Make Detailed 3D Sculpt of Mighty Viking Warrior in ZBrush & Maya

Introduction 

Hello. My name is Monik Sharma, and I’m a 3D Character Artist from India. Since childhood, I’ve been fascinated by how characters in games can tell powerful stories without speaking a single word – through the scars on their faces, the weight of their armor, or the way their eyes carry emotion. That silent storytelling is what drew me into character art and continues to inspire me every day.

To pursue this passion seriously, I completed a two-year training program in modeling, sculpting, and texturing, which gave me a strong technical foundation. But beyond the technical side, what excites me the most is using those skills to breathe life into characters – making them feel real, believable, and filled with history.

For me, every project is more than just a model – it’s an opportunity to craft a story, a personality, and a lasting impression.

Over the past five years, I’ve worked on titles like GreedFall 2, Steelrising, Syberia: The World Before, MotoGP 22, RIDE 5, and Monster Energy Supercross 6. 

Personal projects like the Viking Warrior allow me to experiment, learn, and push my creativity further.

Viking Warrior

This project started with an amazing concept by meltifire. I found this project very interesting because it had so many different characteristics: scars, armor, leather, carving details, fur, muscular body, and expression. I really loved the concept and wanted to bring it to life in 3D.

Before starting the sculpt, I spent some time gathering good references, because the better the references, the more accurate and rich visual details we can add. I collected images of historical Viking clothing, armor, weapons, leather textures, and human anatomy, and kept them open while working to make sure my sculpt stayed close to the concept and looked realistic.

Modeling 

I started with a base mesh and began by focusing on the primary details: the big shapes like the overall proportions, silhouette, and balance of the character. Once that foundation felt solid, I moved on to the secondary details, where I refined the muscle flow, the folds in the clothing, and the structure of the armor. Finally, I worked on the tertiary details: all the fine touches like skin pores, small wrinkles, surface imperfections, and tiny elements that bring the character to life.

In ZBrush, I mainly used the Clay Tubes brush to build up forms, the Move brush to adjust proportions, TrimDynamic to define planes, and the Standard brush for folds and shaping.

For the face, I paid close attention to anatomy, starting with the primary forms while keeping the major bony landmarks in place, and then moving on to the smaller details. I projected skin detail from a scan mesh using the ZWrap plugin and then sculpted wrinkles, pores, veins, and fine breakup manually using the Standard brush and DamStandard brush.

For scars and rougher skin, I used the Orb Cracks brush to add more personality and storytelling. I usually work more on the torso and arms, since they’re more visible with the outfit on, just to save time.

I created the hair in XGen, which was my first time using it. Before moving to grooming, I carefully studied references to understand the flow, volume, and layering of the hairstyle and beard. I then built the hair layer by layer, placing guides and controlling clumping to achieve a natural look. Once the hair was generated, I brought it into ZBrush to give the strands thickness and refine the flow. I also placed the beads in the hair and sculpted the fitting around them so everything felt connected and believable.

The most challenging part was capturing the sense of age and toughness in the character. I wanted the wrinkles, scars, and heavy beard to tell a story of experience. At first, the face felt too stiff, so I went through several passes until it started to feel alive and expressive without losing structure.

The hair was another big challenge, since it was my first time using XGen. I had to learn how to control guides, clumping, and variation, and then figure out how to blend the groom with sculpted details in ZBrush. It took trial and error, but overcoming these challenges helped me grow a lot and made the final character much stronger.

Outfit

For the clothing and armor shapes, I first created the blockout in ZBrush, except for the pants, which I made in Marvelous Designer, to capture realistic folds. Just like with the face, I followed the primary, secondary, and tertiary detail workflow.

After the blockout stage was done, I moved to the secondary details, where I refined the folds and added edge wear to the assets. Then, in the detailing phase, I focused on surfacing, adding cracks, damages, and subtle imperfections. This helped push the realism further and added storytelling to the character, making the clothing and armor feel used and believable rather than brand new. 

Here is the example of waist armor that I followed using the above workflow:

To create carving on clothing and on metallic elements, I followed this process:

Here are the final blocking and high-poly images of the waist armor:

For the fur, I used XGen. I first studied references, then created the fur by working with guides, clumping, and variation to make it look natural. After generating it in XGen, I refined the thickness and flow inside ZBrush, making sure it blended well with the outfit and supported the overall character design.

To optimize the process, I always prioritized the areas most visible in the final render while keeping less noticeable regions simpler. I paid extra attention to the face, hands, and waist region since they naturally draw the viewer’s eye, while spending less time on the lower parts of the character, especially the shoes and leg armor, as the camera rarely focuses on those areas. I also made sure to keep the elements optimized with a reasonable tri count, which will be helpful later during the low-poly stage.

I followed the same workflow as described above to create every element of the character, and here are the final high-poly renders from ZBrush:

I’m planning to texture the character because my goal is to take it through the full real-time game pipeline and present it as a complete production-ready asset.

For the presentation, lighting, rendering, and overall direction, I drew inspiration from several amazing artists, including Raf Grassetti, Vinayak S, Igor Catto, Arda Koyuncu, Nishas, and Jake Waddington. Studying their work helped me understand not only rendering and lighting but also how to present a character in a strong, visually appealing way.

For the rendering and lighting, I was really inspired by the quality of the Arnold renderer, so I decided to render the project there. I used a three-point lighting setup inside Maya for presentation.

To make the character more visually clear, I created separate materials for the eyes, hair, body, metals, and outfit. This helped me clearly distinguish each element and made the sculpt easier to read. It also took a lot of back and forth, since the details in ZBrush often looked different once rendered under the Arnold lighting setup. I had to keep adjusting both the sculpted details and the lights until I was fully satisfied with the final output.

Conclusion

It took me a couple of months to complete this project, as I had to learn new tools along the way and implement them at an optimal level without compromising quality. I enjoyed creating every element of the character, but what really stood out for me was working on the face, body, and organic sculpting of the outfit. Bringing life and personality into the sculpt was the most exciting part.

The main challenges I faced were capturing the sense of age and toughness in the character while keeping the anatomy grounded in realism, as well as learning XGen for the first time and figuring out how to blend the generated hair and fur with sculpted details in ZBrush. Overcoming these hurdles really pushed me to grow and made the final result stronger.

From this project, I learned a lot, both technically and artistically. On the technical side, it helped me grow by training myself to break assets into primary, secondary, and tertiary forms, which made the sculpting process much clearer. Another important lesson was in creating detailed armor and metallic elements: I learned how to handle edge wear, add surface variation using alphas, and introduce subtle cracks and damages that give the pieces history and story. This not only improved my technical skills but also helped me understand how small details can elevate the overall realism.

On the artistic side, I realized that it’s not always about creating the most complex shapes or designs – it’s about making shapes that feel more authentic and believable so they can tell a story.

Here are my tutorial recommendations:

Creating Realistic Hair with Maya XGen – A thorough hair tutorial featuring detailed grooming and Arnold rendering techniques.

Additional inspiration and guidance came from breakdowns and techniques of artists like Raf Grassetti, Vinayak S, Igor Catto, Arda Koyuncu, Nishas, and Jake Waddington, especially in areas like anatomy, rendering, and presentation.

This project was more than just a sculpt: it was a complete learning journey. From anatomy and organic sculpting to armor detailing and hair grooming, every step taught me something new. My goal was not only to create a visually strong character but also to make it feel alive, believable, and full of story.

I hope sharing my process helps other artists see that growth comes from patience, iteration, and pushing yourself beyond comfort zones.

I’m really looking forward to the final completion of this character and pushing it even further with textures and real-time presentation.

Thank you for taking the time to view my work, and I look forward to creating even more compelling characters in the future.

Monik Sharma, Character Artist

Interview conducted by Amber Rutherford