I think having just one object makes more sense. If its a difficult object, that's a good thing, the point is challenge yourself right? That way everyone is doing the same object too, so its easier to compare different methods.
I wouldn't worry about breaking it up into sections/tiers, if someone gets stuck they can post their progress and ask for advice.
The only thing I would stress is that the object should be fairly simple, like the blue thing above.
Just to voice a quick opinion ... I wonder how many people who struggle are going to get involved. I'm seeing a lot of really high quality models and nobody really seems to be struggling or asking questions. This leads me to believe that the guys who know how to do these shapes are doing them, and those who would most benefit are sitting it out because they don't want to embarrass themselves or ask questions.
Don't get me wrong, I think this is a great thread idea - I just hope it accomplishes what you want it to accomplish.
This makes sense but in all fairness peoples final outcome doesn't represent the process they've been through nor can you weigh how much they know based upon the final design.
My picture may look nice but without any help from odd_enough showing the regularize tool I was in a world of hurt. If people want help all they need to do is ask, I'm more than sure most of the people who have submitted a model including myself would offer advice to those in need of it.
As for the level of competition, the stages of the model idea sounds really good and may help others that need to practice within certain areas of hard surface.
One thing I think that should be added weekly is a tutorial/help sheet that newcomers can look at to help them with a difficult part, for instance with this one the threading may have been hard for some so a 'cheat sheet' may interest new bloods to attempt the model.
As for the people who feel there models shouldn't be submitted due to the fact everyone's my look pristine, we are here to help. If you submit a model you aren't happy with and explain areas of difficulty we will offer friendly advice Everyone starts somewhere down that river.
Just to voice a quick opinion ... I wonder how many people who struggle are going to get involved. I'm seeing a lot of really high quality models and nobody really seems to be struggling or asking questions. This leads me to believe that the guys who know how to do these shapes are doing them, and those who would most benefit are sitting it out because they don't want to embarrass themselves or ask questions.
Don't get me wrong, I think this is a great thread idea - I just hope it accomplishes what you want it to accomplish.
I wouldn't say I completely fit in with the targeted group, but this exercise is exactly what I need to get better. I know the theory, but I lack the practice. I may begin to keep a log of the completion time because I know I was probably on the slow side figuring out the best method to create each object, and tweaking them again and again until they looked "right". The monthly noob challenge is fantastic, but I do not currently have the time to devote to it. These exercises can be knocked out at most in a few hours. Perfect for building up not only skill, but confidence to tackle bigger projects.
I would say the best thing for anyone who is pensive about starting; just jump in.
Almost certainly the wrong place to ask but any update on the strange import times for some users with high poly stuff?
Unfortunately no that one is pretty brutal, we've had many artists send us meshes that they have issues loading but we haven't been able to reproduce the issue even once. Until we can get it to reproduce on our end and figure out the cause we won't be able to fix it.
Alex-Stown: Thank you for joining us. In the future, Please Link to Pictures of your wireframe, Instead of posting in open forum. This is to avoid spoilers for other participants who may not want to have any hints on how to do certain things.
EQ: I see your point, And would agree for the most part, But we are back to scaring away less experienced people. We can always give it a shot, and see how participation is, but I don't want someone to see the thread, see the blue thing, and think to themselves "That's too difficult for me".
But if they see a bolt. They'll be like, I can do that.
One thing I think that should be added weekly is a tutorial/help sheet that newcomers can look at to help them with a difficult part, for instance with this one the threading may have been hard for some so a 'cheat sheet' may interest new bloods to attempt the model.
...
Damn, you guys piled in here quick
All good points, By both yourself, and Commador.
I wanted to note this, Specifically, because I do plan on creating a recap. I'm just unsure of how it will go at the moment. Perhaps I'll contact the person I feel had done the best job, or gotten the best results and request they do a breakdown on how they created it. Or get the files from them and recreate it myself, and do the breakdown.
Commador: The phrase "Targeted Group" rang around in my head a bit. My thought on that is; I want everyone to feel like they are the Targeted group I want everyone who see's the challenge to feel like there is something in here they can participate in.
I wanted to note this, Specifically, because I do plan on creating a recap. I'm just unsure of how it will go at the moment. Perhaps I'll contact the person I feel had done the best job, or gotten the best results and request they do a breakdown on how they created it. Or get the files from the and recreate it myself, and do the breakdown.
Sounds good about the recap, but you may find yourself in the position where no one want's to submit a breakdown of the model (Hypothetical now, who wouldn't?" But you have to always remember relying on the people submitting may result in inactivity and or no action from the third party.
You could always use that method as a primary but I don't think you should have a specific person noted as a winner as such, that way it turns everything on it's head and simply makes it a proving ground where new bloods may be put off from trying.
A pm and a breakdown with a simple watermark would be more than fine enough I think, we don't want to make this a competition but more of a learning curve, helping the inexperienced gain experience and the experienced to share their knowledge as well as practice.
Exactly, I couldn't agree more. As for who did the break down, I think it would just be a matter of observing who did the best job. Not necessarily a winner, But someone that I will privately talk to about their method. I could then recreate it myself, and do a breakdown. Giving credit to the participant whose method I use.
