[Dota2] Templar Assassin Nightshade
Complete!
Templar Assassin - Deadly Nightshade
Full set can be found at the Steam Workshop here:
Steam Workshop :: Deadly Nightshade
Work-In-Progress information can be found below:
I was notified by my friend and co-worker about this contest and I thought it would be pretty awesome to join in and contribute.
I'm only vaguely familiar with the Dota universe so I had to read up, using the resources provided, and ask some of my friends who actively play it for advice and extra information. Though the roster was packed with so many visually interesting characters, I ultimately decided to choose the Templar Assassin.
Here are some inspirational images I gathered so I can get some ideas running through my head. Some of these images directly influenced my design choices, some didn't and some are just characters that I was reminded of when reading up on Lanaya, the Templar Assassin:
(All image credits belong to their respective owners.)
Here is the original design for the Templar Assassin:
I really dig the angular design with the huge shoulder pads as well as the insignia being pervasive throughout the costume. Though it seems very signature to this character design, I felt I should conceptualize something in contrast to that, just to play around with theme and possibly come out with a design that is just as aesthetically appealing.
And here two variants of the concept sketch I made on top of the in-game model.
1:
2: (Changed the pouch to a tome, the mask to a veil, and added pants.)
I will most likely go with the second variant, unless the poly count goes too far, then I'll probably opt for the first or a mix of the two. My main concern is the poly count, so I'm hoping it turns out well, if I can get that far. If I do finish, the final design may vary from the concept sketch.
Also, as a question, if anyone knows--is it possible to add extra bones for the rig? Like if I decide to add a cape or flowing cloth for this design, how will I go about doing that and having it implement properly in the game? If it's something I cannot worry about, then I don't mind--I just figured the character would look pretty cool with a cape and it would be nice to have that addition.
Any questions or comments, requests or suggestions, please fell free to let me know and thanks for looking! (And apologies for the large images!)
Templar Assassin - Deadly Nightshade
Full set can be found at the Steam Workshop here:
Steam Workshop :: Deadly Nightshade
Work-In-Progress information can be found below:
I was notified by my friend and co-worker about this contest and I thought it would be pretty awesome to join in and contribute.
I'm only vaguely familiar with the Dota universe so I had to read up, using the resources provided, and ask some of my friends who actively play it for advice and extra information. Though the roster was packed with so many visually interesting characters, I ultimately decided to choose the Templar Assassin.
Here are some inspirational images I gathered so I can get some ideas running through my head. Some of these images directly influenced my design choices, some didn't and some are just characters that I was reminded of when reading up on Lanaya, the Templar Assassin:
(All image credits belong to their respective owners.)
Here is the original design for the Templar Assassin:
I really dig the angular design with the huge shoulder pads as well as the insignia being pervasive throughout the costume. Though it seems very signature to this character design, I felt I should conceptualize something in contrast to that, just to play around with theme and possibly come out with a design that is just as aesthetically appealing.
And here two variants of the concept sketch I made on top of the in-game model.
1:
2: (Changed the pouch to a tome, the mask to a veil, and added pants.)
I will most likely go with the second variant, unless the poly count goes too far, then I'll probably opt for the first or a mix of the two. My main concern is the poly count, so I'm hoping it turns out well, if I can get that far. If I do finish, the final design may vary from the concept sketch.
Also, as a question, if anyone knows--is it possible to add extra bones for the rig? Like if I decide to add a cape or flowing cloth for this design, how will I go about doing that and having it implement properly in the game? If it's something I cannot worry about, then I don't mind--I just figured the character would look pretty cool with a cape and it would be nice to have that addition.
Any questions or comments, requests or suggestions, please fell free to let me know and thanks for looking! (And apologies for the large images!)
Replies
I am a bit iffy on it, but it does look nice.
Yea, I know what you mean, and I had my doubts when I added the pants in during conceptualization. I definitely did not want to make the character look like an existing Disney character, of course, heheh. Though I do understand the use of form-fitting pants, the loose pants do provide more freedom of movement (as long as it's not too baggy!), and mobile assassins need that. But ultimately, I decided to add the pants because it changes the overall silhouette of the legs, making it look more like a complete item set than just objects slapped on with with a neglected bottom using the plain default pants. And again, if it turns out that the pants are not forgiving to the poly count, I wouldn't mind changing it or cutting it out completely. We'll see what happens when I get to actual building...
