First character - Help please!

[david-nunez--3]

Well hello there! Allow me to start my story.

You see, i've had this characters in my head since before i started taking maya classes here in my country, and now that i am capable of doing so, i'm having quite a bit of trouble making things do what i want them to do.

First of all, this is my character:

http://i50.photobucket.com/albums/f313/Rawforce29/Roz\_Fulldressed.jpg?t=1251814515

http://i50.photobucket.com/albums/f313/Rawforce29/2-bocetocara.jpg?t=1251814583

Then the modeling process went very well, it started looking like this:

http://fc08.deviantart.com/fs48/f/2009/230/1/1/3d\_Character\_\_\_Draft\_1\_by\_Rawforce29.jpg

http://fc00.deviantart.com/fs47/f/2009/230/1/3/3d\_Character\_\_\_Draft\_2\_by\_Rawforce29.jpg

http://fc06.deviantart.com/fs47/i/2009/230/6/a/3d\_Character\_\_\_Draft\_3\_by\_Rawforce29.jpg
His face has been modified a lot to make it look much better, this are just some snapshots from the begginning.

http://fc09.deviantart.com/fs48/i/2009/230/8/e/3d\_Character\_\_\_Draft\_4\_by\_Rawforce29.jpg

the Armor Test:
http://fc04.deviantart.com/fs46/f/2009/233/7/e/armor\_test\_by\_Rawforce29.jpg

And finally the hair was looking like this:
http://i50.photobucket.com/albums/f313/Rawforce29/hair\_final.jpg

Now my problem is as follows:

I am having a terrible time rigging this character since i didn't have a good integration between maya and zbrush, and now, im dealing with a high polygon model that's hard to edit directly from maya. So i was wondering, is it possible to rig the low poly one, edit all the weighting from the elbows, knees, neck, etc, and then unbind it, keeping the history and binding the high poly one?

Another thing is, How can i make the Armor move directly WITH the rigged model? since the armor parts are set separetely from the character. I want the glove to move according to the rigged hand... and the shoulder pads to move when he lowers and raises his arms... and his boots to move when he moves his legs. How can i achieve this?

[jesus-bacca]

Jejeje, sounds like a lot of trouble uh?
Ok, first of all congrats for your effort. I'll try to be as clear as possible.
It is a good practice to start out with a fairly low model that has enough topology in those areas where the joints rotates, like elbows, hips, ankles etc... I would say a 3000 to 4000 polygons will be good enough.
don't worry about the armor yet, make sure the topology flows smoothly all over the shape, I saw a few mayor problems of proportions in your character, please get a human anatomy book and trace the shape of the hole character back again.
If you think that's too much work lost, then my friend, this field it is not for you.
Lesson #1: plan your models first, when you are 1000% sure the topology goes along with character set up then is time for ZBrush.
2. Plan your deformations for animation.
Rigging a character is one of the more fun things to do if you know where you are going, the key is not to be worry about your polygon flow at ALLLLLL. you are rigging! not modeling at that time.
3. test the rigg part, by part the go for the next one, remember this is your first character; It will be painfull, but there's a purpose!
get to know what your character are going to do, how much control you need from it. The rigg is the core of the animation, a bad rigg can mess up with you for hours before to kill the hole project. Find out what you want your character to do.
To walk, to Jump, to run, to do acrobatics? I don't know. Start with a simple ik system that help you to understand the system and how it works, then you go for the sweetness of switches, and funky riggs.
Don't bother for now to try to make the low poly to drive the high poly char. it is too painfull for you. Learn the basis first!
Do a simple test with ik driving the low poly, and make sure you take that guy back to modeling again. The deformations will not be acurate.

Better honesty than sadness!!!
Ayhorya.

[david-nunez--3]

Thanks! Suenas como si hablaras español eh? de donde eres?

Where did u see the human problems in proportions? in the 2d design or the 3d model? cuz if its the 3d model, then im guessing u saw the legs, but its alrite, since the legs are gonna be covered in armor so it can be easily fixed directly from zbrush. Besides this character is not intended to be Anatomically correct... i was trying to keep an anime-ish feel to it.

All i want to do with THIS character, is just pose him, and take 1 or 2 renders...thats it....im not planning on animation right now....

its horrible i feel so stuck... i wish there was a way or even more time to complete this personal project.