Returning to 3ds max few issues with basic character modeling.

[Anonymous]

Hi

Long story short it's been about 8 or 9 years since i've used 3ds max for anything other than messing around.

I want to get back into the swing of things but tutorials that focus on the way you work out how to progress with the mesh don't seem to exist as far as i can see. There's millions of 'im making this model follow along' But not really any 'here's how i would go about making this shape or here's how i would start off my mesh knowing i need to cut in arms here' and so on.

I found this blueprint of a cartoon bear online and have been following along with a few YouTube videos however the issue i feel im having the most other than just relearning max entirely is that when im trying to create arms for any type of character i always end up with the really awful looking sort of fold over.

The image below is my first, second and then the attempt im on now to create the bear.

If you were to make this character yourself would you start with a box, sphere or something else? And if you could expand onto how you figure out what shape you would use and why.

My process so far has been to make a sphere, extrude and shape the body, remove the top and bottom of the sphere and then extrude legs / arms after adding loops to make an area around where i want the appendages to come from.

Then attached a sphere for the head and connected it to the body. Cut in half and symmetry modified it.

Feeling very nooby right now. Any help would be great

[Anonymous]

My advice would be to start off with a box for the torso and then extrude the head/legs/arms out of that. Taking a low poly basic approach is best in my opinion. Only add more lines when you need that, you're off to a great start, you just need to space out and clean up lines in some areas, your topology is very important. Also, perhaps you should follow a model sheet for a character and have it perfectly line up front, side and back to ensure you are able to refer to it from whatever point of view you're working on. Also, find reference images on modeling techniques step by step. pinterest is always great to find some. The best way to ensure you are working efficiently is to make sure you know the best tools so experiment with the modifiers and familiarize yourself with all the settings in the editable poly modifier.

Initially looking at your model, One thing that can greatly help is to implement an all-quad approach, which means all your polygons are to be 4-sided, so maybe go in and clean up your lines.