Piercing through the Heavens and the Milky Way ! hehe
Besides that : I would like to hear a bit about people's approach and tips regarding the authoring and previewing of specular maps across the Dota experience. I am bringing this up because it seems to me that the game and the built-in importer are not being very consistent in that regard.
For instance, when working on my set I tried to balance the textures so that they would show up nicely in the loadout screen, since this is the place where people can be up close and personal with items and see them at their best LoD and texture resolution. This involved tweaking the Mask1 and Mask2 textures little by little until the spec and metalness feel "just right".
However, once I launched ingame preview to see things in context, I noticed that the specular map was not showing up at all - even after zooming in close with the recently added third person view.
A few weeks later I see the same item/set in the "proper" game after them being added by Valve, and now things look quite different : the loadout preview seems to have a stronger spec behavior and ingame things are even more drastically different from what I expected, giving everything a plastic look.
(I can upload screenshots if necessary)
Does that mean that the default shader being applied during import is different (or has different multipliers) from the ones applied effectively applied to specific heroes and items ? And is there a proven, safe way to preview items exactly as they will look like in the game ultimately ?
There might be ways to troubleshoot this using the recently updated HLMV viewer. Anyone had some good experience with that ? (I successfully used the CGgo and Alien Swarm versions of it before, but I had trouble running the very latest one which supposedly has better Dota support)
it looks like a just cone with this geometry
not sure if I like this idea. also it looks too long, probably will clip with the ground.
I wanted to give the drill more silhouette through geometry but I'm already cutting the tri count dangerously close as it is
this is the only feasible way to do it
as for length, I can scale the tip of the drill down.
Piercing through the Heavens and the Milky Way ! hehe
Besides that : I would like to hear a bit about people's approach and tips regarding the authoring and previewing of specular maps across the Dota experience. I am bringing this up because it seems to me that the game and the built-in importer are not being very consistent in that regard.
For instance, when working on my set I tried to balance the textures so that they would show up nicely in the loadout screen, since this is the place where people can be up close and personal with items and see them at their best LoD and texture resolution. This involved tweaking the Mask1 and Mask2 textures little by little until the spec and metalness feel "just right".
However, once I launched ingame preview to see things in context, I noticed that the specular map was not showing up at all - even after zooming in close with the recently added third person view.
A few weeks later I see the same item/set in the "proper" game after them being added by Valve, and now things look quite different : the loadout preview seems to have a stronger spec behavior and ingame things are even more drastically different from what I expected, giving everything a plastic look.
(I can upload screenshots if necessary)
Does that mean that the default shader being applied during import is different (or has different multipliers) from the ones applied effectively applied to specific heroes and items ? And is there a proven, safe way to preview items exactly as they will look like in the game ultimately ?
There might be ways to troubleshoot this using the recently updated HLMV viewer. Anyone had some good experience with that ? (I successfully used the CGgo and Alien Swarm versions of it before, but I had trouble running the very latest one which supposedly has better Dota support)
Thanks for any tips and help !
I've always gone off of the model preview until recently when we got the in-game test and showcase mode. I think that's currently the best way to test, and it is inconsistent. The ways the shaders behave is very different under different light sources/conditions. I try to find a spot on the map that's more neutral and not shadowed or with external illumination other than the sun. The lighting setup for the preview is still important though as I believe it's consistent with the loadout hero preview. So a balance between the two is best.
The shader properties are contained in the VMTs for each object and hero. The values in there vary by hero. They can also be changed after you've submitted your items which leads to unpredictable changes in shading that we have no control over.
A tip I'd give is to tweak the rim and the spec both independently. While working on one, black out the other. The rim lighting is a really unpredictable element and the strength in the vmts seems to be wildly different per hero. On my recent meepo set, the rim light behavior seemed to change a lot just between launching the game without making any changes to the maps. It began to show up on the front faces of surfaces that it probably shouldn't have been on. I had to paint it out on the top of the hat brim so it wasn't as bright as the sun in the portrait view and from above in-game.
The model viewer isn't a good place to test maps. The ways in which it's better than the other model viewers are mostly about support for cloth sim and proper support for the metalness/illumination/fresnel warp, but the lighting is still the same and not consistent with the game. If you want to get it working, I posted a method on the previous page that makes it easier to set up.
