Nate, it all looks good, but why don't you use the same texture space in these areas?
If you used a 1024 map for this and didn't take full advantage of that space, you might get kicked back and asked to try again at a game company, especially since you could have done pretty close to that with a 512. Unless someone is going to get really close to that table, I doubt anyone would ever notice that certain areas have the same texture space used....but your art director probably will
Just a thought...especially on something like a small end table. This is about what it might look, also if you took that small circle and buried it underneath another one of those large circles. Your normal maps look like they wouldn't change much either.
Yea your right, Alot of it is sharing the same UV space, but I seperated a few of them for some variation, but looking at it now they all are incredibly similar. Ill go back and do your suggestions.
Anyways, I updated the couch, Im calling it done (again). I think I got the leather looking the way I wanted and I changed the wood to look less worn. Id still like to hear some critiques if you have em. Thanks!
Alright, I took your suggestions Ott and changed the unwrap.
I chose not to do the bronze inlay, it really dosnt fit well with the arts and crafts movement style In my opinion. However I did go back and gave the wood on the table the same treatment I gave to the couch (added more varnish to make the worn areas pop more) And of course the chess board and chess pieces are done.
Personally I think the outer rim of the table would look better if it wasn't divided up like sawn planks, kinda defeats the object of having something ornate there.
Well it hurt a little, but I went back and took out the planks. I spent far too much time trying to get them to look the way I wanted to.... oh well . Anyways, I also made the wood grain a little smaller to match with the couch better, I think before it was a little too big. I also tried to get the design to pop out more with the normal map. The whole thing got a little desaturated in the process though, so Im still going to go back and try to get some more of the color back in. Thanks for the help so far
Im still chisiling away at this room. Been working on this bookcase all day and am calling it quits for the night. I decided to go really low poly on this one, its 525 tris. Any critiques would be appreciated I plan to continue working on this more tommorow. Thanks!
The bookcase looks nice, but a common theme I'm seeing throughout a lot of your work is that the normal maps don't really do their job. Perhaps it's the way it's being rendered, but I really think you should be getting a lot more mileage out of your normal maps, if you use them at all. Just my two cents.
I hear what your saying Jgarland but what are your suggestions?
Ive made quite a bit of headway on the room. I did a quick and crappy lighting setup, but this render gives you a generally good idea of what the final render will look like. And I realize theres some texture issues on the fireplace that I need to fix. But aside from lousy lighting and unfinished textures, are there any critiques for the color scheme or composition? or anything else you see that should be changed?
also, anyone know of any good room lighting tutorials?
nice to see all this progress so much since i last saw it.
diffuse is really nice, i have a couple of small crits though.
the worn patches on the sofa dont look right, they look like a layer of plain colour over the top of the wood in PS
i think it would be nicer to use that layer to desaturate the wood colour in this area, this with a spec map that added some lowfocus shine to the wood (completely diffuse in these areas) would look ace.
also your spec maps dont seam to be doing much at all. i know its cool to keep things subtle but some more shine on the wood and leather in patches would be sweeet.
Yea that fireplace was way too rushed. I went back and reworked it. Heres the updated version. Tried the fix the seems and make it look more believable. Better? about the same? any other suggestions?
and heres the unlit scanline render of the room. Is that what you meant johny by a viewport grab?
and Ill definately go back and mess with the spec maps like you suggested Shep and see what I can do about those worn areas.
I think Johny meant, maximize your camera view and hit alt+print screen. Then you can hit file:new in PS and paste it in, then trim out all of the interface crap. It starting to get almost there, I agree with TGZ, though, those bricks are bugging me, better bricks and a normal map would help a ton.
The bricks seem screwy on the edge of the mantle, to large in comparasion to the others and you cant really see the edge of the brick, looks like its rounded. Also you can paint in some more detail, cracks and chips will make a diffrence.
I don't like the angle that they flow back at. It seems to me that it would have been A LOT more work to shave/cut them so that they all lie flat on the angled bit, rather than to just stagger them up in a stair step type pattern. . . Maybe people really do that, but I haven't seen it (admittedly, I'm in CA where there aren't a lot of fireplaces to begin with.)
