Supersuit

Something I’ve been working on for a while – a supersuit!

When I was a kid, I wanted to become superman when I grew up (didn’t we all?). I’d tie a red blanket around my neck and run around the house pretending I had superpowers! Whenever any of my uncles who lived abroad called, I’d pester them to bring me a superman suit on their return. But alas, they always forgot! So I decided I’d make my own when I grew up – and here we are!

The Suit

I tried many different iterations of the supersuit. There was this really cool black and red version with a bat-like cape that I liked.

But ultimately, I thought I’d do a slightly modern take on the classic suit. I went through the original comics and the Christopher Reeve movies, and then through the newer Henry Cavill movies, and finally re-read the New 52 comics. I wanted the suit to look worn and battle hardened. I wanted it to be a bit dirty and have a few scratches on it. I wanted the cape thicker than usual while still feeling real. I decided to use Marvelous Designer for quick and accurate cloth simulation.

The Symbol

What’s the S stand for?

It’s not an S. On my world, it means hope.

Well, here, it’s an S.

– Lois Lane and Superman, Man of Steel (2013)

I went through quite a few different iterations of the symbol, from the classic S to the black and red Kingdom Come version to the Man of Steel version from the recent movies, but I kept coming back to the original S. The symbol of hope that we all know and love.

Technical Details

The suit was created and draped on a custom body in Marvelous Designer / CLO 3D. I sculpted out the smaller details and retopologized the mesh in Pixologic ZBrush. I then used the sculpted mesh to bake details onto the retopologized low poly mesh in Substance Painter. I used Substance Painter to texture the suit, using Adobe Photoshop as needed to fix any baking artifacts. I rendered out still images in Luxion Keyshot and rendered a turntable sequence in Marmoset Toolbag. I did some basic color correction in DaVinci Resolve, added particle effects in Adobe After Effects, and exported out the final video using Adobe Media Encoder.

This has been a pet project of mine for a few months and I’m excited to finally share it with the world!

Here’s a high resolution video of the different stages below. Enjoy!