Breakdown: Game-Ready Bloodborne's Old Hunter Fan Art

Introduction

Hello! My name is Víctor Monge, I'm 21 years old, and I'm a 3D Character Artist from Barcelona, Spain, specializing in semi-realistic characters for video games. I've always loved drawing and playing video games, so discovering 3D felt like the perfect combination.

I started learning 3D in 2023 when I enrolled in a two-year degree in Animation, 3D, and Interactive Environments. After graduating in 2025, I dedicated all of my free time to building a portfolio focused on AAA-quality. The course gave me a solid understanding of the entire 3D pipeline. While exploring different disciplines, I quickly realized that character art was what I enjoyed the most and wanted to pursue professionally.

Although I learned a lot from my teachers and classmates, most of my progress came from self-learning. Every day after class, I'd spend hours watching tutorials, studying workflows, comparing techniques, and constantly experimenting to improve my skills.

One artist who had a huge impact on me was Marco Plouffe from Keos Masons. His work inspired me to aim for a much higher level of quality. Watching recordings of his live streams, where he created characters entirely in real time, taught me far more than traditional tutorials and completely changed the way I approached character creation.

I haven't had the opportunity to contribute to a large-scale game production yet, but I've worked on smaller freelance commissions, game jams, and collaborative projects while continuing to build my portfolio. I'm currently looking for my first opportunity as a Character Artist, and turning my passion for art and video games into a full-time career has always been my biggest goal.

Old Hunter

The project started while I was replaying Bloodborne. I found myself constantly stopping to admire the game's environments, characters, and incredible art direction. At one point, I thought, "I'd love to create a character with this aesthetic."

Less than an hour into my playthrough, I closed the game and started searching on Pinterest for Bloodborne-inspired concept art. I didn't want to recreate popular characters like Lady Maria or The Hunter because they've already been interpreted many times by talented artists.

Eventually, I came across the Old Hunter concept from The Old Hunters DLC, and it immediately stood out to me. It had everything I was looking for and felt like the perfect choice for a long-term portfolio project, including his weapons.

The biggest inspiration was Bloodborne's unique Victorian Gothic aesthetic. I also liked the idea of taking an eleven-year-old game and recreating it with my style while staying faithful to the original design.

My main goal was to push every skill I'd developed over the last few years and see what I was truly capable of. I also wanted to improve in several areas, such as creating realistic cloth, learning the Hair Cards workflow, and achieving more convincing PBR textures.

However, my biggest focus was on improving my high-poly sculpting in ZBrush and optimizing the character to meet modern AAA game standards.

Modeling

Before I even open ZBrush, I spend a fair amount of time analyzing the concept. One of the first things I do is paint over the artwork, assigning a different color to every major element. Breaking the character down helps me understand how all the pieces are layered and how they're constructed.

After that, I build a PureRef board. My reference boards usually include real-world images, screenshots from Bloodborne, prop references, topology and UVs, and 3D renders from other artists to establish a clear quality benchmark.

Once all the research is done, I move into ZBrush. My workflow always begins with a strong blockout using a base mesh, usually from the Character Creator 5 free Base Mesh. Starting from a clean anatomical foundation allows me to focus entirely on proportions, silhouette, and design instead of rebuilding the human body from scratch. 

As soon as I'm happy with the blockout, I separate the character into individual subtools and refine every element from top to bottom. Throughout the sculpting process, I'm constantly adjusting the silhouette and proportions using Transpose Master, making small adjustments to keep the proportions as faithful as possible.

Head

One interesting challenge was the face. Since most of it is hidden beneath the scarf, the concept leaves a lot open to interpretation. Father Gascoigne became my main source of inspiration. His expression perfectly captured the kind of ruthless hunter I imagined this character to be, so I used his facial structure and expression as a subtle reference while sculpting.

The initial sculpt was completely symmetrical. Using brushes like Move, Clay Buildup, and DamStandard, I gradually introduced asymmetry, breaking up the perfect forms and adding subtle imperfections across the face. Those small irregularities are what make a character feel believable. No real face is perfectly symmetrical.

Eyes

Thanks to the base mesh, I was able to preserve the eyes and jaw, making little adjustments proper of an old man and a scarier face.

Hair

The hair blocking was created in ZBrush using Dylan Kowalski's 30 IMM Hair Brush pack. One of the reasons I like this brush set is that every strand is generated with clean topology, which becomes extremely useful later when building the final haircards.

The workflow starts from a simple plane, then uses the IMM curve brushes to generate straight hair strands. Once I have a strand I'm happy with, I duplicate it and use Bend Curve together with Move Topology to quickly create natural variations. Instead of sculpting every strand from scratch, I continuously reuse and modify existing strands.

