Home 3D Art Showcase & Critiques

Monthly Noob Challenge 6

124

Replies

  • Animesh
    Does anybody know of a good tutorial for baking normals in Maya. A tutorial that shows the high detail being baked onto the actual model. Not just a plane like most tuts I've seen does.

    I've been manually creating the Normals in Photoshop and it takes longer. It's my biggest hold up at the moment. I have a 32bit system so XN is not an option either. Any help is appreciated.:)
  • uberphoenix
    Offline / Send Message
    uberphoenix polycounter lvl 8
    @Arod

    Ah right I see, thanks for that
  • Luka
    Offline / Send Message
    Luka polycounter lvl 5
    working on the back console Highpoly now
    V6xQ4Sw.png

    wires of the scene
    WvjLCpi.png
  • rockguy
    Soooo heres the highpoly war table , still taking this at a slow peace, just enjoying the project.

    #1

    wartable01_zps93ec5bd2.jpg

    #2

    wartable02_zpsc9dc1130.jpg

    #3

    wartable03_zps687aa3af.jpg

    #4

    wartable04_zpsd07316ca.jpg
  • uberphoenix
    Offline / Send Message
    uberphoenix polycounter lvl 8
    @rockguy, are you using floaters? or actually extruding from the geo? Looking great so far :D
  • rockguy
    uberphoenix : Thank you ,yes they are independent pieces so I have more control of the detail.
  • VVCephei
    blazed wrote: »
    Man these kind of coincidences are weird, but anyone notice the background at 03:20 in this video:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLGvKxkUSmk&list=UUY30JRSgfhYXA6i6xX1erWg&index=1#t=03m20s. :D

    Hah, they probably just used the same reference image and placed it on a greenscreen.
  • lukepham101
    Offline / Send Message
    lukepham101 polycounter lvl 7
    Hey guys,

    Got some more work done on the scene, I've finished off a few more assets like light fixtures, cables and girders and what not. Still not quite finished yet, I still got some more stuff to model for this, and get it animated so I make a fly through around the room. I've tried my best not to over do anything, please tell me if something looks glaringly bad, I'll fix it up immediately. Any feedback or critiques are very welcome to help me improve this scene further. :) If you guys wanna ask anything too, ask away! :D

    Cg2yDiP.jpg
  • VVCephei
    @lukepham101

    That's amazing... That's in Cryengine 3 right?
    How did you organize the files and everything? I've been trying to get my stuff into cryengine but it's SO annoyingly impractical (at least from my point of view).

    I have all my work in one folder (yes backed up too, obviously) but cryengine requires some files to be in a subdirectory of the cryengine directory...

    Soon after it all gets so incredibly messy and unorganized... Especially when taking into account that cryengine requires everything to be its own format, from collision all the way to shader types in the 3ds max material editor.

    How do you organize everything so that it's manageable when you have dozens of separate objects to import. It would take me forever!
  • Illusive
    Offline / Send Message
    Illusive polycounter lvl 8
    @lukepham101

    not sure how close you're trying to get it to the concept but the thing that stands out most for me is the lighting is quite different in yours (very yellow overall) and could be improved some i think. maybe play around and add some red lights in for the screens and some blueish lights for contrast. I think that'll help get yours closer to the concept.

    also your ceiling lights are quite strong where as i don't even think the ceiling lights in the concept are switched on.

    as for the modelling i think everything looks great!! :)

    one thing you could add are some holographics planes on the main table like in the concept.

    looks good though, keep it up! see you at work slacker ;)
  • AlexCatMasterSupreme
    Offline / Send Message
    AlexCatMasterSupreme interpolator
    Hey guys,

    Got some more work done on the scene, I've finished off a few more assets like light fixtures, cables and girders and what not. Still not quite finished yet, I still got some more stuff to model for this, and get it animated so I make a fly through around the room. I've tried my best not to over do anything, please tell me if something looks glaringly bad, I'll fix it up immediately. Any feedback or critiques are very welcome to help me improve this scene further. :) If you guys wanna ask anything too, ask away! :D

    Cg2yDiP.jpg

    Damn Dude, nice!
  • uberphoenix
    Offline / Send Message
    uberphoenix polycounter lvl 8
    @lukepham

    Really nice work! you work really quickly which is something I need to work on :(. Could you show what you did for your tiles? (the layout) Any tips for how to know what size your tiles should be etc? also would you consider this part to have a unique UV template? or have you used those tiles elsewhere in the scene also

    rcZEQlf.jpg

    Thanks in advance!
  • ZeroStrike
    Offline / Send Message
    ZeroStrike polycounter lvl 8
    So its about half way and long time no post.

    udk_mnc6_scifi_scene_wip2_by_ryan_griffin_by_zerostrike-d6231pb.jpg

    udk_mnc6_scifi_scene_wip4_by_ryan_griffin_by_zerostrike-d6231zm.jpg

    udk_mnc6_scifi_scene_wip5_by_ryan_griffin_by_zerostrike-d6232dy.jpg

    So most of those where the ones which I have textured and some which I haven't. But I am almost finished the floor, walls, and ceiling.

