So I was originally planning on using this thread to primarily post finished Dota works.
But now I feel that it would probably be more beneficial to use it to keep track on my progress and hopefully get some valuable critiques along the way. Specially since it's a lot easier to fix things while i'm still in the initial sculpting phase then once everything's done being retopod and textured.
So with that said, here's an update of where I ended up with the Ursa set last night. Working on the belt/skirt. Pretty rough at this point but I feel like it's a decent starting point. Continuing work on it again soon as I'm done with this post so keep an eye out for another update later on tonight if you're interested in seeing where this goes
PLEASE feel free to comment! Whether you love it or hate it so far, let me know. I wanna hear other peoples thoughts on whether they think the theme works and just general critiques about any part of the set would be greatly appreciated.
Nice idea and great execution. I feel like the shoulder piece currently looks a bit underdeveloped, most of the detail on that is pointing downward (away from the game camera) so it's not gonna be seen and the uniteresting flat shape is upward. This is especially important since the shoulder piece is probably the most quickly visible item besides the helmet which has the the effect of making the viewer lose interest because the 'main' piece is a bit bland. Just two more of those spikes that point upward would make this a lot more interesting just to break up that huge empty plane at the top. Keep it up the rest of the items look fantastic!
Everything is finally retopologized and baked and textured.
Still need to make masks 1 and 2 for all the items.
Color variation test coming soon. Gonna try black/gray scales instead of primarily violet.
It looks pretty good, but like you mentioned the colors are really basic like this and pruple together with blue isn't a good combination.
I would go for a gold/yellow/brownish armor color, which would fit him a lot better. Also there is almost no detail on the straps, you might want to look into that, because it now reads terrible from a distance.
I think your overall shapes are working, i think like others have said working the colors more would help. Im interested to see what your new color variations are. Maybe you could take some insperation from the comic book version of roshan,
he has more of a rocky skin look, with green tinting from the moss/grass. If you wanted to stick closer to your current colors i think color picking off of Ursa's claws could work, where the tips of the scales would be the same color as the tips of his claws. You might have already done some that though, if so id say you need to push the values more.
I tried giving the helm and shoulder kind of like a bone texture because i figured it would work since it would fall more closely into his original armor color pallet of browns and oranges to contrast his blue/purple-ish fur but it just really didn't look like it was working for me. It was really similar to the color on your Ursa's shoulder skull but I guess the difference is that that is the only place you used it so it balances out well with the brown/leather on the other shoulder/belt.
Most people keep telling me to try to match his original pallet more closely but i'm not too sure how far I want to stray from Roshan's pallet since I want it to still feel like Ursa ripped scales and parts off of him to make armor.
So I guess the color variation I've been planning is basically doing what Trevor said with the claw thing. Gonna try using blacks and grays which are still close to Roshan's scales/rocky look but throw in some of the current purple/pinks on the tips of the scales. Then maybe i'll give the bone and brown leather thing another shot since it wouldn't hurt to just see all my options.
Also really need to figure out what to do about the straps. Don't have any polys left to go back and add buckles or details so I'm hoping that just painting in some wear and tear will be good enough to hold everything together...
Before tackling the task of retexturing everything. I figured I would try to solve some importing problems I was having and try to get everything running in game. Finally figured it out! The shader masks 1 and 2 are all basic place holders, so don't mind the ridiculous amount of spec/waxyness, that will be getting tweaked for sure once I finalize my textures. For now i'm just happy that everything is pretty much working with the exception of some clipping/animation issues. But like they say, gotta take it one step at a time.
Enjoy the vid and epic Lord of the Rings Music. XD
Really struggling with the textures on this one...
Did some really quick paintovers in photoshop to test out different things that were suggested.
Not feeling very exited about any of them. Personally other than the original purple the only one that I felt was kinda working was the bottom left one. so i tried putting it in game and still not sure how i feel about it...
I'm kind of stuck in a situation where if I use Ursa's default armor color pallet, it doesn't really fit with my set. And if I use the colors I think go well with the theme, people seem to not like or understand it.
What are your opinions or suggestions?
