Recreation of Goldbrand from The Elder Scrolls

Borx25

Designs in previous games were quite boring, so i've made it from scratch, following the lore (made by dragons, and is the sword of a god which is sort of represented by a snake, that's why the tsuba is dragon and snake).
Highpoly (WIP)

Bummer6

Looking really neat so far! I especially like the Tsuba. The scratches look a bit too similar and evenly spaced along the blade. I'd try to add some more variety to the damage. It's still a hundred times better than anything I've made though.

MRRT

Bummer6 wrote: »

Looking really neat so far! I especially like the Tsuba. The scratches look a bit too similar and evenly spaced along the blade. I'd try to add some more variety to the damage. It's still a hundred times better than anything I've made though.

Agree with all of this (including the hundred times better comment!). Personally, I'd refrain from sculpting any damage details into the blade, as such deep gouges indicate a pretty serious beating for a thin edged weapon, and this is a legendary item that otherwise looks unblemished. Leaving the blade untouched would give you more options when it comes to texturing; it could be either pristine or battle-worn, as the scratches and wear on a used blade can be light enough to be shown through materials alone.

Of course, you might be planning to rough the whole thing up and show it as an ancient and long-used artifact, in which case you should ignore all of the above! Either way, looking forward to seeing your progress!

felicitousArtisan

I think a bit more roughness variation would really help some of these materials sparkle. The sharkskin looks great as is, but I think the fabric would be a bit nicer if maybe there was more texture to it, like a sense of subtle weave? It's been a while, but I seem to remember the fabric on the grip of a katana being kind of rough to hold and quite tactile.

I feel like the gold is a touch garish, and while that is technically realistic, you may get a more pleasing look if you put some dirt and comparatively higher roughness into the recessed areas of the tsuba, to bring out that awesome detailed design and add variation. Also consider giving the sharp edge of the blade lower roughness from the rest; it'd look really good as light played over the surface.You could even add a marbled look to the roughness to mimic the folded look of a Katana; not technically realistic with a gold one, but a gold katana is inherently unrealistic so you can go wild here and make it look really cool!

ChaosWWW

Although I understand the comments about the roughness and material variation, you guys have to understand that this is the highpoly and not textured yet.

One critique I have of the highpoly is that the gold dragon molding looks a bit vague and lumpy to me in some area. I think this is because you have too much visual noise. I'd keep that level of noise in the scaly parts at the bottom but sharpen it up on the head and wings of the creatures. Remember that people should be able to know exactly what it is they're looking at within a fraction of a second. Also maybe for critique purposes you can show it without the shader so we can see the sculpting more easily.

Everything else looks really good.

(I don't like the font, but that's getting petty :P )

Borx25

Thanks for the critique, i'll work further on the dragon molding, it is indeed a bit vague.

Another thing, though, how would you guys approach retopology for the handle, should i just bake it to a cylinder without silhouette or try to match it better, im worried about the polycount as the tsuba already increases it a lot.

Borx25

Made lowpoly, baked normal map and ao in xnormal and started texturing: