Ombré Dreadlocks - Game Ready Hairstyle

This is my take on recreating Mink’s hairstyle from the game DRAMAtical Murder. I wanted to create a hairstyle where dreadlocks take center stage, while also experimenting with feathers and ombré gradients.
For this project, I explored various techniques and tools to achieve a semi-realistic result—one that pays homage to the original concept art but could also fit into a modern AAA game.

The hair textures were created in XGen and baked in Marmoset Toolbag. The base color/albedo and flow map were painted in Photoshop, while the haircards were placed in Maya using the GSCurves plugin.
The braids were sculpted in ZBrush, and the feathers were textured in Substance Designer with the help of a plugin developed by Guang (https://shining1.gumroad.com/l/joseaa). The accessories were modeled in Maya and textured in Substance Painter.
The base model (head, body, eyes, and t-shirt) comes from a MetaHumans sculpt, adapted to seamlessly integrate with the hairstyle. Finally, the render was done in Unreal Engine 5, focusing on lighting and presentation to highlight the hair details and materials.

Thanks to Andre Pires for his feedback during this project! https://www.artstation.com/torix

Hope you like it! 🚀

Mink and DRAMAtical Murder are intellectual properties of Nitro+CHiRAL and Nitroplus. This project is a fan-made recreation for artistic and educational purposes only. I do not own the rights to the character or the original design.