After finishing the complete hairstyle in ZBrush, I export it to Maya and extract curves directly from the topology. This is where the clean topology generated by the IMM brushes really pays off.

Using the GS Curve Tools plugin, I can automatically convert those curves into hair cards, avoiding the traditional process of placing every card manually. It dramatically speeds up production while preserving the original flow and silhouette of the hairstyle.

This YouTube tutorial was very helpful in understanding how the plugin works:

Outfit

Leather

Leather makes up nearly half of the character, so achieving a convincing material was a very important part of the sculpt. Rather than relying on a single alpha, I built the surface in multiple passes. I started by applying leather alphas to establish the primary noise, but I avoided leaving them untouched because repeated alphas can quickly make the material feel artificial.

To break up that uniformity, I frequently used Morph Targets to selectively remove or soften details in specific areas. This gave me much more control over the result I was looking for.

The key to making believable leather is layering different types of detail, looking for a lot of real-world references.

Ornaments

Most of the decorative ornaments were created using AMcg's 150 Ornament Brushes, 4K Alphas, and 3D Models, Vol.01.The pack provided an excellent starting point for the larger decorative elements, which I later refined manually to better match the concept.

Using IMM brushes for this type of detail allowed me to work much faster instead of creating my own ornaments.

Jacket & Cape

I began by creating a clean blockout, then I subdivided the mesh to high resolution enough for masking and deleting all the torn areas using the Mask brush. At that point, I moved the mesh into Maya to manually retopologize. I also created the UVs so the mesh would be ready for displacement maps later on.

Once the topology was finished, I brought the jacket back into ZBrush and used Panel Loops to give the fabric proper thickness. After subdividing the mesh again, I applied displacement maps for the woven fabric pattern using the Surface Noise system.

With the base details in place, I switched back to sculpting manually. Using the Move brush, I broke up the silhouette of the cloth, creating subtle deformations and irregular folds to make the fabric feel heavier and more natural. From there, I sculpted additional wrinkles, compression folds, seams, and tears. As a final pass, I used Igor Golovkov's Torn Fabric V2 brushes to add fibers on damaged areas.

I followed the same steps to make the cape.

Weapons

Compared to the character, the weapons were a much more straightforward part of the project. The original concept art was very clear and well-designed, so most of the work consisted of faithfully translating it into a 3D model rather than having to interpret missing details.

I started by blocking out the main shapes directly over the concept before refining each component in ZBrush. Since both the Beast Cutter and the Hunter's Pistol feature a mix of organic wear and hard-surface elements, I paid close attention to maintaining clean forms while adding subtle damage and surface imperfections to reinforce the worn aesthetic of Bloodborne.

ZBrush was the core of the entire project. Every single piece of the model has been done in ZBrush. Once the High Poly was finished, I moved everything into Autodesk Maya, where I handled the retopology, UVs, material sets, and the hair card workflow using the GS Curve Tools plugin. 

For baking, I used Marmoset Toolbag 5. I've always loved how straightforward and reliable its baker is, and it consistently produces excellent results. After baking, I imported all the maps into Substance 3D Painter for texturing. Finally, I returned to Marmoset Toolbag 5 for lighting, presentation, and real-time rendering.

Over the years, I've adopted several workflow optimizations that save a significant amount of time across every project. One of the biggest improvements was creating a fully customized ZBrush UI. Having my most frequently used tools only one click away makes sculpting much more efficient than constantly navigating through the default interface.

Starting from a base mesh is another huge time saver. It gives me reliable anatomy from the beginning and lets me focus entirely on the design. It also meant I could reuse the facial topology, avoiding the need to retopologize the head from scratch. Whenever possible, I also try to model accessories such as belts, buckles, buttons, and straps with clean topology from the start.

During retopology, I usually only need to remove a few unnecessary edge loops. I also make extensive use of ID Maps, which allow me to assign materials quickly and keep the texturing process organized.

Topology

For the retopology and UVs, I used Autodesk Maya. From the beginning, my goal was to create a character that could fit into a modern AAA production pipeline, so I approached the topology with animation and optimization in mind rather than simply reducing polygons. I start by creating a low-poly mesh, where I establish the main shapes and clean edge flow before gradually refining it.

Special attention is given to deformation areas such as the face, shoulders, elbows, and knees to ensure the mesh deforms naturally during animation. For hard-surface elements and accessories, I keep the topology as simple as possible while preserving the silhouette and avoiding unnecessary geometry.

Once the retopology was complete, I organized the UVs into multiple material sets, grouping similar assets to maintain a consistent texel density across the character. This made both the baking and texturing process much easier to manage.

