[UDK] Sun Gulch (Western Themed Map) - Would love feedback
Hey guys,
I've been working on this a bit over the last few weeks. It was for my senior capstone project but since the summer semester is ridiculously shorter than an actual semester I had to try and get out something relatively basic.
There are quite a few things I know I want to work on that I came across when I was doing it, but I just wanted to get some feedback so I can try and make things look more alive. I threw a small video, no incredible production values as it's just a basic release. I just wanted to set the tone.
I'll add some screenshots in a bit, I just wanted to get this out while I'm thinking about it.
http://youtu.be/7qvX9_G64Cs
I don't know where my notebook went but some things I can remember I know I wanted to change.
1) Basically I only did 3 textures completely from scratch (modeling wood, baking it, texturing it, etc). A lot of the other ones I just modified for use since I was short on time. I plan to redo most textures from scratch because I got some great looking wood on only flat planes doing it manually since I had 100% control over things like the height map.
2) I noticed there is a small seam issue on a few planks that I didn't realize until I made the video. I'll take care of those pretty quickly.
3) Obviously there are no roofs. I'll be making roofs for the buildings. Since you're on a ground plane I skipped over it for the time being. Plus it would have taken some more time to make the roofs for buildings that weren't just flat planes. Plus there is nothing actually in the buildings now so it looked neater than looking into the window and seeing blackness.
4) Props. I need to make a lot of props. I actually had a few started but didn't get time to finish them off, so I decided to get things together in a presentable format without them.
5) Building variation. If you're paying attention you'll see a lot of the buildings are similar. I only had time to make about 6 or so different looks then I just copied a bunch around. Again, time was always on my back so I had to use illusion to make things look better. Since they're modular I can always remove a floor and what not. With the material I set up I can also create a few different materials for each texture and change all the settings I have set up.
6) Actual building signs. I used few decals as placeholders in a small decal material I set up so I could have 2 signs per texture. (R/G and B/A had a sign and mask pair). I don't really like the look of decals, though. Although these weren't too optimized I'd rather have nice looking meshes for signs.
7) Better landscape. I just did some quick grass with a bit of wind to liven what I had up. I'm going to make a tree or two as well. I'd like to figure out how to make the landscape itself look better, though. UDK landscapes feel so sharp when I'm trying to modify them with the brush. I have some decent texture blending, but I'll have to mess with it a bit more. If anyone has landscape tips I'll gladly take them.
I do want some feedback on how to make the buildings look less squared off. I tried staggering them a bit. I'll need to make some more wooden beams to finish off a lot of the tops of the roofs.
I'm also wondering if I'm going too far in terms of optimization or modularity. Some of the more dynamic roofs seem to be easier to make as a larger roof piece, but I'm making smaller locking pieces. Is there any opinion on this?
The walls themselves are flat planes that came out looking pretty okay with a bump offset. I threw on a couple of subdiv so I had more control on vertex painting.
One of the larger things for this I did was set up a large material that gave me a lot of control with the textures after I was done. I didn't get to put too much of that into action. I have control over tint/spec/depth/tiling/etc of the wood/paint/scratches/etc. I also set up a displacement on the Y-axis so I can stagger the verts and make the wood less linear in places.
I also have higher poly versions of the walls (I think maybe 500-800 verts each) that have a physical bump. Obviously they look better from the side, but from the front the difference was minimal so I decided to save faces.
In next gen gaming does anyone know a good vertex count to shoot for in a scene? Or how many verts should be rendered in view at a given time?
I learned a lot of things I wouldn't have otherwise thought about since I've only been messing with smaller things. I definitely need to plan out a lot more. I was modeling and texturing basically at the same time so it made things take forever when a model didn't work to well and I had to change it up.
All in all I ended up with a decent starting point, but I'd like to flesh it out a bit more. I'm probably going to start from scratch with the layout once I get a few more buildings, I just wanted the illusion of a larger scene for this.
Again, I'd appreciate any tips or suggestions. I'll be going back to this after I work on a few more other things I've been meaning to get to.
I've been working on this a bit over the last few weeks. It was for my senior capstone project but since the summer semester is ridiculously shorter than an actual semester I had to try and get out something relatively basic.
There are quite a few things I know I want to work on that I came across when I was doing it, but I just wanted to get some feedback so I can try and make things look more alive. I threw a small video, no incredible production values as it's just a basic release. I just wanted to set the tone.