    I also spent alot of time trying to figure out my UDK problems and I think I figured them out. So hopefully I will not as much trouble with it.

    udk_mnc6_scifi_scene_wip3_by_ryan_griffin_by_zerostrike-d62316w.jpg

    I also did a few things differently then in the concept. Its some other stuff I have seen in Deus Ex which I wanted to try.

    Though I have had a small problem with UDK with this texture and I am not sure why. Its a square texture and I know that it is tiling from photoshop yet in UDK it doesn't want to tile? Mipmapping? I am not sure.

    udk_mnc6_scifi_scene_wip6_by_ryan_griffin_by_zerostrike-d623329.jpg

    I feel like I am a bit behind at the half way point, but good news is I will be getting alot more time to work on this. The reason being is I was not rehired after my 6th month internship doing 3d modeling for a simulation company here in Baltimore. So I am going to be looking for work. Again. But at least I have "6 month experience" even if its not in gaming.

    So yea tell me what you think and I'll get back to texturing.

    Thanks.
  • lukepham101
    Offline / Send Message
    lukepham101 polycounter lvl 7
    @VVCephei - Thanks man! Don't worry, initially I thought CryEngine's management system was confusing too, but eventually you get the hang of it. Don't quote me on this because I'm hardly an expert but I think essentially all your cgfs or meshes need to go into the objects folder in order to work. It's better if you put your crytiffs in your textures folder for organizations sake, and your materials in the material folder. Just try and organize it in a way that makes sense, like sorting them like the door folder parented into the props folder or the walls folder parented into the environment folder. Just general organization, it helps when you have to work with others. :)

    @Illusive - Bahaha, thanks man! Yeah, the lights are maybe a bit bright, I'll tone it down and I'll play around with the lighting a little more. Also gotta get those holograms in! :)

    @AlexCatMasterSupreme - Thanks bro! Still getting there though.

    @uberphoenix - Thank you :) The tiles should just be on the first page, it's just a modular texture sheet that I cut up and placed around the room. You can use the grid to get everything snapping to the scene and lining up nicely if you get the measurements right. There's a underlying white parchment floor to fake the markings too. Along with this are decals in order to get those details in and so it's easy to place them around. I think I could have planned this loads better if I did it again in terms of measurements and more blocking out, but I managed to make it look somewhat cohesive.
  • ng.aniki
    Offline / Send Message
    ng.aniki polycounter lvl 13
    Rhaaa, I am in the middle of moving back to my country, no Internet for a week, I guess I won't be able to finish in time... But I will finish the scene sooner or later! Anyway good work everyone, this is progressing really well !
  • kadeschui
    Offline / Send Message
    kadeschui greentooth
    Finally got my modular components all fitting together nicely. Begun (very!) preliminary textures and placing things in UDK.

    Noob06_02.JPG

    and my prelim texture map:

    Noob06_03.JPG

    Plan is to sculpt details in once i get everything uv'd the way I want. Essentially following a dumbed down version of Snefer's Workflow using a single texture map.

    Though I'll likely use a second map for decals and dirt...

    Crits very welcome as always!
  • Luka
    Offline / Send Message
    Luka polycounter lvl 5
    almost done with highpolys. just the overhead console, 5 floor tiles and lights :D

    00FVE34.png
  • lukepham101
    Offline / Send Message
    lukepham101 polycounter lvl 7
    Hey guys,

    Just thought I'd share with you folks the good news and tell that I got featured by Crytek's website! :D I made a video and some additional screenshots and such for it, here's a link to both below. Sorry guys for the quality of the video, I'm still getting the hang of editing software and trying to figure out how to get good quality and not ridiculously large video files that aren't 14gs. I still gotta figure out the kinks of Sony Vegas. :P

    http://www.crydev.net/newspage.php?news=107825

    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8Sot0KeMco"]Deus Ex Tactical Operations Centre Scene - WIP 1 - YouTube[/ame]
  • AlexCatMasterSupreme
    Offline / Send Message
    AlexCatMasterSupreme interpolator
    Hey guys,

