Modeling the Torso and Arms

Up to this point, you’ve been working on the face, but now you’ll switch to the body. That means the face’s reference images in the background are not useful anymore. You can just go to the Background Images panel in the 3D View Properties Region, delete the images, and load the full-body references; alternatively, you can replace the head references with the full-body references, but this time, you’ll do something different: in the side view, you’ll modify the reference image so the feet are touching the floor (increase the Y position value) and copy that Y value to the front and back reference images (see Figure 7.14).

Figure 7.14 Jim’s side reference floor position right after you import it (left) and after you slide it up until the feet are “touching” the floor (right)

The first thing you’ll notice is that now the face is really big and out of proportion, so select everything you created so far (face, eyes, and lattices), move them, and scale them to make them fit the new references. The head should now be in place and you should have space to start working on Jim’s body!

There is another problem you’ll have to work out, which was created on purpose so you’d have an opportunity to play with your imagination a little and confront a situation you might encounter at some point in your own projects: Jim’s designs show the character’s arms in a pose slightly different to what you’re actually going to model. Sometimes, arms are modeled in what is often called a T pose: completely extended and parallel to the floor. While the T pose is appropriate for modeling purposes (if everything is aligned to one of the 3D world’s axes, it’s easier to manipulate), it may not be the best thing for the model in future stages. For example, if you create the arms completely extended and parallel to the floor, when they are deformed you could find issues with the shoulders due to their large rotation range.

In Jim’s case, the shoulder area has some details in the jacket, so you should create the arms slightly flexed at about 45 degrees or so; whether you rotate them up or down, the deformation won’t be really big and Blender will keep those details. So in this situation, the reference images that were provided to you show something a little different. As a result, you’ll have to create your model in a slightly different pose, but don’t worry because during the process you’ll learn a couple of tricks that will be very useful.