14 + hours of step-by-step pre-recorded videos in HD covering all the tools and techniques
Anatomy + Organic Sculpting + Hard Surface
Learn how to work with the three building blocks of any character, make believable faces, clothes, hair, armor and accessories.
All Files For Download
Download step-by-step ZBrush and Marmoset files and look at the progress
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"It's amazing, from zero to hero for real. The goals are clear, the path is clear, its an achievable goal, in a very straightforward way. Teaches you the how, by making it with a good portfolio piece at the end."
Maximo "Pit" Bibiloni
Freelance 3D Artist | Traditional Sculptor, Argentina
Program week-by-week
Lesson 1: Custom Interface and intro
Lesson 2: Sculpting the head
Lesson 3: Sculpting the torso
Lesson 4: Sculpting the legs
Lesson 5: Refining the body
Lesson 1: Sculpting the hands
Lesson 2: Refining the head
Lesson 3: Blocking out the hair and cap
Lesson 4: Extracting the jacket
Sculpting hands and faces are the two important lessons you will take away from this module. You will learn how to sculpt a hand in a relaxed pose, starting from the index finger. You will understand head-body proportions and micro details that contribute to an appealing face for a character.
Lesson 1: Extracting the t-shirt
Lesson 2: Extracting the pants
Lesson 3: Starting the boots
Lesson 4: Adding elements to the boots
We will be modeling clothes in Zbrush. In this module we will learn how to extract different pieces of clothes and how to make sure they are topologically-correct. Our goal is to make sure you can implement this process on any character of your choice.
Lesson 1: Shoulder plates
Lesson 2: Creating the weapon
Lesson 3: Building the kneepad
Lesson 4: Beauty pass
Lesson 5: Organizing the file
We're doing all the hard surface modeling in Zbrush, too. Hard surface details of the stylized character we chose for the program are not limited to a weapon, so you will see a variety of hard surface elements covered.
You will learn what makes a truly appealing character and know how to navigate:
Facial asymmetry
Perfect profile view
Proportions of the lips and the face
Character look and personality from different distances
Whether you are working on a female character or you're modeling a male character, you will know how to masterfully sculpt a face in Zbrush in a way that serves your character best.
There are so many reasons why you should never present your character in a T-pose or an A-pose. By doing so, you will lose an opportunity to showcase the strengths of your project and demonstrate its full beauty. After completing this module you will make an overall pass and add tiny details that will add textures and story to your character. Remember, you are an artist, and every piece you create is telling a story, so in this module we're taking the most important steps to finishing it.
The first thing you will need to do if you're planning to texture your character is to create UVs for it. You might find some difficulties, so we will go through the whole process and try to address the most common issues and demonstrate how to solve them, too.
In this module you will grab the textures polypainted in Zbrush and give them a final touch by creating additional maps. After finishing character texturing in Substance Painter, you will render in Marmoset.
Bonus
Substance Painter + Marmoset mini-courses
$199 VALUE
UVs and Polypainting
Starting with UVs, take your character to the next level. Texture and create a professional render with the extra support we provide within the two extra mini-courses.
Render in Marmoset
Two bonus mini-courses of the program show how to use Substance Painter and Marmoset to make your character complete: we cover materials, tools and workflow, starting from your Zbrush sculpt.
Posing + Presentation
Learn how to present your character to give it maximum exposure and show the winning angles.
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Included with the Program
Save $750+ on software and tools from Art Heroes partners
Get up to 15-50% off on tools and software like Marmoset toolbag, Substance Painter, ZBrush, 3D Scan Store and others.
Plus, enjoy our Student card to get access to much more.
Program Flow
1
Practice + post
Watch pre-recorded videos, post updates about your progress on our student community to get instructors' feedback.
2
Join Live Q&A
Attend a live call with your mentor (or watch session replay if you missed it), get your questions answered + show your WIP to the group
3
Refresh your knowledge
You can revisit at any time to refresh your knowledge (or maybe - make another character following the same steps!)