    Just thought I'd share with you folks the good news and tell that I got featured by Crytek's website! :D I made a video and some additional screenshots and such for it, here's a link to both below. Sorry guys for the quality of the video, I'm still getting the hang of editing software and trying to figure out how to get good quality and not ridiculously large video files that aren't 14gs. I still gotta figure out the kinks of Sony Vegas. :P

    http://www.crydev.net/newspage.php?news=107825

    Deus Ex Tactical Operations Centre Scene - WIP 1 - YouTube

    It would be really awesome if you added some moving elements in there. Maybe make some of those holograms have animation, maybe an arm that has a monitor on it that swivels periodically, or possible some lights that flash.
  • ZeroStrike
    Offline / Send Message
    ZeroStrike polycounter lvl 8
    Congrats. I would agree. Some moving animation would be good. Breathe some more life into the scene.

    So here is my next update for the weekend. I need to keep pushing. But things are coming together.


    ryangriffin_mnc_wip6_web_by_zerostrike-d62ldmf.jpg
  • VVCephei
    I'm having a bit of an issue with my Normal bakes and smoothing groups, hopefully somebody here can help me.

    Before I projected the bake, I made the low poly all 1 smoothing group, I had 3 polygons in the low poly to increase the overall quality of the bake in hopes that I could just remove the edge loops later.

    however when I remove the edge loops after the bake, it severely distorts the smoothing/normal map.

    QEgwfmL.png

    After the edge removal:

    UIDLQv9.png
  • uberphoenix
    Offline / Send Message
    uberphoenix polycounter lvl 8
    Might be something to do with the smoothing groups maybe?
  • ng.aniki
    Offline / Send Message
    ng.aniki polycounter lvl 13
    @VVCephei: No, you cannot delete those edges after your bake. Your bake is made specially to work with those edges. The lowpoly you use for the bake has to have the same edges and same smoothing groups as the one you will use in-game with the baked normal map.

    (Basically when rendering it will use a combination of the normals of the geometry and the normals from the texture. If the mesh use only one smoothing group it has to compensate the the big difference between the normals of the high and the lowpoly. when you start deleting edges, the normals on the geometry is not the same as before and the texture will over/under compensate the normal value.)

    In this situation there are several options:
    -You can really bevel the edge there, this will bring a higher polycount.
    -I am not sure (with this camera angle) but it might just work like that without the extra edge loops you created.
    -You can make a hard edge there (different smoothing groups for the sides), and bake using a cage. (with this solution don't forget that you might have to separate uv shells along those edges)
  • tonysladky
    I suppose it doesn't do much good to participate in the challenge and not also in the thread. Oops…

    Since last we spoke, I've been chugging away on my Hi-Polies. Finished up all the big assets, and I'll probably be working on some smaller detail stuff over the next couple days (door, rafters, miscellaneous dangling cables and conduits, floor tiles et cetera) before I start to build out low-poly models. Material assignments are rough indications of what's what (Lambert1: Metal, red Blinn: Emissive screens/holographic, Transparent Blue Phong: Glass). Planning to try and preserve those assignments when I get to Low-Poly; shouldn't be too expensive if I do it right.

    8674423690_545c32dfb8_b.jpg
    8673319487_4d6222783b_b.jpg
    8673319405_228868f49c_b.jpg
    8674423770_104be34a7f_b.jpg
    Animesh wrote: »
    Does anybody know of a good tutorial for baking normals in Maya. A tutorial that shows the high detail being baked onto the actual model. Not just a plane like most tuts I've seen does.

    You're going to want to use Lighting -> Transfer Maps. I don't think I have access to the tutorial I got early in my college career, but I'll take a look and see what I can find.

    A couple tips on Transfer Maps
    1. It takes a long time. My computer's pretty decent, and the ones we were using at school were very nice, and Transfer Maps still gave us a buttload of down time. When I couldn't figure out why xNormal was bugging out on one of my models, and I had to resort to Transfer Maps, I basically got a free coffee break at the cheap coffee place across the street instead of the expensive Starbucks in the lobby.
    2. If you're baking AO as well as Normals, you'll need to change the output settings on both. It took me forever to figure out why TM was outputting Normal Map at the resolution I wanted but making only a 256x256 AO map. I think Normal comes from the Maya Common Output and AO comes from the Mental Ray Output, so you'll need to update your output settings on both of those options.

    This looks like a good basic tutorial for Transfer Maps: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYWj3zGXSjM
  • ng.aniki
    Offline / Send Message
    ng.aniki polycounter lvl 13
    I did try to fight with the Transfer Map tool, but in the end I just went back to xNormal, so much easier ans faster. Just a checkbox to get good AO and normals.
  • uberphoenix
    Offline / Send Message
    uberphoenix polycounter lvl 8
    @tonysladky loving your screens! goodwork dude!
  • rockguy
    Oh boy , recently I been struggling to have space in my schedule to complete the scene in a month, but it doesn't look its happening , I will still upload as far as I can go.

