In all honesty, it looks like it was designed by a committee - there are really too many disparate parts from too many entirely different weapon systems. If you're going for near-future, then pick an existing weapon and add high-tech features - carbon/polymer/ceramic parts, laser range finder, ballistic computer - or go for the old stand-by, a multi-barrel system. For more advanced systems, go for an energy weapon or a rail gun.
A heavy machine gun is a dedicated, specialized weapon; you wouldn't have a second, smaller barrel (although .50 cal weapons have been used as 'spotters' for heavy cannon...) and you certainly wouldn't have a grenade launcher. It's also not a small caliber - a .50 or a 12.7mm are the most common sizes.
Right now, you're weilding a lot of greebles for little effect. And the greebles are obvious.
M203 Grenade Launcher
Front end of the gun is using a lot of elements from the Marksman rifle from Halo Reach.
Modern ACOG scope
Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 Heartbeat Monitor
If it helps at all, really imagine holding that. If my arms have to be that wide in breadth, I'm going to have a large difficulty with aiming it. It looks unwiedly, and the proportions definitely are unwieldy.
Stop. Restart. Literally go back to concepting this out. Look at how modern heavy and light machine guns are made (SAW, RPK, etc.). Where and how does the gas cycle from an expended bullet? How big is a typical trigger mechanism enclosure? How do the weapons eject spent shells? How do machine guns deal with overheating barrels.
You need to ask these questions to get your art past "oh that looks nice." to "That is solid and awesome." Guns especially.
Focus on sihlouette first. Bad silhouette will not save a detail intensive gun.
Thanks JadeyePanda and Dwalker. I kinda feel the problem when i finished this model the day before yesterday. You help me to figuer it out clearly. When the teacher give us freedom to design a weapon whatever we want. I just too eager and excite to do an awsome model cause this is my first time. I throw too much details pick from everywhere when I model it. haha. I see right now u have to stick to an solid design idea to make the design stands.
Originally, my design was like this, but end up very differently.
I will improve the model but not much I think, cause I have a deadline for the high poly, and then need to do the low poly and textures in a short time. So when I finished texturing, I will post the result here and would like to have your opinions~~Thanks again, Helps a lot!!:)
You're definitely not lacking any modelling skills, I hope your texture skills are the same, It will turn out great in the long run.
As mentioned, the main issue is the composition. Place functioning detail in right frequency to draw the eye to the elements you want to sell. The eye bounces all over the place, find the balance of detail and don't be afraid of empty space, trust me it's your friend. Start simple and build up if needed, it would have saved you precious time too.
It looks like you have two separate gun barrels, no trigger for that grenade launcher on the undersling.
There's just too much going on. Simplify!
Just focus on having one barrel, one body, one stock, one grip.
To me right now, it seems like you're getting inspiration from games like Section 8 or Dust 514. The designs seem similar, but those two games don't overburden the look of their guns. Yes, they have a lot of interesting lines and details going on, but it's not so busy with unnecessary additions like energy cores or unnecessary vents that don't seem to mean anything beyond "looks cool."
1. keep focus on one main selling point
2. don't throw details all over the place, keep rythem like music.
3. always think about checking fonctionnality.
Going back to change the model again Thanks Panda.
There are two really important things to think about when you're laying down the foundations of a gun design: mechanics, and balance/proportions. Right now I have no idea how the gun works nor is it balanced.
Currently you have so many greebles they're detracting from the base workings of the gun. You have a drum magazine, but you also have gas chamber things, a shotgun-style tube magazine, and so many little valvestem-looking things all over. Pick one mechanism and stick with it. If you're going to make up some sort of fantasy way of putting bullets into people, it needs to be very obviously clear how it works--look at the Halo weapons for examples of this, they often do it well. In your case, I think it would be best to stick with a typical magazine-fed design like modern-day weaponry. In any case, having a rough understanding of the mechanisms that might make the gun actually work if it were real is the first step to designing believable, made-up weaponry.
Some of your proportions are off. The scope and sights are very small, the flashhider is too small compared to the "bolt", and the grenade launcher was also tiny. Having these out of proportion makes the gun feel very weak. Try using a cylindrical piece that is important for the gun mechanisms (like the flashhider) to compare to when judging sense of scale. This makes working from concept art much easier too.
Bigger weapons also typically have a better feel when they have less height and more length. This helps balance the design a bit. Also, the position of the scope or sights can GREATLY change the balance of the design.
I've made a paintover showing some modifications I might suggest for next time. This might be a little bit too simplified but it's a good base to start adding details back into.
One thing you might also consider is not using clay renders, as they don't show off your model well or show any errors you might have. Try a simple 3 point light setup and a dark material with high specularity and AO.
EDIT: also I just noticed you're trying for an HMG design and my paintover makes it into more of a rifle. My apologies. Currently your model is definitely reading more like a rifle and not an HMG, mostly due to balance and proportions. HMGs are typically very rear-heavy. Check out the Vulcan, the MG42, and the Halo turret guns for good examples of this.
Update, I know It has still room to improve this model, but I guess this is the final version before low poly, otherwise I got really no time for low poly and textures work before deadline. I'll do a better design next time at the beginning
Keep wary of how you composite your colors and vvalues going forward. Really think about which elements are the most important on the gun and how you want it to read overall. Make those focal points clear compared to the rest of the gun.
Also, look at real references of wear and tear on weapons, see where they actually accumulate. A basic rule of thumb is anywhere where there are moving parts or extremities of the gun that will bump into things will receive the most damage.
