D
2025
synthetic
cyborg
A character study of what lies beneath a human face: skin that's been stitched, riveted, and pulled back to reveal the machine underneath. Modelled, textured, shaded, lit, and rendered from scratch in Blender.Every part of it, human and machine, started as an empty scene.
Year
2025
Role
Modelling, UV, Texturing,
Shading, Lighting, Rendering
Category
3D Character Art
ENGINE
Blender Cycles
Concept
The idea started with a question: what if a face were only a cover? I wanted the human side to feel almost familiar, with real eyes, a real nose, and real lips, while the skin itself behaved like armour, pieced together with seams and rivets. The machine underneath needed to feel engineered, not decorative, as if every cable and joint had a job to do.
Modelling
Two very different worlds had to share one head. The organic side, the eyes, nose, and lips, needed soft, natural forms, while the mechanical side called for hard edges, clean bevels, and parts that look like they could actually be assembled. The hardest part was where they meet: making skin plates sit convincingly over the metal beneath.
UV & Texturing
With this many separate parts, including plates, bolts, cables, and joints, clean UVs mattered. I checked every piece with a checker map to keep the texel density even, so the skin pores and metal detail would hold up in close-up renders.
Shading & Render
The final look depended on contrast between materials. The skin is matte and slightly worn, the metal is darker with soft highlights, and the eyes are the only part that feels truly alive. Lit from the side against a dark background, the face emerges gradually rather than all at once.