    I kinda feel bad because I don't like the idea of unfinished projects , and in my mind it was already a commitment to finish it.

    Here is another highpoly its the console behind the war table.

    Oh and congratulations to lukepham101 you sir rock.

    Console01high01_zpsff7fcd29.jpg


    console01high02_zpsd64214f6.jpg

    console01high03_zps981c44f4.jpg

    Console01high04_zpsa14b3a38.jpg

  • lukepham101
    Offline / Send Message
    lukepham101 polycounter lvl 7
    @rockguy - Thanks so much, you rock too. :) Please get this scene finished, those high polys look fantastic! It'd a super shame if it never got finished, I'm definitely keeping up to date and want to see more!

    @ZeroStrike & AlexCatMasterSupreme - Thanks guys, the crits are welcome too, thank you! I'll be sure to put some more movement and life into the scene with some more stuff, needs some flashing party lights up in there boiii! :D

    I just wanted to say thank you to everyone here on Polycount, you guys are a fantastic community and as one of my first pieces I've posted here, you guys have been super helpful. :) Everyone's work on here is grooving, and it's awesome to see so much progress on this thread it's great, keep it up guys! Again, I just want to say you guys are awesome, stay classy Polycount! :)

    stay-classy-ron-burgundy.jpg
  • AlexCatMasterSupreme
  • tonysladky
    Oh dip! Is it that time already?
  • tonysladky
    Man, I love Sci-Fi scenes, but there's something about futuristic doors that just sloooooooows me down. I just can't visualize a door in the future for some reason. Eventually, got something passable, close enough to the concept for now.
    8681691767_1956739277_b.jpg

    And just for kicks, the major Hi-Poly assets all arranged in approximately the concept's layout:
    8681691819_d3197f25d6_b.jpg
  • Esselle
    Offline / Send Message
    Esselle polycounter lvl 10
    Darn guys, you have got such beautiful skills... i won't never have them :(

    anyway, this is my progress
    4r46wx.jpg
  • ZeroStrike
    Offline / Send Message
    ZeroStrike polycounter lvl 8
    Hey Esselle, Your is not half bad. It's a really good start. Just keep going and keep practicing. You will get there in time. I know I'm not that good. I still need alot of work, you just need to keep going, learning, taking crit, and practicing.

    Try to finish this month challenge even if you didn't finish on time. Just keep going until you are finished. I want to see yours at a more finished state. I know that is what I am going to do even if I don't finish on time.
  • Luka
    Offline / Send Message
    Luka polycounter lvl 5
    ok continuing. had enough of those hipolys so i baked the floor corners. will continue with the screens and consoles

    Marmoset:
    floor_zpsb5970488.png
  • Animesh
    @Tonysladky: thanks for the reply. I have messed with transfer maps before but the bake seems to always come out wonky. Thanks for the vid, it did help clear up some setting options I had checked wrong.
  • Animesh
    Unfortunately It looks like I can't complete this on time either. I did learn some new concepts of module design though. It's so hard finding a good solid workflow because their are so many options and each one seems to fail at one point or another. For example Zbrush makes great detail but increases polys by too much. Xnormal only works on 64 bit systems and Maya bakes awkwardly. An artist can only do so much with photoshop and it takes forever.

    Anyway enough complaining lol here is my low poly modules so far using just Photoshop for normals.
    assets_test_01.png
  • Esselle
    Offline / Send Message
    Esselle polycounter lvl 10
    Animesh, xnormal runs on 32bit systems, in fact i run it on 32bit vista and it just warns me for memory usage sometimes

    My progress:
    1y98g0.png

    I got some issues on the floor, seem the same who ng.aniki had too, tomorrow i will spent some time on that.
    Any of you guys have some tricks for lightmaps? I know that charts had to be in 0-1 uv space and not overlayed, but when is a good idea to split islands? Is this the same rules as normal uvs (splitted on hard edges, continuous on soft ones)?
  • Animesh
    Animesh, xnormal runs on 32bit systems, in fact i run it on 32bit vista and it just warns me for memory usage sometimes

    I'll download the 64 bit on my 32 bit PC and see what happens then.
  • Esselle
    Offline / Send Message
    Esselle polycounter lvl 10
    Umh, just checked, the newer versions do not work... 3.17 should be fine :)
  • ZeroStrike
    Offline / Send Message
    ZeroStrike polycounter lvl 8
    @Esselle

    I am going to be going through the same questions myself about lightmass and specular/specular power.

