Looking awesome Jess, beautiful scene and that cow is looking great too! Although i'd consider removing a loop or two from the bottom section of the back leg, its looking quite dense in comparison to the front leg. Also use that middle loop going down the tail to add to the silhouete, at the moment its not doing anything (i guess its there to be used as a mirror seam).
Great work, when I look at it I can't really believe it's game art I can't imagine how it would feel walking around in it.
Only critic I would have is the road in the background, in the concept it's really sharp and looks like a path, but in the scene itself it looks like dark grass and really blurry.
Stromberg90 - Hm, yeah, I would actually have liked additional tessellation on that part of the landscape, but perhaps with a little more vert by vert sculpting I can get it to look less blurry. Thanks for the crit!
Snader - means a lot, coming from one of my harshest critics xD
Alberto Rdrgz - Do you mean the flowers in the foreground? I had intentionally made them large so they could act as a catching leading element into the picture, but if I made them smaller, do you think the path would serve that purpose well enough? (hope I'm making sense haha) I do suppose they are huge, kindof dwarfing the path!! I'll try shrinking them and see how that works.
i think smaller would work a lot better you'd literally have more space for the eye to move, as right now it looks more like they're getting in the way. with smaller flowers the scale would be affected right away, and give you more depth, also good for eye movement. this looks great, push it.
EDIT:
do all the rocks look like they're about the same size?
Jessica I really love the headless cow idea. I think they will provide excellent contrast with the happy paradise scene! :P This is looking excellent btw, I need to get back to work now.
It is looking great, like someone else said, it looks like a painting.
Looking forward to seeing the cow finished. I might not hang it's belly so low unless you want the udder to drag. (Well, idk, maybe you got room for em)
I'm really trying to work in quads as much as possibly these days. Sometimes that's hard, but it makes it a lot easier to select things when you can select by loops and rows, etc... Tris break those tools functions.
I noticed the dark purple flowers up front have some pretty harsh lighting that shows off the polys as an X plane. That's really the only thing giving it away as 'game props' and not a painting.
Oh, okay, I see what you mean Alberto. I will shrink 'em then and maybe even scoot them to the left a tad to give the composition some more breathing room.
itismario - Thanks Your recent character turned out super awesome btw, I love it ^_^
toxic_h2o - lol!! x]
Baddcog - Thanks for the crits and tips. I will fix the lavenders, i think it is probably a vert normal problem.
Hayden Zammit - Yeah, it is one big map haha. Maybe not the best way, but anywayyy xD Underneath the water shader is a separate hand-painted mesh. To find the shoreline I made a numbered grid on the diffuse so I could see where everything was in my scene. Weird, I know :P
Really impressive stuff Jessica! Im at the start of my work now, but reading through your thread has really inspired me to go for it! keep up the good work!
I nominate this one for 2k12 PolyCount Showcase Award for the Category Hand Painted Awesomeness.Seriously from a well to this?Now we need to see that cow..
Hahahaha, thanks guys xD Yeah . . . now that I think about it, I never did finish the well :poly131:
WELL, here is my cow (complete with head, sorry toxic_h2o)! Will be texturing soon, a 512 (unless you guys think 1024? but he is fairly small in the scene . . . ) The alpha planes are fur - he is going to be furry cow! :poly142: Critique and comments welcome:
I love this thread, your work has such style and it's been great watching your progress and learning from you along the way.
I don't know how concerned with optimisation you are at this stage, but there's a lot you could do to reduce the tri count of the cow - plenty of removable edges that don't help define silhouette. especially in the face and around the circumference of the body.
Also, I know this is a heavily stylised cow, but the head doesn't scream cow to me, more... bear. I think it's an enlarged nose and hourglass shape to the head that is often associated with cows. the ears could come down the sides of the head a bit too.
Of course, this is a stylised piece so it's up to you
Thanks for the critique benji - I will optimize at any time, if optimization is needed! xD What do you mean by circumference of the body though? Like going around his belly? Anyway, I will take a second look all around for those unnecessary edges.
As for his un-cow-likeness, I think I will keep him this way I did look at a lot of reference as I made this, but I actually kindof prefer him funny-looking, as in the concept haha. My hope is that when he gets his colors, he will read as cow anyway - don't see no spotted bears with pink udders walking around!! xD
The oddly-shaped head was one of the first things I noticed too, but I was hesitant to say anything because something like that is a stylistic choice. The second thing I notice though was, am I just imagining it, or does the poor dear only have three nipples on her udder?
You've got 4 loops above the shoulders that are pretty close together. That's what benji means. And I agree. I'd merge the middle 2 vertices, and spread out the outer 2 a bit to get a more consistent polygon size.