But then we come to kind of a shady area where people would think "Well, who are you to decide what's best?". Because I know my way around max, And have a job. But that doesn't mean by any stretch of the imagination i'm a master of hard surfaces. So, I'm not sure...yet. Ha. We'll have to see how it all plays out. Only 2 days into it after all.
Edit: additionally, There isn't always one perfect way of doing it. There is rarely one perfect way. So....I'm unsure how to recap things. I could collect good clean submissions, And review what makes them good, and Collect some that aren't as well done, and explain what they could improve on. Just based on my experience. As the thread develops, Perhaps this review could be conducted by bigger names. "Guest Speakers" if you will. Varying from week to week.
I should start requiring an unsmoothed OBJ submitted with each post. So that we can do a detailed recap.
You could add a new optional 'rule' where people are obliged to submit a way they achieved the end result, I'm sure there would be more than enough people that would do it just for the help factor, then if someone uses a different method they could submit that also, It's nice to get a collective that way people can take what they like and there's no right way of doing it.
Exactly, I couldn't agree more. As for who did the break down, I think it would just be a matter of observing who did the best job. Not necessarily a winner, But someone that I will privately talk to about their method. I could then recreate it myself, and do a breakdown. Giving credit to the participant whose method I use.
But then we come to kind of a shady area where people would think "Well, who are you to decide what's best?". Because I know my way around max, And have a job. But that doesn't mean by any stretch of the imagination i'm a master of hard surfaces. So, I'm not sure...yet. Ha. We'll have to see how it all plays out. Only 2 days into it after all.
Edit: additionally, There isn't always one perfect way of doing it. There is rarely one perfect way. So....I'm unsure how to recap things. I could collect good clean submissions, And review what makes them good, and Collect some that aren't as well done, and explain what they could improve on. Just based on my experience. As the thread develops, Perhaps this review could be conducted by bigger names. "Guest Speakers" if you will. Varying from week to week.
I should start requiring an unsmoothed OBJ submitted with each post. So that we can do a detailed recap.
Yes all of this sounds interesting.
So here is a sort of related thought. A while back we had the ill-fated workshop sub-forum thing that was very similar to this, it died because (1) it was hidden in its own sub-forum and most people didn't realize it was there and (2) the people in charge (me and pedro lol) stopped submitting new challenges.
I think its worth trying to come up with a self-sustaining system that won't rely on you solely to keep it running. An idea to do that would be to have the "winner" of each challenge choose the next subject for the weekly challenge, sort of like the q-branch game that has been going on for like 10 years.
The winner of the previous challenge could also judge the next challenge, and of course this person should have the ability to pass the responsibility onto someone else if they don't have the time.
I'm not sure I really love the idea of having a winner, but it does incentivize participation, and a little healthy competition is always a good thing.
hey people. This thread is a great idea. I'll join in.
Concerning the discussion above: I really like a lot of the ideas that have been brought up. But I would suggest to keep this simple during the first weeks and see how everything will develop. I think submiting an obj-file or a selfexplanatory guide how you did the piece will just make things more complicated.
Also we shouldn't talk so much about winning this challenge. this might give a false impression on what this is about.
I could imagine the following:
This week s6 picks a person with the a very good execution. The person is asked to do a break down and submit his files. The same person may select the next reference for the upcoming week and will choose the piece which was executed in the best way.
This might help to keep this thing running without too much attention from the initiators. (as EQ already pointed out)
Have only been modeling for a little over a month but couldn't pass up a great opportunity to participate in such a great challenge. As with s6 previous post this sounds like a even better idea (the only catch is keeping continuity between the 3 levels with 1 being the easiest)
EQ: That's certainly an Interesting idea, But like you said, I'm not sure about the idea of a winner every week. Competition breeds innovation and I know as well as anyone that competition is a compelling reason to be involved in something.
But I don't like the idea for two reasons:
1. Who decides who the "Winner" is? I hardly think I'm qualified to judge. While I could, It would feel a bit wrong not having the XP behind my name to back it up.
2. "Winning" implies there is one resolve, or one solution. I've seen probably 3 or 4 models in the thread so far that I would consider "Winners" and personally couldn't pick one over another for any legitimate reason.
AlexRodriguez, Slave_zero: Thanks for joining us guys
EQ: That's certainly an Interesting idea, But like you said, I'm not sure about the idea of a winner every week. Competition breeds innovation and I know as well as anyone that competition is a compelling reason to be involved in something.
But I don't like the idea for two reasons:
1. Who decides who the "Winner" is? I hardly think I'm qualified to judge. While I could, It would feel a bit wrong not having the XP behind my name to back it up.
2. "Winning" implies there is one resolve, or one solution. I've seen probably 3 or 4 models in the thread so far that I would consider "Winners" and personally couldn't pick one over another for any legitimate reason.
AlexRodriguez, Slave_zero: Thanks for joining us guys
Yeah I agree, I don't like having a "winner" either for those reasons.
