Knights (updated link)

Started by Hannes, May 08, 2014, 01:26:38 AM

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Hannes

Someone recently asked for some medieval characters. Here are six fighting knights of the high middle ages. (75MB!)
https://www.dropbox.com/s/5wx1obfqcx0k4mu/Knights.7z
Edit: link updated. The comments below refer to the old link.

I started with a male nude base mesh created by Nick Zuccarello
( http://www.digital3dmodels.com/nick-zuccarello/ )
who generously gave me the permission to share the final models here.
I had to remove the genitals (poor guy!) and simplified the feet. I rigged and skinned the character and created the chainmail coiffe, helmets, belts, the spores and some weapons and shields.

I then loaded a sword fight motion file, which looked quite nice and only lasts for a few seconds, but it was enough to extract some nice and dynamic poses.

The tunics and the lower part of the hauberk (a long sleeved chainmail shirt that reaches almost down to the knees) were made by running a cloth simulation and were then converted into editable meshes.
They are separate objects (!!!) that fit perfectly to the according knight. Thus you are able to use TG's colour variation feature to get some more variety in populations.
Use the exact same settings for the tunics like those for the knights (don't forget the seed!) if you are creating a population.

The models are far away from perfect. Since I don't have that much experience in rigging and skinning, some parts are a bit overstretched in some places, but it's not too obvious if you don't get too close with the camera.

I created the chainmail textures by digitally weaving rings in 3ds max. I rendered some depth maps and a diffuse map out of that pattern, and the rest was done in TG.

The tunics' textures (not the tunics themselves!) are completely exchangeable. They have all the same size, so you can add some more variation by using the same knights with different tunic colours. Just copy the contents of one tunic's part shader, paste it into another tunic's part shader and delete the old contents.
It was great fun to work out all the details like seams, dirt, blood and so forth.
The face textures can be swapped as well. I didn't spend too much time (actually NO time) in refining the texture outside of the face itself, since the rest is covered by the coiffe.
One of the faces is mine. You may know the others too ;-)

Be aware that the intensity of the bumpmaps are set for a model size of 1.0 which should be approximately the correct human size. If you scale the knights up or down you'll have to adjust these settings accordingly.

All the textures are either made by myself or made of free images from the web. As I said Nick gave me the permission to use his base mesh to create the knights and share these.
So you may use the models as you like. If you are going to show your images using these models anywhere else than here I'd be glad if you'd mention my name.

Let's see some nice medieval scenes now!

By the way, I'd like to create some horse riders as well. Does anyone have or know about some good and free (galloping) horse models?

kaedorg

Thanks for sharing Hannes. Very generous. It should inspire some epic fights.

Here is a link for some horses (not sure they are good enough)

http://www.planit3d.com/source/poser/p_morphs.html

and some textures here

http://www.lynescreations.com/lynefree26.htm

David

N-drju

By golly, I can't tell which one's you. Second left? :D

That's some very nice work Hannes. It's great that you had a possibility to share it! Thank you.

Yeah... unfortunately all my male models need to be castrated too. ;D
"This year - a factory of semiconductors. Next year - a factory of whole conductors!"

Dune

Thanks for your generosity, Hannes, but that's an awful site. All I can find is some small knights.7z.exe, which I don't trust. And a lot of ads junk.

yossam

My malware software blocks the site.  :o

Hannes

Thanks guys.
Oh boy, this site is indeed really awful. I just found it this morning just to share the knights. Ulco, I just tried it. It works. It takes a while until you find the right button, but it's the "knights.7z" file (75MB). 7z is another compression format.
Anyway what's the best file sharing site? I could upload it there and update the download link.

Dune

Dropbox, I'd say.

Hannes

#7
OK, Dropbox:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/5wx1obfqcx0k4mu/Knights.7z

(Same link as the updated one in the first post)

Please tell me if it's not working.

archonforest

Works...pulling it now... ;)
Thx a lot :)
Dell T5500 with Dual Hexa Xeon CPU 3Ghz, 32Gb ram, GTX 1080
Amiga 1200 8Mb ram, 8Gb ssd

bobbystahr

First link worked for me...thanks Hannes....
something borrowed,
something Blue.
Ring out the Old.
Bring in the New
Bobby Stahr, Paracosmologist

archonforest

Off topic:
That is a very cool picture bobby! ;)
Dell T5500 with Dual Hexa Xeon CPU 3Ghz, 32Gb ram, GTX 1080
Amiga 1200 8Mb ram, 8Gb ssd

Kadri


Haven't looked at the objects but in the render they look quite nice Hannes.
Thanks :)

Hannes

By the way, I'm the one with the blue tunic and the shield. ;)

Kadri

#13

Hannes not sure about the legal aspect but have a look here for the free ? (galloping) horse models:
http://people.csail.mit.edu/sumner/research/deftransfer/data.html#credit

Hannes

Thanks a lot, Kadri! Not sure about the legal stuff as well, but I'll have a look at it. The one horse file is an object sequence, so there could be an animated horse riding through a TG scene! ;)