NAYL

Harlyn Nayl is a recurring character from the Inquisitor trilogies by Dan Abnett, set in the world of Warhammer 40K. I listened to the audiobooks of the trilogies over the last year while studying 3D modeling at the Animal Logic Academy at UTS (University of Technology Sydney). We produced two great short films over the year, and the amazingly read audiobooks by Jonathen Keeble provided great inspiration while I spent long hours modeling and texturing characters for our shorts. This inspired me to create a short film in Unreal Engine as a snippet of a potential full-length animated series. My main expertise is in 3D modeling and texturing, and sculpting in ZBrush is the most enjoyable process for me. I prefer freeform modeling and character design rather than sticking to an exact reference image developed by someone else, as it allows me to show more of my artistry and makes the process more creatively enjoyable.

I have also developed a variety of generalist skills, and my previous experience in Unreal Engine meant I felt I could pursue the daunting task of creating an animated short solo, using all the modern tools and tricks to speed up my workflow and avoid getting overwhelmed by the complexity of tasks. I took the approach of making everything “good enough” for what the audience would see on screen instead of spending many extra hours generating perfect UVs or retopologizing, when Nanite and Lumen could create great-looking, performative images without worrying about perfection. I definitely missed having a great team of collaborators on this project as the scope became a bit overwhelming despite trying to save time this way. 

Unfortuantly my plans for the end of the film didn't pan out as I ran out of time with the deadline, so I had to create an alternate version that cuts off before the major fight scene. 

The first step when creating any story is always the characters. Harlyn Nayl is a tough-as-nails bounty hunter who now works for the Inquisition as an imperial agent. He’s rough and cool underpressure but also serves as the comic relief when juxtaposed with the more serious characters in the book. My reference was the characterization of Nayl in the book, but I also gathered references from Warhammer to emulate the style (utilised in all the miniatures I've painted over the years) as well as some specific artist renderings of Nayl as seen on offical book covers which were the main reference point for the costume. Modeling the characters was the longest single task of the process (well it would've been if UE5 didnt crash so much). I knew from the beginning that I wanted to use MetaHuman so I could transfer facial animations easily using the new MetaHuman Animator tools, a magicaly fast and simple tool that was really the only possible way to get realistic facial animations as a solo artist. However, I found the MetaHuman models looked too generic, with unreal generating softer features and less detailed skin than I wanted for my rugged bounty hunter. So, I had to research a way to have my own sculpted face work as a MetaHuman rather than relying on MetaHuman Creator.

I created Nayl's costume in ZBrush. The base mesh was a human body which I sculpted and modified using the move tool and clay buildup to create a larger, more imposing form with bigger muscles. Nayl is described as a large, strong man with surprising grace and agility, and I wanted to show this through his body.

The outfit is meant to be a body glove, a tactical outfit worn for military operations. I was inspired by video game stealth outfits, especially those from Splinter Cell or Metal Gear Solid. The base mesh was made using masking and extraction in ZBrush. This way, you can draw out areas on the body and then extract them to get armor sections that are formed to the shape of the mesh below. My design process was mainly done in 3D, and I iterated on how I wanted him to look without using many 2D sketches as I visualize much better in 3D space. I wanted to have a flexible undersuit reminiscent of a wetsuit with solid armor panels over the top to provide more protection. The border edges were done using insert multimesh brushes which can be applied to a polygroup border to create fast and easy trim. The main chest pieces were also made using masking and extraction. I then polygrouped and ZRemeshed the pieces to create hard edges and smooth out the shapes.

The straps were also done with insert mesh brushes, and I used a selection of bags I bought a while ago that were in my collection to finish off the mesh and make it look tactical.

The process of getting a realistic metahuman involved sculpting the face over a downloaded base mesh, using 3D Scan Store textures edited in Substance Painter, and then applying a morph target to the face so that the final face would more closely resemble the base sculpt.

