Old plaster wall with ornate wood trim.

JamieRIOT

Hi everyone,

I'm going to make another tiling texture/mesh using Zbrush heavily, to build on what I learnt from creating the stone slab floor texture.
This time around I'm going to make a tiling interior wall mesh; a plastered one, with vertical wood beams and ornate, gold-painted wooden trim along the top and base. The wall will be old-looking and worn, with rough, possibly cracked plaster, old wood beams and trim with chipped gold leaf paint coating. The texture will be 2048x1024.

There is a few objectives I have set myself for this piece:
- Continue to learn Zbrush and improve sculpting.
- Experiment a little with shadowbox.
- Create a realistic interior tiling wall mesh, which has texture(s) suitable for PBR and (potentially) LODs.

Software I will be using: Maya - Zbrush - NDO - Photoshop - Toolbag 2

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Here's some reference images I collected:



And here is the base mesh(es) created in Maya, just before I take them in to Zbrush for sculpting:





V The wooden ornaments that decorate the skirting pieces.






I will be Zbrushing this piece up over my Christmas break.

Any feedback you guys could give me would be great.

JamieRIOT

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JamieRIOT

I was wandering about what would be the best way to layout my texture(s) for this piece, before I start sculpting this up properly.

There are two options I was thinking of (as shown in the image below);
A. One 2048x1024 texture which has all elements of the modular wall mesh in.
or
B. A 1024x1024 tiling plaster texture and a 1024x256 trim pieces texture.



It would be great to hear your advice about how is the best way to tackle it.

Sebvhe

This is sweet can't wait to see it textured !

As for the layout, I might be wrong but I think it really depends on your engine.
For instance in UE4, you should use the layout A, that means you only have one material on your mesh thus less drawcall.
Other engine could run better with layout B I believe.
Anyway it's more a question of optimisation than workflow for me.

JamieRIOT

@Sebvhe - Thanks for the reply. That's true, option A less drawcalls than B, but then B would allow for reusability if this were to be a part of a larger environment (currently not) that shares textures. Is it better to show that you can plan and layout textures for reusability, or would people look at this unique piece and think why wasn't that just put into one texture sheet (in portfolio terms)?

Sebvhe

Here is my point of view : For a portfolio piece what matters the most is how beautiful it is. By using Layout A, even though you will loose a bit of reusability you will be able to manage way better transitions, between the beams and the plaster. By adding a bit of dirtiness in the borders of the plaster for instance. It will make the whole thing blend better together and add credibility to the scene.

But this is only my point of view, I personally would go for A. However there is not really a "best method", it really depends on what you want to achieve, what engine you use ...

JamieRIOT

@Sebvhe - Sure. I think for this one, seeing as it is a unique mesh, i will go with method A. Like you said, it will be easier to manage better transitions across the mesh. Thanks for the help.

Cheeky_Pickle

Looks good so far! I'm confuzzled about the same problem at the moment so thanks for bringing it up!

WesleyArthur

Wow, awesome filigree! As for your textures, you could put a trim at the top of a square texture, and a trim across the bottom, then use the bit in between for the plaster. Then when you build your wall, pack your UVs shells based on your texture - so sort of combine the two components of option B into one.

I feel like that was the worst explanation in the world haha

JamieRIOT

@Holly Mellor - Nice to know I'm not sailing in this boat alone. Cheers.
@WesleyArthur - Thanks. Not the worst explanation I'm sure I could then have the vertical beams as another horizontal strip too. As long as I sculpt and make the plaster texture in a way that there's enough detail across it, that will help not notice obvious tiling.

JamieRIOT

Beam me up!

Spent a bit of time today scultping the vertical wood beam. This is one beam model seen from all four sides.



I think I'm going to make another one that isn't so rough too and choose which one matches the degree of aging and damage that I want. After that I'll tackle the plaster parts.