Ha! Loving these reactions. Guess this gives everyone something to work towards The concept is amazing, can't wait to see it in action! This thread is a massive source of inspiration for me.
If there wasn't a line to work on a concept by you, there sure is now! Great work!
Btw, posted in bounch's thread but I believe the entire arm is a separate slot since in the workshop files they are separate from the body and even have a separate texture, though hopefully I'm wrong or someting
Thank you all for the encouragement and feedback, you guys are too kind
Sukotto : yeah I am aware of that, it's been interesting to follow actually - when Valve rolled out the Three Spirits update I extracted the files to see how ES was working and it was already weird at that time. The glowing core "sausage" from inside the arms was part of the upper body base back then, and the rock arms were acting as some kind of long slip-on gloves on top of that. But they adjusted the cuts recently, and now it is as you describe, with a straight cut at the shoulders. Slightly different, but still weird ...
But yes - Bounch and I are aware of that and we have a plan to make it work with more regular forearm items, like the ones in the concept. More on that later, I have some testing to do with the model but I think it will work
Just wanted to get back to the issue of the slot setup for ES. As mentioned by Sukotto the arms are their own "item", similarly to Pudge and Tusk. While it can be great for creative re-interpretations of the character , it's a bit annoying if a set design is more about giving him accessories as opposed to replacing the arms altogether.
So in order to be able to do that I took the original Valve mesh, partially re-modeled it, and re-projected the original textures to new UVs leaving room for some armor pieces, for instance. It makes for an overall lighter model, while preserving the general appearance (especially at game distance). Like this :
That's 200 tris saved, and even more so if one deletes the triangles hidden by an armor plate, for instance.
I still have some cleanup to do in some areas but I should have it up by tomorrow. That way anyone working on an ES set will be able to simply grab it and use it at will. Hope this helps !
It's not too hard , it just requires the usual tinkering with green/Y channel flipping for the normals. The other textures are straightforward to convert, using Render To Texture in Max, Transfer Maps in Maya or baking from texture in Xnormal.
For the normalmap the core idea is to use an object-space map as a mean to transfer the surface information from one model the other. Xnormal has a tool to do just that (tangent to object, and back). Now of course it's not 100% perfect since it doesn't support the exact Source engine tangent basis, but for an organic model like the ES arms it's unnoticeable For very accurate models like guns or armor plates it would cause issues, but on organics it's perfectly fine.
Then once you have the OS reprojected to the new model you can then convert it back to TS using Handplane. And then do some cleanup
What kind of cleanup are you talking about? What kind of issues did arise with reprojecting? I'm curious because I did that once or twice and didn't any big issues so I'm wondering if I just overlooked some things.
Cool, I just love this kinda stuff!!
As for the re-bake of normalmap I may be wrong, but I tried this one time, however a bit different:
- two object were needed, one with old UVs and normal-bump material, and one with new UVs
- than you can bake normalmap from one object to another as it would be baked from HiPoly
That was made in 3DSMax, I am not super sure if tangent map was 100% accurate, however it looked fine.
Spudnik : oh yeah the cleanup is not much at all, just some ray misses because of the extreme polygon reduction. Nothing that a little bit of smudging couldn't fix
As for rebaking normals : yeah Konras, I do have to try that one approach still. I've heard about it before but never gave it a try - I am glad to hear that it worked in your case !
Alright, this is a wrap ! It is now submitted and available in the Workshop for people to check it out
Bounch did a badass job on it all, and we are pumped to have it all finally submitted. The set comes with an alternate head piece, but also a full group of Stone Summons to replace the default ones. Now we just have to hope that Valve will start implementing this kind of accessory item, but I think that there is good hope that they'll start doing so, as they recently released the triangle count limit for these (even tho they did *not* provide for an importer slot for them just yet ... ).
But ... that's not all !
As you might have noticed on the workshop, this set is also part of a bigger collection : along with two sets created for Ember Spirit and Storm Spirit by the Red Moon artists and Boonta, they form the "Three Virtues", sharing common visual elements. Check it all out !