Thank u Panda for ur tips. I finished the texturing a few days ago, well sort of. I hesitated to post here cause it's really rough and has a lot of problems. First time to do a complete game model from A to Z, and with PBR also... So...
But still i finally decided to post it here cause it's kinda a milestone model for me, and i hope to get more helps from ur guys, especially for texturing:)
Thank u panda:) I'll keep it in mind. Next time i'll do a simpler model, need to practice the basic. this model i made is a little overwhelm for me for now. Need to figure our my workflow.
Replies
A heavy machine gun is a dedicated, specialized weapon; you wouldn't have a second, smaller barrel (although .50 cal weapons have been used as 'spotters' for heavy cannon...) and you certainly wouldn't have a grenade launcher. It's also not a small caliber - a .50 or a 12.7mm are the most common sizes.
This design could be a lot better.
Right now, you're weilding a lot of greebles for little effect. And the greebles are obvious.
M203 Grenade Launcher
Front end of the gun is using a lot of elements from the Marksman rifle from Halo Reach.
Modern ACOG scope
Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 Heartbeat Monitor
If it helps at all, really imagine holding that. If my arms have to be that wide in breadth, I'm going to have a large difficulty with aiming it. It looks unwiedly, and the proportions definitely are unwieldy.
Stop. Restart. Literally go back to concepting this out. Look at how modern heavy and light machine guns are made (SAW, RPK, etc.). Where and how does the gas cycle from an expended bullet? How big is a typical trigger mechanism enclosure? How do the weapons eject spent shells? How do machine guns deal with overheating barrels.
You need to ask these questions to get your art past "oh that looks nice." to "That is solid and awesome." Guns especially.
Focus on sihlouette first. Bad silhouette will not save a detail intensive gun.
Originally, my design was like this, but end up very differently.
I will improve the model but not much I think, cause I have a deadline for the high poly, and then need to do the low poly and textures in a short time. So when I finished texturing, I will post the result here and would like to have your opinions~~Thanks again, Helps a lot!!:)
As mentioned, the main issue is the composition. Place functioning detail in right frequency to draw the eye to the elements you want to sell. The eye bounces all over the place, find the balance of detail and don't be afraid of empty space, trust me it's your friend. Start simple and build up if needed, it would have saved you precious time too.
It looks like you have two separate gun barrels, no trigger for that grenade launcher on the undersling.
There's just too much going on. Simplify!
Just focus on having one barrel, one body, one stock, one grip.
To me right now, it seems like you're getting inspiration from games like Section 8 or Dust 514. The designs seem similar, but those two games don't overburden the look of their guns. Yes, they have a lot of interesting lines and details going on, but it's not so busy with unnecessary additions like energy cores or unnecessary vents that don't seem to mean anything beyond "looks cool."
Do you kind of see what I'm talking about, Misuo?
1. keep focus on one main selling point
2. don't throw details all over the place, keep rythem like music.
3. always think about checking fonctionnality.
Going back to change the model again
Currently you have so many greebles they're detracting from the base workings of the gun. You have a drum magazine, but you also have gas chamber things, a shotgun-style tube magazine, and so many little valvestem-looking things all over. Pick one mechanism and stick with it. If you're going to make up some sort of fantasy way of putting bullets into people, it needs to be very obviously clear how it works--look at the Halo weapons for examples of this, they often do it well. In your case, I think it would be best to stick with a typical magazine-fed design like modern-day weaponry. In any case, having a rough understanding of the mechanisms that might make the gun actually work if it were real is the first step to designing believable, made-up weaponry.
Some of your proportions are off. The scope and sights are very small, the flashhider is too small compared to the "bolt", and the grenade launcher was also tiny. Having these out of proportion makes the gun feel very weak. Try using a cylindrical piece that is important for the gun mechanisms (like the flashhider) to compare to when judging sense of scale. This makes working from concept art much easier too.
Bigger weapons also typically have a better feel when they have less height and more length. This helps balance the design a bit. Also, the position of the scope or sights can GREATLY change the balance of the design.
I've made a paintover showing some modifications I might suggest for next time. This might be a little bit too simplified but it's a good base to start adding details back into.
One thing you might also consider is not using clay renders, as they don't show off your model well or show any errors you might have. Try a simple 3 point light setup and a dark material with high specularity and AO.
EDIT: also I just noticed you're trying for an HMG design and my paintover makes it into more of a rifle. My apologies. Currently your model is definitely reading more like a rifle and not an HMG, mostly due to balance and proportions. HMGs are typically very rear-heavy. Check out the Vulcan, the MG42, and the Halo turret guns for good examples of this.
Thank u guys for the priceless advices u gave!
Keep wary of how you composite your colors and vvalues going forward. Really think about which elements are the most important on the gun and how you want it to read overall. Make those focal points clear compared to the rest of the gun.
Also, look at real references of wear and tear on weapons, see where they actually accumulate. A basic rule of thumb is anywhere where there are moving parts or extremities of the gun that will bump into things will receive the most damage.
But still i finally decided to post it here cause it's kinda a milestone model for me, and i hope to get more helps from ur guys, especially for texturing:)
Reflectivity
Roughness
Metal
That first milestone always feels great!
One thing that would really help with getting crits is having higher res screenshots. I kept trying to expand to see the details.
Albedo
Reflect
Roughness
Metalic
Good job up to this point, I think.
I'm thinking Destiny inspiration: