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Re: Building a GPU powered painting program.
Good thoughts!
Yes, agreed, i've already replicated much of the canvas navigation. One issue i have with photoshop is that some shortcuts are handled with special code, for example dragging to change brush size.
I'm building what i think is the most capable shortcut system possible. Any slider in the app can be mapped to drag shortcuts. You can have modifier only shortcuts, shortcuts that only work in specific contexts ect. I'm forcing every interaction I code to go through this system and be Interactable, so there shouldn't be edge cases here.
I'll also have radial popup menus, and the ability to popup small redesigned versions of many panels under your mouse while holding a key.
The vision here is to minimize the user ever having to shoot their cursor halfway across the screen to change say the saturation, you should be able to just hold S and drag.
Converting from PS to this app is a much easier proposition however.
This is one of those things that people will need to try to truly get it though i think.
Mostly already in the works, the effects are the only one not on the to-do list.
Also liquify should just be a tool, not a mode, like photoshop seems to think. I just want to hit G and grab some pixels and drag them around, none of this open a new window gaf.
I also think many of these functions can be conceptually simplified without losing power. But a lot of this will come out if I'm smart of not based on user feedback when we get to it.
Personally I feel like the biggest issue with digital painting is the way tablet display devices like iPads and Cintiqs still can't reproduce the precision of regular drawing tools, forcing the user to zoom into the picture in the most unnatural way (hence constantly loosing sight of composition and perspective),
While I can't improve the hardware you are using, I think we can do a lot better when it comes to showing the user the composition and scale of their drawing while they work.
I love the idea of it working more like pure ref. I'm going to be splitting the concept of a canvas (what you draw on) from a view, which is the camera, you will be able to have reference, multiple canvases all within the one view. And of course color constructor swatches, as I should really bring my legacy software along for the ride.
But also, you should be able to have multiple non destructive views into the same canvas data. for example, you could have another view into the same canvas, but instead of looking at all the color layers, it's just the lineart, and they are both the same file. Representing the UX for this might be a bit tough, but it's something that seems like it would be a big help.
Here's some extra stuff too.
brush preview!
Lerping color themes!
"- First off I think the canvas control really would have to as close as
possible to that of PS, or allowing enough tweaking to closely reproduce
the PS input scheme (which itself has a few redundancies between newer
hardware accelerated canvas behavior/inputs, and legacy inputs).
Spacebar pan, scrubby zoom (ctrl+spacebar),"
Yes, agreed, i've already replicated much of the canvas navigation. One issue i have with photoshop is that some shortcuts are handled with special code, for example dragging to change brush size.
I'm building what i think is the most capable shortcut system possible. Any slider in the app can be mapped to drag shortcuts. You can have modifier only shortcuts, shortcuts that only work in specific contexts ect. I'm forcing every interaction I code to go through this system and be Interactable, so there shouldn't be edge cases here.
I'll also have radial popup menus, and the ability to popup small redesigned versions of many panels under your mouse while holding a key.
The vision here is to minimize the user ever having to shoot their cursor halfway across the screen to change say the saturation, you should be able to just hold S and drag.
And probably PSD import and export.
This is actually the most questionable, because one of the core concepts I'm introducing is a tone mapped canvas, which means colors behave in a more analog way, and we're working in floating point. So if you were to export a file and go to photoshop i can't guarantee that you'll get the same visual output. I'm also considering a crazy idea for how color blending works with colored alpha too, which would push it harder into the photo-shop can't do this category. Converting from PS to this app is a much easier proposition however.
This is one of those things that people will need to try to truly get it though i think.
"- As for PS image editing features I suppose you'll need all the basics :
reliable implementation of Selection, Transform and Liquify ; support
for layers, layer groups and blending modes ; effects like Outer glow,
Cast shadow ; and so on. And probably PSD import and export. Basically
recreating Photopea/Affinity image editing features ... which sounds
like another huge task."
Mostly already in the works, the effects are the only one not on the to-do list.
Also liquify should just be a tool, not a mode, like photoshop seems to think. I just want to hit G and grab some pixels and drag them around, none of this open a new window gaf.
I also think many of these functions can be conceptually simplified without losing power. But a lot of this will come out if I'm smart of not based on user feedback when we get to it.
