Oh no, I'm having second thoughts.

Knowing that I'll need to figure out animated 2D textures for the face of this model later on, I watched this video and the creator's next two videos in the series. She works in Blender but watching her process of modelling, rigging, animating and texturing was still really helpful to me. Unfortunately it's also made me not really like how my model is looking. 

Her cutesy, chibi-like style really works nicely with the low-poly modelling. She's actually also more liberal in her poly count than I've been, making me think I should probably up my poly count, especially given that my model will probably be more complex than hers. I don't really want to backtrack again... but I also don't want to follow through with a project I'm not happy with and possibly give myself problems later on (with regards to the low poly count potentially creating issues with animating).

I'm considering attempting again to simplify the character style - utilising noodle arms or really pushing it towards more chibi proportions - to avoid the uncanny valley that I feel like my model is risking falling into. It may actually be a better idea to lean more realistic though. I'm much more comfortable working with realistic proportions in my 2D character art and so it makes sense that this would translate in my 3D work. Perhaps tasking myself with a big new project, working in a style that I'm not entirely comfortable with, and speeding through the style definition stage was a bad idea... 

I think another factor in my uncertainty with this design is that I haven't modelled hair or clothes onto it yet. This would definitely give me a better idea of how the character style is working.

This next week or so, I may (if I find the time) step back and rethink the character style. I'll look at some different, more high poly and realistically proportioned character models that I like. I'll also try to draw some outfits and hair on screenshots of my existing model to see how that looks.

ARGH !

I guess this was a lesson in knowing my strengths and weaknesses, as well as better defining style. I am still feeling okay with how this project is going. I'm still fairly confident that I can accomplish the minimum that I wanted finished by the end of summer - have it animated. Depending on how much I redesign things, I'll probably just need to re-rig the whole thing. Following the steps I've learnt in the past few weeks, I should be able to get this done within a week. 

In the video linked at the top, she makes the human rig from scratch, whereas I was using Maya's Quick Rig function. I'm unsure of whether I should try making the rig from scratch or not. I'm thinking that for this project, I can probably stick to using the Quick Rig, otherwise I'm worried that I won't be able to get to the animating stage. I will almost definitely get practice in rigging from creating and rigging hair, and accessories with moving parts (once I get to making those). Hopefully rigging those will be a bit more basic than a whole human as well. Additionally, I have heard that we do some character rigging in semester 1 next year.

Also, note from the video: I should probably smooth and sharpen some edges to better define the form.