3D Softwares purposes

Grinvon

Hi everyone,

I'm new on 3D development and my goal is to develop 3D stuff for games, right now I'm just creating some fences, chairs, doors on Blender. I have an experience on game programming, but I've just worked on simple 2D stuff until now, I'm very limited on artistic production even thinking this area is fascinating for me.

Straightening to the point, I wonder how some 3D applications can work to achieve final game production.

For example:

1 - I know we can use UV Mapping for texturing a mesh/model I know we can either use something like Substance Painter or Quixel to painting models, in that case can I completely skip the UV workthough and only use programs like these or somehow I still have to use UV Mapping even using a SP? I asked that because I really don't like UVs.

2 - Substance Designer to create materials and Painter for painting these materiais, can I do the both processes on Quixel? I'm a little bit confused cause' there are Quixel NDO, DDO and 3DO Baker tool.

3 - Is 3D-Coat same segment as ZBrush does and you guys think this tool worthy?

4 - Working on engines like UE4 that you can create materials and shaders if you import these materials from a software like SD you can easily edit these materials on UE4 or only on SD?

5 - What's the difference between normal mapping and high mapping? I think only normal mapping is used for the games.

Sorry about a bunch of newbie questions it's because I have no formal background on this fascinating 3D world.  I also hope my english is clear enough to make you guys answer to me.

Thanks.

MikeF

1) yes you still need uv's
2) yes quixel is an all in 1 alternative to the substance suites, though both have very different workflows
3) Both have similar features, though ZBrush is the industry standard
5) height mapping is also used in games, though mostly for things like terrain maps. Surface details are done with normal maps

Grinvon

Thanks Mike.

About the first question, I still need the UV's to register the texture, however I can skip the process to painting it on an 2D software and can stick the workflow on 3D tools like these one, right?

I wonder if I create a simple 2D pixel art stylezed texture, can I easily use it straightly on 3D painting as a brush or just copy and plase the texture, maybe it's recommend to apply it on the "tradicional way" opening the UV texture on a phoshop or krita and work on it as well?

SnowInChina

yes, you can skip photoshop and use substance painter or quixel, or a ton of different tools

and you can create your own brushes for most 3d painting apps, either as texture or brush
you can also mix them up and do some work in a 2d painting app
this topic is pretty complex since there are a lot of tools out there and a lot of things you can do

sacboi

I'll also recommend that you checkout the Unreal Forums for further information relating too the queries raised here plus those you've not thought of yet... 

Ashervisalis

Regarding question 4: You can create materials in Substance Designer, assign parameters, import the material into UE4, and then adjust the parameters. It's pretty cool. If you had wavy sand, you could create a material with parameters like wave frequency, normal map intensity, sand colour, number of pebbles, size of pebbles, etc, and then adjust the parameters as you see fit in UE4.

Grinvon

Guys, thanks for the replies, you all are being so nice. 

SnowInChina said:

yes, you can skip photoshop and use substance painter or quixel, or a ton of different tools

and you can create your own brushes for most 3d painting apps, either as texture or brush
you can also mix them up and do some work in a 2d painting app
this topic is pretty complex since there are a lot of tools out there and a lot of things you can do

That is cool, I didn't realize before that is possible to completely skip some tradicional tools as Photoshop.

sacboi said:

I'll also recommend that you checkout the Unreal Forums for further information relating too the queries raised here plus those you've not thought of yet... 

Yeah I've noticed that. I used the UE forum sometimes especially for programming stuff. I thought to make this question down here because this is a 3D artist forum, but I didn't realize that I could make that question there as well.

Ashervisalis said:

Regarding question 4: You can create materials in Substance Designer, assign parameters, import the material into UE4, and then adjust the parameters. It's pretty cool. If you had wavy sand, you could create a material with parameters like wave frequency, normal map intensity, sand colour, number of pebbles, size of pebbles, etc, and then adjust the parameters as you see fit in UE4.

I'm new on 3D stuff, then materials and every related thing still a little confusing for me. For example, I have no idea the difference between Diffuse and Specular. I know you can mix a bunch of materials (pre-made ones?) To approach a final result. I think modeling is the easiest part of 3D if you stick on simple things like non-organic stuff as a chair, a ladder, even an house.

All 3D videos that I watch related to modeling is somehow easy to me to follow it up, when I take a look on something different as UV and materials the things get worst for me.

The impression I get is they moved too far or maybe I'm jumping some previous steps and didn't realized that before.

------------------

Like I said before I would like to do something relative easy, I'm not aiming to be an artist, probably I don't have time and capacity for this. However we can google for very good looking simple stuff.

FourtyNights

I absolutely love UV unwrapping in Blender, it's a lot of fun (that's why I love making UVs in general). It's a super easy and fast workflow in Blender's UV tools. Especially with organic models when using "Live Unwrap" with pinned vertices to change the shape of an UV island without the fear of distortion.

So I don't really know what is holding you back from learning to make UVs, especially in Blender because it's so ridiculously easy...

Ashervisalis

Modeling inorganic stuff like a chair or a ladder is easier than creating a material, yeah. But keep working on texturing and eventually you'll enjoy it just as much as simple modeling. Also, the difficult part about modeling a chair isn't just creating the chair, it's making the chair interesting.