[WIP] Thunderlord

Dan Allardyce

While the game isn't out yet, I'm super pumped for Bungie's Destiny. So pumped in fact that I wanted to try my hand at modelling one of the guns, specifically, the Thunderlord.



Originally concepted by Frank Capezzuto and Ryan Demita, and modelled in 3D by Jesse Hall, I chose the Thunderlord because it had the most media about it. My goal with this model is to fully implement it in UDK. It's going to be a journey, but life's about the journey, not the destination.

Here's the only reference images available.






And here's my work so far. Critiques welcome!

Joost

Good start. your edges are way too sharp to bake though. It won't transfer well to a low poly. Even if you weren't baking, those edges are very sharp and won't render well.

image by racer445:

Dan Allardyce

Thanks for the advice, I'll try and get that done for the next update.

Dan Allardyce

Update time!

Dan Allardyce

Finally had some time to do some work on this. I've been trying to not keep the edges so sharp, but it's a tough habit to break.

stevston89

A lot of your are too thin and too sharp. I am having a hard time reading the details from the high poly there is no way it will bake well. Looking good otherwise.

Dan Allardyce

We finally finished up the group project in class, which means I get class time for the next month to work on this. I was able to put all the pieces together, just waiting to get crit from my instructor tomorrow so I know specifics on where I need to fix things up.

Joost

It's looking good, but those edges are so hard! You really need to soften them up. And make some of your bevels a bit deeper and softer.
You can always do a quick test bake to see how it's all baking.

Keep this in mind:

Dan Allardyce

Hey guys, sorry I haven't been updating the thread, my life's been full of highs, lows and cages recently (haha). That said, I have been working on this every day at school since my last post here as my end of year project. I'm using UE4 as my renderer so I can get a handle on it.












Critique is always appreciated.

Dan Allardyce

I was finally able to have a discussion with my instructor today and as it turns out, I was doing all the maps wrong. So I redid my roughness and metallic masks and scrapped my spec and I think it's looking much better compared to yesterday. As always, crit is very much welcome!

eugenefoo

Your unwrapping skills can use some work... But i love the design of this weapon.

Joost

Yeah I agree about the unwrap, I personally try to avoid uv splits as much as possible. The only time you "need" a split is when it causes stretching. And even then, if it's only a minor part that won't be seen much or is too small to see, it won't matter. You do need smoothing group splits along your uv splits. You don't have to take this to the extreme, but it helps optimize UV space and it's easier to texture.

The model looks pretty cool though! It's good to show that you can take it into ue4, but I'd take a beauty render in marmoset tb2. You can get a 30 day trial if you can't afford it. Also take some higher res screenshots.

Not sure if you've fixed this yet, but you shouldn't use grey values on your metal map. Values should mostly be either 1 or 0. Roughness looks like it could use some more detail. If you're using a metal map you shouldn't have pure black on your albedo. The values in your albedo are interpreted as the reflectance values.

Joao Sapiro

your HP edges are waaaay too tight and are making the capture of edge lightning very hard. Also yeah , the uvw unwrap is a tad wastefull...

i uploaded some time ago examples of some guns i did , you can take a look at what i mean first hand, im terrible with words xD

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/575737/Jogos/Cherub_polycount.7z

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/575737/Jogos/Dux_Polycount.7z

Dan Allardyce

Thanks for the pointers guys. I know that the UVs are pretty awful. Certainly not one of my strong points. My main problem was those circles on the magazine and the cylindrical bit above the trigger, how should I have tackled them?

@komaokc: I've fixed the metal and roughness maps. I researched them over the long weekend and did the best I possibly could with my knowledge, but it wasn't until I was able to have a discussion with my instructor yesterday that things finally clicked. There are no pure blacks on my albedo (lowest is I think 5%), should I bump those up?

@Joao: Thanks for the examples.