I am very picky about that kind of stuff therefore I am pretty much set on trying to get to the bottom of this issue in the coming days/week
You mention that the material values do vary by hero, which is indeed what I suspected. (this is not too surprising, considering the number of iterations that Valve went through with the game). I will be diving into various VMTs soon in order to learn more about that.
From there I am wondering : does anyone know which shader/material values are being applied to models at the ingame workshop import stage ? I suppose that if we know these values, and the values applied to a given hero, we could then come up with some kind of conversion guide ...
I am very picky about that kind of stuff therefore I am pretty much set on trying to get to the bottom of this issue in the coming days/week
You mention that the material values do vary by hero, which is indeed what I suspected. (this is not too surprising, considering the number of iterations that Valve went through with the game). I will be diving into various VMTs soon in order to learn more about that.
From there I am wondering : does anyone know which shader/material values are being applied to models at the ingame workshop import stage ? I suppose that if we know these values, and the values applied to a given hero, we could then come up with some kind of conversion guide ...
There's a Max shader which simulates the dota hero shader posted in tech talk. It helps to get to see what the VMT settings do. It has all those controls in it so you can match it to a specific hero's VMT.
The whole thread is probably worth a read but make sure to get shader version 2.2 on the last page.
There's a Max shader which simulates the dota hero shader posted in tech talk. It helps to get to see what the VMT settings do. It has all those controls in it so you can match it to a specific hero's VMT.
The whole thread is probably worth a read but make sure to get shader version 2.2 on the last page.
Edit: I see you posted in there before Pior so you're probably already aware of it.
I'll leave this post for newer people who might not be though.
Didn't valve release their testing application with dota 2? I remember it coming up in a recent update and posts in polycount but I didn't really bother investigating further.
EDIT: I couldn't find the post. But I remember it was something along the lines of
-- Valve has a private testing application to test heroes and stuff and released to the public in one of the recent updates.
Yup Frump I have been using the Max version of this shader already, and it is fantastic in the sense that it does have all the real controls and inputs used by the game - down to Mask1 and Mask2 in their proper format. In that regard it is invaluable
I think the issue lies with the multipliers, since it is very tempting to fiddle with them in order to get something nice in the Max viewport, only to be surprised in the end ... And of course, another question is : what are the default values, and how strongly are they being tweaked on a per-hero basis !
Also, who knows : maybe the items don't necessarily use the same shader and values as the heroes wearing them ...
As for the newer test application, I think they were indeed talking about the new version of HLMV but I'll double check tomorrow.
I like it Vayne and Robo, but i have a feeling that the yellow parts (which i assume are gold) would need some more metalness and colored specular, to pop out fron the purple material...right now they look the same material with different colors
I like it Vayne and Robo, but i have a feeling that the yellow parts (which i assume are gold) would need some more metalness and colored specular, to pop out fron the purple material...right now they look the same material with different colors
I agree, also the gold color looks quite different than the original gold of the character. Maybe take a closer look to the original masks.
The one thing i don't like is the blue round parts, why don't make them like gems.
You got more detail and it will stand out better. Did a really quick paintover for you.
I finally finished most parts for the ogre set I'm making with mango. Now I just need to get some more details into it and I can call the high poly finished. Comments are always welcome!
Hello everybody.
I don't know if this is the right topic, but it seems to be the general discussion one.
I am new to Dota 2 modelling and wanted to ask a few questions about it. The first thing I'm interested in concerns high-poly versions of models.
I would like to know whether I would require a lot of processing power in order to be able to sculpt in high-poly in appropriate values - since I only have 8 GB RAM and dual core of 3.3 GHz CPU. I have been told by a person I know (who seems to know a bit about modelling) that to make appropriate, high-quality models, I would require at least 64 GB RAM or so, which is a ridiculously high amount for me
I would also like to ask what purpose do high-poly models actually serve. As far as I can understand it, they are made in order to make low-poly version look like more detalied, by obtaining light maps, and it also makes texturing way easier - from what it seems to me. Is that right?
Also, what sort of order are low- and high-poly models made in? Do you make low-poly first, and then work on it by sculpting, or do you do high-poly and somehow convert it to low-poly?