I'd also remove the top 2 loops of the front knee, to make it less þ and more Y, like in real life and like your concept (which uses an inverted cone and no bulges). Leave the bottom loop to show a bit of a tapering, to still indicate the knee.
The tail needs a bit of a tweak but nothing huge. Again there are some inconsistently sized polygons. Just drag the loops around to make them more consistently spaced.
Cows don't have 3... 'nipples' in a row, they have 4 in a square ::
I think the eyes can be optimized a pinch too. You should at least turn the biggest loop 22.5 degrees (and then retriangulate) so you can benefit a bit of the intersected geometry.
And like people said, the head looks a bit weird, google some reference to figure out how to caricaturize a cow. You might still end up preferring the current one, but you'll never know for sure if you don't try.
This is definitely one of the best PC threads ever. Such a wonderful insight into a fantastic scene!
Lovely work, Jessica!
I have to ask though, and apologies for it being such a menial question, but I notice you've been using UDK, yet you clearly seem to be painting textures on a Mac in your last screenshot... how are you running UDK? Bootcamping Windows? Surely you're not painting textures in Mac and then rebooting to Win?!
Tigerfeet, Baddcog - Like the snout, the 3 nipples were also intentional; as the cows are going to be placed at a flat side view in my scene, I thought 3 nipples might create a more interesting silhouette value than 2. However, according to everyone's reactions it seems that pushing stylization to the point of inaccuracy is not a good idea hahaha - so I will make the changes to snout and nipples. Thanks for your help! :]
Snader - Thanks for pointing out some specific areas, I definitely see where I need some cleaning up now.
BlvdNights, breakneck - Thanks guys
aajohnny, Nerf Bat Ninja - Ooo, the grass is a good idea!! Will do.
Teejay - Yeahhh, that hahaha . . . I actually have a mac and a pc running at the same time next to each other . . . mac for photoshop and pc for udk/max, and since my pc is kindof broken and doesn't support internet access, my flashdrive sees a lot of use LOL. I really should get photoshop on my pc huh, although I'd still have to have my mac open at the same time for Google reference gathering (and, uh, maybe a little Facebook )
Can you show different camera angles of your scene? I'm curious as to how your water reflection will work then.
Other than that, as I said in Waywo thread few days ago, it's a very nice shot. I'm just worried it only works in this camera angle and that you do not profit from your move to 3D at all in this case, other than having done very nice props and textures that can stand on their own of course.
You are right Paroxum - as I built this scene, it only holds up from one camera angle. The parts of the landscape not shown are quite messy and unfinished, and the landscape itself is actually very small, so if you turn the camera any other way, you will see the edges haha.
As for the water, the shader is very basic, and some of my reflections are actually painted in, like the ones coming from the lake rocks. I hope to create my next environment to be playable, as in great from any camera angle, and I also hope to improve with shader work.
The work here is great Jessica. Been great to see the progress of the scene going from a simple prop to this whole scene. You can really see how much you have grown. Cant wait to see it finished
Thanks Autocon! I can't wait to see it either ahaha.
Cow, redone! I think it looks better , and saved tris too Thanks for the crits everyone. If there's anything else let me know - next step is texturing!
You know... looking at the latest wireframe made me wonder. How are you going to handle the pooper? Making the image happy, innocent and cartoony is weird with one visible, but it might look weird without one...
And this is why polycounters are better than all other game-artists of various backgrounds. Pages and pages of one project being slaved over, improved, taking in critique and improving, perfecting one grand magnificent piece.
Keep going at it Jessica, it's all turning out beautifully!
I'd say no pooper. I'm not afraid of it, or anything like that, but i don't see it adding anything. Like that pick of the cow I posted in basically the same pose, you really can't see any detail there.
Maybe at most a little pink skin/ which would tie into the udders/nose maybe.
Replies
Only critic I would have is the road in the background, in the concept it's really sharp and looks like a path, but in the scene itself it looks like dark grass and really blurry.
Keep it up, Coowl cow btw
Stromberg90 - Hm, yeah, I would actually have liked additional tessellation on that part of the landscape, but perhaps with a little more vert by vert sculpting I can get it to look less blurry. Thanks for the crit!
Snader - means a lot, coming from one of my harshest critics xD
Alberto Rdrgz - Do you mean the flowers in the foreground? I had intentionally made them large so they could act as a catching leading element into the picture, but if I made them smaller, do you think the path would serve that purpose well enough? (hope I'm making sense haha) I do suppose they are huge, kindof dwarfing the path!! I'll try shrinking them and see how that works.
