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LOW-POLY ART

polycounter lvl 19
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hawken polycounter lvl 19
This is the sweet spot for your low-poly models. Post 'em if you've got 'em!

Low-poly hasn't really been a requirement in the games industry for a long while now. This thread is for low-poly art style appreciation, so please take note of these rough guidelines:
  • Keep models under 1,000 triangles.
  • Scenes are fine, if all models are low poly.
Some dedicated low-poly modelling tools now exist that make this art style a lot easier to produce; Crocotile3D & Blockbench

Here's a handy list of ways to make your art look right in mainstream 3D software: Low-Poly Art Style Guide

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  • Red-Fox
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    Red-Fox polycounter lvl 8
    mdinizzz: You're welcome comrade!
    Btw, I love the animation.Wicked
  • phanthanhtruc
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    phanthanhtruc polycounter lvl 8
    entryy.jpg

    Hi guy! This is my entry for the Lowpoly Arm contest :) This is the first time I submit my entry to join a contest on Polycount, So I think it would be better for me if I can receive as much c&c as it possible :) Thanks you so much! :)
  • NeoDement
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    Turn backface culling off to fix your wristbands. I'm not sure how/why but your texture also looks very compressed? Especially around the fingers.
  • Baddcog
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    Baddcog polycounter lvl 9
    But if he turns off back face culling he goes over the 200 tri limit effectively. (in game it would)
  • Xaltar
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    Xaltar polycounter lvl 17
    Been a while since I posted any actual art so here goes. Part of a 1k tri model I am working on inspired by the arm comp, IE. get as much detail into the limit as possible.

    Here is the head.
    headscrn.jpg

    Body is modeled but needs a texture before I post it up here :P
  • fabio brasilien
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    fabio brasilien polycounter lvl 11
    Nice face xaltar!
    phanthanhtruc your arm looks great. But your fingers have only two bones (I did that too)
    It is funny how the Snader comment created all this arm challenge... :poly124:
    I am quite busy to work on mine, but I have read the comments...let´s see if I can fix mine this week. :\
  • dactilardesign
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    dactilardesign polycounter lvl 10
    Xaltar wrote: »
    Not really in the spirit of low poly there dactilardesign. Something like this in an iphone game for example really shouldn't be more than 20 tris and possibly a small portion of a 256 texture. It looks good but isn't really a low polly asset. Do it in 18 tris on a 64x128 and then you will be talking :)

    Thank you Xaltar for your feedback.
    To be honest, low poly... well, should be just low poly, not sure about that texture stuff. The thread asks for -500 triangles, that's all.
    About the polycount... well, I have some experience on that, so I may agree with you in some way. It depends on how important is the asset ingame, and what is going to be it's size in pixels in game.
    I would never use a single texture for an asset, I always share a 1024x1024 texture with many objects (and lightmap).

    Please, have a look to Red Gun.
    Red Gun Gallery

    redgun1-1_5.jpg

    I can post "real" textures from Red Gun, so you may give feedback for real iPhone game textures (all devices and retina supported). This texture is 1024x1024 ingame (player gets really close to the props)
    a15u8i.jpg




    If you ask me if I would use that prop as it is ingame, sure not. But I said "just having some fun"... there is a lower poly version. About the texture comments, notice that there are 2 different concrete barriers there, not just one, so the texture size for each is about... 196 pixels.

    34goufc.jpg
  • dactilardesign
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    dactilardesign polycounter lvl 10
    Xaltar wrote: »
    Been a while since I posted any actual art so here goes. Part of a 1k tri model I am working on inspired by the arm comp, IE. get as much detail into the limit as possible.

    Here is the head.
    headscrn.jpg

    Body is modeled but needs a texture before I post it up here :P

    really nice.
  • phanthanhtruc
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    phanthanhtruc polycounter lvl 8
    THanks you guy so much! :) I'm glad that I had a lot of great C&C for my work here :)

    NeoDement: Yeah... my texture quite compress cause (maybe it's what I thought) maybe I sharpen it too much T_T so maybe it's kill the whole piece T_T
    fabio brasilien: yeah cause I see a lot of work here and I think 2 bone fingers would be great to though about polycount, shape and things :P It would be great if you join the contest to :) can't wait to see yours!
  • Micah
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    Micah polygon
    Havn't posted on here in a while :p
    So here i go.. Here is a hand painted low poly super hero for a small game I'm thinking of making.
    Zip/cape on the back clips off to be a weapon.
    texture will be brought down to 256 for in game.

    donebk.png
  • fabio brasilien
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    fabio brasilien polycounter lvl 11
    Micah, Great character! and very low poly.
    If you dodn´t mind there are a few things I would suggest:
    -his cape is a alpha texture, and when you reduce the texture it will pixelate. I see two ways to avoid it: 1-make a symetric texture and increase the size in the texture map to reduce the pixelation (the texture already looks symetric) 2-model the actual border of the cape. It will increase two tris. :)
    9awiea.jpg
  • Cap Hotkill
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    Cap Hotkill polycounter lvl 13
    Very good Xaltar, love the head ^^
  • Wendy de Boer
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    Wendy de Boer interpolator
    Xaltar wrote: »
    Been a while since I posted any actual art so here goes. Part of a 1k tri model I am working on inspired by the arm comp, IE. get as much detail into the limit as possible.

    Here is the head.
    headscrn.jpg

    Body is modeled but needs a texture before I post it up here :P

    Really nice painting on the face, but the hair is a cop-out, IMHO. There's no layering to it or anything that makes it look like an actual haircut. The fact that it's mirrored straight down the middle is really hurting it as well, it's always a good idea to include one extra strip of polies to avoid that unpleasant "rorschach blot" effect.

    But even with the mirroring, some careful painting can be done to make the hair flow down properly instead of forming that odd shape on the back of her head.
  • Xaltar
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    Xaltar polycounter lvl 17
    Thanks for the comment DP, not really sure what I want to do with the hair yet so I just did a very quick and dirty paint to get it looking vaguely like hair. What I do with the hair in the end will depend on what I decide for the outfit. Thanks for the tip about the extra polly strip, I will definately give that a go.

    Always loved your low polly work so its great to get a comment from one of the artists that has inspired me :)
  • TAN
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    TAN polycounter lvl 12
    $!nz wrote: »
    Tan: Also crank up your diffuse to 100% self illumination and check out the specs thread/post for lowpoly specs here:
    http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=40563

    And rendering how to here:
    http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=51622
    Specifically max settings, since that is what your using.


    Thanks for the links $!nz.I' ll use that rendering set from now on :) Also I'll keep an eye on self illumination :D
  • Delko
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    Delko polycounter lvl 15
  • rooster
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    rooster mod
  • Kurt Russell Fan Club
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    Kurt Russell Fan Club polycounter lvl 9
    Lovely work Delko! The house and the cone trees look rough but the sky, lake and mountains look lovely so far
  • gilesruscoe
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    gilesruscoe polycounter lvl 10
    Awesome Delko, this is for your racing game i hope! really looking forward to seeing more :p

    about 1 hour 45mins speedie:
    demonintie.jpg
  • SanderDL
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    SanderDL polycounter lvl 7
    Having a bit of fun with JGcount's strong man. He has a 256x256 texture. I also did a simple CAT bone animation.

    strongman_fun.jpg
  • gilesruscoe
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    gilesruscoe polycounter lvl 10
    Just finished up this robot for an up coming Iphone/android puzzle game he's 660 tri's with a 64x128 texture (alpha channel for glow effects).

    Screens from unity player
    robot%20finished.jpg
    Will be posting tons of other stuff for this game over the coming weeks.
  • Red-Fox
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    Red-Fox polycounter lvl 8
    SanderDL: Nice work man!
    Maybe you could try adding an overlay layer over the skin, painting with red the nose, elbows, kness area.Adding more temperature and warm feeling to the character.

    gilesruscoe: well done!
    How you get those emisive lights in unity? (which map and format?)
  • gilesruscoe
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    gilesruscoe polycounter lvl 10
    Diffuse texture only but with the glowing parts coloured white in the alpha channel, then add a "self illumination - Difuse" shader to it in unity, plug the difuse texture into both material slots. This makes the glowing areas...glow... but to give them the haze around them you have to use image effects in Unity Pro.

    Edit: Walk cycle, moves a little slower in the browser then it did in photoshop, wierd.

    robotwalkcycle.gif
  • Snader
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    Snader polycounter lvl 15
    Browsers usually render a gif at a maximum speed of 10 frames per second. So you'll want to render it at 10FPS. Yes it will be a bit more choppy, but it's usually acceptable.

    Also, you'll want to render a gif (with the current amount of frames) without the shadow plane, like this:
    HATERS.png
  • gilesruscoe
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    gilesruscoe polycounter lvl 10
    Haha haters gonna hate indeed :P

    Cheers for the GIF info, didn't know that!

    Edit:
    @Cap thats exactly what i do :P apart from i use .mov :p
  • Cap Hotkill
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    Cap Hotkill polycounter lvl 13
    Use Photoshop to convert your Raw Avi files into animated Gif ;)
  • 9skulls
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    9skulls polycounter lvl 13
    Use Photoshop to convert your Raw Avi files into animated Gif ;)
    Much easier to just render out specific frames as .png's and put them together in PS.
  • paradise.engineering
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    paradise.engineering polycounter lvl 11
    wow giles, that robot is outstanding! Congrats for another great result.
  • sketch81
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    Hey guys, I took on everyone's advice and made a few adjustments to my monster. (Blended the stomach and added veins) I also used 3ds max's Viewport canvas to get rid of the seams, worked great and was pretty easy to use.
    I really appreciate all the tips and help! :)

    gobster_monster_final2.jpg
    @Micah, great little dude and the texture looks awesome.
    @gilesruscoe, very nice speedie. I really digg your robot, especially the walk cycle, he has so much character. Looking forward too seeing what other things you've whipped up for the mobile game! :)

    @SanderDL, looking good, it reminds of the TF2 art style. I'll also second what Red-Fox said and try adding in some red dude.

    @ Delko, sexy artwork.
  • osman
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    osman polycounter lvl 18
    ~600 tri
    256x128
    Still working on it.
    scraptruck.png
  • Bruno Afonseca
    Interesting, but too much black, don't you think?
  • osman
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    osman polycounter lvl 18
    I agree, I work from dark to lighter, perhaps that's what pushes it towards so much black. It's still WIP, will see what I can do with it :)
  • rooster
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    rooster mod
    I was going to say the same comment, but I left it- because I *could see a game all in that style looking kinda cool. Still, be nice with some subtle secondary light source going on
  • Ged
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    Ged interpolator
    rooster wrote: »
    I was going to say the same comment, but I left it- because I *could see a game all in that style looking kinda cool. Still, be nice with some subtle secondary light source going on

    yeah especially underneath the trailer but youre still workin on it sooo :)
  • Funky Bunnies
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    Funky Bunnies polycounter lvl 17
    i did a little dood for a friend's game! not totally sure if it'd fit though.
    But any thoughts would be awesome!

    bearWalk1.gif
  • equil
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    haha, cute! i think you could drop the spec on the glass and just use a cubemap instead. that way it'd possibly be cheaper since it's totally unlit, and you could add a lot more interest to the reflection.
  • Snader
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    Snader polycounter lvl 15
    animelordvijay - I think you're misguided, made a bunch of mistakes, and have a lot to work on. I'll explain via the palm tree.

    First of all, you state 201 polygons. After doing some calculations I came to a number of about 400 triangles. While your statement might be correct ,because a rectangle is a polygon too, (almost) every games studio will count in triangles. It's a bit confusing that people still call them polygons, but triangles is where it's at for game models. So next time: triangles, or tris for short, and not polygons.