In either case, are there any tutorials that show how do you actually transfer the light map (or whatever it is) from a high poly to a low poly?
Yup Frump I have been using the Max version of this shader already, and it is fantastic in the sense that it does have all the real controls and inputs used by the game - down to Mask1 and Mask2 in their proper format. In that regard it is invaluable
I think the issue lies with the multipliers, since it is very tempting to fiddle with them in order to get something nice in the Max viewport, only to be surprised in the end ... And of course, another question is : what are the default values, and how strongly are they being tweaked on a per-hero basis !
Also, who knows : maybe the items don't necessarily use the same shader and values as the heroes wearing them ...
As for the newer test application, I think they were indeed talking about the new version of HLMV but I'll double check tomorrow.
You can find the proper values in the vtm files for the hero.
But you need to be sure the shader works just like the one in-game...
Farfarer : cool, I'll get on with that soon. If I remember correctly the Max shader is actually pretty accurate in its calculations, so hopefully it should just be a matter of finding some way to convert the values consistently...
Ooooh maybe this partly explains the removal of Skeleton King then ? If I understand correctly, China is not too found of the representation of skeletons in video games ...
Ooooh maybe this partly explains the removal of Skeleton King then ? If I understand correctly, China is not too found of the representation of skeletons in video games ...
Partially..SK also bore a close resemblance to Diablo's Skeleton boss.
Valve did make a bunch of changes in China due to cultural beliefs- any hero with exposed bones, zombie like appearance or otherwise had to be redesigned.
Yeah that certainly played a role too. Very interesting stuff, than you for posting the icon page - that's certainly something to keep in mind when doing custom art for the game from now on ...
Looks like we can't use Ember Spirit's sword flame particles. We have to make the full swords. I tested by loading in a handle and no particles are there. No option to load in a particle mesh either. Maybe this will be changed later, but for right now any weapons are going to be less cool than the defaults.
Partially..SK also bore a close resemblance to Diablo's Skeleton boss.
Valve did make a bunch of changes in China due to cultural beliefs- any hero with exposed bones, zombie like appearance or otherwise had to be redesigned.
Does that mean now we should consider this in new items?
Some of the new heroes look weird, like sf and lifestealer. Also, what do you guys think will happen with undying and previous sets that had bones in it, like the tidehunter set and huskar set?
I did everything in that regard but as soon as I want to decompile the .mdl's, StudioCompiler crashes.
Are you pointing to he Alien Swarm sdk? you need to rename the .dx90 to .dx80 on the file extensions. I have also found i need to leave the output folder as the default documents folder, otherwise it has issues.
Hello everybody.
I don't know if this is the right topic, but it seems to be the general discussion one.
I am new to Dota 2 modelling and wanted to ask a few questions about it. The first thing I'm interested in concerns high-poly versions of models.
I would like to know whether I would require a lot of processing power in order to be able to sculpt in high-poly in appropriate values - since I only have 8 GB RAM and dual core of 3.3 GHz CPU. I have been told by a person I know (who seems to know a bit about modelling) that to make appropriate, high-quality models, I would require at least 64 GB RAM or so, which is a ridiculously high amount for me
I would also like to ask what purpose do high-poly models actually serve. As far as I can understand it, they are made in order to make low-poly version look like more detalied, by obtaining light maps, and it also makes texturing way easier - from what it seems to me. Is that right?
Also, what sort of order are low- and high-poly models made in? Do you make low-poly first, and then work on it by sculpting, or do you do high-poly and somehow convert it to low-poly?
In either case, are there any tutorials that show how do you actually transfer the light map (or whatever it is) from a high poly to a low poly?
Mmmm you're friend doesn't know what he's talking about, 64 gigs of RAM is overkill to the highest degree, you'd probably get away with 8 but 16 works well for me in ZBrush and Maya.
High poly models are used to generate normal maps and other light maps to help the texturing process. Usually you make a base mesh and take it into a sculpting program to generate the high poly then you have to retopologize it down to game resolution.
