Classic Superman in Flight

[system]

Hello All!

I have been working on this personal project for the past couple of months, on and off!

My goal with this project was to produce an image, and character, that would show the Superman that I wanted to see. A Superman that was truer to the original vision, that was classic and from the 1930’s or 1940’s era USA.

The colours are warm and saturated to help evoke the feeling of a golden age America and its heroes. I wanted the final image to feel like an Edward Hopper or Jack Vetriano painting. I also wanted Superman to be personable and be robust enough of character to exist in a world where he could do some of the goofy stuff like pluck a cat from a tree, or help an old lady cross the road, but that could also kick General Zod’s (Terence Stamp!) arse and have a fatal encounter with Doomsday.

In the images below Superman and The Daily Planet were rendered in Marmoset Toolbag 2.
The models were created in Maya and ZBrush, with textures done via Polypaint and Photoshop.
The clouds have been added in Photoshop.

Faster than a speeding bullet!

Foggy day in Metropolis.

Let us know what you think!

Attachments

[Jake_Rupert]

Great Renderstyle. Love it!

could you please give a quick breakdown how to achieve this with marmoset toolbag 2 please?

(is your supermanversion kind of emitting jetpower from his hands in order to enable him to fly?
kind of astroboy like idea)

[Songai]

I think you definitely achieved what you set out to do. The wide eyed optimism and idealism associated with the old Superman comics in that era is what I initially enjoyed about the character too. Great work, Jason.

[nassosa]

great style! love it!

[chief71]

Great style and render!

[aHernandez]

Wow really great work! Render look really great!

[system]

Thanks for the possitive comments chaps, I’m glad you like the images.

When you are working in relative isolation, as I am at the moment, it is sometimes tricky to keep your artistic objectivity so I am pleased that I seem to have hit somewhere near the target.

In response to your question Jake, the jets from his arms are meant to be a vapour trail of sorts. I’m not sure if this is physically correct but it felt visually correct!

I have attached some images that show how the final composite was put together and also some screen grabs from Toolbag 2 to show some of the settings that I used.

Thanks again.

[mrscott]

(is your supermanversion kind of emitting jetpower from his hands in order to enable him to fly?

I just figured they were vapor trails 'cause he’s flying so damn fast

[Jake_Rupert]

Hi Jason,

Sorry, I was kind of joking.
I took it for a vaportrail as well.

Thanks a lot for the breakdown!

[system]

Hi All,

It took a little while but I now have Wonder Woman to keep Superman company!

The character and set were modelled in Maya and then sculpted in ZBrush.

Normal maps were rendered in XNormal.

These assets were then taken into Toolbag 2 where materials were added, the scene lit and then rendered.

A little bit of post work in Photoshop and Bob’s yer uncle!

[FONT=georgia]Hope you like, thanks for your time.

J

[selahpoetic]

So, did you start from a basemesh in maya or did you dynamesh,remesh it and refined in zbrush? What was your starting point? could you provide any wip images that walk us through the process? Inspiring minds would like to know

Lastly, I loooove it. Awesome interpretation.

Thanks
selah.

[Dragon]

How the heck did I miss this AWSOME thread? Anywho, so glad I found it. Love the colours man, love the colours. The sculpts are so cool, really digging that ‘old fashioned’ feel. Great work sir. Best.

[Nolan_R]

Love the style of these pieces. Particularly like the Wonder Woman images, great forms and colours. Top work!

[nagulov]

Great style. I’m not one to usually care about superheroes, but that is some sweet retro design there. Especially Wonderwoman.

[system]

Thank you Selah and Dragon for the lovely comments.
In answer to your questions I started with zspheres to make a base mesh, sculpted this mesh and then retopologised in ZBrush and continued to refine.
Textured in ZBrush and Photoshop and finally presented in Toolbag 2.
I’m hesitant to include any WIP images as both characters went through several levels of hell before getting to this stage, which I would rather forget!
Cheers,
Jason

[selahpoetic]

Post some wip images. For me at least, I start and then I give up because I can’t stand the valley of suck. So it would be cool to see what steps you went through before your character came out as this awesomeness. Just a thought.

[Dragon]

Cool deal.

[MJGHP]

lovely works man.especially your version of superman.he’s really cool.keep it up & keep’em coming.;);)