0017_MGR_40.4

beefaroni

New project I've been working on! Will update thread with more info soon.

Made a few changes to the concept to make the gun a bit more functional. The bolt was originally near the front of the gun and it didn't make sense for the bullet to travel literally from the rear to the front of the gun so I pushed the bolt back like other bullpup style weapons. 

In addition, it seems that most bullpup weapons (older and modern) seem to place the rear sights around the same area as the trigger.

Blockout almost finished..

Latest:

Brian "Panda" Choi

Got me feeling all kinds of Wolfenstein.

Robert Berrier

nice, I like the concept. Interested to see the end result

C86G

Imo shortening the handguard/ front part kinda kills the initial concept´s balance.

Mattvaughn12

Love the mix of wood and steel with this concept. I've always loved guns that have a mix of the two. I look forward to seeing the end result!

beefaroni

C86G said:

Imo shortening the handguard/ front part kinda kills the initial concept´s balance.

Ah I see what you mean now. I'll go back and lengthen that out!

Thanks everyone!

Kaine123

I would make the grip thinner, the grip panels should be flush with the receiver imo

aaronmwolford

Looking solid so far. I second lengthening the hand guard.  I will say something about the scale of the pieces seems a bit off, but it's hard to put my finger on what exactly. The concept has a thick feeling where your block in feels small and delicate. Scaling up the guard may be the solution though so we will wait and see. 

beefaroni

@Joshua - When the mag was that large it didn't leave much room for the bolt of the MP40 to fit back there comfortably without lengthening the stock out even more. I ended up going with more of a STG44 magazine.

Although, with that said, what @Aaron said about the weapon looking more delicate may have to do with the proportion shifts and scale changes done to make it feel more functional.

I think I'm going to take a quick step back and see what I can do about bulking up some sections of the gun while maintaining the functionality I attempted to introduce. After looking at the AUG and TAR I think putting the charging handle in front with a rod leading to the bolt in back could be a better option to retain more of the feel of the concept.

Thanks for the comments guys

beefaroni

Small update. Made everything a bit more beefy and figured out that I could have the bolt up front. The cylinder in the middle will be a thick rod that connects to the bolt. Actual bullet is the larger one up top. The rest are from the previous update.

I feel like I may have lengthened it out up front a bit too much. Will play with proportions some more before I go forward with the HP.

gfelton

This is all kinds of sexy, love it!

another caveman

concept itself is gold cant wait to see the final mesh!!

beefaroni

Thanks guys

I've been super busy at work recently so I haven't gotten the time to give this much love

I will try to update again soon!

beefaroni

Just some quick Zbrush high poly tests (VERY ROUGH!). High poly is underway though!

Pedro Amorim

i would chunkify the handguard and in the processe you could chunkify parts of the design like the bottom of the magazine. that bottom plate looks hella skinny.

Quack!

This is looking great Chris, can't wait to see it progress!

beefaroni

Another small update on high poly. Been testing out some new stuff. Edges aren't completely softened yet so they may look a bit too hard. Going to polish / sculpt some damage in later.

beefaroni

Deadline approaching at work so less time to work on this. Mini tutorial though!

Creasing in Maya to hold hard edges that will then be polished in zbrush. On top of that, converting the crease to 1 subdiv smooth mesh preview and then exporting that to zbrush (no n-gons!). I've been using this method a ton both on this and at work to speed up my workflow.

What I build for the blockout ends up being very close to the high poly which ends up being very close to the low poly. I feel that I've really sped up my workflow as a result!

Pedro Amorim

It's basically like using the turbosmooth by smooting groups.

Nerono

Using your method results in some areas more dense than others because the starting mesh has uneven topology, therefor adding detail would be a messier task , dynamesh would be required, but for the purpose of polishing edges it works

beefaroni

Pedro Amorim said:

It's basically like using the turbosmooth by smooting groups.

Yep. Very close

aaronmwolford

Looking much nicer in terms of proportions. Eager to see more. 

beefaroni

High poly is more or less finished. For this one I want to try some Zbrush damage sculpting instead of heading right into painter. I don't have everything in ZB right now but most of it is in. Screens (hard edges will be polished out and sculpted).

beefaroni

Lil update, just trying to sculpt in some damage before bakes.

polygoo

Looking awesome, love ww2 style stuff, can't wait to see it unfold!

beefaroni

Low poly is almost done, bakes should happen soon!

