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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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  • Seyhk
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    Seyhk polycounter lvl 11
    Wilson that's cute, pixelated stuff are awesome!

    SpaceSoldierSmaller.png
    Awkward the way this hose thing is right now, i might fix both the model/texture and the rig later.
  • Harry
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    Harry polycounter lvl 13
    more boring stuff for dat ass
    welp.png
  • hawken
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    hawken polycounter lvl 19
    Bit of a postmortem from my latest iOS app, some might find an interesting read:

    http://dadako.com/blog/whats-new-in-ibath-1-2

    Dig up the original thread on here for tech details.
  • Mr_Drayton
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    Mr_Drayton polycounter lvl 14
    hawken wrote: »
    Bit of a postmortem from my latest iOS app, some might find an interesting read:

    http://dadako.com/blog/whats-new-in-ibath-1-2

    Dig up the original thread on here for tech details.
    This night I took a read at the whole post, and I actually found it interesting. It's great you got so much feedback from parents who let their childeren use your App, sure iBath is perfect for them.
    But the most important thing to me is that the whole post makes me sure about this idea of mine: small game != small work. No matter how an App/game is simple, the work behind is never short.

    In the place where I live, nobody seems to understand this concept. I'm actually developing solo an iOS game about beach marbles, and since "beach marbles" is a simple game, they all think it's simple and fast to create, so they feel free to say that I'm failing at coding it because I'm slow. But honestly, I can't expect much more than this in my country.

    I would love to see what would they do in my shoes, really. They'd ragequit the first day, maybe. :shifty:
  • Ged
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    Ged interpolator
    hawken wrote: »
    Bit of a postmortem from my latest iOS app, some might find an interesting read:

    http://dadako.com/blog/whats-new-in-ibath-1-2

    Dig up the original thread on here for tech details.

    yeah interesting, we are now finding that in our latest mobile games we have extra geometry or shaders we turn on on the higher powered devices(4s, ipad2) to make it look more awesome. Always a little sad when the lower end devices dont look quite as cool but hey thats the hardware I guess.
  • Leisure Centaur
    Yo, been a while but I'm currently working on another simple character.

    This is my D&D character, Fizzgig the half-elf druid, hello ladies etc.

    He's currently 612 tris, 256x256 texure.

    Couple questions. I'm finding it quite hard to make an asymmetrical character. A main part of my workflow recently has involved creating half a model and then mirroring geometry. In terms of the UV process do I literally just unwrap a full model rather than half, and get down to work?

    Also any feedback regarding the texture would be ace, I find I sometimes fall between the line of cel style shading and pixelart shading and end up with an inconsistent look.

    Cheers :)

    fizztest9.png
  • Baddcog
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    Baddcog polycounter lvl 9
    Looks cool leisure.

    You can just uv half, mirror it. Then select the polys you don't want mirrored, and mirror their uv's, move them elsewhere for painting. It's easier to only uv half and just flip the uvs then it is to uv the entire mesh.

    I think maybe you need to look at pixel density. Add a checkerboard pattern to your model and try to adjust the uv's so all the checkers are the same size.
    The pixels on his buttons are really small, yet the ones in his eyes are really large.
  • stabbington
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    stabbington polycounter lvl 10
    Hello! I am new.

    Still pretty green with low-poly stuff but I'm modelling characters for a Unity/iOS game. Here's the first couple I've finished;

    Dunk.jpg
    Dunk - one of the main characters - ~ 1160 tris, 512 texture

    PookerNook.jpg
    Pookernook - first of the enemies ~ 306 tris, 256 texture

    I have about 1-2 days to pump out each one from start to finish, so I feel like I'm at least learning a lot each time I get one done... got a ton of these to get through

    Anyways, good to be here!
  • Tigerfeet
    Stabbington - I love the style on those! The only thing that seems weird to me are the wings ont he Pookernook. In the side view they're completely flat. Are they rigged in such a way that their profile can be curved, or do they remain flat even when animation? I think it would be a shame to leave them flat :)
  • SamuraiDan
    Hi guys, here's a model of a engineering guy in a space suit (without a helmet cause he's in his engineering bay) :)

    8dCnt.png
    1000 tris

    sqpk8.png
    1 256x256 diffuse

    Modeled & Textured in Silo3d
  • Mr Smo
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    Mr Smo polycounter lvl 18
    looking pretty sweet harry.
  • bbob
    Harry wrote: »
    more boring stuff for dat ass
    welp.png


    RE7?
  • Grimm_Wrecking
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    Grimm_Wrecking polycounter lvl 8
    vector_kriss.png

    Played around with pixel art. Fun.
  • Leisure Centaur
    Baddcog wrote: »
    Looks cool leisure.

