Just got my portfolio online
interpolator
And I'll devour any feedback you offer.
http://benredmond.net/
I will expand the highpoly and texture sections with time; I felt it was better to include the little I have now than to omit those sections. You might disagree though.
Any comments or critiques would be fantastic. Polycount and its members have been fundamental in learning this trade and I really can't thank you all enough the generosity of members here has been astounding. Hopefully I will see some of you in the hangouts soon.
http://benredmond.net/
I will expand the highpoly and texture sections with time; I felt it was better to include the little I have now than to omit those sections. You might disagree though.
Any comments or critiques would be fantastic. Polycount and its members have been fundamental in learning this trade and I really can't thank you all enough the generosity of members here has been astounding. Hopefully I will see some of you in the hangouts soon.
Replies
I like the layout of your site: simple and effective!
I also like your modelling and texturing skills, but:
your specular maps definitely need a lot of work!
Everything looks like plastic (metal, wood on the weapons look all the same).
Make things pop out more and get a lot more contrast in there.
For the texture: try to make it more interesting
-> maybe some different color values for the different bricks
-> get some more time on the "plaster" part of the texture
But that's just my opinion
And I have to say, that I really like your site and it's content!
Great start!
I agree, and disagree to an extent in either direction.
Personally, I enjoy well done minimalistic wear on weapons. I appreciate a subtle but realistic texture more than one that's been beat to shit, like you've seen in 10000 games over the past 10 years. If your setting is Fallout 3. Sure. I get it. But even games like R.A.G.E. that were set in a post apocalyptic wasteland achieved what I think is a great look for their weapons despite being a wasteland.
http://www.d4gameplay.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/rage_weapons_lg.jpg
http://elder-geek.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/Rage-Screenshots-260111-2.jpg
Another great example is from PogoP recently in the WAYWO thread.
http://www.polycount.com/forum/showpost.php?p=2054785&postcount=4404
IMO with the higher fidelity of engines comes an opportunity to create more subtle and realistic textures that still have interest and accurate surface definitions. I think in the future we'll see a lot less of the beat to shit look, and more of the look PogoP achieved on his piece(And that several other people have achieved).
On the flip side: I agree that some portions of your weapons are under detailed. Just creating slight variations in the Spec and gloss will help break up materials and keep them from looking like they've existed in a bubble.
As far as your port goes, I like it. Easy to read/navigate. I personally don't care how big the title or pictures are, I'd rather have something huge that's easy to read/look at than something tiny that I have to strain on.
Definitely expand on the Highpoly and Texture sections. At the current moment I wouldn't say they do anything to help sell you as an artist. I understand the idea of putting it in now and adding to it later though. I probably would have done the same. Just keep the "best work only" motto in mind.
:thumbup:
As mentioned already your weapons could do with more wear. The type of wear, and how much of it you apply, will depend on what you want the story to be behind the weapon. Is it something that's been used a lot and has been carried around by somebody trying to survive? or is it a weapon that has only been used a couple of times for fun? Obviously if it's been used for survival means then you will have more heavy damage. Also try to think about how it's used on a daily basis, for instance think how it's being propped up when not being used as this will indicate where you need to add wear, as those are areas in constant contact with walls and floors etc. If it's been used for survival then has it ever been used in close combat? if so then some cracks and more heavy damage would possibly be on the butt of the gun/crossbow where it's received a heavy blow. Also try to think about any kind of mechanical movements, as this will create some wear like scratches. Keep it simple but think about how that wear got there (i.e if it's been used a lot then it's likely the 'grip' will be a lot more worn, the corners will be softer and the wood will be faded).
A lot of this definition will really pop out if you get your specular right. Scratched metals, for instance, will mostly show up in the specular map, possibly a little bit in your normal map if it's a deep one but hardly at all in your diffuse.
As for the 'high poly' and 'texture' sections I would think about presentation because it just feels unfinished at the moment. Give a couple of different views of your high poly and maybe add a more interesting material (I always like to see flat white textures with a bit of AO, but that's a personal preference) you could also maybe show some wires to show how you modelled it.
These are just my personal opinions. It's a great start, but I think you should look to really push what you already have before starting something new
Regarding the wear: I'm glad I'm not the only one who likes cleaner stuff — but that is still no excuse for not showing I can do the job. I'll aim to include some dusty, rusty, and dirt-covered pieces "soon" (uni is taking up a lot of time currently). Regardless of my preferences it just makes sense commercially to do some worn stuff. And as s6 mentions, I still need to push the subtle wear further. I'm keen to use the metalness workflow and see how small the metalness map can be after grouping metals together in UV space. Could be quite small unless you have small details that change metalness like rust.
Last night I noticed some small errors with the site; mainly some broken images. They're fixed now; apparently capitalisation mattered once the site was uploaded (possibly because the server is linux based?) whereas when I was testing locally capitalisation didn't matter.
I also have a question about preferred default behaviour for links. At the bottom of each piece I have text for those who care to read it and links to the maps/flats. Would you prefer such links to open in a new window by default, or not? I've assumed not because you already have that functionality via MMB (and you might prefer opening in the same window, so this option gives you both choices). I did make downloading the pdf or docx of my resume a new window by default though. Thoughts?
s6 what I see is that you are locking yourself from critique.
When people tell you you gotta work on the wear etc, they are beeing nice, as they are nice people here (unlike me haha
Multiple people said it in this thread and in your last thread aswell.
You are completely right with that PBR assets do not need much wear, but theres a rather long way from what you have currently to that point.
Its not about not having textures with high wear, its about that your clean textures are not up to quality for clean textures.
Theres a lot more to "clean" textures than base colors and some stains, and so far it looks like you have not a single spot on any model with some quality photoshop work, and thats what people concerns.
Also wear is the hardest thing in texturing, and well, the essence of texturing. If you like objects with wear or not is secondary, what is important is that you dig into that stuff hard and build up on those skills, else where is the photoshop experience coming from that you need?
Everyone here just wants to help you and if you act all defensive and know-better then youre not progressing as good as you could : P
The website looks decent, some nice fonts could push it over the edge tho, and I would make it left bound on your resum
So I recently updated my portfolio after some criticism and completing some new assets.
Main changes:
Added Shipping container & Flamberge dagger
Removed 'textures' pending something worthwhile
Added highpoly renders of models to the highpoly section. Debating also adding them to each individual items page
Added Art for Games + Artstation profile links to resume page (Unnecessary?)
Made contact / pdf download highest on resume
Changed links to texture flats from text to thumbnails
Todo:
Update twinbow/VSS images with new email address
Try left justified resume page
Test on tablet displays?
Also got advised to change the front page images to side by side squares. As I continue to add projects the current 800x350 images will likely cause too much scrolling. They're also not as friendly to smaller screens. Any thoughts on the above or crits of the new pieces would be great.
- Present all textures belonging to the same model in one image (e.g. present the twinbow albedo/normals/spec and gloss as one single image). I'd make the thumbnail for the textures much bigger as well.
- Make a groundplane for the containers as they look a bit weird just floating like that. A single white flat plane would look better than nothing, but an asphalt or concrete floor would probably look better.
- The suggestion to make the thumbnails side by side is a good one imo. It's okay for now but will be cumbersome when you add some more projects.