[FINAL, FINAL] CLASS ANNOUNCEMENT #7 (Apr 11, 2018): Thanks to those of you who have responded to the Questionnaire. The feedback is extremely helpful. If you haven't responded yet and you participated in the class - or even if you didn't participate - please fill that out and I will gift you 20 Breath of the Wild screenshots from my Switch.
[FINAL] CLASS ANNOUNCEMENT #6 (Apr 9, 2018): We've reached the end of the homework extension period and this class officially comes to end. What a month! It's been a thrill to see each of you forge your characters, learn new things, share tips with each other, and offer critiques along the way.
This thread will be open indefinitely but it's officially at the end of it's "class lifespan" meaning I won't be able to commit weekly time to it anymore and I will unpin it from the forum topics list. I'll pop in occasionally if I see activity but you all are more than welcome to keep working on their characters here if you wish!
UPDATE: Closing post on page 44 and XP has been added to each participating account.
CLASS ANNOUNCEMENT #5 (Mar 28, 2018): Week 4's stream is archived and available via the Past Events button on the Live Event page. Also a reminder that I'm extending the 'deadline' of this month and will be keeping this thread alive through the end of the first week in April. Hopefully that gives you all a bit more time to get your characters done!
CLASS ANNOUNCEMENT #4 (Mar 26, 2018): Week 3, done! Thanks to everyone who submitted by Sunday. I'm quite impressed by the neutralization and retoplogy work I've seen. It's a lot of work and I can see that effort in the WIPs and especially completed submissions.
Week 4 - the final week - dives into adding color to our model, primarily in the form of creating textures. Check out this week's breakdown a little further down in this description and see you tomorrow at the Live Event!
CLASS ANNOUNCEMENT #3 (Mar 19, 2018): Week 2 is accomplished and I'm finally caught up on submissions! Thanks to everyone who submitted by Sunday. We have some impressive character concept sculpts underway. In fact, I have yet to bestow a grade lower than an A this week.
Week 3 continues our 3-week character building production. Specifically we're going to look at pursuing an animation friendly version of our character - both how and why we would do this. See you tomorrow at the Live Event! Don't forget to RSVP.
CLASS ANNOUNCEMENT #2 (Mar 12, 2018): Week 1 is done! Thanks to everyone who submitted by Sunday. It's been a lot of fun seeing your caricature work and concept art choices.
Week 2 begins the 3-week process of building a character based on the concepts we choose. Don't forget to RSVP to the Live Event tomorrow - See you then!
CLASS ANNOUNCEMENT #1 (Mar 5, 2018): Class is in session! Today officially begins the BC2-1803 class. Please check the syllabus below for Week 1's focus and assignments. Begin watching the pre-recorded courses if you haven't already and begin looking for a cool, stylized character design for creating in 3D this month. The first Live Event is tomorrow at 2pm EST - SEE YOU THERE! 😎
Welcome to the CGCookie Class: Creating Stylized Characters with Blender! This class is designed to teach you everything you need to know about building stylized 3D characters. If you’re diligent in watching all content and hitting homework deadlines, by the end you will have a modeled and textured stylized character! It’s an intermediate-to-advanced class which means you’ll do best by having some experience with Blender and 3D modeling before committing to this class.
This is the second "Class" format where Citizen members are invited to focus together on a particular topic/skill for a month. Participation looks like this:
WHEN? The class will take place from March 5th through March 31st
Abstract: Stylization is any deviation from realism. Thus it’s a broad spectrum from slight liberty away from reality to extreme abstraction of reality. This week we're going to sift through various examples of stylized characters, noting their qualities, and categorizing a spectrum of stylization.
Goal of the Week: Train your eye and mind to stylize your perception. Practice simplifying and exaggerating reality. Loosen up your sculpting approach (gestural sculpting).
Pre-recorded course to watch: Art of Sculpting: Caricature Chapter
Week 1 Live Event (Already happened and archived!)
Homework:
Abstract: Story plays a big part in stylization. Not necessarily ‘narrative’ but background, personality, and purpose. The success of a character is strengthened by its developmental arc. The best artists create characters that are more than the sum of its pixels; more than the sum of its brush strokes and polygons; more than its final render.
Goal of the Week: Develop a story for your character; one that can fuel your creative workflow for the rest of the month. Then channel that story into the first stage of sculpting.
Pre-recorded courses to watch:
Week 2 Live Event (Don't forget to RSVP)
Homework:
Abstract: At this point a decision needs to be made about our character sculptures: A) Leave it as a sculpture or B) optimize it for ‘production’. Leaving it as a sculpture means it’s a static sculpture that can be painted, rendered, or 3D printed but not animated. Optimizing it for production means you turn your sculpture into a model that’s easiest to work with up to and including animation. If you opt for optimization, this week is mostly a technical and problem-solving task. We need to both retopologize our mesh and also neutralize it if the sculpt is posed.
Goal of the Week: Understand the concept of “production-friendly” and practice retopology.
Pre-recorded courses to watch:
Week 3 Live Event (Don't forget to RSVP)
Homework:
Abstract: Like Dorothy, our characters have so far lived in a black and white world. This week we’re leaving Kansas and adding color. There’s many methods for creating our character texture(s) including hand-painting, baking maps that accent the painting process (great for the less painterly character artists), as well as photo-sourcing. There's also a couple different formats: Vertex Colors and UV/Textures.
Goal of the Week: Get comfortable with painting textures.
Pre-recorded courses to watch:
Week 4 Live Event (Don't forget to RSVP)
Homework:
This thread is reserved for CG Cookie Citizens that are participating in the "Creating Stylized Characters with Blender" class. Its purpose is to serve as central communication for all participating Citizens (excluding Hobby plan Citizens) to ask me and each other questions and to post homework. As the instructor of the class, I will be monitoring this thread on a daily basis (especially Mon-Thurs) throughout the month of March to review homework and answer questions.
Free members are welcome to observe the thread but please respect that communication is reserved for Citizens.
I just did a render with denoising and a glossy shader, the result is beyond comparison better! I did not know about the denoiser in the render layers, thanks a lot i learnt something new :p
That is incredibly good mmalhomsi
You guys know how to do characters really well.
Good evening (at least for me), I've been trying to get my character according to the concept art, I tried it in different approaches (posed, t-posed), but I couldn't make it believable and/or according to the concept art.
I don't know what I'm doing wrong and how to fix it. Could someone help me with this?
I'm leaving a link to a google drive .rar file if you want to play with it or with the images.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/11pBz_hMOgE08ssxE7bYBO3Ds64KL_Px2/view?usp=sharing
Thanks for your attention.
Do you mean Arnold Schwarzenegger? If so, I can see some elements of general likeness. But I'm curious to see your reference imagery. The hair in particular does seem Schwarzenegger's type..Overall a pretty decent face sculpt even if the likeness isn't 100%
Wow, your character sounds quite cool! Looking forward to seeing it become blendereality.
Love this design 
silentheart00! I agree that the raven theme is very cool and present throughout - good stuff. I also really like her pose. This will work very well for the sculpt.
Hi katcap, welcome to the class! Based on my Googling, I believe this is Karel Roden. And you've done a pretty good job! Big thumbs-up on the forehead emphasis. That's definitely a distinguishing feature imo. The hair looks good too. Aside from that, his expression and facial features are somewhat generically handsome. So it's hard to caricaturize that...
The sculpt feels a little unfinished as well, with the blown out highlights hiding some areas. Despite that, I still can recognize Karel. It's a B in my book 👍
HOMEWORK WEEK 2
Meet Rusley Cypert.
Rustley grew up on a farm in the old west. As a child he worked on his hunting becoming one on the most recognizable marksman. He spent long years working in the family farm inheriting it upon the death of his Father. Rusley, who married and had 2 children, spends his time raising the livestock and protecting everything he values this family and farm.
When the sheriff was killed he stepped into the role to protect his family and land. The town elected him to protect them as they know his character and that he will not step down from a fight. He wears a family logoed eagle belt buckle to remember where he came from.
Ran out of time so posted my wip. More work needs to be done to clean up the gun, and more detail added. With the retypo phase coming up, I also didn't want to include too much detail that could be lost. Critiques are welcome.
I peeked at the images and thought "That's Lemmy" before I finished reading the description. So that's a victory!
Welcome to the class 
valandrath. You did a good job with your caricature. I'd put the exaggeration level at 20-30% beyond reality. Which has been common for other students in the class. I'd love to have seen you push for 50%+ but I still. What I think is hindering this is the super neutral face. I know Lemmy's not a tremendous emoter, but maybe a singing expression would have been easier to caricaturize.
Overall a good job though! I like the detail level and the likeness you've achieved. It's a B+ in my book 👍
It's pretty authentic to the reference toy 
csehz. The surface is a little bumpy in areas, like the rear/backside. But that should be smoothed out naturally with the retopology.
I'm digging the story as well! Thanks for sharing about your experience working on your sculpt this week 2. You've earned an A imo.
Great job with the background 
lhumungus - It sucked me in immediately. Nice job. And I'm glad to hear the class is pushing you out of your comfort zone. Some of the best learning happens there 😎
I like the dynamic pose - very strong. The only negative imo is that it's planar in a way. Like I feel like a slight gust of wind would knock her forward or backward lol. Honestly though, that's a nitpick. Your shapes are coming along quite nicely. The hair is a little undersculpted at the moment, but it's a wip after all.
Good stuff this week 👌
That background! What a glimpse into your character's mind - I loved the way his thoughts kept jumping in and out. I totally get ta feel for what this guy is like. Excellent job!
And that sculpt! Love the details. You've really taken the time to flesh out this concept sculpt thoroughly. Excellent, excellent job. A+
OH and does this character have a name??
mmalhomsi........................impeccable concept sculpt. Absolutely lovely. A++
Unfortunately I had a hard drive crash on Wednesday and couldn't get a replacement until today. I keep my saved projects on OneDrive, so I didn't lose the work that was done so far - but the sculpt will not be finished until tomorrow at the earliest. Before next week's livestream at any rate. I'll submit it when it's done, but late is late so if it doesn't get a grade that's okay.
