Before I can start working on my character firstly i need to research the middle ages. Understand what kind of role the knights played in that time. What were they like, what was culturally acceptable for them, what armour and weapons they used in the battles.
The Middle Ages – 1066 -1485
The Middle Ages encompass one of the most turbulent periods in English History. Starting with the Battle of Hastings and the Norman Conquest – when William the Conqueror effectively took all of the lands from the Saxon English and gave them to French nobles. The English Middle Ages then saw the building of the great English castles, including the Tower of London, which helped the Normans to retain their hold on England. The start of the Crusades and the knights of the Middle Ages, including the founding of the Knights Templar. The Domesday Book and the Magna Carta. The Kings and Queens of the Middle Ages including Richard the Lionheart and great Plantagenet Kings from Henry II (1154-1189) to Edward III (1327-1377). The Hundred Years War between England and France. The Medieval Kings and Queens of the Royal Houses of Lancaster and York and the Wars of the Roses. The Middle Ages Feudal System and the terrible Black Death which really did plague the period of the Middle Ages.
Definition of the Middle Ages in England
The Middle Ages are so called as the middle period between the decline of the Roman Empire and the Renaissance. The early Middle Ages are often referred to as the Dark Ages. The Middle Ages are also referred to as the Medieval era.
Definition of the Middle Ages dates in England – 1066 – 1485
Their is some variance in the views and definition of the dates which encompassed the Middle Ages. We have included events in England from the Battle of Hastings in 1066 and ending in the emergence of the English Renaissance period with the Tudor dynasty in 1485. To put this into perspective, and for ease of reference, the periods in English history have been categorised as follows:
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Neolithic – Stone Age ( 3000 – 1800 BC )
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The Bronze & Iron Age ( 1800 – 600 BC )
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The Romans (600 BC – 410 AD)
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The Dark Ages – Anglo-Saxon England ( 410 AD – 1066 AD )
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The Middle Ages – 1066 – 1485
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The Renaissance Period in England starting with the Tudor Dynasty
Middle Ages Knights
The Middle Ages was dominated by the feudal system and the role of the knights and their servants. Their life, living conditions, clothing, weapons, training, armor, tournaments and jousts. The Knights Templar organisation was also formed during the Middle Ages. Knighthood Training. Included in this section are Facts about Knights. The training of Knights during the Middle Ages, the Steps to Knighthood, the lives of the Squires culminating in the Order of Knighthood Ceremony which occurred after about 14 years of training. The Knights Code of Chivalry, rules about Courtly Love and Knights Tournaments. Learn about jousting, the History of Jousting, Jousting Terminology and Jousting Weapons. Finally facts and information about a Knights Armor, Chainmail and his war horse called a Destrier. In fact everything you need to now about Middle Ages Knights.
Knights Templar
The crusades saw the emergence of religious knights including the Knights Templar, the Teutonic knights and the Hospitallers. The members of the orders of Religious knights were both monks and knights; that is, to the monastic vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience they added a fourth vow, which bound them to protect pilgrims and fight the infidels. This section details facts and information about the Templar Knights, the Knights Templar History, Knights Templar Banking, a Knights Templar Timeline, the Names of Knights Templar Leaders, the role of the Religious Knights, the Teutonic Knights and the Knights Hospitaller.
Middle Ages Weapons
Every man was expected to be able to use weapons during the Middle Ages. There were basically two types of armed men during the Medieval era – The Knights and the Foot soldiers, who included the Archers. Middle Ages weapons and the training of soldiers during the Middle Ages including a Knights Weapons, the Quintain, Pell Training, Pell Mell and the Butts. The Medieval Shields and the Medieval Swords including the Broadsword, the Falchion sword, the Greatsword, the Longsword and the Scimitar. The different types of Polearms that were used as weapons during the Middle Ages including the Lance, the Halberd, the Pike, the Poleaxe and Spears. This comprehensive section then goes on to provide interesting facts and information about Battle Axes, Batons, Maces, the Billhook, Caltrops, the Flail, the Quarterstaff, the Warhammer, the Longbow, the Crossbow and other types of Bows and their arrows.
