Summer Project - Cyborg Assignment

For our summer project we were set the task of designing and modelling a cyborg character. The brief was to follow the design process to design a cyborg character of our choice and sketch out this character in multiple views including front, back and sides with proportions and create a backstory for this character. Once designed we then had to take this character forward and model this creating both a low poly and high poly version with mapping and textures and shading.

To start off the project I first looked into creating a visual board for inspiration with various cyborg and robotic images that I can use to inspire my own piece as shown below.

I then began by sketching out some rough studies from my inspiration board trying out shapes and colours to see how I can mix and match within my own design to create a realistic and aesthetically interesting piece. From my studies I noticed how a lot of the current designs for cyborgs and robots have themes behind there design and lots of lights and glowing colours which give off a futuristic type feel which I will incorporate within my own designs. I particularly like the idea of keeping my design plan with various shades of grey to give that robotic feel and then add pops of bright colour to tie in with a theme and bring the character to life.

After creating my studies I then went on to create some silhouettes to rough out my own ideas for my cyborg design. Looking between my references and pulling pieces from various pictures and combining them I firstly created my stage one of silhouettes, keeping them basic just to get quick ideas down. Once happy with my five initial silhouettes I then took my two favourites (labelled in red in stage one) into stage two, duplicated each one.  three times and then edited and worked into each duplicate, trying out various styles and details to make the silhouette more interesting and unique. Once happy again with these silhouettes I then chose my final silhouette, based on the brief of a cyborg, I felt my chosen design (the one in red under stage 2) would allow me the most freedom when working up the final design to create that part human, part robot look. I will now take this silhouette forwards and begin working it up into my final cyborg design, referring back to my initial visual board for inspiration to bring the silhouette to life.

I firstly began by blowing up my initial silhouette larger in size before working up to create a better canvas. I then began working the silhouette up by applying base colours to lay out the rough design I wanted to create referring back from my visual board and applying the grey colour scheme with pops of colour as intended. Once happy with the base colours I then began adding layers and creating details such as shadows and highlights, face details, hair details, cape details and body details, referring constantly back to my original visual board for inspiration and tips to bring my own design to life. Once happy with the overall design I found it looked a little flat so I added a background colour, grounded the character with some floor and added some basic metal and cloth textures to really liven up the design and lift it off the page. 

Overall I am mostly pleased with my silhouette as I feel the overall design and body and details work really well to create an interesting cyborg design sticking to brief of having at least 20% flesh and 20% robotic components. However I am not 100% happy with the head and hair as I feel it's a little flat compared to the rest of the design and looks off but after playing around and changing up the face and head this was the best outcome. I will now continue forwards and create the back story and details for my character and then start modelling my low poly and high poly model and if I have time I may return to this design and continue to play around with the head and hair until I am happy with the overall design.