[CE3] SciFi Walkway

XaKu

Took just over 3 weeks in spare time after work and weekends. Its based on a concept by Razorb so big thanks to him and also a big thanks for all the help he gave me during the process!

Decided to try something a little different and have a rain and snow version - hope you like











And Video

[ame]www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTRXuwpKvSc[/ame][ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VdthV6sLFA"][/ame]

mootybog

fapfapfapfapfap

reminds me of halo

XaKu

mootybog wrote: »

fapfapfapfapfap

reminds me of halo

Haha thats a huge complement! bought the art of halo 4 concept art book before i started this and it really inspired me!

ZeroStrike

A few things look weird to me. The snow is kind of placed everywhere when snow should be more towards the bottom and building up. Same goes for your main piece on the first image. The snow on the wall where the normal map is the snow is floating when it should fall down there the HP is.

A few of your floaters for your HP are still in the model or something else that is funky.

Do you have spec?

I do like the falling snow in the middle of the air.

I hope you don't mind me painting over your work.

XaKu

The floaters are just Pom failings,might have cranked it too high - the snow is completely precedural in cryengine and has some major flaws which you have noticed. Really appreciate such constructive crits though, thanks!

ZeroStrike

Yea, sorry. I use UDK so I don't know about Cryengine, but I wise you luck. You have a good start. Keep going I would like to see more in time.

XaKu

Some one asked to see some of the WIP shots on another forum so thought i would post here too

First shot is the master texture used for everything but the droid,container and terminal

Zepic

Looking good.
I do have to ask, what program are you using to bake out your hi-poly?

XaKu

Zepic wrote: »

Looking good.
I do have to ask, what program are you using to bake out your hi-poly?

Thanks! I use maya for my normal maps and topogun for my AO - i have never had a good ao bake from maya so i gave up and used a different program

Zepic

XaKu wrote: »

Thanks! I use maya for my normal maps and topogun for my AO - i have never had a good ao bake from maya so i gave up and used a different program

Have you tried XNormal?

Also, are baking out a height map for the POM?

XaKu

Zepic wrote: »

Have you tried XNormal?

Also, are baking out a height map for the POM?

Yea i find Xnormal hit and miss and the maya normal maps are really nice, even if they take a while to bake out! i am going to start using xnormal again for my AO maps though

Generated the height map in topogun also - has awesome texture baking options

Zepic

XaKu wrote: »

Yea i find Xnormal hit and miss and the maya normal maps are really nice, even if they take a while to bake out! i am going to start using xnormal again for my AO maps though

Generated the height map in topogun also - has awesome texture baking options

Never tried Topogun myself.

One thing I've noticed and Zerostrike pointed out as well, there seems to be something odd about the ground texture. (the part where he says you have weird floaters) I can't quite figure out what it is myself; are you flipping the Y axis when baking out your textures for the Cryengine? I think Maya defaults at +Y when it should be -Y for the Cryengine (when baking). Might want to see if Topogun is set to -Y as well... Then again, I'm not certain that's the issue.
BTW, I hope you don't mind me critiquing your work.

XaKu

Zepic wrote: »

Never tried Topogun myself.

One thing I've noticed and Zerostrike pointed out as well, there seems to be something odd about the ground texture. (the part where he says you have weird floaters) I can't quite figure out what it is myself; are you flipping the Y axis when baking out your textures for the Cryengine? I think Maya defaults at +Y when it should be -Y for the Cryengine (when baking). Might want to see if Topogun is set to -Y as well... Then again, I'm not certain that's the issue.
BTW, I hope you don't mind me critiquing your work.

No dont mind at all

the issue you are both seeing is where the uv edge is really close to another panel in the default texture i made, for some reason the pom is bleeding information from an adjacent texture and showing it.. i can get around it by having more padding in my uvs or by having a lower pom amount. it sucks that i didnt notice it but i had gotten that used to seeing the issue my mind deleted it

Zepic

Would you mind doing something, just to satisfy my curiosity?
Could you open your normal map file for the ground texture in Photoshop and go to the channels tab and hit ctrl+I on the green channel. For some reason I think the green channel is flipped wrong. I could just be me though.
Maybe two quick screen caps of the before and after.
Sorry to burden you, I just have a thing for flipped Y normal maps, I feel like I'll lose sleep tonight thinking about it

XaKu

I cant tell difference between the green channel being flipped tbh - but you can see the weird error with pom on and off

Zepic

The Green Flipped is correct. Sometimes the POM can throw you off because it's creating a different type of height information.




Also, do you mind posting both normal map textures? That would be the best way to tell if it's set up right or not...

Zepic

I'm not a Maya guy nor Topogun, however, I do remember reading that Maya defaults at +Y when baking. (I don't know how to invert it in Maya). I'd imagine Topogun defaults with +Y as well.
The Cryengine was setup to work with 3DSMax and from what I remember, Max bakes out at -Y.
I've been down this road myself before, and it can get real confusing because from some angles it will look kinda correct. It's just the nature of Normal Maps.

XaKu

Zepic wrote: »

I'm not a Maya guy nor Topogun, however, I do remember reading that Maya defaults at +Y when baking. (I don't know how to invert it in Maya). I'd imagine Topogun defaults with +Y as well.
The Cryengine was setup to work with 3DSMax and from what I remember, Max bakes out at -Y.
I've been down this road myself before, and it can get real confusing because from some angles it will look kinda correct. It's just the nature of Normal Maps.

hOW DID I NOT NOTICE THAT... BLEH I FEEL STUPID - THANKSSSS!

Zepic

XaKu wrote: »

hOW DID I NOT NOTICE THAT... BLEH I FEEL STUPID - THANKSSSS!

Been there myself...

ZeroStrike

Yea Maya is +Y. Max is -Y Maya and 3ds Max user.

benj666

yeah he is right, I have to flight my green when i import into UDK all the time. when using maya

awesome though Xaku gj man looks great.

TheRealFroman

Cool!!! I like the snow version the most ^^