    You can just uv half, mirror it. Then select the polys you don't want mirrored, and mirror their uv's, move them elsewhere for painting. It's easier to only uv half and just flip the uvs then it is to uv the entire mesh.

    I think maybe you need to look at pixel density. Add a checkerboard pattern to your model and try to adjust the uv's so all the checkers are the same size.
    The pixels on his buttons are really small, yet the ones in his eyes are really large.

    Thanks very much dude, that is some super useful feedback!

    Think I'll have to do some playing around to nail the asymettrical stuff, all feels very abstract.

    Going to force myself to rig and animate this guy a bit before I do anymore models, been putting it off again and again. I've seen some people on here (most likely pro 3D artists I expect) mention they've modelled, textured, rigged and sometimes animated a character in a few hours. Is there a quick process or walkthrough anyone can link me to for basic rigging and animating in Maya, I mean basic!
  • lean
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    lean polycounter lvl 5
    Leisure Centaur: I love what you did!! really awsome. About the texture style, I really like it, though I know what you mean with the mix of pixelart and celshading. If you want to make it just celshaded, bigger texture size would do it.

    I agree with baddcogand if you want to do pixelart kind of textures, the pixel density should be pretty much the same over the whole model. Take into account that it's also a common practice when you're not going for a pixelly look, to give more texture space to bigger and most important parts of the model, specially the face.

    About doing it all in a few hours: the minimum it takes to me (from zero) is about eight or ten hours. But sometimes people make basic template models and then add all the details to make different characters in one style to get a greater performance.
    don't know about rigging in maya, but for animation, 2d animation books like preston blair's are a great reference.
  • Baddcog
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    Baddcog polycounter lvl 9
    @Leisure, No prob. Here's the best shot I have of an assym thing I did, maybe it'll help you visualize better.

    tank_04-1.jpg
    You can see his whole body is mirrored, except the wound on one side of his chest. I just grabbed that tri in the UV tool and dragged it to the side. Then in photoshop I did the same with the texture, then painted the wound on top.

    I suppose a very good artist could knock out a simple character in a few hours. Personally I can knock out a decent mesh in an hour or two (low poly) and maybe even uv it. But texturing something simple takes me at least several more hours. Simple rig and anim maybe a few more.
  • dirty bassett
    Doing some work on a low poly Zoey from left for dead.roeylowpoly.png
  • linz1010
    I've been working on an environment from my current favorite show:
    http://tinypic.com/r/2mcw2o9/5

    http://tinypic.com/r/f1fig6/5
    http://tinypic.com/r/729j75/5

    My goal for this environment was to make it usable for a nintendo 3ds game, though I am unsure of the poly/ tri limits of environment assets within the system. This particular environment is already 2,340 tris and I was hoping someone could suggest ways of cutting that down (if I even need to). I think the mushrooms are taking up a lot more polys than need be, but let me know what you guys think.
  • Helba
    Finally finally a bit of Steel!
    Sword_03.jpg
  • Tigerfeet
    Thanks very much dude, that is some super useful feedback!

    Think I'll have to do some playing around to nail the asymettrical stuff, all feels very abstract.

    Going to force myself to rig and animate this guy a bit before I do anymore models, been putting it off again and again. I've seen some people on here (most likely pro 3D artists I expect) mention they've modelled, textured, rigged and sometimes animated a character in a few hours. Is there a quick process or walkthrough anyone can link me to for basic rigging and animating in Maya, I mean basic!
    Hey! I've been using these tutorials for building a biped rig in Maya: http://www.swinburne.edu.au/design/tutorials/P-maya/T-Maya-Rigging-Rigging-a-biped-character-for-animation/ID-125/

    They're SUPER helpful, and are very similar to a process I learned in college on 3D Studio Max.

    I've been working on this all weekend and in the evenings. It's taken me a LONG time to build my rig, however through the whole thing I was taking notes. I remember taking half a day to rig up the leg for the first time (and take notes) then when I went to go do the opposite side it took all of five minutes. The biggest thing for speed is just practice and repetition. Do something, then do it again, you'll be amazed how much quicker you are just the second time around.