Hope you guy enjoy it all ! Now time for some serious fingers crossing
Wow!!! Now this is just...amazing. I can't believe the amount of work that must have gone into this whole set - really impressive amount of talent and dedication by all involved. Jealous of all your skills for sure!
Hey Pior,
I read your post on the Marmoset thread and since I always kinda wondered how to use marmoset with for dota item presentation, if you dont mind elaborating on which mask/channel you use where in marmoset. That would be of great insight thx
Heya - it pretty basic really : Toolbag2 has input fors Albedo (= color), Gloss, Self-illumination, and Specular. So basically you can just put the Dota masks in there (after converting them to separate greyscale textures of course). The only difference is that the Toolbag2 rendering tech uses either specular or metalness as reflection, not both - so you just have to use what works best for a given asset. That's about all I know about it really ... nothing special !
Hello，pior：） I really like your work， is really perfect.
2d, 3d are very amazing！I was very impressed.I learned a lot of useful skills from your share of the tutorial.Thank you very much：）
The last few months have been kinda crazy - right after the end of the CNY2014 New Bloom event I moved oversees back to Europe, then spent the next two months traveling around. Which was great
At that time DotaCinema contacted me to work on Veno set for them, and since I had been somehow curious about the whole third party thing I figured it would be an interesting experience. It was kinda tricky working on that while on the go, but still fun at the same time.
The idea is for the DC followers to vote on which color theme they would like to see on the wings of Veno :
At the same time, Elder Titan was released so I wanted to play with him a bit since he is such an iconic Hero. I think I still have to touch him up, most notably dialing back on the tiny details - more on that soon hopefully ! This set has been attributed to Motenai for the modeling duties, and I cannot wait to see what he'll be doing with it
I have to say I am still not sure which is more appropriate - orthos or perspective renderings. Still got to figure this all out... but it's fun.
On a side note : I *just* saw that my Sniper set is on a special 50% sale on the store for the coming 8 hours. This was totally unexpected, so I thought I'd pimp that up here too !
Oh my god... no words for the amount of insanely awesome stuff in this thread! As always, absolutely stellar work.
About the orthos/perspective, I personally think that orthos are much more helpful on the modelling stage to get the silhouette right, with no real need for a lot of rendering, but a perspective view is also good to check out the concept in different angles, for some details and textures, however, having just a perspective view and no ortho make the 3D modeller have to guess a lot of stuff and everything takes a longer time. Anyway, that's my opinion and from some colleagues too, I know some people who don't mind perspective only, but I feel that having a simple ortho with just some linework can help a LOT on the modelling stage, really making everything go a lot smoother.
Again, your work is always stunning! Hope one day I get on a level worthy of such amazing concepts to work from.
Thanks for the kind words everyone I am now hoping to get much more active in the community in the coming months, and cannot wait for it !
As for perspective vs orthos - yeah, it's a bit of a never ending debate, thanks for the input guys ... I've heard a lot of supporters for either, or both ... From a concept standpoint I think it's also good to work on a design in another image altogether (messy and not to be shown) and then transfer that to the final model sheet later. But this takes longer ...
On a side note, I don't know if that is a coincidence but I just got told that the ES set made with Redmoon is on sale today too !! 75% off for the next 16 hours. I am happy (sorry for the spam !)
Hehe thanks Blade Squeezing in a Greentooth is always good fun
So, after doing some work for third parties I thought it would be fun to come back to more public workshop stuff. I have been thinking for a while about various ways to "think outside the workshop box" ; basically, identifying ways in which the art community could contribute to the game besides hero sets, wards and couriers.
And now that the Ti4 Compendium is revealing more intriguing stretch goals like "Base customisation" and "New upgraded Creeps" it seems like a great time to do so !
Here's the idea - what if, somehow, a team of players could use custom Lane Creeps ? I love the look of the default ones as they fit very well within the "forest" theme of the game, but what if there were packs that the players could acquire in the store, that would replace them with something new ? It could strengthen the feeling of going against the enemy as a cohesive group.
From there I thought that the Slithereen would be a good place to start, since the Dota lore mentions that they actually are an army/society with a complex hierarchy. One could imagine the Creeps as being their basic soldier units.
