DEL LAGO SOLDIER

ARTIST Robert Farrand SOFTWARE Blender, Marvelous Designer, Substance Designer, Zbrush, Substance Painter, Marmoset Toolbag, Photoshop

Robert Farrand currently works as a junior level artist at Ubisoft Bordeaux, creating props and building worlds for a host of AAA titles. Around a year ago he began work on Del Lago Soldier as a side project. “The objective was to try something really new for me, something outside of my comfort zone,” he explains to 3D World. “I wanted to learn and experiment with each step along the way.”

Farrand always begins with areas of uncertainty. “I like to break down the challenges and test them out before,” he adds. “I might test the shaders and maps that I need, or see if an effect can be done in Substance or if it requires sculpting.”

The soldier’s triangular armour was decided early in the concept phase. “It is inspired

by the Ratnik 3, a Russian exoskeleton with this kind of shape. I wanted it smoother so I tried to render just the arm from the shoulder to the wrist, in order to see how it reacted to the lighting and how it folded with the cloth. Do I need to sculpt it with the arm? Do I make it flat geometry? Do I use tessellation? This was the place to experiment,” explains Farrand.

Substance Designer proved helpful for any 2D pattern Farrand needed, particularly those on the armour. “I created a basic triangle tiling pattern, on top of which I used several Flood Fills to randomise directions,” he adds, “this gave me a good heightmap to extrude in Zbrush.”

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