    For ANIMATION: I bought this book [ame="http://www.amazon.com/How-Cheat-Maya-2012-Techniques/dp/0240816986"]Amazon.com: How to Cheat in Maya 2012: Tools and Techniques for Character Animation (9780240816982): Eric Luhta, Kenny Roy: Books[/ame] and I love love love it. It was a huge help in getting me up and running learning how to use the interface, etc.
  • stabbington
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    stabbington polycounter lvl 10
    Tigerfeet wrote: »
    Stabbington - I love the style on those! The only thing that seems weird to me are the wings ont he Pookernook. In the side view they're completely flat. Are they rigged in such a way that their profile can be curved, or do they remain flat even when animation? I think it would be a shame to leave them flat :)

    Cheers for the comments, Tigerfeet!

    We were kind of restrained by an incredibly low bone count (8 per small enemy, or something) so we made the potentially ass decision to sacrifice being able to bend them in favour of articulation elsewhere. 'Tis a shame, though. It's one of those things where I learned after the fact that I probably should have tried to model a bit of curve into it instead...
  • Baddcog
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    Baddcog polycounter lvl 9
    stabbington, if it's not rigged bending the wings would be easy.
    Even if it is you should be able to turn off the bones and do a quick bend. Or even a quick re-rig.
  • osman
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    osman polycounter lvl 18
    New vid showing the editor and some new tiles and shaders :)
    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hf5FU6KitZU"]RM Mapping Speed - YouTube[/ame]
  • Tigerfeet
    I'm still poking about on this between Planitia projects. I think now I'm just down to messing about with color schemes. I'm really liking this one.

    BikeandGirl_Front.jpg
  • Snader
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    Snader polycounter lvl 15
    You can make the wheel a flat plane, because you have an alpha map on it anyway.
  • Tigerfeet
    Snader wrote: »
    You can make the wheel a flat plane, because you have an alpha map on it anyway.

    :poly115: how did I NOT think of that!? Thank you!
  • brandoom
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    brandoom polycounter lvl 13
    osman wrote: »
    New vid showing the editor and some new tiles and shaders :)

    Looks awesome. You made this editor yourself?
  • osman
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    osman polycounter lvl 18
    brandoom wrote: »
    Looks awesome. You made this editor yourself?

    Thanks, yes together with a friend :)
  • sahil
  • Helba
    Parry, Dodge, Miss and pain animations!

    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-Q0qUXbJqM"]Blackreef Pirates #50: Parry, dodge and pain animations - YouTube[/ame]
  • linz1010
    I realized that I forgot to add images of my wireframes! So here they are!
    marcelines_house_wire1.jpg
    marcelines_house_wire2-1.jpg
    and my ref:
    Marcelines_House.jpg
  • linz1010
    Hboybowen wrote: »
    that's a cool ref. Is it from Adventure Time,because it seems like that art style. Hope to see this to the end if that is the goal

    Yeah, it's marceline's house from Adventure time.
  • Mr_Drayton
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    Mr_Drayton polycounter lvl 14
    And another scenery of my iOS project is finally done! It's not much polished (stock images *coff coff*), but my deadline is near and I don't have other time to work more on the graphics. I'm still enough satisfied with the final result. Now it's time to get back on the code, there are many things to be done before the final release. I'm keeping a development blog of this game, if you're just curious.

    Here's a bunch of screens:

    SCN03_1.PNG

    SCN03_2.PNG

    SCN03_3.PNG
  • Harry
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    Harry polycounter lvl 13
    bbob wrote: »
    RE7?

    Naw, it's a B.E.2. Close though. The RE8 was basically the same airframe with a new engine and fixed gunner/pilot positions, among some other little changes.

    The b.e.2 is complete crap. Gunner sits in front, under the wing, with no synchroniser. So his fire is limited by the prop in front, the wing above, the pilot to the rear, the plane itself below, and the interwing struts on the left and right. He can basically only fire on a limited upward angle out the back. Needless to say, hundreds and hundreds of these things were destroyed in flight by albatros and such.
  • hawken
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    hawken polycounter lvl 19
    Mr_Drayton wrote: »
    And another scenery of my iOS project is finally done! It's not much polished (stock images *coff coff*), but my deadline is near and I don't have other time to work more on the graphics. I'm still enough satisfied with the final result. Now it's time to get back on the code, there are many things to be done before the final release. I'm keeping a development blog of this game, if you're just curious.

    Looking good Mr! Keep on it, don't give in :)
  • Spizami
    Hey everyone. I'm new to Polycount, though I've been lurking for a while. I'm a complete beginner when it comes to 3D modelling but I'm excited to learn and grow. I have a project to model a character in less than 600 tris and this is my first attempt.
    I would love some feedback or advice!

    SpiritOrthographic.png
    Here is my Concept and Orthographic
    SpiritModel.png
    And this is what I have so far.

