My first steps in game art

rock

Hey out there,

I'm totally new to the subject and came into painting/concepting and texture art via the Dota 2 workshop. I'm currently making my first steps and wanted to share them with you in order to recieve honest and badass polycount feedback. I will be using this thread as a little overwatch of my progression (as far as there will be any ).


So here we go, with my very first texture set ever made - for a dagger for Slark of Dota 2 (AO,Diffuse,3pointlight):

Outcome:

And the obligatory barrel, everyone has to go through obviously as my 2nd piece ever made (Diffuse only):



Outcome:




Whanks for watching!

Holland

Hi Rock, i don't see any pictures at the moment.

rock

Oh really? I can see them just fine hmm..

Edit: Should work now I guess.

lotet

hey looks great! esp if you havnt been doing this for a while.
the handle of the blade looks great! the actual blade looks a bit weird, look at reference for metal next time, or 3D versions of it that you like, and try to mimic that.
right now the handle looks kinda World of Warcraft and the blade looks kind of call of duty.

another thing, you have a very high contrast in your textures, it makes it look almost cartoony/borderlands. its almost like your AO is a black ink line. Dont go overboard with the shading in the diffuse, get some mid values in there

Good luck!

Arkana

I really love the look of that barrel. The blade kind of looks like it's made of concrete though.

Pixelatedkiwi

I agree with Arkana, if you are wanting to make your blade more metallic looking you need to create a bigger contrast between the darker base metal tones and the sharper edge highlights, don't spread out your painted specular to wide.

Also the other thing that will help sell it as metal is if you have a light direction established (usually top down). Currently the sharp blade part is evenly lit from all sides which makes it look a lot more diffuse than metal, which is why its coming off as stone/concrete.

JedTheKrampus

My advice for the Slark blade would be to take the asset into Dota 2 and use a little bit of the metalness mask to make it look more metallic. Don't go overboard with that mask--a pretty low value is usually good enough--but it should help the asset. You may also want to darken the diffuse texture on the blade as well. But if it's for Dota 2, make sure to get it in the engine at some point!

rock

Hey guys, thank you very much for all your suggestions! I know it sounds like an excuse, but actually the blade wasnt intended to be metal but stone kinda (we thought it fits slark as in his overall colorsheme and the fact he comes from deep seas). But I guess now its neither one of it really. This guy is actually submitted already, so I can't really work an changes in, but I really appreciate all of your comments! I will try to update this thread regulary and am lokking forward to your thoughts!

Here is a ingame shot of it and the workshop link: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=201062957



But then again, thanks for all the good advices, I really gonna try to make use of them in the next texture!

Cheers!

rock

I decided it would be the best practice, if I'd create a little scene with a few different assets, so Im going for some barrels, vegetables, bottles,… you know, the typical fantasy whine cellar kind of stuff.

Good idea?

Also, Ive absolutly no clue about all this stuff. So what do you guys think would be the smartest texture size/polycount limits to set myself for this type of style? Right now the barrel is somewhere at 370 tris (probably way too high) and the pumpkin is 100.

NeeeBs

sweet

Snafubar7

You can definitely paint, for someone just starting in game art. How long have you been drawing or practicing other traditional medium?

The chunks/dents hint concrete in the blade to me.

D4V1DC

for a new comer it looks pretty nice, gj on your props, ect.

rock

Thank you guys!

@Snafubar7: I'm actually pretty new to painting in general. Of course I drew one or the other concept on paper, but I started to really think about the process, technical requirements and drawing techniques just as I began to draw concepts for Dota 2 assets back in November. So yeah, I really try to do read everything I can about this stuff and since I followed you fellow Polycount artists quite some time, it makes it somehow easier to find orientation.

Btw, I followed your threads before and I love your style, serves as inspiration already

So, just to give you an example, heres one of my first concepts..



Thanks for your kind words!

rock

Added 2 new assets: Kind of a middle age hay cart, and a pretty odd looking bottle. I really tried hard to make it look glassy but, well, see for yourself. Also I pretty much messed up the UVs and the overall textures of the hay cart pretty hard, I probably going to unwrap and redraw this again..

Any tips on how to optimize the bottle, and of course, this little cart thingy?


Thanks guys!

rock

Another asset, still wip: A shield.

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