And yes, I agree, the fuller face scarf looks pretty cool as well.
Thanks for the support and suggestions!
Here are the slot divisions for the item set so far--hopefully model work to come soon!
Since the poly count for the armor is so limited, I may have to move some pieces around, like the pants to the shoulder slot, and that might help in the texture space as well.
Thanks again for looking!
The itemset design:
And the divisions:
I have a bad habit at picking at everything and changing stuff little by little--I should move on to import/export testing and start the modeling process!
Hope you dig and thanks for looking!
Well, here is what I have so far from modeling the armor portion of the item set:
Omit her bald head, heheh--I have yet to get around to modeling Lanaya's hair and scarf yet, but I wanted to concentrate on getting the armor right since that relied heavily on the budgets than the other pieces. I wish this particular section had larger texture space, but I'll just have to work with what I have. Not much difference can be seen for the different LOD meshes, but the main changes were for geometry definition (like in the back of her pants and in the tome), and doubled geometry for backfaces (since the technical requirements says there's no double-sided shaders.
Before I continue working on other portions of this character, I will have to bind the pieces and attempt to import it in the game and see how it goes--hopefully I won't run into any issues...
The geometry import/export test ran smoothly, besides a hiccup with the spelling with the mask filenames (remember to rename files from "_masks1" to "_mask1"). The texture is just a test texture to show the stretching and resolution, so apologies if it looks a bit garish. Things to work on that I could see immediately is the weighting and adjusting some of the geometry as there are some points of interpenetration, especially in the pants area.
More to come soon!
If so I think this set would look great with a light transparency to part of it, since it has a very strong middle-eastern vibe going for it.
Can't wait to see how this turns out.
Also, good work squeezing that much detail out of the polycount for the armour.
Unfortunately, the Templar Assassin doesn't use a Transparency map. I don't think the model uses the Detail or Diffuse/Fresnel masks either. I agree, it would be cool to have some semi-transparent parts.
It was a task to economize the geometry, but now I hope the textures will turn out well with such a small resolution...
Here is what I have for the shoulder slot:
I obviously have a lot of geometry left over for LOD0 and a bit for LOD1. Even though I call the modeling done for now, I later left some extra empty space on my UV sheet in case I decide to add something else to it later (maybe a cape, if possible, or something to cover the shoes).
Next is the hair and then sculpt and texture work!
I ran through another import and adjust the geometry and weighting for all the pieces. So far, everything seems fine, but when I run through some of the animations, I notice some of the verticies wiggling outside of where they should be. I'm not sure if this is a common issue with anyone else, but it's a bit of a nuisance...
I didn't notice it in the LOD1, but the LOD0 is definitely noticeable. I double and triple checked my weights and readjusted them but it does not fix the issue. I am unsure if the weights are redistributed, there's some hidden influences for the animations, or if the imports just aren't updating properly. If anyone has any advice for this, I'd really appreciate it.
In the meantime, I'll delete files and folders the game created for the items and try the re-import the pieces at a later date and hopefully that fixes the issue if it's an update problem.
Sculpting and texture work to come soon!
Because I'm new to sculpting still, I decided to get some hard modeling out of the way first, then I'll get into the more organic sculpts. Hopefully more progress to come soon!
Sculpting is almost done and normal transfers and colors to come soon!
I had to paint in some touch ups and corrections, but that part didn't take too long. I have an issue with the normals not even showing up in-game, but I think that had to do with flat mask layers, otherwise it's the file format I am saving it at (correct me if I am wrong, but 24-bit .tga's are the way to go, right?), so I'll try to get that sorted out. Going to transfer other maps and work on colors, so more to come soon!
Normal info is right. Could be the masks giving you problems. Make sure with your masks that each channel isn't one solid black color. That can give funky results. So say you want mask1 (g) to be all black. Leave some pure white marks in an unused corner.
I have no idea if my normal's green channel is flipped or not (normal maps were baked in Maya with mostly default settings), but I will test it in the game when I get around to it...
Man, getting pressed for time...
Here is the WIP of the texture:
I am going to color correct it, fine paint in some details and adjust some occluded parts, test it in the game engine, and prepare it for some presentation shots--so hopefully I'll have something up this weekend if all goes well!
