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Ming the merciless character redesign

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#1

Ming the Merciless character redesign

[mingSSS6.jpg]

http://www.dashdotslash.net/photogallery/data/media/1/ming2-sm.jpg

Another of my film character redesigns. This time up its something a bit more complex and I’m redesigning Ming the Merciless from the ancient flash gordon movie serials. (I’m tryign to forget teh dreadful 80’s film…:o )

I’m trying to go for a less ‘cartoon evil villain’ look than the original. It’ll be a fair challenge as I also have to design , sculpt and render the clothes and enviroment for him as well.

This is just a test render and he still needs eye lashes and some serious work on the mouth. I’ve also included a slightly earlier versoi of the sculpt in Zbruhsh as well. Asymetery will be added later once I have the other bits made and posed in palce. Although to be fair this could take quite a while to do, so I’ll be doing bits on and off as I get time. :wink:

I alos realised while messing around drawing some clothes designs tongiht that ming isn’t a 100 miles away from the ‘gallifrey timelords’ from Doctor who so he may get recylced as well once finished lol.

Wayne…

#2

dreadful 80s film??? Man… thats a classic. Max Von Sydow, Brian Blessed? I love that movie. If you want to pick on Ming take a look at the awful Sci Fi channel show here in America. It really horrible, they should hire you to do a redesign for that one.

Nice start by the way… I look forward to this ones progress.

#3

I have to agree with kramskoi - I loved the Flash Gordon movie from the 80’s! Max Von Sydow was a great Ming The Merciless. Bought the DVD. Sure, not everyone got it, but it’s a cult classic now. In fact, it was the movie that inspired Comic Book Legend, Alex Ross to get into comics. That alone makes it a worthwhile movie. The Sci-Fi Channel rendition has to be the absolute worst version of Flash Gordon ever. Not even remotely like the original - just terrible.

#4

dreadful 80s film

Whoa, whoa, WHOA! Stop right there! that movie is one of my all time favs!

At any rate, I’m looking forward to seeign what you come up with. The Von Sydow’s Ming is going to be hard to top, IMHO. :wink:

#5

[headtest-sm_col.jpg](javascript:zb_insimg(‘83122’,‘headtest-sm_col.jpg’,1,0))

This one sort of got mothballed for a while due to having to clear some time for work for clients. As I needed somthing to test out some of the production shaders in mental ray I dragged out again. I can’t take any credit for the BG (as I’ve STILL not gotten around to buying a damn gazing ball to take my own HDRI lol)

I’ll keep nibbling away at this one as I have time over the weeks as its a scene I really want to complete.

Wayne…

#6

I love the wonders of lighting. Is it lit purely by hdri or a direct light aswell?

#7

but i think, the Shadow is to soft and not dark enough.

#8

Its lit using the productoin shaders that are hidden (as they were not tested before release) in mental ray in max 2008 and maya 2008. They basically allow you to take a image for your BG, then a image of a gazing ball in the same position (as in a HDRI…only this time only 1 exposure is taken, thus saving a whole load ot time). The it works out the lighting info.

You may well be right, a mate said he felt the same things a couple of days ago. Whether this is an inherent limitation of these shaders or just something that needs a few tweaks was one of the reasosn I did this (and other tests). My motto is find out how something works, then how it buggers stuff up, then learn how to fix it :D. So it does not appear to be a ‘out of the box’ solution without a few tweaks. Although as a rule I’d export the passes and composite anyway allowing me futher levels of control anyway.

I’d be interested if any other users feel its incorrectly making shadows a bit too light a well.

Wayne…