Recreating Dwight from The Office Using ZBrush, Maya & Mari

Introduction

Hi! My name is Samer. I'm a 3D Character Artist/Facial modeler working in Games and VFX. I have worked for Snappers Tech for 5 years. Currently, I'm a freelancer. During this time, I have worked with a wide range of companies like Krafton, WB, Capcom, Arkane, NCSoft, Microsoft, Bethesda Studios, and many more. I was involved in Dagon's Dogma 2, Alan Wake 2, Immortals of Aveum, The Callisto Protocol, Atomic Heart, and many more.

Growing up, I fell in love with drawing portraits. I did a lot of colored pencil drawing back then, and the idea of creating portraits not only on paper but also in 3D space fascinated me and made me pursue this career.


Inspiration & References

I've always been a huge fan of The Office and Dwight's character in particular. His unique personality, schemes, and iconic look made me think it would be fun yet challenging to choose him as my next project.

For the references, I watched episodes of The Office to study his face while taking some screenshots that I found helpful and gathered some more from the internet with some lighting conditions to help me figure out his bone structure as most of the images from the series were looking flat due to the office lighting.

With this project, I wanted to push myself to create realistic facials and also get more comfortable with XGen.

Modeling

Personally, whenever I'm about to do a likeness project, there is always an image that I found online a long time ago that pops up in my head, and it concludes what likeness is, no matter how many alphas/high-quality displacements you use if the base forms and the secondary ones aren't there yet there is still some work to do before getting to the surface detailing phase.

With that being said, I started the blockout phase with the lowest SubDiv and spent some time only using the Move brush to get the overall shapes roughly in place. Then, I did some camera line-up using some refs. Going back to ZBrush, I started to go a little bit higher (SubDiv 4) to do some secondary forms and surface break-ups.


When I was satisfied with the overall shapes, I decided to move forward with the surface details and start working with (SubDiv7). I used TexturingXYZ as a starting point, then added more hand-sculpted details and imperfections to the skin, like pimples and blackheads to the nose, forehead wrinkles, lips, and chin. 


Grooming

For the Eyebrows, I used a Paint Effect tool in Maya, then I converted the curves to guides and spent some time tweaking them, then added the modifiers. 

For the top part, I used the same lineup cameras and started to put the guides in place. I decided to go with the healthier hairstyle to capture a more youthful appearance, similar to how Dwight looked in seasons 2 and 3. After getting the guides in place, I added the modifiers and tweaked each one to make it look as natural as possible.


The Albedo was done in Mari with a few tweaks in Photoshop. I started with a base from TexturingXYZ, which provided a high-quality foundation for skin texture and detail. I then combined it with hand-painted layers in Mari to refine specific areas.


LookDev

I exported the Displacement from ZBrush and began to build my shader. I wanted to have control, so I built the skin shader driven by custom RGB masks, each mask only affecting a specific region of the face. It's a bit more advanced but it gives much freedom to tweak/adjust the different areas of the face as you want. The eyes setup was much simpler. However, I was careful to achieve his staring eyes look, as it's one of his character's unique features.


Lighting

To replicate the lighting conditions seen in the series, I used an indoor studio light HDRI from HDRI Haven as the primary light source. To ensure accuracy, I calibrated the lighting using both Macbeth charts and chrome balls.


Conclusion

I have worked on this project on and off during my free time. Sometimes, it's important to step away and take breaks from the project occasionally, as it allows me to return with a fresh perspective and see things I might have missed while deeply immersed in the work.

My advice to younger artists is to focus on mastering the fundamentals, and they take time to develop. Be patient with yourself, as growth doesn't happen overnight. Consistency and dedication will pay off, so keep practicing, stay curious, and don't rush the process.

"If I have seen further, it's by standing on the shoulder of giants."

Some of the giants I would like to thank:
– Antone Magdy
– Michael Cauchi
– Mahmoud Salah

Samer Elseidy, Senior Facial Modeler