Here are a few sketches to get me started. I usually don't post things that early in the design process but I thought it would be a nice change This is mostly focusing on the core look of a species of fish-men ; later on I will be diving (no pun intended !) into the specific Creep types, and Radiant/Dire versions based on the existing ingame model rigs.
This is a bit of a can of worms to open (who knows if Valve would even implement them !) but I see it as a nice change of pace compared to sets and other usual items.
In the coming days I will be polishing/expanding on these designs doing tight model sheets for all of them ; and them maybe form a team of people potentially interested in trying to make it happen
Replies
Btw, posted in bounch's thread but I believe the entire arm is a separate slot since in the workshop files they are separate from the body and even have a separate texture, though hopefully I'm wrong or someting
Sukotto : yeah I am aware of that, it's been interesting to follow actually - when Valve rolled out the Three Spirits update I extracted the files to see how ES was working and it was already weird at that time. The glowing core "sausage" from inside the arms was part of the upper body base back then, and the rock arms were acting as some kind of long slip-on gloves on top of that. But they adjusted the cuts recently, and now it is as you describe, with a straight cut at the shoulders. Slightly different, but still weird ...
But yes - Bounch and I are aware of that and we have a plan to make it work with more regular forearm items, like the ones in the concept. More on that later, I have some testing to do with the model but I think it will work
Congrats on you sniper set sailing right in-game! Looking forward to see what you come up with next.
Merry Christmas man!
Just wanted to get back to the issue of the slot setup for ES. As mentioned by Sukotto the arms are their own "item", similarly to Pudge and Tusk. While it can be great for creative re-interpretations of the character , it's a bit annoying if a set design is more about giving him accessories as opposed to replacing the arms altogether.
So in order to be able to do that I took the original Valve mesh, partially re-modeled it, and re-projected the original textures to new UVs leaving room for some armor pieces, for instance. It makes for an overall lighter model, while preserving the general appearance (especially at game distance). Like this :
That's 200 tris saved, and even more so if one deletes the triangles hidden by an armor plate, for instance.
I still have some cleanup to do in some areas but I should have it up by tomorrow. That way anyone working on an ES set will be able to simply grab it and use it at will. Hope this helps !
- - - - -
Link to edited arms :
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B3tXoYtBEtrTVVlEcWthSHh1TzA/edit?usp=sharing
For the normalmap the core idea is to use an object-space map as a mean to transfer the surface information from one model the other. Xnormal has a tool to do just that (tangent to object, and back). Now of course it's not 100% perfect since it doesn't support the exact Source engine tangent basis, but for an organic model like the ES arms it's unnoticeable
Then once you have the OS reprojected to the new model you can then convert it back to TS using Handplane. And then do some cleanup
As for the re-bake of normalmap I may be wrong, but I tried this one time, however a bit different:
- two object were needed, one with old UVs and normal-bump material, and one with new UVs
- than you can bake normalmap from one object to another as it would be baked from HiPoly
That was made in 3DSMax, I am not super sure if tangent map was 100% accurate, however it looked fine.
As for rebaking normals : yeah Konras, I do have to try that one approach still. I've heard about it before but never gave it a try - I am glad to hear that it worked in your case !
Link to edited arms :
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B3tXoYtBEtrTVVlEcWthSHh1TzA/edit?usp=sharing
Bounch did a badass job on it all, and we are pumped to have it all finally submitted. The set comes with an alternate head piece, but also a full group of Stone Summons to replace the default ones. Now we just have to hope that Valve will start implementing this kind of accessory item, but I think that there is good hope that they'll start doing so, as they recently released the triangle count limit for these (even tho they did *not* provide for an importer slot for them just yet ...
But ... that's not all !
As you might have noticed on the workshop, this set is also part of a bigger collection : along with two sets created for Ember Spirit and Storm Spirit by the Red Moon artists and Boonta, they form the "Three Virtues", sharing common visual elements. Check it all out !
Hope you guy enjoy it all ! Now time for some serious fingers crossing
[ame="
[ame="
A huge congrats to everybody submitting items for the Year of The Horse event by the way - there is some truly amazing work all around !
Happy CNY everyone !!