- That said I suppose that code for legacy image processing effects like
Gaussian Blur, noise, pixelate and many more is widely available.
Yep basic image filters are shockingly easy to implement. Personally I feel like the biggest issue with digital painting is the way tablet display devices like iPads and Cintiqs still can't reproduce the precision of regular drawing tools, forcing the user to zoom into the picture in the most unnatural way (hence constantly loosing sight of composition and perspective),
I love the idea of it working more like pure ref. I'm going to be splitting the concept of a canvas (what you draw on) from a view, which is the camera, you will be able to have reference, multiple canvases all within the one view. And of course color constructor swatches, as I should really bring my legacy software along for the ride.
But also, you should be able to have multiple non destructive views into the same canvas data. for example, you could have another view into the same canvas, but instead of looking at all the color layers, it's just the lineart, and they are both the same file. Representing the UX for this might be a bit tough, but it's something that seems like it would be a big help.
Here's some extra stuff too.
brush preview!
Range sliders (gotta make em prettier)
Lerping color themes!
Muzzoid
5 ·
Re: Game Industry Layoffs - WTF?
Imagine being so obsessed and sucked in to whatever flavor outrage of the week, there is the need to derail not just this thread, but several others.
Read the room, our industry is in shambles and the economy is about to hardcore tank, which will further impact our industry and chances of recovery it can have. Pronouns aren't the reasons tariffs are in place starting a global trade war and threatening to jack up the price of everything, including consoles, computer hardware, stuff people need to make and play games. A black protagonist isn't the reason the number of layoffs have greatly outpaced the number of re-hires, threatening people's livelihoods, homes, families, visa status, so much so that some people have to leave the industry entirely. A woman not being pretty enough, isn't the reason people are seeing their savings and 401k tank in real time, greatly threatening whether or not they will be able to comfortably retire, if they even have anything left at all by the time this turns around. We've also seen again and again, it doesn't matter how good the game does, there will be layoffs. The corporate motive is profit by any means, and we're all numbers on a spreadsheet when they decide cuts need to be made.
If you're getting sucked into this culture war nonsense, please go touch grass, read a book, do some life drawings, interact with some people in real life, remember what real people look like, how there is so much variation to humanity and we need to step outside of our own bubble sometimes. I cannot imagine asking for a very narrow definition of what games and game characters should look like that is completely safe, a cookie-cutter proven formula. That sounds so boring and limiting, and quite frankly absurd.
Alemja
9 ·
Re: How The F*#% Do I Model This? - Reply for help with specific shapes - (Post attempt before asking)
You might get some "fitting" radiuses for two different sized circles with different amount of vertices repeated in this circular way. But as soon the radius changes because of the profile you have to be very lucky to get some fitting vertices... The green marked may fit; but the red ones don't and also may produce triangles (or even n-gons..)
It's the same with this 32 and 16 vertices cylinders with a 1.5 bigger top:
The side edges just cross over in different angles all over the place.. so this kind of topology is a really nasty..
It's the same with this 32 and 16 vertices cylinders with a 1.5 bigger top:
The side edges just cross over in different angles all over the place.. so this kind of topology is a really nasty..
okidoki
1 ·
Re: How The F*#% Do I Model This? - Reply for help with specific shapes - (Post attempt before asking)
If something like that is available in Maya, you could just stick them together and use a rounded edge map / shader to get a small bevel transition between them and bake that to your lowpoly.
Noren
1 ·
Re: How The F*#% Do I Model This? - Reply for help with specific shapes - (Post attempt before asking)
You would usually bake this detailed mesh down to a normalmap to be used on a low poly meshZ0ltBa said:Hi, thanks for the answer. Yes, i know, tried to clean it up by hand adding new vertices and supporting edges, then target weld the miss-matching vertices, and it kind of worked but this is why i ask if there is any way to approach this correctly, or re-topologies the final result somehow. I tried welding the pillars together in ZBrush and dynamesh it to a higher polycount to keep the details and then subdivide it with zremesher, but it just became way to high poly for game asset. Any advise?