Well to be honest that top part is not supposed to be brick its always some other material. Its plastered over then painted normally. The sides of the bottom make no sense to be curved in and to have a chamfered edge.
well heres the brick reference I was working from. Obviously I did a different style for the fireplace itself, but the brick pattern is relatively the same.
Looking at it now I see alot I couldve done differently...
I only have until sunday to finish this thing. So Im gonna finish texturing everything else in the room and then hopefully go back and completely rework this fireplace with all of your suggestions. Its becoming the bane of this room. Thanks for the continued feedback.
The tutorials written for max but if you just skip through and pick out the relative parts it could be useful.
I think this technique would be ideal for your fireplace, if you build it brick by brick you'll get that depth in your normal map which I think is missing from the one you've got at the moment.
edit: its kind of old so take some of it with a grain of salt
Nate id go with more of something that looks like that ref of yours. Look at how the brick is used, its all hard edges with vertical and horizontal elements. Note that it doesn't do any of the things you have your doing, because that not how brick works.
Think more about how the bricks form a shape not a shape with brick texture on it. Why not just build the base of that ref reference with all its hard edges(no chamfers!) Where its justs out just out the model, you did that detailing on the other parts of the room why be cheap on this? Then once you get the base done where it goes up just scale in the reference on the sides a bit and have it be strait up.
For the textures use texture reference look at how much better that brick looks in the reference you need that in the diffuse and for the normal map that easy, just make a layer and for every brick put a white square over it then drop black under that layer and combine those two layers and use the normal map filter to make the normal map from that, then copy the diffuse and turn that into a normal map and set it over the first normal map and set it to overlay and then tone down the opacity on that layer.
Once the diffuse is done in 30 min youl have the normal map done. Now get to it!
That's a major improvement, Nate. Your normal map seems to be doing it's job a lot better this time around. The bricks really pop. Your hard work definitely paid off, and this will be an excellent addition as the centerpiece of the room.
Just upped the saturation and color shifting the texture a bit to get the middle ground between what you posted and the reference. Other than that id call it done, youl see more things wrong with it later but its fine for now.
Finished! At least for now. I gotta thank everyone who stepped in and helped critique this thing. Im pretty happy with how it turned out. If any of you still have some thoughts or critiques though Id still like to hear them, Ill have some time to fix it over the next week. But this will be the final render I turn in. Thanks again!
I decided on my break to contribute a model to a Half Life 2 mod I like called Pirates Knights and Vikings 2. They asked me to make a full skeleton which is WAY out of my comfort zone. But I wanted to try it so heres where Im at. I was given a 2000 tri limit and could use 2 512's for textures.
Its 1994 tris.
Skull Textures
Im having trouble on the diffuse. I know it still looks more or less like a first pass but Im stumped on what to do next.
cool stuff! nice geometry! the ribcage needs to be a bit wider near the top and the lower legs need to be some longer IMO.. (i'd also twist the feet a bit outwards, so that he doesn't seem that uncomfortable with his pose)and about the diffuse, i would just start dirtying things up, adding creases and scratches and also some color variation.
Hey thanks Japhir, I made the minor tweeks you suggested for the rib cage,legs and pose. And Im going to make another pass at both the skull and the rest of the skeleton. Heres where Im at so far.
I'm kind of confused why you are doing a normal map, or at least what it is doing for your prop. You can't normal map roundness on an edge, as a normal map doesn't alter the silhouette's of the object.
The only thing I could thing of adding with a normal map against something normally smooth would be bone chips or scrapes, or maybe some more definition in his teeth if it were an upclose view.
The spine is a good idea though as well, but I would really go crazy and use a low poly / high poly version to do it, and make discs for each of the actual bone pieces. Right now the spine doesn't look right.
Another thing to remember is that your normal maps aren't going to look as good as they would unless you get some lights in there. Not sure what your light setup is, but it's something to keep in mind.
If this skeleton were sitting in a lab as a reference piece it would be pretty close...but if you wanna add character or make it a monster in a game - give it some tattered clothing pieces hanging off of it, give it some more dings and knicks. Take off some tris from the toes and give him a bracelet or a necklace or mossy hair.
