First low-poly, pixel model for a gaming asset. Please critique!

graysan

So after three months learning blender for modelling and gimp for uv painting I've come up with this. It's created for a mobile game using UE4 and will be unlit in the engine. The props, wheels, rudder etc are separate for rigging.

2642 Tris, 512 pixel uv 

PolyHertz

The topology looks a bit strange in certain areas but it's hard to make any specific critiques on that front since there's only an animated pic and no wires shown. Though if you're going to be using pixel art for textures I'd use a much lower resolution so the fact that it's pixel art becomes more apparent. Bravo Air Race on PS1 would be a good benchmark, which used 256x128 textures for its planes: https://www.textures-resource.com/playstation/bravoairrace/

Don't be afraid to shade the textures, just use dithering patterns as needed to stay within your color budget. Also, I count 14 colors in your palette but you can have 16 if you're going for 4-bit color  (or 15 displayed if you want to use one as a mask like many old games did).

graysan

Thanks for the critique. Regarding the texture size, I think the next step is to see what it looks like in game. The target platform is the Oculus Quest which has a resolution of 1440 x 1600 and it will be the hero piece fairly close to the camera. I hadn't decided to paint it pixel style when I did the modelling and will make future models more "chunkier". I had to enlarge some of the thin faces, especially around the cockpit as they were less than a texture pixel wide and looked really odd. 

The animation is rendered in blender and has flat shading which won't be in engine. I haven't tried, but I thought I could bake flat shading into the texture at some predetermined angle. I'll also try adding some grunge to add a bit of life. 

I hadn't really thought of a color budget. I just wanted to keep it simple!

DavidCruz

Just posting this as an example towards the textures, uv layout and how you should consolidate the space you have.
This example is using a 1024 (no engine goals in mind)
This still has some bad uv spacing but you get the idea, pack it in better now so you do not do more work later if you choose to use this(your current design) at any point.  Something old i did once to learn for the heck of it.  It utilizes the normal mapping though and you seem to just want the diffuse option for phones.

Example of someone making a game for mobile that also uses planes:
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/R0Xzm
This guy made some stuff for mobile you can see how detailed he got so you can expect a similar result since his was paid work, its best to look for examples get the proper setup (uv space/textures) then get to pumping out some nice planes for any games. 

P.s. i'd also ask that guy and hard specific questions, whether he answers though is another issue, Best of luck.
P.p.s.
If you are going to go that low on the texturing colors might as well make the maps smaller also, bottom left in your uv/texture layout.  If its pixels only you can get away with a lot there with very little.  Very cool for 3 months, nice.

graysan

Totally. There's a lot of room for optimization with the uv packing. After settling on a look I'll spend some time to see how far I can pack it for a good future workflow. Hopefully I can reduce the overall size so I can use texture atlasing to improve mobile performance... It would help if the aircraft had symmetrical wing/fuselage but it doesn't!

I really like the art style of that Skies of Fury game, thanks for the reference.