Scorpion Z-0 Robotic Turret
polycounter lvl 5
Hi there! I finally decided to kick myself and start a new project to do in my spare time. So I've recently started to work on a robotic turret to practice my hard-surface skills. It's based on a very neat concept by Gill Bates ( http://www.polycount.com/forum/member.php?u=27416 ).
Latest Update:
I've only done part of the hi poly so far and there are still areas that would need retouching. Trying to stay as true to the concept as possible.
Obviously I made this thread for various feedback, but I also have a small question.
Does anybody know on what real-life gun the rifle on the turret might be based on? I'm definitely no weapon expert, and a little expertise would be quite helpful for getting right proportions and a good amount of details on the high poly.
Thanks!
Latest Update:
I've only done part of the hi poly so far and there are still areas that would need retouching. Trying to stay as true to the concept as possible.
Obviously I made this thread for various feedback, but I also have a small question.
Does anybody know on what real-life gun the rifle on the turret might be based on? I'm definitely no weapon expert, and a little expertise would be quite helpful for getting right proportions and a good amount of details on the high poly.
Thanks!
Replies
That really helps!
I need to kick myself into working more on it.
This model really has no business taking me this long, haha.
I'm planning to be done this week, hopefully.
High poly is mostly done.
I'm still wondering if my edges are okay for baking though, some of them might be better a bit wider. What do you think?
Anyway, I'm gonna be able to get started on the low poly and baking soon so I can have fun with the textures. Should be good.
I just finished my first pass of low poly. I still need to optimize it more I think, because the tri count is a bit high at the moment.
954 tris for a leg.
8 043 tris for the rest of the body + the rifle.
Which would almost put me at 12k, and I'm not sure if it may overkill for this model. I think I'm too fussy when it comes to try and keep the shape as close as possible to the high poly, and I think it'd help if I'd have some feedback about the problematic areas.
On the other hand, I'd like to have a very detailed low poly, so I'm conflicted.
Thanks for the comments!
The forum is fast these days!
When you start doing test bakes you'll be able to see what areas need more geo, and what can be reduced further. You might even end up addign in extra loops to help with baking. You might also find this thread interesting regarding keeping a continuous mesh (at the moment your barrel and other extrusions are floating, which might not be what you want).
Really cool project by the way, your highpoly looks really nice.
It’s difficult to reduce the polys without knowing how you are planning on UV'ing the model but as a quick pass here is where you could save a few!
blue = can be removed
green = inserted
red = T junction
I think the main ones are down the center line, but these might be for mirroring the texture?
Ran out of lunch break to go through the gun properly so I've just highlighted a few areas that could be trimmed down apart from the center loops again.
I'm definitely going to check deeper into the thread you posted, Bek. I'd like to use this project to try out a few things I never tried, such as handplane and maybe Ddo.
Thanks for the quick paintover, benc, I already trimmed a few tris down on the legs
I'm still unsure about what to do with the picatinny rail, as I was planning on only baking one block so it's instanced. I'm not sure how it'd look as one long block.
The one critique I can offer, and it's probably too late to fix it, is that the leg proportions specifically in the "foot" look a little short.
Otherwise this is really cool, and I can't wait to see more!
I never really figured out which way to unwrap was better, and I'd like some feedback on that.
What would you do, A or B?
Obviously A makes it easier and more efficient to pack UVs, but would it be better to bake it the other way?
Just curious.
so if you have different smoothing groups, they should be separate UV islands, even if on the same contiguous mesh. This will help your edge blending look much better in your Normal Map.
Which is wy I'd usually do B. But I'm questioning my method here. x)
http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=107196
I hope that helps!
I unwrapped it all, still got to work a lot on the UV packing, it's merely a crappy automatic one at the moment. I'm only gonna texture two legs, and do a diagonal symmetry so you don't notice the repeating texture.
This is taking me a hell of a lot more time than it should, but I'm working some overtime on something really cool at my job and hopefuly I can show that off when it gets released
Been busy with work and overall life lately so I sadly haven't made a tenth of the progress I wanted to on this thing. It reeeaaaally should be done by now.
Anyway, here's what's baked so far. The black parts aren't baked yet (duh).
I can't wait fo finally texture it. Soon I hope.
I'd like some feedback on my direction here
Also, I do know that the bake on the stock is quite iffy, I'll redo it.
As for the wire, I could do that, but I'm not sure it'd be worth the tri boost, they're major culprits of my somewhat high tri count.
I agree for the contrast though, I think it's a bit hard to read as it is, I'll redefine the materials better in contrast of each other, thanks!
I checked the outline for the hell of it and I kind of fell in love with it. What do you think?
Feel free to comment on anything
Calvin: Pretty straightforward. I usually start with dents and scratches on the paint, then I convert the paint to a VERY light normal map to give it a little thickness. Then it's on to way too many hand-painted scratches, grunge, dirt, etc. The bulk of the texture is pretty much grungy brushes and a light metallic tiling texture or two blended in somewhere. Not many secrets here
I'm gonna do some last fixes, but I really need to wrap this up quickly and start something else, getting sick of seeing it. I've been on and off this thing for far, far too long!
Comments?
ERRATUM: Add a zero to the tri count, I'm not that crazy.
Yeah, I'll put up a final render without the background. I'm probably gonna ditch the outline on this one, or maybe have two versions of it. I'm thinking about having a proper 'borderlands' one at some point with a more handpainted look to get some practice.
As for now, I'm gonna tweak the glossiness on the 'realistic' one and try to make the white paint stand out more as it's almost all washed out right now.
Thanks again!
Flat Grey backgrounds do not look good and never will. A subtle gradient is the better in any case.
Top shots would need hard desaturation, but the bottom one is nice.
I'm in dire need of a new project now.
what did you render this in? sorry if i missed it if it was already mentioned, too distracted by the eye candy :P
Thanks for the feedback people!
I played The Cave recently and I'm really digging the art style. My next project is definitely going to be something with a more hand-painted cartoony look. I haven't done anything serious in that style and I love what some of you Polycount guys do. I'm always impressed with good handpainted textures.
Now I just need to fix my tablet