Program Instructors
We're proud to bring you the expertise of some of the best artists in the industry
Art Director and co-founder at Art Heroes, Marlon has been a part of some of the world's best teams, from EA, Blur, Goodbye Kansas, and RealtimeUK. Marlon specializes on digital humans and one of his big passions is creating stylized characters
Daniele is a specialist in collectibles and statues and WACOM ambassador in Italy. He's been working in the industry for over a decade and has taught thousands of students in live workshops.
Character artist and modeler, Alfredo is a year-round instructor at Art Heroes. He currently lives in Mexico, freelances, and constantly works on personal projects.
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Our students' feedback
The best part is the simple way that Marlon approaches a difficult character, and the way he breaks it into simple steps to achieve an awesome character! Because the course gives you exactly what it offers, you can learn a cool workflow and how to tackle a character from point A to Z.
Martin Carrillo, Ecuador
Art Heroes student, 2020
I learn new techniques to create art from the instructor who is the expert. Also, I got a lot of feedback to help me improve from other instructors and fellow students.
Sebastian, Mexico
Art Heroes student, 2020
I learned a lot, so I think it is super recomendable. The workflow and the constant correction of the instructor has given me another view of my work process.
Julio Padula, Argentina
Art Heroes student, 2020
I loved the length of the videos, it covered enough for me and then let me go off and figure stuff out for myself. The character I had was not the same as in the videos and there was a lot of room to go my own way. For me that was good as I had done enough step by step courses and some things don't stick that way. But using what I was taught in the videos on my own character brought up new challenges and locked a few things into place.
Sean Olsen, Ireland
Art Heroes student, 2020
The feeling of improvement the course gives to you - it's the best thing for me. Thanks to the overall organization and Marlon's human and technical skill the process of trial and error was not frustrating but funny and challenging. I've never stayed up so long at night having so much fun in "making 3D".
Francesco Gianfreda, Italy
Art Heroes student, 2020
Marlon gave very good advice and the pace of the course was just right. I learned lots and faster way to learn than just looking around random Youtube by myself.
Momoko Okabe, Canada
Art Heroes student, 2020
Student gallery
Meet our students!
AND LEARN WHAT IT'S LIKE STUDYING WITH ART HEROES
Brendan McCaffrey (Ireland)
Martin Carillo (Ecuador)
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Prices and registration
JOIN TODAY PLACES ARE LIMITED
STYLIZED CHARACTERS FULL ACCESS
$897$547 or $99 x 6 months
STYLIZED CHARACTERS + PRIVATE MENTORSHIP
1697 $1297 or $449 x 3 months
14+ hrs of High-quality pre-recorded HD videos
GROUP Q&A sessions every 2 weeks +All sessions recordings
Unlimited daily Feedback via Forum during 8 weeks of the program
PRIVATE mentorship sessions 1h sessions every 2 weeks
*Live Q&A Sessions are offered during the 2 months of the Program.
ART HEROES GUARANTEE
Try risk-free for 2 weeks
Not sure if it's the right fit? Try the program risk-free for 14 days, and if don't love it, ask for a refund. No questions asked.
Here's even more stories from our alumni
FAQs
Join the waitlist to get notified when your place becomes available. As soon as you register, you will have access to community, pre-recorded videos, Q&A sessions and everything our ecosystem has for you.
Yes. You will get an invoice as soon as you complete the checkout, and if you need a business invoice for reimbursement, email us and we'll be happy to provide this too
The bulk of the program is offered as pre-recorded HD-quality videos. There's a private community of the program where you are able to get your questions answered, as well as live sessions that you can join.
Feedback is offered in private community of the program OR via live sessions. You can post your WIPs as frequently as you want.
Yes, you are eligible for a certificate upon course completion and submission of your final project.
The program is split on 6 modules, and we estimate about 3-4 hours of workload per module. We estimate one module per week, so it will take you 6-8 weeks to go through the course.
You will need ZBrush, Marmoset and Substance painter. As Art Heroes student you are eligible to free Substance Painter for 1 year, and discounts for both Marmoset and ZBrush.
For most of the softwares, you will be able to get a student discount (or a free academic version) by showing your attendance certificate. When you join, you can download this from your student area.