3rd Year University Project crits (Game Ready M4 Portfolio Piece)

Badge95

Hi guys,

This is my second major attempt at creating a hard surface model for games, the final aim of the project is to have a decent showreel piece.

all crits welcome, I live in the UK so the closest I get to holding a real gun or looking at one is playing airsoft when i was 13 so I'm not 100% savvy on weapon terminology or how things work in great detail.

From the past few years of sitting watching everyones work and scowering the forums Im always paranoid that my edges are too tight and the first response i get will be racer445's example of edges. but i suppose this is something i need to get right.

Im happy with it so far in the sense that its definitely the best looking model I personally have ever made to date. stressful business as being a university project it needs to pass and I have an official timescale I must follow. Hoping to have the model done by the end of next week.

anyway, thanks again for looking and hopefully some of you get back to me as I've had poor luck with some of my previous posts getting views and no one replying.

Thanks again.







This is one the problem areas I've always had, my knowledge of topology and how it works is failing me on some parts so if any of you can point me in the right direction of tutorials and such that would also be most appreciated. 

defragger

Can we see the reference pictures you are using?
Well, I dont know anything about guns, but I will let you know what I think about the mesh so far. This is of course from an artist point of view. So maybe you want to wait until someone answers who actually knows stuff about this kind of weapon.

Anyway ... :

1. red = room for improvement
2. green = I like it (visually appealing)
3. white = ideas (shouldnt this be ... more like this stuff)



Edit: Can we see closeup wireframes of the areas that are causing you problems (last image)? That would help.

Badge95

that is exactly the help I was looking for, thank you very much for replying!
I'll post images of the closeup wireframes later when I'm at my pc, I'm mainly wondering about how I go about modelling In general, do I just Cap the open areas on the receiver parts? Or do I find more reference and model the inside? It's going to a game so I doubt it's the latter but these are the things I'm curious about how the pro's do it,
the receiver is an airsoft variant (purely because it looks slightly different and i dont want to model another standard variant) Its called a "G&P MOTS Skull Frog"





found another good reference, ill be starting work on the receiver tomorrow as i haven't completed the other side, i might remake it completely, the wire image i posted show the learning curve I've taken as i go along, the receiver was the first part I made and the pistol grip was the last.

Badge95

In response to defragger, this is the section that I'm worried about. is it okay to just capped this top part of the receiver like so? or is it bad to do that? It will never be seen in game so i see no need to detail it (nor am I good enough with topology to make sure it stays clean ) 






I also had a go at fixing the areas you mentioned. i think you were right about the stock, it looks better now that it comes to more of a point. will try and fix the top receiver pinching soon.

Kroma!

Badge95 said:

In response to defragger, this is the section that I'm worried about. is it okay to just capped this top part of the receiver like so? or is it bad to do that? It will never be seen in game so i see no need to detail it (nor am I good enough with topology to make sure it stays clean )

Seeing as this is the high poly you can leave it capped, it doesn't really matter unless part of it is visible and will affect the bake. If it won't be seen on the low poly then delete it on there.

Badge95

Awesome, that clears that up. Thanks kroma.

I always see these insanely accurate models people do for games, even in places that are completely invisible to the player, never saw the purpose. Superly that's just classed as un-needed work? Didn't think anyone would be up for that.

Badge95

starting working on some parts and thought it was time for an update, have at it with the crits





I also started working on an An-Peq 15 laser box, but the topology became really messy and I'm not sure if it's worth spending the time to fix or just starting from scratch, any suggestions would be helpful, posting a photo just for reference to what i already have



thanks in advance guys.

Dethling

Abnout the "super accurate" models:
It's mostly about what you as an artist gives the rigger etc. to work with.
Example:
I'm currently working as weapon artist on a hobby project.
We have an awesome looking weapon and decided that we want to have a "pick up animation" where the players character inspect the weapon the first time he picked it up (clearing the chamber etc.). Problem: the artist didn'T know about this and didn't model the chamber, so we have to scrap this idea.

The level of detail is always related to what the other member of your team want to do with the weapon. (e.g. an exploded view if you select your attachment etc.)

Badge95

finally got around to getting some work done, been struggling to find the motivation recently due to working and several other university assignments. I had some issues with the receiver which I think was due to the way I stack edit poly modifiers, model was ruined, so a few parts have been remade from scratch and swapped for easier to make parts. I'm just going to dump a quick few renders done in marmoset. As always let me know what you think.







Thanks guys.