If this were an old pirate skellie, or any kind of soldier, think about what he was in his former life and add some character that way. Right now it looks like an anatomy study and not really something you would see in a fighting game.
pelvis doesn't make sense; check out these references (i assume the skeleton is male): top view front view
notice how both sides curve forward and connect in front. haven't looked at the rest of the anatomy very closely but it looks pretty good; just that pelvis jumps out immediately as wrong. the room scene from earlier is really cool, by the way.
CRAP haha yea your right I gotta fix that, my reference decieved me, thanks for pointing it out.
And Ott, Im still trying to figure out what exactly normal maps are capable of. I thought that if I round off the corners in Zbrush, it might fake the roundness when you look at a corner straight on. I realize the sillouette wont change but wouldnt it help the sharp corners when you look at it straight on?
Also originally the mod guy asked me just to make a generic skeleton which is why he is so plain. I thought that the gold tooth might be going too far with what he wanted. But I think Ill ask him if I can add some details like you suggested. Mostly just to make it a cooler portfolio piece.
You can use normal maps to smooth corners and transitions. I am doing it right now on the stuff I am making. We are also only using 1 smoothing group on the low poly model. I have made a few high poly things items that when put on the low poly the corners still look chamfered and round and smooth.
Yes, the interior surface of the object can be altered to give it the illusion of smoothness and chamfers...but you can't alter the actual silhouette of the object. Take your normal mapped version and line it up with your base low poly version and the edges will be almost identical. There will be some "fakey" in some spots, depending on your light setup, but the overall silhouette is relatively unchangeable.
And when you only apply 1 smoothing group to an object, THAT is why the light is bending around the surface of it, not necessarily because of your normal map. Your game engine may or may not even retain 3dsMax's smoothing group information.
Make a 6 segmented sphere and normal map it all you want, but the outline will still be almost identical. The surface detail INSIDE the sphere will appear rounded, but you can't change the outside edges of it. (much)
And on that note, the edges that make up the interior can appear rounded, but it is pretty damn hard to make a 45 or 90 degree angle appear completely round. Not saying its impossible, but you will never be able to make a box look 100% like a cylinder.
Wanted to chime in on the skeleton Nate, you have way to many polys within the skull and the skeleton itself I'm sure that are just fighting your normal map. Alot of times, less is more when it comes to a normal map, as it helps fake the depth that you are trying for, such as in the nose cavity. Create a indentation of the cavity, but forgo creating the inner bridge, as the normal will fake that out better than what you are trying to create, while coming in at a lower tri count. You didn't post the wires, but I'm sure you have alot of that around your mesh that you could reduce, while helping the normal out. I hope this helps some.
Hey thanks for all the help so far, but Ill admit, Im still pretty confused. So was it decided that rounding off the corners for my normal map was useless? or useful? Or was it just the smoothing groups rounding it off?
And Spark I also dont understand what your suggesting about the nose cavity and bridge. Im posting a close up wireframe, hopefully it will help you see what Im doing better. And maybe help you give me a better idea of what your suggesting?
Sorry guys, this normal mapping stuff is difficult for me to grasp.
Edit: Yea and Jesse, I think the prop modelling class should be pretty good, dont know how much he's actually going to teach us, but its a good class just to get some portfolio pieces done. Its a morning class on Saturday, but Im cool with it, means no traffic for me.
Ok, thanks for the wires, you pretty much had the problem areas that I thought you were having. I did a quick overdraw on your mesh to show you were you could rework and use the polys to redistribute in other areas.
Basically you have to remember that alot of what you are doing can be done with an alpha, helping you achieve a lower polycount for your mesh. I have seen alot of people using a large amount of there poly budget on an area of the eyes lets say, then not have enough polys to finish out another area, leaving it a box for a foot. I hope this workover shows a little more of what I was saying, if not just let me know and I will try again.
Thanks alot for the paintover spark, way more clear. I went in and did everything you suggested (let me know if I missed something). Its now 1870 tris as opposed to 1994. And I added knee caps and more details to the hand.
