WIP - 2026 Reallusion 3D Character Contest Submission (by Kas Gadsden (KG)) - Zodia -King of The Water People
ArtStation WIP Page - LINK HERE
Youtube Video - LINK HERE
Creature Biology: Aquatic.
Zodia’s hide is fish-type scaling, smooth overlapping cycloid plates with a wet, pearlescent, faintly iridescent sheen, like a deep-sea fish. All textures are aquatic biology: moisture speculars, sub-surface scatter through the scale edges, and a marine sheen.
Counter-shading logic: dark above (coral crown), pale below (pearl ventral), the natural camouflage of an open-water predator. The colorway has in-world biological justification.
Process & Pipeline
Zodia started on the CC5 HD Neutral Base, sculpted by hand in CC5, proportion first, then a profile refinement pass on skull, jaw, and brow, checked against clean mesh topology
Tools & Pipeline
Character Creator 5 (sculpt, RTX Beta render), iClone 8 (pose/motion testing), Blender (topology and prep work), Unreal Engine (environment test/lighting, but decided to built 100% in iClone 8 (RTX Beta)). Zodia’s design, sculpt, proportions, and coloration was built entirely via traditional CC5 workflows.
Coloration was planned before it was painted: the coral-to-sage counter-shading was mapped in zones on the sculpt itself, so the “dark above, pale below” camouflage logic had a plan behind it rather than being applied after the fact.
- Face: strong Afro-descendant architecture, broad nasal base, full features, heavy dark expressive brows, bald head, narrow chin-strap goatee tight to the jaw.
- Character build note: lean athletic free-diver physique, long-limbed, tapered, defined but slim. He is tall-and-lean.
- Gear (minimal, matte-black): segmented high neck collar, a separate wide waist wrap above fitted black shorts, asymmetric spiral wrapping down the left forearm terminating at the hand (Kit bashed wardrobe from Reallusion Marketplace creator network, credits: LeBaronMarket, JoeLoXYungChuang
Out-of-Water Adaptive Breathing System, a grafted apparatus at the skull and spine, letting Zodia survive on dry land. A controversial evolution among the Water People, not everyone agrees it should exist.
From there the character moved into CC5’s RTX Beta render path for the first ray-traced look at the scale material, then into a round of pose and motion tests in iClone 8 to check how the hide, gear, and silhouette hold up in action, including an early diagonal-dive test that became the source for the final hero concept.