EDIT:
do all the rocks look like they're about the same size?
Looking forward to seeing the cow finished. I might not hang it's belly so low unless you want the udder to drag. (Well, idk, maybe you got room for em)
I'm really trying to work in quads as much as possibly these days. Sometimes that's hard, but it makes it a lot easier to select things when you can select by loops and rows, etc... Tris break those tools functions.
I noticed the dark purple flowers up front have some pretty harsh lighting that shows off the polys as an X plane. That's really the only thing giving it away as 'game props' and not a painting.
That water came out awesome too. Did you use one big texture map to do all the little color changes and everything?
itismario - Thanks
toxic_h2o - lol!! x]
Baddcog - Thanks for the crits and tips. I will fix the lavenders, i think it is probably a vert normal problem.
Hayden Zammit - Yeah, it is one big map haha. Maybe not the best way, but anywayyy xD Underneath the water shader is a separate hand-painted mesh. To find the shoreline I made a numbered grid on the diffuse so I could see where everything was in my scene. Weird, I know :P
Cow is coming along slowwwwly but surely lol xD
exceptional work from concept to finish, I love the style captured here.
Maybe the thread needs entitled: Awesomness.
Me too. This thread makes me want to be a better artist.
WELL, here is my cow (complete with head, sorry toxic_h2o)! Will be texturing soon, a 512 (unless you guys think 1024? but he is fairly small in the scene . . . ) The alpha planes are fur - he is going to be furry cow! :poly142: Critique and comments welcome:
I don't know how concerned with optimisation you are at this stage, but there's a lot you could do to reduce the tri count of the cow - plenty of removable edges that don't help define silhouette. especially in the face and around the circumference of the body.
Also, I know this is a heavily stylised cow, but the head doesn't scream cow to me, more... bear. I think it's an enlarged nose and hourglass shape to the head that is often associated with cows. the ears could come down the sides of the head a bit too.
Of course, this is a stylised piece so it's up to you
As for his un-cow-likeness, I think I will keep him this way
Like they said the nose need to be bigger.
Here's a typical cow cartoon that shows how the nose always gets exagerated even more. (I can't explain the udder and horns, lol)
Tiger is right too, should be 4 nipples.
I'd also remove the top 2 loops of the front knee, to make it less þ and more Y, like in real life and like your concept (which uses an inverted cone and no bulges). Leave the bottom loop to show a bit of a tapering, to still indicate the knee.
The tail needs a bit of a tweak but nothing huge. Again there are some inconsistently sized polygons. Just drag the loops around to make them more consistently spaced.
Cows don't have 3... 'nipples' in a row, they have 4 in a square ::
I think the eyes can be optimized a pinch too. You should at least turn the biggest loop 22.5 degrees (and then retriangulate) so you can benefit a bit of the intersected geometry.
And like people said, the head looks a bit weird, google some reference to figure out how to caricaturize a cow. You might still end up preferring the current one, but you'll never know for sure if you don't try.
Lovely work, Jessica!
I have to ask though, and apologies for it being such a menial question, but I notice you've been using UDK, yet you clearly seem to be painting textures on a Mac in your last screenshot... how are you running UDK? Bootcamping Windows? Surely you're not painting textures in Mac and then rebooting to Win?!
Snader - Thanks for pointing out some specific areas, I definitely see where I need some cleaning up now.
BlvdNights, breakneck - Thanks guys
aajohnny, Nerf Bat Ninja - Ooo, the grass is a good idea!! Will do.
Teejay - Yeahhh, that hahaha . . . I actually have a mac and a pc running at the same time next to each other . . . mac for photoshop and pc for udk/max, and since my pc is kindof broken and doesn't support internet access, my flashdrive sees a lot of use LOL. I really should get photoshop on my pc huh, although I'd still have to have my mac open at the same time for Google reference gathering (and, uh, maybe a little Facebook
Update on the mesh coming today!
Other than that, as I said in Waywo thread few days ago, it's a very nice shot. I'm just worried it only works in this camera angle and that you do not profit from your move to 3D at all in this case, other than having done very nice props and textures that can stand on their own of course.
As for the water, the shader is very basic, and some of my reflections are actually painted in, like the ones coming from the lake rocks. I hope to create my next environment to be playable, as in great from any camera angle, and I also hope to improve with shader work.
Cow, redone! I think it looks better
Keep it up!
does this make me weird?
Keep going at it Jessica, it's all turning out beautifully!
Maybe at most a little pink skin/ which would tie into the udders/nose maybe.
Butt it's your cow
Looking excellent.