[W.I.P] Fable 2 house (critics wanted)
polycounter lvl 8
Hello !
This is my first post so I'm un bit intimidated and I will start by introducing myself a little bit. My name is Laurent, I'm french and I'm working in computer graphics but not real-time (:thumbdown:).
I would like to make real-time environments in UDK so I started to learn it a few months ago but I've never done anything really finished (no normals baking for example, just a little of render to texture) so I've decided to take an exercise :
take a concept art from Fable 2, make one high poly house from the concept, and bake it onto a low poly one.
So here is the concept :
http://www.creativeuncut.com/gallery-08/f2-sketch-shops.html
and here I am (done in 3ds max, vray sun lighting) :
So first, what do you think about it? If you have any remarks, critics, questions, please write it down.
I'm questionning myself about the 4 pillars at the angles of the house, I can't find out what kind of material would be expected at the intersection of the beams. There are also a lot of things that should be changed (like some of the colors I think...) but I don't really see it right now.
Second, I have a lot of questions about the baking process like :
-should the low poly be placed inside or outside the high poly or does it even matter?
-should my low poly be one object?
-on the low poly would you rather use one multi-material or only one material (is it possible with the glass?)
It would be very nice if some of you could tell me in which tutorial or thread I could get some answers or tell me what you would personnaly recommend.
I will keep the thread updated with my progress and I hope in the end I will be able to make a proper model optimized for UDK.
Thanks for reading
This is my first post so I'm un bit intimidated and I will start by introducing myself a little bit. My name is Laurent, I'm french and I'm working in computer graphics but not real-time (:thumbdown:).
I would like to make real-time environments in UDK so I started to learn it a few months ago but I've never done anything really finished (no normals baking for example, just a little of render to texture) so I've decided to take an exercise :
take a concept art from Fable 2, make one high poly house from the concept, and bake it onto a low poly one.
So here is the concept :
http://www.creativeuncut.com/gallery-08/f2-sketch-shops.htmland here I am (done in 3ds max, vray sun lighting) :
So first, what do you think about it? If you have any remarks, critics, questions, please write it down.
I'm questionning myself about the 4 pillars at the angles of the house, I can't find out what kind of material would be expected at the intersection of the beams. There are also a lot of things that should be changed (like some of the colors I think...) but I don't really see it right now.
Second, I have a lot of questions about the baking process like :
-should the low poly be placed inside or outside the high poly or does it even matter?
-should my low poly be one object?
-on the low poly would you rather use one multi-material or only one material (is it possible with the glass?)
It would be very nice if some of you could tell me in which tutorial or thread I could get some answers or tell me what you would personnaly recommend.
I will keep the thread updated with my progress and I hope in the end I will be able to make a proper model optimized for UDK.
Thanks for reading
Replies
Don't use Vray to render, either take screenshots from within UDK, or use a real-time renderer in 3ds max, such as xoliushader.
House looks very high poly please could we see texture flats and a wireframe?
Keep plugging away, UDK isn't hard to learn don't worry!
EDIT: Crap, just re-read, didn't notice that was a high for baking! As for Tutorials, if you search around on the polycount Wiki I'm sure you will find something. I usually use a program called xNormal to produce the bakes.
Anyway here is the perfect tutorial for you about the entire game asset creation process! It should answer all of your above questions.
For glass, I think you will need 2 different material id's because the glass is going to need a reflective material while the rest of the house will not. There might be a way to do it with just one material, but I don't know of it, does anyone else?
When you've finished the asset, here is a great tutorial on importing content into UDK - really straightforward!
Good luck, looking forward to updates!
Thank you a lot for your comments and links, I will carefully read them.
I think you definately have a point with the green, and more than the reflections I'm thinking about maybe making a green room in the attic slightly visible through the window...
I'll keep you up
I would advise you to try out a few different color schemes maybe you can come up with something you like better, one way to do this without changing the textures is to do a few quick paintovers in photoshop.
