[blender] a question about geometry...

oraeles77

im just wondering which one of these is the prefered geometry.

regarding attaching cylinders to to cubes etc.

not knowing the correct word, the top one I'd describe as 'ziggurat' style, with blocks on top of blocks, while the lower one is a single triangluated mesh.

I've always assumed the lower one is better for light baking etc, although its more time consuming, but I've honestly got no idea.

Mink

Lower one is better for baking. More or less. But should also take the same amount of time. Also your UVs suck. That curved thing should be straightened.

oraeles77

Mink said:

Lower one is better for baking. More or less. But should also take the same amount of time. Also your UVs suck. That curved thing should be straightened.

cheers for the curved thing, cause believe it or not, until recently I would add seams to all of my  curved things, to make them straight, but about 2 weeks ago  I took my tablet to a meetup group and this old guy was like 'meehhhh your UVs are terrible, its better to snip them less and use curved shapes, and it saves time and LOOKS MUCH BETTER FOR GAME DESIGN STUDIOS,' and at the time I thought he was a dick.

meanwhile I was just unwrapping this quickly so I could post this quesiton so dont worry about the curved bit too much, but I appreciate your answer.

frmdbl

@Mink

Not sure what you mean by 'should take the same amount of time', if rendering,
the 2nd version has more vertices so it will take longer.

@oraeles77

As for baking, you have sharp edges in the same places so you'll hardly see any benefit unless you use a custom cage.

You might benefit from using the 2nd version if you need Vertex Color AO or need to Vertex Paint it in the engine,
and there's that little bit of space withing those circles in the UV to put some small stuff in.

In terms of the curved island I wouldn't necessarily consider it a mistake, though it probably uses the available pixels less efficiently than 
a more straight shape,
straightening the cylindrical part, pinning the vertices and unwrapping it once again would be better.
There's no angle stretching though, it's fine if it doesn't cause problems with packing (depending on the shape of other islands)
and doesn't cause any problems with texturing   
(wouldn't work great with very clear horizontal or vertical patterns like would grain, would work fine with noisy detail).

oraeles77

frmdbl said:

@Mink

Not sure what you mean by 'should take the same amount of time', if rendering,
the 2nd version has more vertices so it will take longer.

@oraeles77

As for baking, you have sharp edges in the same places so you'll hardly see any benefit unless you use a custom cage.

You might benefit from using the 2nd version if you need Vertex Color AO or need to Vertex Paint it in the engine,
and there's that little bit of space withing those circles in the UV to put some small stuff in.

In terms of the curved island I wouldn't necessarily consider it a mistake, though it probably uses the available pixels less efficiently than 
a more straight shape,
straightening the cylindrical part, pinning the vertices and unwrapping it once again would be better.
There's no angle stretching though, it's fine if it doesn't cause problems with packing (depending on the shape of other islands)
and doesn't cause any problems with texturing   
(wouldn't work great with very clear horizontal or vertical patterns like would grain, would work fine with noisy detail).

i never bothered with cages, from what I understand its simply an enlarged low poly mesh inverted? how far away should it be from the original mesh? I assume it helps a calculation by being a 'cutoff' point for stray rays when rendering.

VincentHalman

Oeh this is an interesting topic question . I think it also depends on the kind of object that you are creating. If It's a small prop I should do it the lazy and fast way like the first one. If it's a big(important) prop I should use the second method.