Medieval Siege Weapons used during the Middle Ages
Medieval Siege Weapons used during the Middle Ages were the Ballista, Catapult, Mangonel, Battering Ram, Siege Tower and the awesome Trebuchet. A brief description of each of the major siege weapons and engines are described in this section. Gain an understanding of Siege Warfare during the Middle Ages and Siege Weapon Design. What happened when a castle or town came under siege. The use of the Siege Tower,
Catapults and the mysterious Greek Fire are also included in this section.
By looking in to it more in depth, I have learned that knights were very prestiges title. Among the earliest metallic armor to be worn by medieval knights was chainmail armor, consisting of tens of thousands of interlocking rings woven painstakingly by hand to form a shirt, coif, or leggings. Because of the mild steel produced in medieval times each ring had to be riveted to keep all the rings from spreading and opening under the weight of the piece. Underneath the metal armor the knight would wear a padded garment known variously as an “aketon,” or “gambeson.” To this defensive equipment he added a shield, usually made of leather-covered wood, and a helmet . As the medieval arms race progressed and new, more powerful weapons were developed (such as the longbow and crossbow), chainmail became ineffective on its own. Using all this research I will incorporate it into my own design.
Late in the Middle Ages plate armor began to appear (late 13th/early 14th century), first as reinforcements to vital areas such as the chest and shoulders, and finally as a complete suit (early 15th century). The medieval “knight in shining armor” that most people think of is the fully plate-armored knight. Chainmail armor was now relegated to protecting smaller vital areas that could not be covered with plate armor, such as the groin and under the arms. The shield became smaller, or disappeared altogether as it became unnecessary and redundant.
After discussing my project with a teacher she suggested to have a look at some of the modern fashion designer who use armour in their designs. Alexander Mcqueen is one of them.
Armour has been influential our society up to today , from the quilting used for protection to the outrageous sculptural piece , it is amazing to see how we as an artist can create our unique design. We can appreciate that Armour has been used throughout recorded history.I will try and incorporate this style into my design as it suites me.
I have familiarised my self with knight armour. I started thinking what specific parts of the armour I should use. I know I’m not going to do very heavy armoured character, so I decided to design only important pieces(helmet. breastplate, vamrace, sword, shield and greaves) and all using Maya. Maya is probably is best suited for this task, because I need them to be squared and with other software like sculptris, mudbox or zbrush they would come out rounded.
I have also researched into some games who are medieval themed or are relevant,for example Skyrim, Assassins creed, Medieval Total War. They all gave me a rough idea how a game characters look like and how ar they modelled here is some examples to see what I mean.
Before I could star making 3D model, I have sketched ot couple of design ideas.
At first I had an idea to make my character wearing a hood, but it was to similar to assassin’s creed character and after consulting with my teacher I dropped that idea. He suggested to do something that resembles eastern European knight, because it would be something closer to my roots, as I came from east Europe.
For my first piece of armour I recited to make a helmet. After an hour of research a discovered that the best design is Ottoman empire type helmet. I chose this one because I want to model facial features for my character and with this helmet it is perfect, because I could clearly see the face.
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To make this 3D model of a helmet I used Maya. As a reference I used a picture of an Ottoman helmet. It took me a while to make it, because I never did this sort of thing. Despite of my knowledge of software I had to learn different techniques and use ways to make it. The hardest part to make was probably the sides that cover ears. I had to make them parallel to each other, which I managed to do at the end. I think what went well, that at the end I made it as I wanted it to look, even though it took me a while to understand how to make it.
The second piece of armour I stared making is the sword. Probably the main weapon in medieval times.
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The sword is the first part of my design what I did. Its a basic sword design, containing of four parts pommel which is at the end of the grip/handle and a fuller. It wasn’t difficult to make as it was a simple design.
The third piece is the probably the biggest is the breastplate. I have researched for a very long time for a design that suited me the best. And after a while researching paid of.
This is a medieval breastplate for my character. This part of an armour took me the most time to make. Every peace had to be parallel to opposite piece. In front I made one big piece which is the main one, and then I did 3 smaller ones on each side and combined them to the main piece. The problems I faces were few. Firstly I couldn’t get it right from a first try. After couple of attempts I got the front plate right I started making other parts. After I finished the front I stated making the back part, which wasn’t much of a challenge, but it took me time to make.At the end it turned out as I wanted it .
Next I stated on making shoulder plates.
This is my design of a right and left shoulder plate. They both took me approximately two hours to make using Maya. The left shoulder plate has more detail and it looks different compare to the right one. The reason i did them differently is because I don’t want my character to look very heavy, like he is uncomfortable in his armour and has any movement restrictions.
After I finished with shoulder plates I started making vambrace and greaves.
Both look very similar but vambrace goes on the forearm and greaves go on the shins. To make the was not much of a challenge, it took me twenty minutes to make each one of them. Vambrace contains from 4 pieces.
Then I stated working on the shield.
A very simple design which I referenced from a image that i took from the internet. I also made I bi cross in the middle to establish that my character is Christian. I was simple to do it took me about 30 minutes to do.
By finishing by armour pieces I was half way through. I started working on my character and for this I used different software’s. Firstly I used mudbox which is very useful piece of software it already had a build in full body model, which was perfect because i did have to everything from scratch. Next I posed him the way I liked it, left leg in front, leaning foreword that way he looked aggressive. Then I took him into sculptris where I modelled his face, I took i reference from my previous work the one I did at the beginning of the year, and then I gave him some muscle tone. Afterwards I took him back to mudbox and stared adding the armour on the model. It was not trickie to do, I only had to size them accordingly, and place them in the right place. When I was finishes with that I exported it as OBJ file and imported it into zbrush where i did the final touches(boots, belts) and then textured it. With The texturing I have decided to make it as a statue. I did not have much time to make it properly textured with the skin tone and everything. The problems I faced were a few. As I wasn’t familiar with zbrush it took me few hours to understand it and navigate through it, but couple of hours of practice I notices that it was very impressive piece of software, I can do a lot of thing with it, and would have to so many other software to complete my work.
This is my final piece. I used stone textures for the whole character.
Evaluation
I will be evaluating my Final Major Project. The title of my project is “Medieval Knight”. My plan was to make a 3D character inspired by 5th until 15th century middle age knights. By the end of this project a have I fully designed character with a body armor, facial expression and texture.
I have researched the background of middle ages, who are knights and what roles they played in that period of time. I have found out that knight were very influential and honorable people. They strongly believed in honor and defending their beliefs at any cost. So because of that I wanted to make a strong looking character, who would strike fear into someones hart in battle.
Firstly i looked at images of knight from different eras and cultures, from European crusaders to Ottoman empire soldiers. I took ideas from each cultures and incorporated them into my designs. To do a helmet I took reference images from ottoman empire soldiers, breastplate from eastern European soldier and everything else from crusader.
To design my armor I used Maya, because it was the most suited and convenient for the job. I faced couple of setbacks on the way. I had to make everything symmetrical, it was difficult because I had to make every piece separately and align equally with parallel piece. I could do it from first few attempts, but when i finally got it it did payed of. The hardest one to do was the breast plate. I had to make proportions right and the structure correctly, but after some hard work i managed to do complete it. The easiest t design was the sword, it only had 4 simple pieces that were easy and quick to make. The rest of the armor was just a matter of time.
When I was done with my armor. I started on making the base of my character. I used couple of software’s zbrush, sculptris and mudbox. For starters I used mudbox because it already had a build in full body model I only had to pose it. To look more threatening I made him look like he was coming towards you, left leg in front, leaning forward a bit. Then I imported it into scultris and modeled his face and made him look angry and vicious and added some muscle tone. After that I used mudbox again to put he armour on. For the last step I used zbrush to add final details and texture it. I decided to go and make my character a statue, and I added stone textures on him. There were few problems I faced. I wast familiar with zbrush, so had to learn this piece of software, and took long time to learn how to navigate through. Because of that learning curve I wasted a lot of time. I wasn’t able to put my character into urban environment as I didn’t have enough time, instead I made a short video, containing pictures of renders.
In conclusion I would like to say, that this project was the most interesting so far. At the beginning I wasn’t sure what I was suppose to do and didn’t know where should I start with, it was to overwhelming at first but I have overcome the problems I faced. I have learned how to use new software, but because of that I wasted a lot of time experimenting what works and what not, and I also had more practice using the software I already knew. I could have spend more time on texturing but instead i chose the simple way and textured it in stone and made look like a statue. But at the end ‘m rather happy with the final outcome, as it was my first fully designed 3D character I thing I did pretty well, and I hope in the future ill get to do a lot more of it.
dariustr1992 