The main trick was getting the scar to work. I did this by sculpting it in, then baking it down and combining the normal maps in Photoshop so that the scar layer was on the same normal map as the high-resolution details downloaded from 3D Scan Store. This was the same process to create the textures for the Orator. 

I also modified the metahuman groom inside blender using their groom tools, it was a subtle change but I wanted a longer moustache and thicker goatee as it is described in the books. 

I wanted a unique sci-fi gun that placed the character in a different world. I found this old concept art of a pistol that matched what was described in the novels. This was made using basic 3D modeling processes in Blender, where I drew it out using polys and modified base shapes to get the profile. It was textured in the same way as the other assets.

A week before submission, I had to rebuild the main bad guy (The Orator) because the original character design didn't work with the mask as intended. I wanted a more menacing look and to continue to leverage the new innovations of MetaHuman Animator in my workflow.

I started by designing a new face in ZBrush, focusing on sharp, intimidating features. I then integrated this face with the MetaHuman framework, enabling realistic facial animations. Using MetaHuman Animator, I captured subtle expressions and movements, adding depth and menace to the character. The acting was done by myself for Nayl and my Father played The Orator, both of us have a background in theatre and acting .

This last-minute change was challenging, but it significantly improved the character's impact and made full use of the advanced animation tools available. The Servitors were built using kitbash parts I had in my zbrushlibrary that I modifed to create an idustrial look, this was also how I did the hands of the original cultist villian.

To animate characters, I downloaded animations from Mixamo. In Unreal Engine, I imported these animations and used the new animation retargeting tools to map the Mixamo aniamtions to my custom models. This 

Connecting a MetaHuman head to a custom body was more challenging. The main difficulty was ensuring the head connected properly to the neck, this requried the use of opacity masks for Nayl so I could remove texture on the neck and manual adjustments of the head for scenes in which I required head movement. 

Additionally, syncing facial animations with the dialogue was difficult as the 24fps of the final render didnt sync up with the 30fps recordings. To try and fix this I slowed down the audio in Premier Pro, which had the added bonus of deepening the voices and creating a creepier performance for the Orator. Despite these challenges, the end result was a seamlessly integrated character with fluid animations

for the Final fight scene I was inspired by the fight scene from "The Batman" film, where muzzle flashes light up a dark hallway, revealing the characters only in those brief moments of light. I chose this approach because I knew my animations might look unpolished in full light, and this technique offered a clever way to create a visually appealing scene with my limited animation resources.

To achieve this effect, I used Niagara systems for the muzzle flashes, but encountered issues with them not rendering consistently in a single take. As a result, I had to stitch together multiple sequences by mering different image sequences into one. Ultimtly I wish I had had more time to polish the final fight scene, but the additon of my sound mixing I think really helped to bring it up to a standard I was more happy with. 

In hindsight, I maybe should have chosen a less ambitious project to better showcase my modeling skills. However, I was captivated by the innovations of Unreal Engine 5.4 and excitedly embarked on a project that turned out to be much bigger and more challenging than anticipated. While the project allowed me to explore new features, develop new skills and push my creative limits, it also stretched my resources and time constraints. I did 90% of the final edit the night of the submission including all the sound and final compositing. In the future, I'll prioritize projects that align more closely with my strengths and time manage ebtter to take into account the numerous ways a project can go side ways. I am happy with the final result but I think Ive sworn at my computer more over the past week than the rest of my life combined. I really ran out of time to properly capture all the images of the process I wanted to show and I thought my time would be best spent actually finishing the film, as it was a lot of work to go back through and collate by myself. I will create a personal project page where I can show off more of the envionment work and the editing process in the coming days, so you can look there for more information. (Hopefully thats allowed). Thanks to Ildy for creating the robes for The Orator and Servitors in Marvelous and doing the texturing and to Olivia for helping to retarget the walking animation to better hold the pistol. 

Cheers, Angus Thomson.