    (It's been a while since I've posted images on a forum, I hope it works!)
  • Snader
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    Snader polycounter lvl 15
    Right now she looks really boxy, try to work a bit more with triangulated shapes. Look into a geosphere-esque shape for the head. I can also suggest rotating the legs 45 degrees so (topdown) they look like <> <> instead of [] [], this will reduce blockiness a lot.

    I think you need to cut three or so loops from the legs. Personally I'd also add 1 extra side to the upper leg, because it's thicker than the rest of the limb.
  • Spizami
    I can't seem to get her looking not boxy without going over the tri limit, which is fustrating. The leg position has helped however. Thanks for the reply. I'll keep trying.
  • lipebello
    Spizami - you could try to make her legs with a 6 side cylinder and her arms with 5 sided cylinder. Or booth 6 sided.
  • Veko
    osman wrote: »
    New vid showing the editor and some new tiles and shaders :)
    RM Mapping Speed - YouTube

    looking very awsome
  • lean
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    lean polycounter lvl 5
    Spizami - It would be nice, and it would probably help you to see the whole mirrored model in order to check that everything is well proportioned. Right now I think that the legs and specially the lower legs are too fat when compared with the reference you provided. also, they are too wide when seen from the side. I would give her a little thinner ankle. I would make the arms thinner too. I can't really tell as it's not mirrored, but i'm kinda guessing that her torso is a bit wide.

    Now these are some minor details: the nose could be pointing a bit more upwards and maybe putting an extra quad or tri to the chin would make it a little less pointy. finally, the shoulder is pointing too low. Also the neck could be longer (pushing the clavicle down, would fix it).

    I think the design is pretty nice, and your model is looking cool. just check if those suggestions make sense.
  • Delko
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    Delko polycounter lvl 15
    handn.png
    Made a hand after watching a youtube tutorial. 720 tris
    Looks pretty good I think, Ive never tried making a hand before. The topology wont work for animation so its kinda useless.
  • osman
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    osman polycounter lvl 18
    rmbot.png
    Replaced my character model with a proper one. Got tired with the blockout one.
  • krisCrash
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    krisCrash polycounter lvl 9
    Spizami; cool design, but yeah, keep experimenting with that mesh. You're losing her dynamic. Think more about form, and less about if it's possible to animate - that is my advice. Break the rules you know from quad modelling.

    Gosh that is cute, osman.

    It kind of does, Delko. Not every bone needs to have anything assigned (or something assigned at both ends). But you probably actually already knew that :B
    fingerrig.png

    Assign the tip of the finger+joint verts to the outermost finger bone (distal phalanx idunno), assign the innermost finger section+joint to the innermost bone. Don't assign the middle part of the finger to the middle bone (well ok, you have one ring there you need to assign, but if it was simpler)... the middle section is now the deformation zone between the other two, and there is no blending - it animates alright.
    It's probably common knowledge, but it was a bit of a revelation to me, honestly.
  • green
    quick brainfart.
    treasurechest.png

    Keep up the awesomeness guys.
  • Chai
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    Chai polycounter lvl 17
    Delko have a look here - http://wiki.polycount.com/LimbTopology?highlight=%28%5CbCategoryTopology%5Cb%29
    krisCrash wrote: »
    It kind of does, Delko. Not every bone needs to have anything assigned (or something assigned at both ends). But you probably actually already knew that :B

    Assign the tip of the finger+joint verts to the outermost finger bone (distal phalanx idunno), assign the innermost finger section+joint to the innermost bone. Don't assign the middle part of the finger to the middle bone (well ok, you have one ring there you need to assign, but if it was simpler)... the middle section is now the deformation zone between the other two, and there is no blending - it animates alright.
    It's probably common knowledge, but it was a bit of a revelation to me, honestly.

    no man that's totally off ...

    crit_krisCrash.jpg
  • GabrielP
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    GabrielP polycounter lvl 7
    a little something Ive been working on

    DemonCatStagetwo.png
  • hawken
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    hawken polycounter lvl 19
    iBath 1.2 yay!

    http://itunes.apple.com/app/ibath/id486196001?mt=8

    now heaps faster and new camera views:

    mzl.paolfdod.320x480-75.jpg
  • Spizami
    I'm back. I think I've improved the body a bit. Ignore the head, I'm still working on that one!
    Thanks for all the advice, I'm still applying some of it to the model. I have a ways to go yet but I've got time!
    (I've got work in an hour and all I wanna do is work on my model! >_<)

    SpiritModel2.png
  • GabrielP
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    GabrielP polycounter lvl 7
    Alright so now he is finished, animated and shipped out, would love to hear thoughts on him though!
    DemonCatFinal-1.png
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