I'll add some screenshots in a bit, I just wanted to get this out while I'm thinking about it.
http://youtu.be/7qvX9_G64Cs
I don't know where my notebook went but some things I can remember I know I wanted to change.
1) Basically I only did 3 textures completely from scratch (modeling wood, baking it, texturing it, etc). A lot of the other ones I just modified for use since I was short on time. I plan to redo most textures from scratch because I got some great looking wood on only flat planes doing it manually since I had 100% control over things like the height map.
2) I noticed there is a small seam issue on a few planks that I didn't realize until I made the video. I'll take care of those pretty quickly.
3) Obviously there are no roofs. I'll be making roofs for the buildings. Since you're on a ground plane I skipped over it for the time being. Plus it would have taken some more time to make the roofs for buildings that weren't just flat planes. Plus there is nothing actually in the buildings now so it looked neater than looking into the window and seeing blackness.
4) Props. I need to make a lot of props. I actually had a few started but didn't get time to finish them off, so I decided to get things together in a presentable format without them.
5) Building variation. If you're paying attention you'll see a lot of the buildings are similar. I only had time to make about 6 or so different looks then I just copied a bunch around. Again, time was always on my back so I had to use illusion to make things look better. Since they're modular I can always remove a floor and what not. With the material I set up I can also create a few different materials for each texture and change all the settings I have set up.
6) Actual building signs. I used few decals as placeholders in a small decal material I set up so I could have 2 signs per texture. (R/G and B/A had a sign and mask pair). I don't really like the look of decals, though. Although these weren't too optimized I'd rather have nice looking meshes for signs.
7) Better landscape. I just did some quick grass with a bit of wind to liven what I had up. I'm going to make a tree or two as well. I'd like to figure out how to make the landscape itself look better, though. UDK landscapes feel so sharp when I'm trying to modify them with the brush. I have some decent texture blending, but I'll have to mess with it a bit more. If anyone has landscape tips I'll gladly take them.
I do want some feedback on how to make the buildings look less squared off. I tried staggering them a bit. I'll need to make some more wooden beams to finish off a lot of the tops of the roofs.
I'm also wondering if I'm going too far in terms of optimization or modularity. Some of the more dynamic roofs seem to be easier to make as a larger roof piece, but I'm making smaller locking pieces. Is there any opinion on this?
The walls themselves are flat planes that came out looking pretty okay with a bump offset. I threw on a couple of subdiv so I had more control on vertex painting.
One of the larger things for this I did was set up a large material that gave me a lot of control with the textures after I was done. I didn't get to put too much of that into action. I have control over tint/spec/depth/tiling/etc of the wood/paint/scratches/etc. I also set up a displacement on the Y-axis so I can stagger the verts and make the wood less linear in places.
I also have higher poly versions of the walls (I think maybe 500-800 verts each) that have a physical bump. Obviously they look better from the side, but from the front the difference was minimal so I decided to save faces.
In next gen gaming does anyone know a good vertex count to shoot for in a scene? Or how many verts should be rendered in view at a given time?
I learned a lot of things I wouldn't have otherwise thought about since I've only been messing with smaller things. I definitely need to plan out a lot more. I was modeling and texturing basically at the same time so it made things take forever when a model didn't work to well and I had to change it up.
All in all I ended up with a decent starting point, but I'd like to flesh it out a bit more. I'm probably going to start from scratch with the layout once I get a few more buildings, I just wanted the illusion of a larger scene for this.
Again, I'd appreciate any tips or suggestions. I'll be going back to this after I work on a few more other things I've been meaning to get to.
Replies
The doors in the scene the scales are kind of funny looking what is the door and window dimensions?
Overall it's looking like a great start, a large scene with a lot of work but your matinee was much too fast to really nail down anything constructive. Good Luck!
I may have worded that a bit confusingly. I'm not actually using the higher poly version, I'm using the low poly with extra verts for painting. I'll look into the door size as well. UDK character sizes are so oddly proportioned I had some trouble trying to find something that looked "right" in the game.
Thanks for the feedback!
But yeah, UDK scale, its trouble, it honestly depends on your work after all, the difference between the 96unit~6ft tall marine and the 128unit~10(1/2)ft tall Marcus Fenix is that you are usually adapting your scale all the time.
I think in this case its that the doors seem smaller both height and width wise, whilst the bottom of your windows are almost shoulder level to someone walking through that door, so its the placement of them as well.