Here is the current texture layout for the model:
Also, I tried what you suggested, by flipping the Alpha on Mask2 and it blows out the light even more, heheh. Here is the result:
From my understanding, the Alpha in Mask2 works like a what some call a glossiness map--where it affects the specular exponent to either be sharp and small (white), or soft and wide (black). After that experiment, I guess I can say that the masks do work to an extent, but I'm still getting crashes for my shoulder texture... I want to fix this problem before I do any refining to match the game's settings. Not sure how to solve this issue though I'm willing to try out more suggestions if time allows.
Thank you very much for helping so far!
Though like the hair, it's specular was kinda blown out--but it works and I'm happy for that. I will try to experiment some more to find out what works and what doesn't.
Not sure why its crashing with your 32 bti tgas though. I've never had a problem with textures.
I noticed some channels did the inverse of what the document told me, and in the end I just copied what the original character masks were. Anyway I hope you find a non hacky solution xD Love this set so much
I realized that even though knocking out the pixels I added into the R and G channels of Mask1 help temporarily, my main issue was probably the resolution of the mask textures. I'm unsure if others have run into this situation, but the 4096x2048 32-bit .tga's were just too much for the compiler to handle, so that ended up causing the crash (I assume). After I compared both my custom masks and the original source mask, I noticed they had resized the masks to half the size of the color/normal maps. So I resized my masks and it ended up working--let's hope another error doesn't occur...
Also, you are right, some of the maps do work in reverse for some strange reason. When trying to solve the specularity issue, I found that not the Specular map, nor the Specular Exponent map, but the Specular Tint was causing that issue... so after I fixed that, everything fell into place. My masks also ended up very similar to the original masks, though with exception to the Specular Tint, which was pretty much inverted.
Here is another WIP image before I get to the final presentation pieces:
Not sure about the shiny stuff on her pants and all throughout her character--not much I can change about that, but I assume it has something to do with the game's shader that I have no control over.
Any comments or suggestions are welcome, though I know I'm too pressed for time to change much, heheh. Thanks again for looking!
Head:
Shoulder:
Armor:
I don't think I'll have time to fiddle around with making the full set appear before the deadline, but I might try it after it's due and see what it looks like.
And for an added bonus, a drawing I made to accompany the short lore I attached to these items:
Thanks again for looking!
Here are some eye-candy splash images for each item with painted effects:
Here are the images explaining the lore for each item:
And finally, here is the presentation image:
The first post will be updated to reflect the completion after I upload everything to the Steam Workshop. Thanks again for looking!
I understand very well why you chose to make it purple. I personally like it and I think it's integral to the look as a whole. However -- yeah. Valve doesn't like to anger the community and the community gets angry very easily. I hope you don't, but I fear you may be forced to compromise. Something like keeping the hair black and only having a few purple streaks. I don't know.
Yes, a couple people have pointed that out to me so far. I did question the purple hair a few times myself while working on it, but no one pointed it out prior and it just fit so well with the rest of the colors I didn't want to rub it out. I did try out a few combinations that I did not save shots of, but none of them turned out well, especially when I tried applying streaks--it was just too much and looked awkward. However I do not mind adjusting the color and saturation slightly if it comes down that I have to; otherwise, I think it looks perfect.
I also would like to note that while the hair looks brighter in a couple of the promotional images for clarity, it is definitely darker combined with the shader effects in the game. Though thanks for your concern!
---
And finally, I got the complete set to work in-game, so here are a few shots of it in action (sorry I don't have video so you can see it in motion, but hopefully stills will do!):
Idle:
Running/Meld Pose:
Within the environment:
Thanks for looking and and thank you again for the feedback! I learned a lot and appreciate every comment!
Thanks, and same to you too--Congratulations on your winning set! I really dig the set's overall look, which really matched the game's aesthetics in my opinion. Keep up the great work!
And thank you very much everyone for the congratulations; I appreciate all the support!
I can't wait to finally equip your set.
I'm relieved to see that they approve of the purple hair. I'm really glad Valve aren't the kind of nitpicking assholes that some of the community can be.
Me too! Well, there are no suggestions to change it yet anyway, heheh.
Thank you very much! I am glad it turned out well, especially in the portrait.