In the meantime, I wanted to play around in Keyshot on the high. Forgot to mirror some things though.. Will update later on.

beefaroni

Bakes are more or less finished now. A few small errors to fix though.

beefaroni

Processing some wood to test out for the stock.

beefaroni

Probably need to revisit some of the gloss values from metal to metal to give it a bit more visual interest. Anyways, update for the day.

Edit: The overall goal is to have this be a pretty worn version although I like to establish clean base materials in my painter stack before I start adding wear to them. That way I can have a more versatile smart material for future use.

Kn5743

Nice work man!  I really like how the wood turned out.

Bek

Looking really cool; that wood turned out really nice. Not sure I'd have the round sling extrusion wooden though. In the concept it's a lot softer / larger bevel radius, which seems a bit more realistic, but even so it's a bit odd.

Also the suppressor really adds something; not sure why. Maybe because it looks more balanced that way. Regardless, good call on adding it.

bsichterman

Awesome, really digging this. Looking forward to further updates!

kohg

i could see myself making love with this weapon

beefaroni

Thanks everyone. Ill see what I can do about the wood protrusion with the sling area to make it feel more natural in the textures. Just a quick little update though. Happy with this wood for now. It definitely needs to more wear (especially value and gloss differences where the varnish is super worn) but I'll wait to do a pass on the other materials.

Shrike

The metal still looks a lot like plastic currently. A darker diffuse, a slight blue tone to the metal and maybe stronger spec would be adequate.
Proportions actually look better than the concept imo.

On a side note the name "Machtgewehr 40.4" given by the concept artist is total nonsense. That translates to "Might Rifle" and sounds very stupid. Also the designation of the original weapon, STG-44 (or MP44 as it was called to decieve Hitler to be a MP as he initially didnt agree to build an AR) comes from the year, 1944. So having 40.4 makes no sense, as there is no year 1940.4. Also it would be earlier in time, while it is clearly more futuristic, so id suggest STG-48 or something like that if you decide to name it.

Pedro Amorim

cool story bro

Shrike

Later when hitler was on the russian front, and he asked the Soldiers what they would like to have, and they said "More of that amazing 44 rifle"
Hitler was surprised as he did not agree to make a rifle, but when he saw it, he was amazed and called it the "Sturmgewehr". Really a cool story.

kohg

Contemplate amazing art and still get a history lesson. That's why i check this forum daily.

Tomiajayi

wow i like the bump texture on the gray bits.
i'd say you could crank the bump a bit on the wood.  and it looks like the gloss is just a solid value no texture? or if not the texture needs more contrast, that's all
Or just grab some other premade wood material, haha, nothing wrong with that amazing model.
 
Just a question: The hard surface poly bits. How are you doing the bevels? It looks like you mark the edges you want beveled and it applies a value to them different from the rest? Am I correct?

I do all my modeling in max so i'm just curious.

spexel

Awesome, I'm also working on a riffle at the moment, I hope mine will be half as good!

gfelton

This is looking so good man, cannot wait to see it completed!

DsculptStudio

Nice work.

Ingsoc75

It's a short barreled bullpup StG44 that mated with an MP40!

sziada

nice work Chris!

rage288

Good work!

beefaroni

My apologies for the lack of update!! Anyways, came back to it and a friend suggested I try a red bakelite similar to the MP40. I like the look of it but it feels like the rear is too saturated compared to the front. Decals are just temp for now but I'm trying to figure out a way to balance color in front and rear. Any ideas are welcome!



Also a version of it more brown. May jsut go with this if I can't figure out a good way to solve the problem above!

gfelton

Maybe try a darker, less saturated plum for the polymer pieces? It feels like it might fit the palette pretty well. If not, I really liked the colors you have going in the second image, the materials harmonize well together.

beefaroni

Lil update. Need to make the shiny silver metal worn now. It's pretty basic. Hopefully after that's finished I can do a focused scratch pass instead of the more procedural stuff I have going on right now. Going to make the wood slightly more glossy and then wear it off instead of the matte feeling it has going now.

Shrike

beefaroni said:

My apologies for the lack of update!! Anyways, came back to it and a friend suggested I try a red bakelite similar to the MP40. I like the look of it but it feels like the rear is too saturated compared to the front. Decals are just temp for now but I'm trying to figure out a way to balance color in front and rear. Any ideas are welcome!

You could add a short colored sling on the front ring to counterbalance the colors and weight.

Sir Apple

looking cool but your materials are all feeling sorta similar in gloss value.. i would try making the top receiver parts a bit glossier.

beefaroni

@Sir Apple  Good call I think I went a little matte with everything. Small update. Probably will work some more saturated spec color into the metal.