    By the way. The lighting is starting to look nice.




    I am also probably not going to technically make the challenge for a month. It maybe like a month and a few days. I am working hard to finish up the last few things. I will continue on with this until it is finished cause I want this for a portfolio piece. I will post my work here even after the contest is technically over.
  • Zerogun
    Offline / Send Message
    Zerogun polycounter lvl 9
    Found the challenge last week just days before I got super busy and couldn't participate. So I tried. On a tiny time budget I was able to get some work done.
    8695916683_3c3f181592.jpg
    8695916643_f9cb98a2b4.jpg
    8695916615_ccb4e1bb4a.jpg

    I hopefully can mess with some nDo and dDo today and clean up those tiles.
  • Animesh
    Here is my latest progress. No way would I call this even being close to finished. I did however learn a lot with the scene. I learned I need to find a faster pipeline. I need to better understand modules and I really need to fine tune and figure out a solid pipeline for making normals. I feel Maya really lacks when it come to that. Anyway it was fun but I don't think this is worth spending anymore time on. I learned and now I'm moving on to make something without so many mistakes. Good Luck to the rest of you :)

    monthlyNoob_6.png
  • AlexCatMasterSupreme
  • ng.aniki
    Offline / Send Message
    ng.aniki polycounter lvl 13
    I finally could get back on the project.
    Had some fun with the material editor:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=dMXzGbgQGjM
    (sorry for the bad resolution, youtube downsized it.)
  • ZeroStrike
    Offline / Send Message
    ZeroStrike polycounter lvl 8
    Dude ng.aniki that is Great! Do you use a reflection mask on that glass and how did you get the glass for the top to work. Did you have it as multiple materials/pieces or just one?

    Liked and add to list.

    I am also like the frozen synapse, btw
  • AtlusZMH
    Hey! I just wanted to pop my head in and show off my early WIP. I got started on this one a little late obviously, but I plan on finishing it before moving onto next month's challenge. I am on vacation for another week and a half, so I should have a decent chunk of time!

    zYL9Mtn.jpg

    This is my first time tackling Cryengine. So far I love the Max integration, but like any other program, I'm stumbling through it at points.

    Let me know what you think!
  • Esselle
    Offline / Send Message
    Esselle polycounter lvl 10
    God, aniki and atlus, your works are great... some chance to see textures? or just specular maps? :(

    Here is my progress anyway

    1zohrfc.jpg
  • ng.aniki
    Offline / Send Message
    ng.aniki polycounter lvl 13
    ZeroStrike wrote: »
    Dude ng.aniki that is Great! Do you use a reflection mask on that glass and how did you get the glass for the top to work. Did you have it as multiple materials/pieces or just one?

    I used a different material, this is the lighter way I think. The bottom part is basic opaque shader with a reflection mask for the screen and some other parts, and the top glass material is an additive - Unlit shader. Additive blending is the cheapest to have a translucent-looking material.

    With only one material, this would have required a blend_translucent shader (> Expensive, especially if you have multiple layers), for the whole static mesh (>More expensive) and also an addition alpha-blend texture. It cost an additionnal draw call for the static mesh but I think it is worth the price.
    Esselle wrote: »
    God, aniki and atlus, your works are great... some chance to see textures? or just specular maps? :(
    Actually for the last piece I was a bit lazy and had used all the alpha channel of my diffuse and normal map texture, so I used the diffuse texture as specular. In the material editor I made the texture power 2 (to add contrast) and multiplied it by a high value to make it stronger.

    The result is not the best (especially because darker part will have really softer specular, which is not always the best fit, and you can't make some other details pop with more dirt in the specular. So the specular effect is a bit poor), but it is really fast and time saving.
  • AtlusZMH
    Esselle wrote: »
    God, aniki and atlus, your works are great... some chance to see textures? or just specular maps? :(

    Thanks!

    I can show off some spec maps... they aren't anything crazy though :P

    I generally just get my diffuse done, then copy it, de-saturate it, move around the levels until there is decent contrast with the most mid-tone value on the texture, then alter the base colors of the other materials until they look good :P

    Lotsa testing and checking!

    tC5dITP.jpg
    UyQiRYK.jpg

    And here's a quick update to my scene.

    sxwXGDO.jpg
  • AbKI
    Offline / Send Message
    AbKI polycounter lvl 6
    That looks great AtlusZMH :)

    I'm not even close to finishing mine yet but I think I'm going to stick with it as I seem to be learning lots from this concept (basically failing a lot, fixing the problems and trying not to do them again ^_^').
124
Sign In or Register to comment.