Hats for Snowmen

One of the levels in the game is an Ice level and the protagonists are snowmen. In order to make them more interesting and follow the cartoony theme the entire game has got, I was asked to create some hats for these snowmen. No particular idea was given, so, it was left up to me to decide what would work and what not.

First step, was research into hats and try to find interesting ones, hats that would stand out and would give character to the snowmen. The ones that drew my attention, were a witches hat, an aviator's hat and a top hat. These, I felt, would give ordinary snowmen the edge and transform them into unusual snowmen. The reference images I have used, were the ones shown below. (Fig 1 - Fig 4)

Fig 1

Fig 2

Fig 3

Fig 4

First hat I have modelled, was the top hat. Using a cylinder as the starting point, I have deleted the bottom polygon and scaled and copied the border obtained. That gave me the bottom side of the hat. After giving it the shape desired, following my reference image, I have then, used the Shell Modifier in order to give the model the thickness required. After unwrapping, texturing and optimising, the top hat I have modelled, looks as shown in Fig 5:

Fig 5

 Here is the wire frame of the model, showing the flow of polygons and giving a more in depth idea of how I have built it: (see Fig 6).

Fig 6

The reason the bottom side has got sharp corners, is because due to the size of the ode when featured in the game, it was not worth keeping more polygons than this.

The second hat I have modeled, was the witches hat. This was slightly more complicated than the previous one, as it had more detail. First of all, I have started with a cone and applied the same steps as for the top hat, in order to create the bottom side of it. But in a funky witches hat, the top side is the one giving it personality, so I have decided to create some folds, some pretty large ones, visible from a distance. 

Then, I have proceeded to reshaping the basic bottom side, and adding some character to that as well. By just moving groups of vertices, I have created another fold and rolled the border, giving the hat the thickness required. I am really happy with the final product, as when placed on the snowmen, it certainly makes them stand out.