Replies
If you used a 1024 map for this and didn't take full advantage of that space, you might get kicked back and asked to try again at a game company, especially since you could have done pretty close to that with a 512. Unless someone is going to get really close to that table, I doubt anyone would ever notice that certain areas have the same texture space used....but your art director probably will
Just a thought...especially on something like a small end table. This is about what it might look, also if you took that small circle and buried it underneath another one of those large circles. Your normal maps look like they wouldn't change much either.
Anyways, I updated the couch, Im calling it done (again). I think I got the leather looking the way I wanted and I changed the wood to look less worn. Id still like to hear some critiques if you have em. Thanks!
Diffuse
http://i38.photobucket.com/albums/e117/SkepticalNate/NewUnwrap.jpg
Spec
http://i38.photobucket.com/albums/e117/SkepticalNate/newspec.jpg
I chose not to do the bronze inlay, it really dosnt fit well with the arts and crafts movement style In my opinion. However I did go back and gave the wood on the table the same treatment I gave to the couch (added more varnish to make the worn areas pop more) And of course the chess board and chess pieces are done.
updated unwrap
Edit:
Alright made those minor color tweaks.
Keep up the good work, man. I'm looking forward to seeing more.
And yea I think at this point Im just gonna call the table done, I gotta move onward.
Heres a chair I just finished. 654 Tris, 1024 diffuse, normal and spec.
diffuse:
http://i38.photobucket.com/albums/e117/SkepticalNate/ChairUnwrap.jpg
Spec
http://i38.photobucket.com/albums/e117/SkepticalNate/ChairSpec.jpg
Normal
http://i38.photobucket.com/albums/e117/SkepticalNate/ChairNormal.jpg
looking forward to see how the room ends up to look like.
Im still chisiling away at this room. Been working on this bookcase all day and am calling it quits for the night. I decided to go really low poly on this one, its 525 tris. Any critiques would be appreciated I plan to continue working on this more tommorow. Thanks!
Diffuse:
http://i38.photobucket.com/albums/e117/SkepticalNate/BookCaseUnwrap.jpg
Normal:
http://i38.photobucket.com/albums/e117/SkepticalNate/BookCasenormal.jpg
Ive made quite a bit of headway on the room. I did a quick and crappy lighting setup, but this render gives you a generally good idea of what the final render will look like. And I realize theres some texture issues on the fireplace that I need to fix. But aside from lousy lighting and unfinished textures, are there any critiques for the color scheme or composition? or anything else you see that should be changed?
also, anyone know of any good room lighting tutorials?
Its shaping up very nice but the ugliest thing in the scene is the only thing people will notice.
diffuse is really nice, i have a couple of small crits though.
the worn patches on the sofa dont look right, they look like a layer of plain colour over the top of the wood in PS
i think it would be nicer to use that layer to desaturate the wood colour in this area, this with a spec map that added some lowfocus shine to the wood (completely diffuse in these areas) would look ace.
also your spec maps dont seam to be doing much at all. i know its cool to keep things subtle but some more shine on the wood and leather in patches would be sweeet.
carry on its cool
So far, the progress has been really good, keep it up
and heres the unlit scanline render of the room. Is that what you meant johny by a viewport grab?
and Ill definately go back and mess with the spec maps like you suggested Shep and see what I can do about those worn areas.
Thanks everyone!
http://www.mayang.com/textures/perl/preview.pl?image=brick_square_pattern_9261479.JPG
For the love of god give it a normal map!
Looking at it now I see alot I couldve done differently...
I only have until sunday to finish this thing. So Im gonna finish texturing everything else in the room and then hopefully go back and completely rework this fireplace with all of your suggestions. Its becoming the bane of this room.
The tutorials written for max but if you just skip through and pick out the relative parts it could be useful.
I think this technique would be ideal for your fireplace, if you build it brick by brick you'll get that depth in your normal map which I think is missing from the one you've got at the moment.
edit: its kind of old so take some of it with a grain of salt
Think more about how the bricks form a shape not a shape with brick texture on it. Why not just build the base of that ref reference with all its hard edges(no chamfers!) Where its justs out just out the model, you did that detailing on the other parts of the room why be cheap on this? Then once you get the base done where it goes up just scale in the reference on the sides a bit and have it be strait up.
