[ArenaNet Internship Art Test] Environment - sybrix

sybrix

Hello PCers,

Since the deadline has miraculously been extended to Nov 16th, I decided to noodle away on this. So far I have the house modeled and unwrapped, and now I'm working on the textures.

I'm planning on using a diff/spec/normal setup for this thing, but my biggest challenge is getting all three of those to fit onto the equivalent of 2 1024 maps (or one 2048x1024 map)

Right now I'm trying to figure out how my textures will lay out before I waste time making sculpts and baking out textures that ultimately won't fit in the allotted texture space! The only way I can think of pulling that off is having 512 diff and 256 normal/specs, but I've never heard of that being done and have no idea what effect that could have on the final product. Going to experiment with that when I get the first tiling texture done.

The other solution is to make 32 bit TGAs and store the spec maps in the alpha channels, which would free up space but also wouldn't technically adhere to the rules of the test.

The third options that I really want to avoid are to A) Make the tiling textures with 256 diff/spec/normals which will probably look pixelated and junky or Just make diff/spec maps

Anyway, here's the model.

Kaiser D

You know what, I've also been thinking of storing the specs in the TGA alphas, but what makes you say it doesn't adhere to the rules? I consider it totally fair, even necessary considering the given texture space.

Oh and your mesh looks incredibly clean, good jorb. What's your tri count so far?

darkchief117

I've also been considering storing my spec maps in the alpha channels. It isn't necessarily prohibited by the rules, but I've been concerned about whether or not to do it because it would require a specific shader functionality for it to function that way in their game engine, and they may want us to set these up to work with their standard shaders.

sybrix

Kaiser & darkchief: Yeah you're right, I thought it technically would be cheating but I gave it more thought and think I was overthinking it. That's probably what I'll end up doing.

The tri count's at 2030 at the moment; I wanted to leave plenty of polys for modeling details like rocks jutting out of the base and the alpha cards for the grass/window plant box.

Here's my WIP texture for the house's rock wall base. Need to work on integrating the grout and mess with the colors a little more.

sybrix

Applied the texture to the base... Realized there are some very noticeable repetition in the texture. Tiled it so that the worst offenders aren't visible, and plan on further breaking up the repetition with some sort of foliage element growing around the base.



I also am getting some bad stretching towards the top of my UV shell. The base is one long strip sewn together to avoid seams, but the nasty stretching seems to be a result of the triangles I have on the top row of faces. If I pull the top UV of a triangle to the left, it fixes the stretching on the left half yet makes the stretching on the right half worse, and vice versa. Don't know if that makes sense, but here's a picture anyway.



Easy solution I'm guessing is to turn the triangles into quads. I also realized I need to put more thought in how the rocks will transition to the grass.

To do:

512 map combo #1:
512x256 Shingles
512x256 Wood

512 map combo #2:
512x256 Grass, flowers, ivy
512x256 Plaster wall segment

512 map combo#3:
512 of door, windows, and chimney (tight fit!)

Total:
4 512 diffuse maps (or 1 1024 map) and the other 1024 will be the normal maps for the diffuse with the specs stored in the alpha channels. Alpha maps for the foliage will be stored in the alpha channels of their respective diffuse texture.

absorbentghost

Looking good there,can you add some cool props outside the structure to give that feeling we all hope to see?id keep my eye peeled to this thread.