This series of movies will show how a simple base mesh can form the starting point for a detailed and fully textured female warrior complete with clothing and armor. The tutorial will begin with some introductory lessons in ZBrush and cover some of the key techniques and methods necessary to follow the lessons on offer, before moving on to sculpting the general anatomy. From here you will be guided through the process of building the various armor components and items of clothing. The actual anatomy will be sculpted in ZBrush with 3ds Max being used to create the armor pieces and handle the UVW mapping. You will then be shown how to import these elements back into ZBrush for further refinement and detailing.

There is also a comprehensive section dedicated to texturing which will explain how texture maps can be built from photo references as well as within ZBrush, before the training concludes with a section on posing the character in ZBrush. Although much of the character utilizes handmade texture maps, much of the armor/clothing incorporates Max’s mental ray materials for the final effect which will be incompatible with other 3D packages. However these materials can be substituted for similar ones in other programs.

The series incorporates over six hours of movie footage with nearly four hours dedicated to ZBrush techniques and the remaining time divided between Photoshop and 3ds Max. This training is aimed at people who are new to ZBrush and wish to learn about character creation and although 3dsMax is used as a tool in creating parts of the geometry and some of the materials, the techniques could be applied universally across numerous 3D packages.