Why not emulate the monthly noob challenge and offer a few different objects at the end of the week to pick for next weeks challenge? Since this should be attractive to everyone at every skill level, having the ability to choose may seem empowering.
1. People have to dedicate a large amount of time to the noob challenges. It seems fair people have a say in what they are spending a month on. This however, Can be accomplished in an hour or two.
2. Voting requires participation and some level of footwork by other people, and that's one more component capable of breaking, and crippling the thread. In addition, the objects picked shouldn't be fun, or cool to look at(while that's nice) but they should be technically challenging. If the people inexperienced chose the subject it would likely turn into a small asset work shop, instead of a hard surface exercise.
My vote Is to keep it simple, have someone pick a single object that can be broken down into three sub groups, advanced, moderate, beginner. The one to two hour a week challenge is perfect. Leaves time for personal projects, after-work relaxation, but is enough time to push yourself or give you the motivation to take your studies to the next level. I feel this is quickly going to become my favorite thread, as a hard surface artist myself.
Keep it up, and thank you S6 for committing so much time to the thread already.
How about this. When the next thread is made post a vote for the following week with it. That way people can vote and post their challenge piece at the same time. It is simple and doesn't require a ton of extra threads or participation.
I'm in agreement about not having a vote. It's only a week. If you don't like the shape that week, just wait 7 days. Over complication will kill this thing before it gets going.
make them all relatable so in a few weeks time you can combine all the created assets into something awesome, like those magazines with individual part :P
I agree with Warren M and some of the others. Simplicity should be the name of the game here, no voting, no winners, just a new model every week. Regardless of what is ultimately decided, I love this idea!
I wasn't planning on making a new thread, every week, As i'd like to archive past weeks within the same thread. How do you guys feel about this?
My thought at this point is:
Post pieces of geometry, Increasing in difficulty, And each prior difficulty playing a role in the next. (like I talked about with the blue piece). To The in-experienced, This gives them something small and easy to work on.
To the Big guns, It's just the matter of doing one object. The point being we are all still working on the same thing.
So it's really just one object, But broken into bite size chunks for those who can't chew the whole thing yet.
Require 1. Shaded/Rendered shots of it, 2. Linked Wires/constructions pics, and 3.OBJ
At the end of the week, someone will collect examples of what was done well, and collect examples of what could have been done better. This could be Me, Or alternate from person to person week after week. This could be in the form of a video, Or a write up.
After the recap, I will collect the images for the challenge, Entry shots(maybe), And the Recap all in one place, Link to that place in the OP. Then update the rest of the OP with the new challenge, And Link to which page it starts on.
As well as post the new challenge images in the body of the thread.
So, Simply put:
One Object assigned ( by person(s) running the thread), X Deliverables (done by the participants) , 1 Recap/Review at the end of the week (by person(s) running the thread), Achieve, And repeat (by person(s) running the thread).
hmm. I don't feel particularly strongly about this or anything but my preference would be to keep it simple. Just post one ref a week. People make it and post screenshots and wires of what they made. Mandatory .objs, writeups, etc. strike me as complicating factors. People can always do those things anyway if they really want to. The less you require of people the more people will participate and the easier it is to sustain
I know these things have already been said by others in this thread but it's my $0.02
AHH: Oh, I might not have been clear. There wouldn't be a write up for every post/person who submits. It would be at the end of the week done by a third party, per se.
And yes. There would be one object....With different focuses depending on who you are and what your looking to achieve.
So the only thing required of Joe Smoe submitting is Shaded Shots, And linked wireframes. If he wants to be considered in the recap, He posts OBJ as well. If he doesn't, He simply isn't eligible for the recap.
Gloriousczar: OBJ's might be a next week thing. And for the zbrushed bolt, I created the threads and bolt base in max, then simply used dynamesh to combine them (boolean Operation), ran a couple passes of "Polish Crisp edges" on it to smooth out the transitions, Viola. I can post a more detailed how to a bit later if you're interested
I completely agree with keeping it simple. I might be over explaining it and making it sound complicated. But short of complete chaos, I think this has pretty few rules/guidelines. As we get closer to the date, I'll try to better illustrate what I mean and do a mock up post.
Post pieces of geometry, Increasing in difficulty, And each prior difficulty playing a role in the next. (like I talked about with the blue piece). To The in-experienced, This gives them something small and easy to work on.
To the Big guns, It's just the matter of doing one object. The point being we are all still working on the same thing.
So it's really just one object, But broken into bite size chunks for those who can't chew the whole thing yet.
This is still kinda overcomplicating imo. Theres no need to break stuff down. Its an average piece (like that blue thing I posted) and most people should be able to do it. More importantly, everyone is welcome to try. Its a challenge, not a competition. The point of this thread is learning, not seeing whos the most skilled. I think you should emphasize this as much as possible in the OP to encourage everyone to try.
If someone hits a bump along the road, they can always post where they've stopped and since there are a handful of people that are up to the challenge here, 99.99% of the time he/she will receive help. Everybody wins.
At the end of the week, someone will collect examples of what was done well, and collect examples of what could have been done better. This could be Me, Or alternate from person to person week after week. This could be in the form of a video, Or a write up.
After the recap, I will collect the images for the challenge, Entry shots(maybe), And the Recap all in one place, Link to that place in the OP.
This makes it sound more like a competition imo. What would work better is if we had top 5 (number is relatively irrelevant) assets/techniques and convert those in some kind of mini tuts, something like what Pedro posted about the bolt threading. The whole thing would work as a 'conclusion' from the challenge every week. Would work a lot better imo.
Either way, the whole thing might get tedious after a while if you do it on your own. If we could get a few more people to occasionally do it, I think it might just work out. Obviously, I volunteer since this thing has already gotten way more attention then I ever expected
Oh and I added you on skype; I gathered some ideas for future challenges and I'd like to discuss it (along with everything else without spamming this thread), so hit me up when you can :cool:
This is a very nice idea for a thread. Thank you for starting it, s6!
It's interesting to see many different ways people did to model the same thing. Thank you also for everyone who gave hints and posted their wires. I learned a lot from those
Also I don't pay much attention to proportions since that's not what this is about.
It's interesting... at first i thought the screw was actually gonna be the harder of the two subjects because of the spiral groove, but in fact most of the people making the "advanced" subject have demonstrated serious inconsistencies with proportion, or else have simplified parts of the ref for convenience.
i know for my part i had difficulty making the scale of the two securing screw holes match the concept exactly while also keeping everything else in proportion. i think the artist behind the reference may have made a few projection errors. thinking about this was a good learning opportunity for me.
looking at everyone's posts, I'm seeing lots of work based on the "advanced" subject that ignores major forms in the extruded platform which are indicated in the reference. Knowing when to simplify in order to save time is definitely a skill, and very useful in production, but for this challenge i think it's quite beneficial to try and come as close to the reference as possible in every aspect. it makes it that much harder
Just my 2 cents, its already been said but keeping it simple is my preference also!
As far as submissions go, I think this is perfect.
"So the only thing required of Joe Smoe submitting is Shaded Shots, And linked wireframes. If he wants to be considered in the recap, He posts OBJ as well. If he doesn't, He simply isn't eligible for the recap."
It's interesting... at first i thought the screw was actually gonna be the harder of the two subjects because of the spiral groove, but in fact most of the people making the "advanced" subject have demonstrated serious inconsistencies with proportion, or else have simplified parts of the ref for convenience.
Excellent point. When I said I ignored proportions I meant I didn't try to match the reference's dimensions exactly; not that people should simplify the design to avoid a challenge.
As a specific example on the advanced model, the reference shows the lower part cuts off leaving the extruded cylinder to form the very base, rather than being like the top which ends in a flat box. Some people simplified this and avoided some tricky geometry. Although the line drawing reference is a little vague (and not to be a jerk s6 but the screw reference was kinda blurry and just the one picture repeated 4 times :poly124: ). Usually sorting by image size in google helps find good pictures quickly. Maybe clearer references would lead to less discrepanciesbut then again it might be cool to see why some people simplify parts of a design, provided they have a good reason to do so.
It's interesting... at first i thought the screw was actually gonna be the harder of the two subjects because of the spiral groove, but in fact most of the people making the "advanced" subject have demonstrated serious inconsistencies with proportion, or else have simplified parts of the ref for convenience.
True. I was working now on the advanced mesh and checking other people's renders and some were quite different. Truth be told, the drawing isn't exactly perfect and if you try to get some of the proportions on check with the sketch, things like the holes won't ever match up :P
Anyway, I'll get at it now, and will post whenever I get done with it. This is definitely more difficult to me than the screw
Also, not related and you might have explained it before, but what's up with your nickname? Every time I see you I imagine some guy in the Hilton Hotel lobby working the night shift and doing 3D models out of boredom, hahahaha (I know you work on a game company, your stuff is too good to be done by some bored guy at a hotel, lol).
Alright, finished the second model. I know the bottom part isn't correct, but it was a bit difficult to get an idea of how the whole shape was.
Edit: Also, I'm not a big fan of having to upload an OBJ file somewhere. Uploading the images takes a couple seconds, but having to add an OBJ to the mess and all that...
Crash: I completely agree. I think maybe the message is getting lost in the translation and I may be over explaining it. I think we all want pretty much the same thing. In regards to the recap, It would be pretty much be what you said. The form it takes, I'm not sure of, But the intention is to go over the geometry and provide solutions that work, How to's on how its done, and other helpful things we can achieve for people to later look back on.
The easiest way I can think of doing this is to collect good submission ( a number of them, Like you said) and review them. The review could be by me, or any number of people I might bug into doing it. Like EQ, Per, Pedro, etc etc. Preferably the latter, Cause those dudes know damn near everything.
I want to make a mock up OP for the next thread, And illustrate exactly how I'm thinking it will go down. That way we can make sure we're all on the same page, and refine the idea before next week actually rolls around. I want to do that after I create next weeks geometry though, cause that's a big part of it.