As for tutorials on the process just google 'baking normal maps'
Though if you're asking these questions it sounds like you're pretty new to the entire game art pipeline. Perhaps try modeling something on your own before diving into the DotA style. Just a suggestion though
@ExpositionFairy about the hipoly sculpting your friend must have something mistaken. For example ZBrush (most popular sculpting software) is 32-bit and don't support more than 4GB of ram as far as I know. Even if you would like to manualy model hipoly models in 3dmax/maya/blender 8GB of ram should be more than enought for dota2 model. 64GB is needed if someone would like to make super complex models for cinematics/movies in with transformers or pacific rim ammount of detail. Saying this you should not worry about your spec.
Hipoly models are mostly made for as you said grab detail for low poly models that are made later based on that hipoly. Its also easier, you can make hipoly with no limitation and later build lowpoly based on it that will be within game limits(number of triangles and texture size).
For starters I would suggest you to try and made a single weapon for any character. It should be most straight forward, and some tutorial (for example those made by Lennyagony) explains this process very detailed.
Anyway welcome in the community, and good luck with your work!!
Does that mean now we should consider this in new items?
Some of the new heroes look weird, like sf and lifestealer. Also, what do you guys think will happen with undying and previous sets that had bones in it, like the tidehunter set and huskar set?
China got their own store because of these cultural issues, and I wouldn't be surprised if some sets are just missing because they dont work with the redesigns. It would be a good idea to keep this in mind going ahead.
Konras, Sukotto - thank you very much for help!
Thank you for a detailed reply, I think I now know the direction in which I need to start working.
You seem to have a much nicer community here than on some other forums, so I'm glad I decided to register
@ExpositionFairy about the hipoly sculpting your friend must have something mistaken. For example ZBrush (most popular sculpting software) is 32-bit and don't support more than 4GB of ram as far as I know. Even if you would like to manualy model hipoly models in 3dmax/maya/blender 8GB of ram should be more than enought for dota2 model. 64GB is needed if someone would like to make super complex models for cinematics/movies in with transformers or pacific rim ammount of detail. Saying this you should not worry about your spec.
:thumbup: Completely correct. ZBrush is a x86 application so even on x64 machines it cannot address more than 4GB of ram on the system. Another point to make on ZBrush is that it will magically compress the memory, and can be done so manually. I don't remember the default but if you have lower resources I would recommend to lower this amount by at least 512. If you have 8 gigs of RAM than having it compress at 4096 should be fine as that leaves 4GB for the rest of the system. Large pools of RAM are only really necessary for video composting, compression, and large high resolution renders. And again welcome to Polycount :poly142:
Ok guys sorry for not replying the messages about the ember set, this is the color version. I will see who will do it tomorrow!
Any suggestions?
Whats the plan for the sword blades? Others have posted that the particels are seperate in tests they did, and unless Valve will take care of it, it appears that the blade may need to be a part of the model as well
Replies
it looks like a just cone with this geometry
not sure if I like this idea. also it looks too long, probably will clip with the ground.
Besides that : I would like to hear a bit about people's approach and tips regarding the authoring and previewing of specular maps across the Dota experience. I am bringing this up because it seems to me that the game and the built-in importer are not being very consistent in that regard.
For instance, when working on my set I tried to balance the textures so that they would show up nicely in the loadout screen, since this is the place where people can be up close and personal with items and see them at their best LoD and texture resolution. This involved tweaking the Mask1 and Mask2 textures little by little until the spec and metalness feel "just right".
However, once I launched ingame preview to see things in context, I noticed that the specular map was not showing up at all - even after zooming in close with the recently added third person view.
A few weeks later I see the same item/set in the "proper" game after them being added by Valve, and now things look quite different : the loadout preview seems to have a stronger spec behavior and ingame things are even more drastically different from what I expected, giving everything a plastic look.
(I can upload screenshots if necessary)
Does that mean that the default shader being applied during import is different (or has different multipliers) from the ones applied effectively applied to specific heroes and items ? And is there a proven, safe way to preview items exactly as they will look like in the game ultimately ?
There might be ways to troubleshoot this using the recently updated HLMV viewer. Anyone had some good experience with that ? (I successfully used the CGgo and Alien Swarm versions of it before, but I had trouble running the very latest one which supposedly has better Dota support)
Thanks for any tips and help !