Neox
1 ·
Re: How The F*#% Do I Model This? - Reply for help with specific shapes - (Post attempt before asking)
The only trick I have for models like that is use so much geo that the width of the bevel at the intersections is the same as the spacing of the edges around the pillars. It's never going to be perfectly clean, and you could delete some of the edge loops after modeling out the intersection. If I just needed a clean high poly and simple low poly I'd just use sculpting software. Only for subdiv or nanite would I worry about modeling it super cleanly, but even with nanite you can get aware with using sculpting geo.
ZacD
1 ·
Re: How The F*#% Do I Model This? - Reply for help with specific shapes - (Post attempt before asking)
I'm not a 3D modelling expert by any means, but I believe the key here is to model the whole thing with a not so dense mesh. I've spent a little time with it and started with a 12-sided cylinder. That way, you have better control over the intersecting parts. I recorded a time-lapse, so maybe it'll help you in some way. It's not perfect or finished at all—there are some triangles here and there, and overall it would need more time (which I don't have), but hopefully the point is clear:
https://youtu.be/0RkImxRA3Rg?si=SGzmB5d9Tm4TmGvdlighthouse3d
2 ·
Re: [Finished] The Road Grandma
Nice work! No wireframes though? Any statistics to share, like poly count, texture sizes, etc.?
Eric Chadwick
1 ·
how to mimic DOOM 3 Style ?
hello guys , i need you advices and opinions about creating environement similar to Doom 3 , i want to mimic the architecture and the textures ...
and the most hard part is how to create a playable space , that makes sens... you know what i mean :shifty:
thank you !
and the most hard part is how to create a playable space , that makes sens... you know what i mean :shifty:
thank you !
hypnos
1 ·
Re: [Game Art] Modular Kits related Issues
So the wood panel is something you want to sculpt (not the rest of the wall).You want to sculpt the bent corner with some detail and probably some other surface detail into the panel. but not have the ends be affected by either dynamesh or subdiv shrinking, you want the final geometry to be clean so it snaps up in engine. You only need the game mesh to snap in engine, so it matters less how accurate the high if to snapping.
Assuming you don't care about the sculpted details tiling from end to end on the bent panel, one thing you can do is extend the high poly mesh at the sides to give you some extra area to avoid issues with ray misses at those ends, adding something extra there for the bake is essential really anyway, be it another copy of it self tiled one grid over or just adding some extra geo on the high poly to help> otherwise your bake might have some goofy pixels if the high poly just ends exactly there.
I'd personally be tempted to sculpt the panel flat, If I were to bother sculpting it, tile sculpt it properly. For specific detail on the bent corner> I'd spend time developing a decal sheet for mesh decals and have a strip on that decal sheet that I use for some corner dmg. It appears to be such a minor detail I wouldn't complicate things just for that tbh. Spend the dev time elsewhere in the scene and not over complicate a little bent corner where you have a whole modular tile set to worry about.
Another way might be like what I did here> all the wooden parts on these modular tile pieces I did as a trim sheet in substance designer and just poly modeled over that as a section and built the whole tile set out of that. The corner is just the big panel terminating into a sliver as a panel, so I basically didn't even address it as it looked ok (and I was trying to shave time anywhere possible so some things are scuffed)
Assuming you don't care about the sculpted details tiling from end to end on the bent panel, one thing you can do is extend the high poly mesh at the sides to give you some extra area to avoid issues with ray misses at those ends, adding something extra there for the bake is essential really anyway, be it another copy of it self tiled one grid over or just adding some extra geo on the high poly to help> otherwise your bake might have some goofy pixels if the high poly just ends exactly there.
I'd personally be tempted to sculpt the panel flat, If I were to bother sculpting it, tile sculpt it properly. For specific detail on the bent corner> I'd spend time developing a decal sheet for mesh decals and have a strip on that decal sheet that I use for some corner dmg. It appears to be such a minor detail I wouldn't complicate things just for that tbh. Spend the dev time elsewhere in the scene and not over complicate a little bent corner where you have a whole modular tile set to worry about.
Another way might be like what I did here> all the wooden parts on these modular tile pieces I did as a trim sheet in substance designer and just poly modeled over that as a section and built the whole tile set out of that. The corner is just the big panel terminating into a sliver as a panel, so I basically didn't even address it as it looked ok (and I was trying to shave time anywhere possible so some things are scuffed)
Ghogiel
1 ·