OH, And i'm not sure if anyone caught the question: Should there be a new thread each week, Or keep it within the same thread to keep all the information collective?
thebamboobear: well done. Looks a lot like the ref on all fronts, material, Proportions, etc.
Illusive: Take a look at the end of someones post, Generally the wire shots should be linked at the bottom :thumbup:
AHH & The proportion Discussion:...What he said, Pretty much. I found the top bolt holes more difficult than anything else, and Proportion/accuracy is a very important aspect of modeling anything. You'll never regret getting it as close to the ref as you can, But you'll often regret not paying close enough attention to how shapes and portions relate to each other. In my experience anyway.
As for that extruded platform, i honestly didn't "see" that in the reference. I realized you were right when I saw yours, and it's definitely implied in the concept, But I just didn't pay close enough attention. That's something i should probably work on in the future
Mike2121: It wouldn't be required you share your OBJ, you would need to only if you wanted to be in the review/recap of some sort. Basically we would want peoples to examine and break down so people know a few various ways of doing it.
Everyone I didn't reply to: Thanks for the support and participation guys! This wouldn't be possible without you guys, your awesome.
Couldn't sleep so I took a shot at the advanced one.
I think the edges are a bit too sharp right now, but I'm going to leave it for now and try going to sleep >_>
OH, And i'm not sure if anyone caught the question: Should there be a new thread each week, Or keep it within the same thread to keep all the information collective?
I think it'd be nice to have a new thread every week if we get at least 6 pages every time. Otherwise it'd be quite hard to find the starting post with the new tasks.
You could also make the new thread with some links to each week's thread so other people can go and check
@Mik2121: Even though it doesn't exactly match the reference, I like what you did with the bottom part
Thanks. I think Amsterdam Hilton Hotel's model is the closest one, but I checked it too late and didn't feel like modifying my mesh by then. Yours is looking great too!
New thread each week seems best. As Mik said, it would be hard to know where the current week starts unless you updated the original post each week with a link to that post or something.
Well, That was the plan. Update the OP with a link to the new weeks starting point in the body of the thread.
I think both has pro's and con's. If anyone else has an opinion on this, please weigh in. I'd like as much feedback as possible.
But we can always just start a new thread every week and link to the subsequent threads. That would make it easy to archive, Because once the week is over, I could just put all the recap info in the OP for the week, which we couldn't do if it was always in the same thread. Couldn't embed it, anyway. Could always link it.
It just seems like a lot of threads. 4 threads a month over X amount of months
I think one new thread per month and update the OP for the individual weeks. That way at most each thread contains 4 challenges and it's easier to sort through.
sadaharu : Keep an eye on your edge width. If your support loops are too close to the edge you're trying to support you directly limit the amount of information that can be baked down to a normal map.
Also, Note on the bolt, There is a single thread that runs the length of the bolt. Take a look at the bottom of other peoples post to observe how they have one continuous spiral.
Any opinions on that? "The Weekly Hard Surface Challenge-January" etc
Keep the threads at weekly intervals as it's less work and keeps the thread on the front page when it's posted and just add any useful posts to the new thread for people to use as help for specific things.
So for instance you would post next weeks thread by copying all the stuff you wrote for this thread, change the picture and title of the thread and add last weeks helpfull posts. If you stay on top of it you can have columns of the previous weeks tips like this.
Keep the threads at weekly intervals as it's less work and keeps the thread on the front page when it's posted and just add any useful posts to the new thread for people to use as help for specific things.
So for instance you would post next weeks thread by copying all the stuff you wrote for this thread, change the picture and title of the thread and add last weeks helpfull posts. If you stay on top of it you can have columns of the previous weeks tips like this.
Simple and it gives new people tips on how they approached last weeks object.
Yeah, But what if the old modeling information doesn't pertain to the new week? Id like to keep information grouped in its respective area. So stuff from week one (like you noted) could be added to the OP of this thread (as it pertains to this weeks model) and next week is completely fresh. Otherwise we would have 140 random tips on how to model something irrelevant to the current challenge.
Not sure though. I'll collect a few more opinions and talk to a couple guys and see what conclusion we can reach.
Replies
Started learn modo
I wouldn't worry about breaking it up into sections/tiers, if someone gets stuck they can post their progress and ask for advice.
The only thing I would stress is that the object should be fairly simple, like the blue thing above.
This makes sense but in all fairness peoples final outcome doesn't represent the process they've been through nor can you weigh how much they know based upon the final design.
My picture may look nice but without any help from odd_enough showing the regularize tool I was in a world of hurt. If people want help all they need to do is ask, I'm more than sure most of the people who have submitted a model including myself would offer advice to those in need of it.
As for the level of competition, the stages of the model idea sounds really good and may help others that need to practice within certain areas of hard surface.
One thing I think that should be added weekly is a tutorial/help sheet that newcomers can look at to help them with a difficult part, for instance with this one the threading may have been hard for some so a 'cheat sheet' may interest new bloods to attempt the model.