I wanted to give the drill more silhouette through geometry but I'm already cutting the tri count dangerously close as it is
this is the only feasible way to do it
as for length, I can scale the tip of the drill down.
I've always gone off of the model preview until recently when we got the in-game test and showcase mode. I think that's currently the best way to test, and it is inconsistent. The ways the shaders behave is very different under different light sources/conditions. I try to find a spot on the map that's more neutral and not shadowed or with external illumination other than the sun. The lighting setup for the preview is still important though as I believe it's consistent with the loadout hero preview. So a balance between the two is best.
The shader properties are contained in the VMTs for each object and hero. The values in there vary by hero. They can also be changed after you've submitted your items which leads to unpredictable changes in shading that we have no control over.
A tip I'd give is to tweak the rim and the spec both independently. While working on one, black out the other. The rim lighting is a really unpredictable element and the strength in the vmts seems to be wildly different per hero. On my recent meepo set, the rim light behavior seemed to change a lot just between launching the game without making any changes to the maps. It began to show up on the front faces of surfaces that it probably shouldn't have been on. I had to paint it out on the top of the hat brim so it wasn't as bright as the sun in the portrait view and from above in-game.
The model viewer isn't a good place to test maps. The ways in which it's better than the other model viewers are mostly about support for cloth sim and proper support for the metalness/illumination/fresnel warp, but the lighting is still the same and not consistent with the game. If you want to get it working, I posted a method on the previous page that makes it easier to set up.
I am very picky about that kind of stuff therefore I am pretty much set on trying to get to the bottom of this issue in the coming days/week
You mention that the material values do vary by hero, which is indeed what I suspected. (this is not too surprising, considering the number of iterations that Valve went through with the game). I will be diving into various VMTs soon in order to learn more about that.
From there I am wondering : does anyone know which shader/material values are being applied to models at the ingame workshop import stage ? I suppose that if we know these values, and the values applied to a given hero, we could then come up with some kind of conversion guide ...
There's a Max shader which simulates the dota hero shader posted in tech talk. It helps to get to see what the VMT settings do. It has all those controls in it so you can match it to a specific hero's VMT.
The whole thread is probably worth a read but make sure to get shader version 2.2 on the last page.
http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=110022&page=8
Edit: I see you posted in there before Pior so you're probably already aware of it.
I'll leave this post for newer people who might not be though.
Didn't valve release their testing application with dota 2? I remember it coming up in a recent update and posts in polycount but I didn't really bother investigating further.
EDIT: I couldn't find the post.
-- Valve has a private testing application to test heroes and stuff and released to the public in one of the recent updates.
I think the issue lies with the multipliers, since it is very tempting to fiddle with them in order to get something nice in the Max viewport, only to be surprised in the end ... And of course, another question is : what are the default values, and how strongly are they being tweaked on a per-hero basis !
Also, who knows : maybe the items don't necessarily use the same shader and values as the heroes wearing them ...
As for the newer test application, I think they were indeed talking about the new version of HLMV but I'll double check tomorrow.
Aeol Drias Legacy by Vayne and Robo
looking for a collabo to build it
It's a mongolian style set I did for Storm Spirit.
Hope you guys like it
I like it Vayne and Robo, but i have a feeling that the yellow parts (which i assume are gold) would need some more metalness and colored specular, to pop out fron the purple material...right now they look the same material with different colors
I agree, also the gold color looks quite different than the original gold of the character. Maybe take a closer look to the original masks.
The one thing i don't like is the blue round parts, why don't make them like gems.
You got more detail and it will stand out better. Did a really quick paintover for you.
I finally finished most parts for the ogre set I'm making with mango. Now I just need to get some more details into it and I can call the high poly finished. Comments are always welcome!
i remember you months ago saying "i will never get another item in game, valve hates me. i just want give wards a new level of complexity"
and one day you got like 3 itens in game =]
I don't know if this is the right topic, but it seems to be the general discussion one.
I am new to Dota 2 modelling and wanted to ask a few questions about it. The first thing I'm interested in concerns high-poly versions of models.
