Pipeline 1: Jet Pack Jones - The Hands

   The hands will be broken up into parts for modelling, starting with a cube for the first finger. Bringing it up in the view port, we align it with the front orthographic. Changing the vertices points to get a rough shape and then scaling it to the correct size. 

  Dividing it up into 2 horizontally, we scale out the edges to give us a rounder appearance and the same was done vertically. Sculpting the fingers to get the correct volume, the ends are brought back to start creating the end.  Working from the middle of the finger, more loops are made with the multi-cut tool to create thirds and then scaled to straighten them. To stop any future loop being wonky, we place one just before the finger top so to give us perfect loops for sculpting. 

  As with the elbows, two loop was placed around the joins and more though the bigger sections. With all the starting geometry in place, we use our vertices to sculpt a more finger-like appearance.  We need the fingers to taper so to have a bit more realism to the design. 

  Using a lattice and selecting the points, we finalise the shaping. This base will be used for all of  the fingers on the hand. 

Base Finger

  Moving onto the palm, we create a cube and place it into the correct place via the orthographs. As we need it to match the fingers (which is now a 8 sided geometry), we add some loops to break up the square. Rounding the object with the new vertices and cleaning up, we add some more loops to bring in a little bit of separation for the fingers. We need the end result to look a hexagon so to be able to attach the fingers, placing more geometry on the top and bottom. 

Hand Base

  For the thumb, we have to use the multi-cut tool as the edge loop won't work (these is due to the increased amount of geometry), drawing though the middle of the hand base. Placing another loop at the end of the palm, we sculpt the vertices to create a rounder appearance. 

  Once the clean up and sculpting is complete, we create a duplicate of the finger, place it to the side and bring in a lattice. Using the lattice allows us to move the finger around in the correct orientation an scale, the hand need to be modelled in a open position for the rigging process.

  Positioning the finger, more duplications are created and then lattices applied to bring it them up to the correct scale. Using the lattice rotation, there is some overlap in the base of the fingers. Scaling downwards and tapering enables the overlapping to be removed. Deleting the history gets rid of the lattices. 

  Using the wireframe-on-shaded mode, we snap all the vertices together and then merge them. It's important to snap the hand vertices to the finger so to create a more realistic join. When all connected, cleaning up with the average tool and sculpting enables better a better appeal. To stop stretching in the knuckles, another edge loop is placed and small bumps created in the  knuckle and pad areas.

Fingers Connected