As for the people who feel there models shouldn't be submitted due to the fact everyone's my look pristine, we are here to help. If you submit a model you aren't happy with and explain areas of difficulty we will offer friendly advice
I wouldn't say I completely fit in with the targeted group, but this exercise is exactly what I need to get better. I know the theory, but I lack the practice. I may begin to keep a log of the completion time because I know I was probably on the slow side figuring out the best method to create each object, and tweaking them again and again until they looked "right". The monthly noob challenge is fantastic, but I do not currently have the time to devote to it. These exercises can be knocked out at most in a few hours. Perfect for building up not only skill, but confidence to tackle bigger projects.
I would say the best thing for anyone who is pensive about starting; just jump in.
Unfortunately no that one is pretty brutal, we've had many artists send us meshes that they have issues loading but we haven't been able to reproduce the issue even once. Until we can get it to reproduce on our end and figure out the cause we won't be able to fix it.
EQ: I see your point, And would agree for the most part, But we are back to scaring away less experienced people. We can always give it a shot, and see how participation is, but I don't want someone to see the thread, see the blue thing, and think to themselves "That's too difficult for me".
But if they see a bolt. They'll be like, I can do that.
Then maybe they try the holes, and so on.
Damn, you guys piled in here quick
All good points, By both yourself, and Commador.
I wanted to note this, Specifically, because I do plan on creating a recap. I'm just unsure of how it will go at the moment. Perhaps I'll contact the person I feel had done the best job, or gotten the best results and request they do a breakdown on how they created it. Or get the files from them and recreate it myself, and do the breakdown.
Commador: The phrase "Targeted Group" rang around in my head a bit. My thought on that is; I want everyone to feel like they are the Targeted group
Sounds good about the recap, but you may find yourself in the position where no one want's to submit a breakdown of the model (Hypothetical now, who wouldn't?" But you have to always remember relying on the people submitting may result in inactivity and or no action from the third party.
You could always use that method as a primary but I don't think you should have a specific person noted as a winner as such, that way it turns everything on it's head and simply makes it a proving ground where new bloods may be put off from trying.
A pm and a breakdown with a simple watermark would be more than fine enough I think, we don't want to make this a competition but more of a learning curve, helping the inexperienced gain experience and the experienced to share their knowledge as well as practice.
But then we come to kind of a shady area where people would think "Well, who are you to decide what's best?". Because I know my way around max, And have a job. But that doesn't mean by any stretch of the imagination i'm a master of hard surfaces. So, I'm not sure...yet. Ha. We'll have to see how it all plays out. Only 2 days into it after all.
Edit: additionally, There isn't always one perfect way of doing it. There is rarely one perfect way. So....I'm unsure how to recap things. I could collect good clean submissions, And review what makes them good, and Collect some that aren't as well done, and explain what they could improve on. Just based on my experience. As the thread develops, Perhaps this review could be conducted by bigger names. "Guest Speakers" if you will. Varying from week to week.
I should start requiring an unsmoothed OBJ submitted with each post. So that we can do a detailed recap.
Yes all of this sounds interesting.
So here is a sort of related thought. A while back we had the ill-fated workshop sub-forum thing that was very similar to this, it died because (1) it was hidden in its own sub-forum and most people didn't realize it was there and (2) the people in charge (me and pedro lol) stopped submitting new challenges.
I think its worth trying to come up with a self-sustaining system that won't rely on you solely to keep it running. An idea to do that would be to have the "winner" of each challenge choose the next subject for the weekly challenge, sort of like the q-branch game that has been going on for like 10 years.
The winner of the previous challenge could also judge the next challenge, and of course this person should have the ability to pass the responsibility onto someone else if they don't have the time.
I'm not sure I really love the idea of having a winner, but it does incentivize participation, and a little healthy competition is always a good thing.
Concerning the discussion above: I really like a lot of the ideas that have been brought up. But I would suggest to keep this simple during the first weeks and see how everything will develop. I think submiting an obj-file or a selfexplanatory guide how you did the piece will just make things more complicated.
Also we shouldn't talk so much about winning this challenge. this might give a false impression on what this is about.
I could imagine the following:
This week s6 picks a person with the a very good execution. The person is asked to do a break down and submit his files. The same person may select the next reference for the upcoming week and will choose the piece which was executed in the best way.
This might help to keep this thing running without too much attention from the initiators. (as EQ already pointed out)
wires
Advanced - Smoothed
Beginner
Have only been modeling for a little over a month but couldn't pass up a great opportunity to participate in such a great challenge. As with s6 previous post this sounds like a even better idea (the only catch is keeping continuity between the 3 levels with 1 being the easiest)
BeginnerWires
AdvancedSmoothedWires
But I don't like the idea for two reasons:
1. Who decides who the "Winner" is? I hardly think I'm qualified to judge. While I could, It would feel a bit wrong not having the XP behind my name to back it up.
2. "Winning" implies there is one resolve, or one solution. I've seen probably 3 or 4 models in the thread so far that I would consider "Winners" and personally couldn't pick one over another for any legitimate reason.
AlexRodriguez, Slave_zero: Thanks for joining us guys
Yeah I agree, I don't like having a "winner" either for those reasons.