    Secondly, you're not making very good use of resources. The tree trunk is okay, but those flat strips for the leaves are very ugly. You would be far, FAR better off with something shaped like a leaf. This model is only 356▲, and it has a much nicer shape:
    palmtree.png

    Third point: your textures are all over the place. The tree is very cartoony, with a generic woodgrain for the bark, and almost flat color for the leaves. The harbor shows photosourced texture and a try to make it look realistic. The train again uses super-cartoony textures again, with totally flat colors. The forklift shows very heavy use of filters and attempts to make it look damaged and worn. So there are a bunch of very different styles, and they conflict. This conflict also exists for the models, but it's most apparent in the textures.

    It looks as though you're just trying to get as many different models 'done' as quickly as possible - and that's not a good way to learn. Take your time to make every model the best you can, speed can be added later on. Quality over quantity.

    Take a good look at your models - are there any ones you're actually proud of? How about you pick what you think is your best model, and let's see how to make it better.
  • Gorman
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    The texture style mismatch is very bad, but I actually thought the palm trees were very interesting, and one of my favourite models.
    The water and rock were the most troublesome texture wise.

    If you used flat colours for everything it would probably improve quite a bit, but you need to consider your art direction a lot more!

    As for the video itself, show us some close ups of models, and some turntables of the better ones. You can't see much from that range, especially as to topology and such.
  • mcunha98
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    mcunha98 polycounter lvl 7
  • SanderDL
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    SanderDL polycounter lvl 7
    A Unity project that will hopefully give me a better chance at grabbing cool intership:

    screen1.jpg

    Play here!
  • paradise.engineering
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    paradise.engineering polycounter lvl 11
    awesome work SanderDL! had fun playing it, reminded me of an old bugs bunny and taz game
  • mcunha98
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    mcunha98 polycounter lvl 7
    Sander,

    The static animation needs improve, the walk cycle dont "close" correctly for the loop, but the enviroment and music are greate !
  • Delko
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    Delko polycounter lvl 15
    drivini.png
    More or less finished now.
    Im glad you guys like it, been putting a lot of work into this game recently, hope to have a basic demo out soon.

    @sketch81 I loved that thing the first time, its even better now. Maybe add a highlight to the top of he stomach to give it a little more depth.
    Crappy paintover: munster.png
  • achillesian
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    Looks like you're running with a very low spec Delko, which is cool, would you have room for shadow under the car by using a transparent texture on a plane? It could be really low rez, and extremely small file size if its just black and white, and I think it would add a lot. You could even fit it onto 1 triangle if you wanted.
  • willy-wilson
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    willy-wilson polycounter lvl 8
    pine tree looks much better but i would suggest some size variation for the ones in the background.
  • CactusFantastico
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    CactusFantastico polycounter lvl 12
    @delko love the old fashion style with ultrabright colours, cant wait for the demo!
  • ChristianB
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    ChristianB polycounter lvl 11
    A mini project being ran on my uni forums, heres my models so far for it:

    building.jpg

    Test1.jpg

    test2.jpg

    test3.jpg

    car.jpg

    Mas.jpg

    Pretty new to low-poly pixel painting
  • Sixton
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    @Delko: Nice! brings good memories. Keep working man.. Have you checked Kavinsky btw? Might have some similar feel --> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQSHg-SJXR8

    @sketch81: moar colour!? maybe this kind of "Baneling/Overlord" -style translucent skin could work?

    modgobster.jpg
  • Baddcog
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    Baddcog polycounter lvl 9
    Nice paintover Sixton, I was thinking about mentioning the need for blending in the purple better. The edges are just too sharp currently.
  • Delko
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    Delko polycounter lvl 15
    Thanks guys, I know its a bit sparse looking still but its not done yet.
    @achillesian
    Shadows are on the to-do list, we just barely got the map in game right now so little effects like that will come later.

    @willy Ill mess with the texture are see how it looks.
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