As part of our Patreon scheme we are bringing the feedback rounds to a Studio level. On this case we will use Chloe Roberts example, she is a student at the University of Hertfordshire. You can find her Arstation and her LinkedIn here. Model Texture and Lookdev by Adrian Teoh. This is a pretty good example of what is a daily. Normally every day we have rounds, and present the updates of the day before to the supervisor or leads so they can check the progress and guide us for future steps. We can do this daily because of the render farms, normally we adjust what they ask us to do and before end of day we sent it to the farm, then the next day we “daily it” to the review system. On this case I am using my custom review tool and shotgun pipeline for the review. The main difference will be the time that is spend on this review, normally its less per character unless its a hero character. And the only things that I am reviewing is a bit of shading and mostly groom.

Most of the problems mentioned on the video are super common. Even professionals make them. Here I will list the most common mistakes.

1.Changes on cameras from daily to daily

This is an important one, you need to set your camera on the first daily, and try to get is lock as soon as possible.  This will avoid as much as possible to have jumps, every daily needs to be compared to the daily before and for this we need stability in the information.

2.Resolution changes

Same as the camera, the resolution should not change from daily to daily. Because of the same principle

3. Model – Groom Renders

Model and groom renders are normally presented on gray materials, This because its easier to read shapes on gray values, unexpected changes on this materials can make a daily impossible to compare.

4. No adding reference to a daily * IMPORTANT *

Dailies MUST have references, and this references should be constant unless they are useless to show the progress.  Every project must start with a reference sheet to drive the style. It does not matter how high is your level or how low. Nature is the best artist. Use the corners of the video to show your dailies.

5. Videos have too many frames

yes, too many frames is a thing. Why, because render time is money. Period. Render as little frames as you need. Turntables for non hero assets can have 12 frames,  super early dailies can have 4 frames ( Front, Back and sides ) And model dailies can be Zbrush or playblast. Take this into account when building your dailies.

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This is a perfect video for a reel, but not so much for a daily because of the length and also because it has a ease in an ease out

6. Lookdev Turntables with unrelated HDRIs

When you run a turntable the basic turntable should be using an HDRI. You must have at least 3 on your library Cloudy Sunny – Sunny – Night  this will give you most scenarios. But also if your character is never at night, don’t render it at night, don not loose that precious time. Normally we present in 2 HDRIs at least when working with lookdev. Groom and Model renders are normally done using Cloudy Sunny. Before lookdev is on place. Once lookdev is on place groom will render both.

HDRI HAVEN is an amazing resource for FREE HDRIs, remember to support them on Patreon too. I use Approaching Storm as my favorite cloudy sunny.

7. GROOM ONLY  – Don’t forget your Gray Render

Once you have lookdev in place, you will have a new fancy material with textures, but do not forget your gray render, remember that we still need something to compare with. Use both renders every time you create a daily so you can see issues on the lookdev or on the groom.

This is an example of a gray render, this is the raw render with no daily building. This is an example of how a daily looks.

This is an early render of my character, Depends of the supervisor if you use a brighter or darker gray material .This depends on the type of character, always try to use mid 0.5 gray.

And this one is the last result that we got, I changed a bit the camera to have a more stable camera, remember that this is my second render, added more frames and changed the direction ( Which I am still not sure )  But you can see how the images of the details are also updated.

That’s all for today, I hope you liked the post, remember to share if you liked and to support our content on Patreon if you can.