For the textures use texture reference look at how much better that brick looks in the reference you need that in the diffuse and for the normal map that easy, just make a layer and for every brick put a white square over it then drop black under that layer and combine those two layers and use the normal map filter to make the normal map from that, then copy the diffuse and turn that into a normal map and set it over the first normal map and set it to overlay and then tone down the opacity on that layer.
Once the diffuse is done in 30 min youl have the normal map done. Now get to it!
haha I stayed up till 3:30 to get this thing done, I threw away the old one. so heres the updated one.
your critiques have been extremely helpful thegodzero. I followed just about everything you suggested. So thanks alot for taking the time.
Just upped the saturation and color shifting the texture a bit to get the middle ground between what you posted and the reference. Other than that id call it done, youl see more things wrong with it later but its fine for now.
moving onward!
Its 1994 tris.
Skull Textures
Im having trouble on the diffuse. I know it still looks more or less like a first pass but Im stumped on what to do next.
Help would be helpful.
Suggestions?
The only thing I could thing of adding with a normal map against something normally smooth would be bone chips or scrapes, or maybe some more definition in his teeth if it were an upclose view.
The spine is a good idea though as well, but I would really go crazy and use a low poly / high poly version to do it, and make discs for each of the actual bone pieces. Right now the spine doesn't look right.
Another thing to remember is that your normal maps aren't going to look as good as they would unless you get some lights in there. Not sure what your light setup is, but it's something to keep in mind.
If this skeleton were sitting in a lab as a reference piece it would be pretty close...but if you wanna add character or make it a monster in a game - give it some tattered clothing pieces hanging off of it, give it some more dings and knicks. Take off some tris from the toes and give him a bracelet or a necklace or mossy hair.
If this were an old pirate skellie, or any kind of soldier, think about what he was in his former life and add some character that way. Right now it looks like an anatomy study and not really something you would see in a fighting game.
top view
front view
notice how both sides curve forward and connect in front. haven't looked at the rest of the anatomy very closely but it looks pretty good; just that pelvis jumps out immediately as wrong. the room scene from earlier is really cool, by the way.
And Ott, Im still trying to figure out what exactly normal maps are capable of. I thought that if I round off the corners in Zbrush, it might fake the roundness when you look at a corner straight on. I realize the sillouette wont change but wouldnt it help the sharp corners when you look at it straight on?
Also originally the mod guy asked me just to make a generic skeleton which is why he is so plain. I thought that the gold tooth might be going too far with what he wanted. But I think Ill ask him if I can add some details like you suggested. Mostly just to make it a cooler portfolio piece.
So OTT SHUT UP you old bastard. haha
And when you only apply 1 smoothing group to an object, THAT is why the light is bending around the surface of it, not necessarily because of your normal map. Your game engine may or may not even retain 3dsMax's smoothing group information.
Make a 6 segmented sphere and normal map it all you want, but the outline will still be almost identical. The surface detail INSIDE the sphere will appear rounded, but you can't change the outside edges of it. (much)
And on that note, the edges that make up the interior can appear rounded, but it is pretty damn hard to make a 45 or 90 degree angle appear completely round. Not saying its impossible, but you will never be able to make a box look 100% like a cylinder.
Oh, and Moody, eat a piece of poo!
Spark
Hows that prop modeling class going? What days is it? I might drop by.
When you moving to Maine??
And Spark I also dont understand what your suggesting about the nose cavity and bridge. Im posting a close up wireframe, hopefully it will help you see what Im doing better. And maybe help you give me a better idea of what your suggesting?
Sorry guys, this normal mapping stuff is difficult for me to grasp.
Edit: Yea and Jesse, I think the prop modelling class should be pretty good, dont know how much he's actually going to teach us, but its a good class just to get some portfolio pieces done. Its a morning class on Saturday, but Im cool with it, means no traffic for me.
Basically you have to remember that alot of what you are doing can be done with an alpha, helping you achieve a lower polycount for your mesh. I have seen alot of people using a large amount of there poly budget on an area of the eyes lets say, then not have enough polys to finish out another area, leaving it a box for a foot. I hope this workover shows a little more of what I was saying, if not just let me know and I will try again.
Spark