface detailing, I needed custom brushes. I created VDM brushes inspired by real-life lizards, crocodiles, alligators, and snakes.Same as the process with the scales in the previous explanation, I applied the drag method all over the body and head surface. Just to make sure it was in organic order, I analyzed real life animals, especially with scales like reptiles. Ill give you an example from the tail part. I replicated it like an alligator or crocodiles shape as in the image below.This is the how finished head part looks like:And the whole body:I spent more time, like two days, on surface detailing just to make sure no surface was left unsculpted.I need to tell you that the total vertice count is 254.71 Mil that's millions of total vertices for all subtools and thats how crazy I am about detail. If my PC could handle more, I would have.So, I'm done with this step. I exported both low-res and high-res, and then proceeded to the next step.TexturingThe second step is texturing using Adobe Substance 3D painter. In this step, I baked high-res mesh to low-res mesh first so that I have baked maps, which I will use for the second process when I start painting it again for more detail.I went through 2 processes; the first one is painting for the base color. Have a look at the images below.I contained a stack of multiple layers in this base color creation until I was satisfied and my PC could still handle it. I kept putting layers in the stack from painting layers to masking layers.Proceeding to the next process, I exported the base color and baked maps only, which I needed to paint extra, i.e., micro details, adjustment colors, roughness, and a masking map for the subsurface in the second process.In the second process, I created a new file, reimported low-res mesh, and baked maps, then reused the baked maps on the imported low-res, so I didnt have to rebake from high-res mesh all over again because it took almost an hour to bake it.Notice how I only have 5 baked textures and am missing world space normal and position map in the image above, because I don't need those to paint the model.So what to do with the exported base color textures? I create a new layer, then put the imported base color into the base color slot in that layer, just like this image below.Then I put the layer at the very bottom of the stack.Now I have smooth painting again with the created base color without worrying about lag in the first process that my PC struggled to handle caused by more than 15 paint layers.Here is the complete painting in the second process.Have a look at this side by side image from the first and second processes.As you can see in the image above, the second process adds roughness and the color is more organic when micro details are added.The last one is creating the masking for the subsurface map to be used in Blender Render, with only black and white value on the surface like the mouth area and wings, as in the image below.Finally, I exported all the necessary textures with 4K resolution. Base color textures Roughness textures Alpha textures Normal map textures You are probably wondering why the mesh in the painting is posed. That is because I posed for the sake of painting. Its just menothing is wrong with texturing in the base pose, I just wanted to see how cool the model was going to be.RiggingThe third step is rigging.The end goal of this artwork is to create still images and animation. First of all, I don't claim to be a professional rigger and animator, so what you are about to see is just basic rigging to unite all 30 of the meshes.Import the low res into Blender and start spawning the first bone, and just align it with the mode. Heres several pictures of all the bones covering the meshes.After that, I did the weight painting. I will not cover the weight painting here because it was difficult workbasically, weight paint the mesh part that is aligned with the bones just like the GIF clip below:I created controllers and inverse kinematics to control the arms and legs.To test if the rig was working, I posed it like this image below.Here is the tested animation:And now that I am finished with rigging and the meshes have become fully functionable 3D models to pose or even animate, I can finally render it in any pose I want.RenderingHere are the render results that I made with Cycles render engine and HDRI included in Blender. Post-processingI gave an extra render and if you wonder how composition works or combining real captured images and CGI cycles render objects, I'll show you in brief how I did it.Here are some example pictures I downloaded from a wallpaper site through Google search to combine with the Blender render of the dragon.I posed the dragon model according to the reference images above the way I wanted it to be. Ill explain one with this reference:Analyze where the light is coming from.Then I posed the model like this.Then use the sunrise HDRI included in Blender for lighting so that it looks natural by rotating, using the world shader node map to match the direction of the light of the reference image.Then I rendered the model and noticed the result looked incomplete, even though its completed. This was because I rendered this with the holdout feature in Blender.I wanted the final image to look like the dragon was coming out of a fog or clouds, and the right arm and wings hidden behind the hill and trees. So, I used smoke textures with alpha like this as the holdout to mask the right arm and wings, which is how I created the illusion.Have a look at this image below and youll see what I'm talking about. I compiled both the pictures using Adobe Photoshop. The tricky part is to balance the color using color balance adjustment between two images without a lot of change.Here is the complete composited image in full resolution.Remember one thing that I didnt change the reference image except the color only for balancing purposes, so its basically an indestructible method to the reference image.For the rest of the images, its the same principle as shown below: And that was all! Below are the final renders, I hope you like them!RENDER: The Windrunner If you want to see how its done in a video format, here is the YouTube video:BonusThis is a simple dragon fire breath animation using particle sprite.See the full resolution video on YouTube:Thank you for reading! If you have any questions or feedback, feel free to share your thoughts.About the Artist Andri Stefanus is a 3D artist from Indonesia. Links