And if you have any problems just keep on posting here, and we will do the best to help you
quick update on the modeling (really quick actually but some of my work is on the other side of the house).
Thank you Stromberg90, I used to do quick photoshop all the time when I got stuck on something before and I don't do this enough anymore... on the left side of the black line is the photoshop version, with a new tone for the green, and less saturated red.
Also I added some color inside just to give the impression that we can see a bit of the inside.
I watched a lot of the tutorials you recommended me and I think Anthy9986's one is a good start in order to understand the process on a simple objet.
Next update soon (I hope)
Hi there !
Here is this weekend update. I've spent some time on the textures, all the textures I had were procedural so I did an unwrap session + render to texture and the work the textures outside 3ds max. I still need to work some parts and make specularity maps.
The pavement is... temporary, I would like to make some blocks in Zbrush and assemble them in Max later.
After that I was thinking of importing the different parts of the house in Zbrush for color and mesh adjustments. I really need to improve at Zbrush...
and then bake everything
Comments and critics welcomed
I think your house is fine but you went too far in the texturing process. I think it's so noisy in general (bricks, concrete etc....).
Keep it simple and efficient.
Don't try to make a lot of different shaders (It seems to you have five different woods for example). You should have a global vision with your shaders and colors.
The green on your house is not working very well with the rest of the colors.
I like the pavement and the fact that the stones follow the edge of the house.
Let the normal map do the job and keep in your color map just necessary informations. (cavity, highligts, ...)
Go go on Zbrush ! I think that the normal map can to help you to make a simple color map.
In any case, great work !!! :poly121:
Thank your for your good advises! I will try to simplify things in Zbrush but I need to play around with it first.
Does anybody have a good tutorial for color painting in Zbrush? I haven't seen one in the textures wiki.
Thank you again
I am finally able to show a realtime version of my house.
It took a while... I know...
It took me some time to adapt to the zbrush workflow and realize I didn't need so many details in 3ds max.
But in the end, here it is: 5326 tris
I did the screenshot in UDK but it shows poor quality mipmaps on some parts (like the bow window, or the walls). If anyone can give me advices about that It would be nice
I have sculpted some parts that are not the most visible ones so I'm adding a few screenshots :
So in the end I realize I have done some bad choices here (especially about where and how to put details).
If you have advices about how to improve it don't hesitate to comment!
It's very useful to integrate all the elements next to each others.
If it's there already, then we don't notice it enough,
maybe because your house is very large compared to the scale unit in UDK.
I prefer the simplicity of your new textures , but I find the wood a little too orange or too bright.
By the way, the transitions in you wall, between red and white stripes, are not visible enough i think.
I also find the highlights of your blocks and your ramp a little too hard.
I made a very quick paintover for you !
You're totally right with the colors and highlights.
I have started to play a bit with the textures, colors, and materials.
Also I've got rid of some mipmaps in order to show better quality textures.
Also the SSAO was not applied because it was a screenshot of the editor itself and not the emulator.
Here is the result so far.
However, I interpret the concept a bit differently. The red coloured vertical lines that you have actually look like they should be wooden pillars, part of the construction of the building. You can see on the drawing some of them show some form. (where they intersect with horizontal planks.)
Anyways, thats minor when you are doing a good job learning making realtime assets! Looks like they would fit right in to some cosy RTS
Please share the normal maps! want to take a look at those tiles for the roof.
Thank you for your feedback!
The wooden pillars are a good point, I've asked myself wheter to do it out of wood or just paint stripes and I ended up choosing the stripes because I was afraid it would make a really massive structure...
I am not really proud of the roof tiles but since you asked here is a sample (I don't post the whole thing because it's not really clean on the borders).
I have used the bumpoffset node in UDK with the height map after the diffuse to have a better displacement effect but I really set it to a very low value because it made weird edges as you can see on my first screenshot.
I will try to post more later