Polycount

Old Hunter:

• Character – 57k Tris
• Hair – 9k Tris
• TOTAL: 66k Tris

Beast Cutter – 8k Tris

Hunter Pistol – 8k Tris

For the UVs, I organized the character into six material sets; this gave me a consistent texel density while keeping the asset efficient and easy to manage during baking and texturing.

I used Decimation Master in ZBrush to create lighter meshes for retopology. I then moved into Autodesk Maya, where I completed the retopology, UV layout, and material sets. Finally, I baked all the texture maps in Marmoset Toolbag 5.

Texturing

For texturing, I used Substance 3D Painter. I also used the ACES LUT (UE5) inside Substance 3D Painter to preview the textures in a more realistic color space and ensure consistency between texturing and final presentation.

The biggest challenge was the leather; I spent a lot of time refining the color and roughness variation to achieve a believable look.

I also created several custom Smart Materials using Anchor Points, allowing details such as blood stains, edge wear, and leather damage to automatically interact with the underlying layers.

Throughout the process, I relied heavily on real-world references and constantly checked the materials in Marmoset Toolbag 5 with ray tracing enabled.

Dark Fantasy Style

The original concept already had a strong dark fantasy foundation, but my goal was to reinforce that atmosphere through every stage of the production. I pushed the worn leather, torn fabrics, and blood details to make the character feel like a real hunter from Bloodborne.

I also kept the color palette muted and desaturated, allowing the materials, silhouette, and lighting to carry most of the visual impact. Finally, the presentation in Marmoset, with dramatic lighting, helped give that dark fantasy look.

The leather was by far the most challenging material. I had to rework it several times before I achieved a convincing look. It required a lot of iteration and attention to subtle details, but I believe those small variations are what make the final result feel believable.

Lighting

I created two different presentations for the character, each with its own pose and lighting setup. For the main presentation render, where the character is standing still, I used a cloudy HDRI from Poly Haven, complemented with 3 types of directional lights.

For the dynamic pose, I switched to a more traditional three-point lighting setup, using key, fill, and back lights to create stronger contrast and a more cinematic look.

Rendering & Post-Production

My initial plan was to present the character in Unreal Engine 5, but since I wasn't as comfortable with it at the time, I decided to use Marmoset Toolbag 5 instead. Marmoset Toolbag's intuitive workflow allowed me to focus entirely on presenting the character without spending time setting up a more complex rendering pipeline.

I tweaked very little. Almost everything was done directly inside Marmoset Toolbag. The built-in image controls gave me everything I needed, including exposure, color grading, bloom, vignette, and other camera adjustments, so I didn't feel the need to postprocess anything.

Challenges

One of the biggest challenges was staying motivated and trusting the process. There were many moments throughout the project where I wasn't happy with how the character looked, and it was easy to feel like I wasn't making enough progress. Instead of starting over or rushing to the finish line, I kept refining each part little by little and trusted that the work would eventually come together. Looking back now, I'm really proud that I stayed consistent, because the final result is exactly what I had hoped to achieve.

From a technical perspective, I improved my sculpting, game-ready optimization, topology, Hair Cards, UV workflow, and PBR texturing. One of the most valuable things I learned was how to use transparency maps for elements like the jacket and the cape. It was my first time baking and integrating them into a complete game-ready workflow, and I found them to be an incredibly effective way to reduce polygon count while maintaining visual quality.

Advice for Beginner Artists

Don't give up. Learning 3D art takes years, and progress doesn't happen overnight. There will be moments when you feel like you're not improving, but consistency is what makes the difference. Surround yourself with people who share the same passion and ambitions. Being part of a community is incredibly valuable. Constructive feedback can help you spot mistakes that you would never notice on your own, and seeing other artists grow can be a huge source of motivation.

Always look for references. Spend time studying real-world materials, anatomy, clothing, and the work of artists you admire. One habit that has helped me a lot is spending at least five or ten minutes every day browsing ArtStation's homepage. Looking at outstanding work on a daily basis helps train your artistic eye. Over time, you naturally start noticing things like shapes, materials, composition, presentation, and overall quality, and I think that has had a huge impact on my own work.

Finally, trust the process and be patient. Great characters aren't created in a few days. Every project teaches you something new, and every finished piece brings you one step closer to the level you want to reach.

Conclusion

This project reminded me why I fell in love with character art in the first place. Seeing an idea slowly evolve into a finished game-ready character is one of the most rewarding parts of the process. My advice is simple: create what genuinely excites you, not what you think other people want to see.

If you enjoy what you're making, you'll naturally be willing to put in the hours needed to make it the best it can be. Thanks for taking the time to read about my journey, and I hope some part of it inspires you to start your own. 

Víctor Monge López, 3D Character Artist

Interview conducted by Emma Collins