I would like to know whether I would require a lot of processing power in order to be able to sculpt in high-poly in appropriate values - since I only have 8 GB RAM and dual core of 3.3 GHz CPU. I have been told by a person I know (who seems to know a bit about modelling) that to make appropriate, high-quality models, I would require at least 64 GB RAM or so, which is a ridiculously high amount for me
I would also like to ask what purpose do high-poly models actually serve. As far as I can understand it, they are made in order to make low-poly version look like more detalied, by obtaining light maps, and it also makes texturing way easier - from what it seems to me. Is that right?
Also, what sort of order are low- and high-poly models made in? Do you make low-poly first, and then work on it by sculpting, or do you do high-poly and somehow convert it to low-poly?
In either case, are there any tutorials that show how do you actually transfer the light map (or whatever it is) from a high poly to a low poly?
Would be grateful to anyone who could help.
But you need to be sure the shader works just like the one in-game...
I'm at the first step right now, I'll keep my fingers crossed for the second part.
Hi guys, this is our new set of Faceless Void
created by Zarrad and Patosh, vote if you like it, ty
http://steamcommunity.com/workshop/filedetails/?id=204611414
Hahah I know! I beat myself up too much sometimes. :P
My Crystal Maiden set is the featured sale for the day too, nice coincidence.
http://store.dota2.com.cn/
Partially..SK also bore a close resemblance to Diablo's Skeleton boss.
Valve did make a bunch of changes in China due to cultural beliefs- any hero with exposed bones, zombie like appearance or otherwise had to be redesigned.
Gallery of all the 'low violence' heroes.
http://imgur.com/a/TWi1M#0
Redesigned icons
Thanks for your help, 'hope we get this set in the store!
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=204677632
Good news! this should mean more sales hopefully!
Does that mean now we should consider this in new items?
Some of the new heroes look weird, like sf and lifestealer. Also, what do you guys think will happen with undying and previous sets that had bones in it, like the tidehunter set and huskar set?
He should just get a mask of madness head
u can extract it from gamefiles with GCFscape
Are you pointing to he Alien Swarm sdk? you need to rename the .dx90 to .dx80 on the file extensions. I have also found i need to leave the output folder as the default documents folder, otherwise it has issues.
Ok guys sorry for not replying the messages about the ember set, this is the color version. I will see who will do it tomorrow!
Any suggestions?
High poly models are used to generate normal maps and other light maps to help the texturing process. Usually you make a base mesh and take it into a sculpting program to generate the high poly then you have to retopologize it down to game resolution.
As for tutorials on the process just google 'baking normal maps'
Though if you're asking these questions it sounds like you're pretty new to the entire game art pipeline. Perhaps try modeling something on your own before diving into the DotA style. Just a suggestion though
Hipoly models are mostly made for as you said grab detail for low poly models that are made later based on that hipoly. Its also easier, you can make hipoly with no limitation and later build lowpoly based on it that will be within game limits(number of triangles and texture size).
About the tutorials be sure to check this thread:
http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=123800
For sure you will find there something useefull.
For starters I would suggest you to try and made a single weapon for any character. It should be most straight forward, and some tutorial (for example those made by Lennyagony) explains this process very detailed.
Anyway welcome in the community, and good luck with your work!!
China got their own store because of these cultural issues, and I wouldn't be surprised if some sets are just missing because they dont work with the redesigns. It would be a good idea to keep this in mind going ahead.
Thank you for a detailed reply, I think I now know the direction in which I need to start working.
You seem to have a much nicer community here than on some other forums, so I'm glad I decided to register
:thumbup: Completely correct. ZBrush is a x86 application so even on x64 machines it cannot address more than 4GB of ram on the system. Another point to make on ZBrush is that it will magically compress the memory, and can be done so manually. I don't remember the default but if you have lower resources I would recommend to lower this amount by at least 512. If you have 8 gigs of RAM than having it compress at 4096 should be fine as that leaves 4GB for the rest of the system. Large pools of RAM are only really necessary for video composting, compression, and large high resolution renders. And again welcome to Polycount :poly142:
Whats the plan for the sword blades? Others have posted that the particels are seperate in tests they did, and unless Valve will take care of it, it appears that the blade may need to be a part of the model as well
Try copy & pasting the output path instead of browsing to it.
That fixed it for me..!
any suggestions on how to improve this?