Upvoted for certain
I read your post on the Marmoset thread and since I always kinda wondered how to use marmoset with for dota item presentation, if you dont mind elaborating on which mask/channel you use where in marmoset. That would be of great insight
2d, 3d are very amazing！I was very impressed.I learned a lot of useful skills from your share of the tutorial.Thank you very much：）
Oh，a few days ago I released my new work，maybe not quite mature：
http://steamcommunity.com/workshop/filedetails/?id=234280463
I really hope you can give me some advice ：D thank you~
The last few months have been kinda crazy - right after the end of the CNY2014 New Bloom event I moved oversees back to Europe, then spent the next two months traveling around. Which was great
At that time DotaCinema contacted me to work on Veno set for them, and since I had been somehow curious about the whole third party thing I figured it would be an interesting experience. It was kinda tricky working on that while on the go, but still fun at the same time.
The idea is for the DC followers to vote on which color theme they would like to see on the wings of Veno :
[ame="
At the same time, Elder Titan was released so I wanted to play with him a bit since he is such an iconic Hero. I think I still have to touch him up, most notably dialing back on the tiny details - more on that soon hopefully ! This set has been attributed to Motenai for the modeling duties, and I cannot wait to see what he'll be doing with it
I have to say I am still not sure which is more appropriate - orthos or perspective renderings. Still got to figure this all out... but it's fun.
On a side note : I *just* saw that my Sniper set is on a special 50% sale on the store for the coming 8 hours. This was totally unexpected, so I thought I'd pimp that up here too !
http://www.dota2.com/store/
(Sorry for my late reply HyrX - Still crossing fingers for your set ! Very cool stuff ...)
….
…
…Welp.
Pior's back with a vengeance
I would kill for the opportunity to work on a concept from you….someday
About the orthos/perspective, I personally think that orthos are much more helpful on the modelling stage to get the silhouette right, with no real need for a lot of rendering, but a perspective view is also good to check out the concept in different angles, for some details and textures, however, having just a perspective view and no ortho make the 3D modeller have to guess a lot of stuff and everything takes a longer time. Anyway, that's my opinion and from some colleagues too, I know some people who don't mind perspective only, but I feel that having a simple ortho with just some linework can help a LOT on the modelling stage, really making everything go a lot smoother.
Again, your work is always stunning! Hope one day I get on a level worthy of such amazing concepts to work from.
Personally, I find perspective more useful in that you get a better idea of what the in game view would be.
As for perspective vs orthos - yeah, it's a bit of a never ending debate, thanks for the input guys ... I've heard a lot of supporters for either, or both ... From a concept standpoint I think it's also good to work on a design in another image altogether (messy and not to be shown) and then transfer that to the final model sheet later. But this takes longer ...
On a side note, I don't know if that is a coincidence but I just got told that the ES set made with Redmoon is on sale today too !! 75% off for the next 16 hours. I am happy
http://www.dota2.com/store/
So, after doing some work for third parties I thought it would be fun to come back to more public workshop stuff. I have been thinking for a while about various ways to "think outside the workshop box" ; basically, identifying ways in which the art community could contribute to the game besides hero sets, wards and couriers.
And now that the Ti4 Compendium is revealing more intriguing stretch goals like "Base customisation" and "New upgraded Creeps" it seems like a great time to do so !
Here's the idea - what if, somehow, a team of players could use custom Lane Creeps ? I love the look of the default ones as they fit very well within the "forest" theme of the game, but what if there were packs that the players could acquire in the store, that would replace them with something new ? It could strengthen the feeling of going against the enemy as a cohesive group.
From there I thought that the Slithereen would be a good place to start, since the Dota lore mentions that they actually are an army/society with a complex hierarchy. One could imagine the Creeps as being their basic soldier units.
Here are a few sketches to get me started. I usually don't post things that early in the design process but I thought it would be a nice change
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v242/pior_ubb/ArmyoftheSlithereen002-small_zps2481a3e2.jpg~original
This is a bit of a can of worms to open (who knows if Valve would even implement them !) but I see it as a nice change of pace compared to sets and other usual items.
In the coming days I will be polishing/expanding on these designs doing tight model sheets for all of them ; and them maybe form a team of people potentially interested in trying to make it happen
Let me know what you think !