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Sketchbook: Valentin Nadolu

ValN84
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ValN84 polycounter lvl 5
Hi everyone,

My name is Valentin Nadolu, I'm a 3d artist specialized in vehicles for more than 10 years and the Lead Vehicle Artist @ AMC pixel factory for the last 7 years. I've did a hell of a lot of vehicles for games like Mercenaries 2, Saboteur (EA), Test Drive Unlimited and Unlimited 2, Call of Duty: Ghosts to name a few. I work in Maya, Max, Photoshop, Substance Designer and whatever in necessary. I also like to automate things with scripts and like to dig deep into pipelines and technical aspects of 3d graphics.
I like cars, computers and graphics, preferably all mixed together to create something cool.

Feel free to comment and add critique, I'm always looking to improve my trade so any input is welcome!
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  • ValN84
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    ValN84 polycounter lvl 5
    This is my first test with Marmoset Toolbag 2. I used this Chevy Chevelle model I did I think 4 years ago. It's pretty low poly (7771 tris) but had a high res model and 2048 textures. I did a quick job of making Glossiness and Metalness maps for MT2 as way to get accustomed to PBR:

    iSFTgRd.png

    6FYShwa.png

    fSTYDwt.png

    phEb1im.png
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  • ValN84
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    ValN84 polycounter lvl 5
    Next up is a Camaro I textured in dDo. I love the results although it felt pretty limited by the presets which will get very played out as people will start using them and by the general slowness caused by the reliance of PS scripts. Lack of speed and customizing possibilities ultimately drove me to buy Substance Designer 4 instead.
    This is similar to the Chevelle in specs:

    iQzX5Wc.png

    erqNs6z.png

    shnoVJi.png

    psRftpM.png

    AA1sTJF.png

    HyLixe5.png
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  • ValN84
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    ValN84 polycounter lvl 5
    Moving on to Substance Designer, this is my first attempt, using the Chevelle I posted above.

    p2IVrHm.png

    Overall the results are a bit noisy but that can be easily rectified by adjusting the sliders as you can see on this Hemi Cuda.

    4589xYl.png

    Lastly, here's how the SD graph looks like. On the right you can see the sliders that can be used to adjust the car paint material.

    A9ViLfG.png
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  • jacksteel
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    jacksteel
    Really nice models man, super clean. Cant wait to see more
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  • ValN84
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    ValN84 polycounter lvl 5
    Here's my latest work, loosely based on the IAR-80, a Romanian fighter plane from the Second World War. Converted to a salt flats racer. Features the original 14 cylinder radial engine with a gearbox that drives the stub wing mounted solid aluminum wheels. The rear wheel is taken from a larger bomber and features a regular tire. Everything was put together on a tight budget, hence the weird method in which the front wheel hub assembly bolts on what remains of the original wing. Heavy usage on the corrosive and abrasive salt flats means that the hotrod got painted over multiple times, hence the rough paintjob. Also, nobody really bothers to clean up the salt buildup, although there's a bit more concern about the cleanlieness of the glass for obvious safety reasons.

    The high resolution model has ~1 million triangles and it's created in Maya using Creases and Smooth Preview.
    The low resolution model has 12.000 triangles and was created using the Quad Tool in Maya's Modeling Toolkit.
    The textures are made up of one 4096x4096 texture set for the plane and one 512x512 texture set for the glass area. Both shaders are PBR using a spec / glossiness model.

    Programs used:
    - Maya for high res and low res modeling.
    - xNormal for baking tangent space normal maps.
    - Quixel nDo2 for normal map panels, nuts, bolts, rivets and other small details.
    - Substance Designer for the base materials and generic details such as dirt, salt deposits.
    - Substance Painter for extra custom details.
    - Marmoset Toolbag 2 for rendering .

    First, here are some renders with just the base materials:

    hOpmmNS.png

    4mi7xPK.png

    hOpmmNS.png
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  • ValN84
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    ValN84 polycounter lvl 5
    Next up the final renders showing the final look of the hot rod: really used and full of salt.
    PS: still looking for a good free salt flat HDRI and backplate for some beauty shots. Any ideas? Let me know!

    iLMo9K5.png

    eisDwlN.png

    1wIVyku.png
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  • ValN84
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    ValN84 polycounter lvl 5
    And a look at the output textures.

    3uMLw1I.jpg
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  • ValN84
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    ValN84 polycounter lvl 5
    Haven't posted here in a while. I've since posted a bunch of stuff on Sketchfab, latest being this simple configurator that allows the user to swap wheels on a Dacia Logan. I've used Sketchfab's API through shaderbyte's Utility (see page for credit and links to resources).
    For the purposes of this I've updated the Dacia Logan model to about 100k triangles to avoid any normal map bakes for low curvature shapes. Since sketchfab compresses textures, I wanted to avoid "stepped" artifacts. 
    The whole thing is still very much WIP, both 3d model and functionality.
    Please use this link to use the configurator, clicking on the Sketchfab play button will show the model with all the wheels on top of each other.
    http://vrntech.ro/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/vrnLoganWheelConfigurator.html
    model'
    PS: For anyone curious, this is my real world car, the Enkei RPF1 configuration is what I use in the summer and the widened steelies are what I use in the winter.
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  • ValN84
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    ValN84 polycounter lvl 5
    Haven't posted here in a while. I've since posted a bunch of stuff on Sketchfab, latest being this simple configurator that allows the user to swap wheels on a Dacia Logan. I've used Sketchfab's API through shaderbyte's Utility (see page for credit and links to resources).
    For the purposes of this I've updated the Dacia Logan model to about 100k triangles to avoid any normal map bakes for low curvature shapes. Since sketchfab compresses textures, I wanted to avoid "stepped" artifacts. 
    The whole thing is still very much WIP, both 3d model and functionality.
    Please use this link to use the configurator, clicking on the Sketchfab play button will show the model with all the wheels on top of each other.
    http://vrntech.ro/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/vrnLoganWheelConfigurator.html
    model'
    PS: For anyone curious, this is my real world car, the Enkei RPF1 configuration is what I use in the summer and the widened steelies are what I use in the winter.
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  • ValN84
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    ValN84 polycounter lvl 5
    Haven't posted here in a while. I've since posted a bunch of stuff on Sketchfab, latest being this simple configurator that allows the user to swap wheels on a Dacia Logan. I've used Sketchfab's API through shaderbyte's Utility (see page for credit and links to resources).
    For the purposes of this I've updated the Dacia Logan model to about 100k triangles to avoid any normal map bakes for low curvature shapes. Since sketchfab compresses textures, I wanted to avoid "stepped" artifacts. 
    The whole thing is still very much WIP, both 3d model and functionality.
    Please use this link to use the configurator, clicking on the Sketchfab play button will show the model with all the wheels on top of each other.
    http://vrntech.ro/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/vrnLoganWheelConfigurator.html
    model'
    PS: For anyone curious, this is m
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