23 swords
polycounter lvl 10
As foundation for my newest "Imma learn to 3d!"- project, I found this picture:
And I will try to make a 3d- version of all of them. Any critique welcome!
I will try as much as possible to limit the polycount, and the models will only have one diffuse map (though normal and/or specular etc. can be done upon request).
The original concepts are not made by me. Cred to some guy Kozivara on deviantArt.
And I will try to make a 3d- version of all of them. Any critique welcome!
I will try as much as possible to limit the polycount, and the models will only have one diffuse map (though normal and/or specular etc. can be done upon request).
The original concepts are not made by me. Cred to some guy Kozivara on deviantArt.
Replies
But I think that you can up the contrast on each of your swords. And also get in more color variations in to your texture work to make it all pop more. right now your textures are a bit boring, you can get in a lot more color in there. Like for example the number 4 concept has a lot more blue in it than your finished sword has.
But great commitment, good luck with the rest of your swords.
i think u can also use uv space in a bit more efficient way, rather than pack main blade of sword vertically. u can rotate it 45 degree then put in center, something like this
I love handpainted textures
but I have to agree with alifarsangi on the UV space
instead of rotating your blade by 45° in UV space you could also do what I do :
I usually use 2:1 scaled texturemaps for swords, so something like 2048*1024
That said, you're matching the concepts pretty well and your hand painting is very clean.
I might also have to save that image of the concepts... There are quite a few of those I'd love to try making myself at some point. :P
i wouldnt rotate the uvws like that , simply make the texture a 1024x512 ? less wastefull. or pack all the swords into 1 texture sheet.
Check this one: http://www.polycount.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1612612&postcount=21
Blade is some kind of dark material but highlights on edges are way lighter and give it effect of metalness, also the soft brush shine at the tip of the blade, on the edge and guard helps a lot. As for the shading, look at the grip - it's way lighter on the side and darker on the top and bottom - it even looks like a seam through mirrored mesh (but despite that it's not that annoying).
I'm not native english speaker so if something isn't clear don't hesitate to ask
but looking through the eye sockets it looks like your next focus should be on poly flow and optimization, your other swords have quite a bit of unneeded edge loops
*sorry if someone else already said any of this, didn't have time to read it all
Your coloring is mad clean though, so that shouldnt be a problem at all.
Looking at your painted handles, I can't help but notice that you might have an ugly seam in the middle of the handle that you're not showing us. You could clean the seam by offsetting each half of the handle UVs and painting over them.
Also try using masks to ensure a clean texture sheet.
If anyone would care to elaborate on the comment "adjust the hues on these swords to give them some depth", I would appreciate it! Like, how do I achieve depth with hue?
Next sword will include a tricount and side- view, so you can get a proper look at the seams!
I hope this includes everything you need for a proper judgement. I tried to restict my polygons this time.
However you really have issue with the number of poly.
Hope this help, red lien are completely useless edgeloop that serve 0 purpose i don't even know why you put them. Some of them have really small almost invisible variation, it's useless in handpaint low poly. The orange one is edge loop you don't need but you have to move the other to make it look better. also you don'T need 14sides cylinder to do a circle form, 6-8 is more then enough, 10-12 if it's really a big visible circle.
I wouldn't go as far as saying all those are useless, the bottom of the blade ones serve a purpose for the silhouette and this day of age a little bit more sides on a cylinder isn't a huge deal especially on a weapon which is usually a "hero" prop of sorts (it also depends on what platforms, for mobile I guess the lower option would be ideal)
But Odow does point out a lot of pointless edge loops, if it doesn't add to the silhouette get rid of it.
Some of those edges are leftovers from before i applied the mirror, and forgot to remove. And other edges are there because I wanted the UV- shells to be separated for different materials, etc. but alot of what you marked as unnecessary are edgeloops that are important to the over all shape. Like the lower part of the blades. Can I remove those edges, and still keep the same silhouette? Otherwise I feel that the blades would just look like spikes or something.
The one thing I think you need to push like what everyone else seems to mentioning is variations in colour, deeper variations in hue and saturation as well as more attention in getting highlights in the changes of surfaces to stop it from looking too flat.
I agree with what pigart also.
Keep going and good luck.
Removing 1 edge loop make it look the same, removing 2 edge loop change the curve but it still read nice as a sword, none of that make it look like crap or ruin the weapon , after that it's just a matter of limitation and preference.
not if you are not intending to do a good looking model or proper bake : P
have to disagree there, 6( 8 )sides are no circle, thats a hexagon and you would be better off defining it as such one instead of trying to make it something it isnt. Cant argue with uneeded edge loops of course, but from an artistic standpoint its a sin to remove those loops from the front blade edge, that curve is the most important defining element of every real sword (bullet, rocket, and similar objects) and very minor inaccuracies in such a curve can make or break a similarity towards a reference
id even put more on that ring, the sword has tons of budget left and i dont understand why people always connect hand-painted with 2005 silhouettes
Nice proress on the swords man , although some look a lot nicer than others texturing wise, the one with yellow gradient is my favourite id say
Mostly because those are the specs I've had to hit, it's been even lower on mobile.
well i just wanted to avoid leo to cut in visual quality of his art for no reason, nothing is uglier imo than a hexagon disguised as a circle : P
Take another look at your reference picture. if you zoom in you can see even the cleanest blade has some color variation.
Now about your use of geometry. You need to use less of it. The models only need enough geometry to maintain the silhouette since your are not baking any maps from a high poly.
Thank you for posting your virginity in my thread then
And this was the first time I've ever heard the term N-gon, so I had to google it, since I'm a noob. But right you are! I am using blender, but im sure there is an option for it in there too.
i have to agree with the others with your number of polys though
i just copied your picture and made a low poly version, mind you i am no expert what so ever but yea this is about how i would do it, could still optimize more, depending on what kind of game you are going for
an important thing to keep in mind is the silhouette, so whenever possible, turn off all the lights and pretty much just look at it from the front and side view and if the shape reads then you're good
i would also start thinking about a light source because as of right now it just looks like theres equal lighting everywhere
heres a few resources i used when i was first learning to handpaint
http://cgcookie.com/concept/page/6/
legion commander
hope this helps
Woa dude, thank you! Now I get it, that is one optimized mesh. I will use this picture as a reference for the coming swords as far as possible.
And thank you for the tutorials too!
You can still lower the polycount. I modelled the sword too and got the tri count down to 256.
yea, your method was better. I wasted some polys on the middle- brass- part along the blade (and alot of other places too) cuz i wanted that part to be UV- mapped separately for the texture painting.
Any suggestions would be appreciated : )
Thank you for the reference, I will upload a revised version with this thing in mind!
Keep going man. Your poly flow is looking much better already.
I try to refrain from using the colour picker tool in pchotoshop to sample the reference, but here I cheated. This was a hard one.