1. People have to dedicate a large amount of time to the noob challenges. It seems fair people have a say in what they are spending a month on. This however, Can be accomplished in an hour or two.
2. Voting requires participation and some level of footwork by other people, and that's one more component capable of breaking, and crippling the thread. In addition, the objects picked shouldn't be fun, or cool to look at(while that's nice) but they should be technically challenging. If the people inexperienced chose the subject it would likely turn into a small asset work shop, instead of a hard surface exercise.
Perhaps though...Lots to think about.
Keep it up, and thank you S6 for committing so much time to the thread already.
And I agree, about keeping it simple.
I wasn't planning on making a new thread, every week, As i'd like to archive past weeks within the same thread. How do you guys feel about this?
My thought at this point is:
Post pieces of geometry, Increasing in difficulty, And each prior difficulty playing a role in the next. (like I talked about with the blue piece). To The in-experienced, This gives them something small and easy to work on.
To the Big guns, It's just the matter of doing one object. The point being we are all still working on the same thing.
So it's really just one object, But broken into bite size chunks for those who can't chew the whole thing yet.
Require 1. Shaded/Rendered shots of it, 2. Linked Wires/constructions pics, and 3.OBJ
At the end of the week, someone will collect examples of what was done well, and collect examples of what could have been done better. This could be Me, Or alternate from person to person week after week. This could be in the form of a video, Or a write up.
After the recap, I will collect the images for the challenge, Entry shots(maybe), And the Recap all in one place, Link to that place in the OP. Then update the rest of the OP with the new challenge, And Link to which page it starts on.
As well as post the new challenge images in the body of the thread.
So, Simply put:
One Object assigned ( by person(s) running the thread), X Deliverables (done by the participants) , 1 Recap/Review at the end of the week (by person(s) running the thread), Achieve, And repeat (by person(s) running the thread).
Wires - http://i.imgur.com/YPykw35.jpg
Did you want the OBJ's this week or are we going to start doing that format for the next challenge?
Edit - S6, do you mind me asking, how did you do the threading on the first piece in zBrush? It looks really nice.
I know these things have already been said by others in this thread but it's my $0.02
And yes. There would be one object....With different focuses depending on who you are and what your looking to achieve.
So the only thing required of Joe Smoe submitting is Shaded Shots, And linked wireframes. If he wants to be considered in the recap, He posts OBJ as well. If he doesn't, He simply isn't eligible for the recap.
Gloriousczar: OBJ's might be a next week thing. And for the zbrushed bolt, I created the threads and bolt base in max, then simply used dynamesh to combine them (boolean Operation), ran a couple passes of "Polish Crisp edges" on it to smooth out the transitions, Viola. I can post a more detailed how to a bit later if you're interested
I completely agree with keeping it simple. I might be over explaining it and making it sound complicated. But short of complete chaos, I think this has pretty few rules/guidelines. As we get closer to the date, I'll try to better illustrate what I mean and do a mock up post.
i will join .
This is still kinda overcomplicating imo. Theres no need to break stuff down. Its an average piece (like that blue thing I posted) and most people should be able to do it. More importantly, everyone is welcome to try. Its a challenge, not a competition. The point of this thread is learning, not seeing whos the most skilled. I think you should emphasize this as much as possible in the OP to encourage everyone to try.
If someone hits a bump along the road, they can always post where they've stopped and since there are a handful of people that are up to the challenge here, 99.99% of the time he/she will receive help. Everybody wins.
This makes it sound more like a competition imo. What would work better is if we had top 5 (number is relatively irrelevant) assets/techniques and convert those in some kind of mini tuts, something like what Pedro posted about the bolt threading. The whole thing would work as a 'conclusion' from the challenge every week. Would work a lot better imo.
Either way, the whole thing might get tedious after a while if you do it on your own. If we could get a few more people to occasionally do it, I think it might just work out. Obviously, I volunteer since this thing has already gotten way more attention then I ever expected
Oh and I added you on skype; I gathered some ideas for future challenges and I'd like to discuss it (along with everything else without spamming this thread), so hit me up when you can :cool:
It's interesting to see many different ways people did to model the same thing. Thank you also for everyone who gave hints and posted their wires. I learned a lot from those
Here is my shot at the screw:
wire
Will give the advanced one a try tomorrow
i know for my part i had difficulty making the scale of the two securing screw holes match the concept exactly while also keeping everything else in proportion. i think the artist behind the reference may have made a few projection errors. thinking about this was a good learning opportunity for me.
looking at everyone's posts, I'm seeing lots of work based on the "advanced" subject that ignores major forms in the extruded platform which are indicated in the reference. Knowing when to simplify in order to save time is definitely a skill, and very useful in production, but for this challenge i think it's quite beneficial to try and come as close to the reference as possible in every aspect. it makes it that much harder
As far as submissions go, I think this is perfect.
"So the only thing required of Joe Smoe submitting is Shaded Shots, And linked wireframes. If he wants to be considered in the recap, He posts OBJ as well. If he doesn't, He simply isn't eligible for the recap."
It clearly worked well this week :P
As a specific example on the advanced model, the reference shows the lower part cuts off leaving the extruded cylinder to form the very base, rather than being like the top which ends in a flat box. Some people simplified this and avoided some tricky geometry. Although the line drawing reference is a little vague (and not to be a jerk s6 but the screw reference was kinda blurry and just the one picture repeated 4 times :poly124: ). Usually sorting by image size in google helps find good pictures quickly. Maybe clearer references would lead to less discrepanciesbut then again it might be cool to see why some people simplify parts of a design, provided they have a good reason to do so.
True. I was working now on the advanced mesh and checking other people's renders and some were quite different. Truth be told, the drawing isn't exactly perfect and if you try to get some of the proportions on check with the sketch, things like the holes won't ever match up :P
Anyway, I'll get at it now, and will post whenever I get done with it. This is definitely more difficult to me than the screw
Also, not related and you might have explained it before, but what's up with your nickname? Every time I see you I imagine some guy in the Hilton Hotel lobby working the night shift and doing 3D models out of boredom, hahahaha (I know you work on a game company, your stuff is too good to be done by some bored guy at a hotel, lol).
Edit: Also, I'm not a big fan of having to upload an OBJ file somewhere. Uploading the images takes a couple seconds, but having to add an OBJ to the mess and all that...
The easiest way I can think of doing this is to collect good submission ( a number of them, Like you said) and review them. The review could be by me, or any number of people I might bug into doing it. Like EQ, Per, Pedro, etc etc. Preferably the latter, Cause those dudes know damn near everything.
I want to make a mock up OP for the next thread, And illustrate exactly how I'm thinking it will go down. That way we can make sure we're all on the same page, and refine the idea before next week actually rolls around. I want to do that after I create next weeks geometry though, cause that's a big part of it.
OH, And i'm not sure if anyone caught the question: Should there be a new thread each week, Or keep it within the same thread to keep all the information collective?
thebamboobear: well done. Looks a lot like the ref on all fronts, material, Proportions, etc.
Illusive: Take a look at the end of someones post, Generally the wire shots should be linked at the bottom :thumbup:
AHH & The proportion Discussion:...What he said, Pretty much. I found the top bolt holes more difficult than anything else, and Proportion/accuracy is a very important aspect of modeling anything. You'll never regret getting it as close to the ref as you can, But you'll often regret not paying close enough attention to how shapes and portions relate to each other. In my experience anyway.
As for that extruded platform, i honestly didn't "see" that in the reference. I realized you were right when I saw yours, and it's definitely implied in the concept, But I just didn't pay close enough attention. That's something i should probably work on in the future
Mike2121: It wouldn't be required you share your OBJ, you would need to only if you wanted to be in the review/recap of some sort. Basically we would want peoples to examine and break down so people know a few various ways of doing it.
Everyone I didn't reply to: Thanks for the support and participation guys! This wouldn't be possible without you guys, your awesome.
I think the edges are a bit too sharp right now, but I'm going to leave it for now and try going to sleep >_>
wire
@Mik2121: Even though it doesn't exactly match the reference, I like what you did with the bottom part
You could also make the new thread with some links to each week's thread so other people can go and check
Thanks. I think Amsterdam Hilton Hotel's model is the closest one, but I checked it too late and didn't feel like modifying my mesh by then. Yours is looking great too!
I think both has pro's and con's. If anyone else has an opinion on this, please weigh in. I'd like as much feedback as possible.
But we can always just start a new thread every week and link to the subsequent threads. That would make it easy to archive, Because once the week is over, I could just put all the recap info in the OP for the week, which we couldn't do if it was always in the same thread. Couldn't embed it, anyway. Could always link it.
It just seems like a lot of threads. 4 threads a month over X amount of months
...my stuff...i just took screen shoots + one render (decided to try something with lightning so...)
Any opinions on that? "The Weekly Hard Surface Challenge-January" etc
Also, Note on the bolt, There is a single thread that runs the length of the bolt. Take a look at the bottom of other peoples post to observe how they have one continuous spiral.
Keep the threads at weekly intervals as it's less work and keeps the thread on the front page when it's posted and just add any useful posts to the new thread for people to use as help for specific things.
So for instance you would post next weeks thread by copying all the stuff you wrote for this thread, change the picture and title of the thread and add last weeks helpfull posts. If you stay on top of it you can have columns of the previous weeks tips like this.
Weekly Hard Surface Challenge - Week 1 (BOLT & VICEGRIP) Tips & Methods
Creating the Hexagon Shape - S6
Creating threading - Pedro Amorim
Simple and it gives new people tips on how they approached last weeks object.
Yeah, But what if the old modeling information doesn't pertain to the new week? Id like to keep information grouped in its respective area. So stuff from week one (like you noted) could be added to the OP of this thread (as it pertains to this weeks model) and next week is completely fresh. Otherwise we would have 140 random tips on how to model something irrelevant to the current challenge.
Not sure though. I'll collect a few more opinions and talk to a couple guys and see what conclusion we can reach.