Also if any of you feel like doing a quick paint over of your own to show me what I'm doing wrong, please by all means go ahead since i'm having trouble visualizing how to make this work.
I'm digging the purple one. And I agree that if you deviate with the color, people aren't gonna understand the theme. What you can do though is paint in some more color variations based on lighting. From the ingame shots you posted, in the bottom right picture, you have rosh and ursa next to each other : Rosh has some nice teals/light greens on the top of the scales that are being lit, the purples in the midtones and the reds in the ground bounce light areas. Obviously there's some lighting here at work, but I think if you want to include a more varied palette, you can try to mimic that lighting by painting it straight into the texture.
Started throwing around some ideas for Luna mount as the starting piece to a set I want to make for her. Trying to go a bit outside of the box with the mount mainly just for fun but also because i figured it would look cooler than just another tiger replacement mount.
Here's some quick sculpts/sketches to kinda visualize the concepts:
Replies
But now I feel that it would probably be more beneficial to use it to keep track on my progress and hopefully get some valuable critiques along the way. Specially since it's a lot easier to fix things while i'm still in the initial sculpting phase then once everything's done being retopod and textured.
So with that said, here's an update of where I ended up with the Ursa set last night. Working on the belt/skirt. Pretty rough at this point but I feel like it's a decent starting point. Continuing work on it again soon as I'm done with this post so keep an eye out for another update later on tonight if you're interested in seeing where this goes
PLEASE feel free to comment! Whether you love it or hate it so far, let me know. I wanna hear other peoples thoughts on whether they think the theme works and just general critiques about any part of the set would be greatly appreciated.
Cheers! [=
Shoulder Redesign.
Need to finish retopoing skirt/belt.
But everything else has been retopo'd and normaled. [:
Texture WIP pics:
Still need to make masks 1 and 2 for all the items.
Color variation test coming soon. Gonna try black/gray scales instead of primarily violet.
Here's what I got now though [=
I would go for a gold/yellow/brownish armor color, which would fit him a lot better. Also there is almost no detail on the straps, you might want to look into that, because it now reads terrible from a distance.
http://static.giantbomb.com/uploads/original/0/1081/2295850-page_31.jpg
he has more of a rocky skin look, with green tinting from the moss/grass. If you wanted to stick closer to your current colors i think color picking off of Ursa's claws could work, where the tips of the scales would be the same color as the tips of his claws. You might have already done some that though, if so id say you need to push the values more.
I tried giving the helm and shoulder kind of like a bone texture because i figured it would work since it would fall more closely into his original armor color pallet of browns and oranges to contrast his blue/purple-ish fur but it just really didn't look like it was working for me. It was really similar to the color on your Ursa's shoulder skull but I guess the difference is that that is the only place you used it so it balances out well with the brown/leather on the other shoulder/belt.
Most people keep telling me to try to match his original pallet more closely but i'm not too sure how far I want to stray from Roshan's pallet since I want it to still feel like Ursa ripped scales and parts off of him to make armor.
So I guess the color variation I've been planning is basically doing what Trevor said with the claw thing. Gonna try using blacks and grays which are still close to Roshan's scales/rocky look but throw in some of the current purple/pinks on the tips of the scales. Then maybe i'll give the bone and brown leather thing another shot since it wouldn't hurt to just see all my options.
Also really need to figure out what to do about the straps. Don't have any polys left to go back and add buckles or details so I'm hoping that just painting in some wear and tear will be good enough to hold everything together...
Enjoy the vid and epic Lord of the Rings Music. XD
[vv]66877824[/vv]
Did some really quick paintovers in photoshop to test out different things that were suggested.
Not feeling very exited about any of them. Personally other than the original purple the only one that I felt was kinda working was the bottom left one. so i tried putting it in game and still not sure how i feel about it...
I'm kind of stuck in a situation where if I use Ursa's default armor color pallet, it doesn't really fit with my set. And if I use the colors I think go well with the theme, people seem to not like or understand it.
What are your opinions or suggestions?
Also if any of you feel like doing a quick paint over of your own to show me what I'm doing wrong, please by all means go ahead since i'm having trouble visualizing how to make this work.
Here's some quick sculpts/sketches to kinda visualize the concepts: