Character : Face Hugger
I got a suggestion on another forum to work on some different stuff outside my usual box (and someone from someone else's concept) so I decided to make a face hugger. Even though i haven't had time to work on my main project, I have had some side time during lunch at work to work on this. It's currently untextured, just the Normal Map. I'm trying to tie up some projects before I jump head long into DWIII.
Comments critiques etc. as always appreciated.
Comments critiques etc. as always appreciated.
Replies
Your normal map also seems a bit faint in some areas. Nothing a little crazybumping cant fix. I'd suggest making it a bit deeper, so you dont lose a lot of the detail once it's textured. That was one issue with older games when normal mapping was pretty new. For example, half life 2 didn't render normal maps very well, and they weren't too deep to begin with, so a lot of times they just got crushed by the textures.
Nice start though
Cant think of anything else to really say apart from Slum's comments. Looks nice man.. any chance of spec map in the final thing?
lots of wasted polys. If a poly does not add to the form or to animation its pointless. I would aim for 1200 or less with out loosing anything in its outline.
@ ImSlightlyBored - blast my fingers and their sloppy typing. I think a spec map would be very appropriate for the final thing, esp considering how slimy these things are supposed to be.
@ Thegodzero - Yeah pretty much no poly cleanup done on this yet. I know I have some fairly pointless and minute details in there right now for geometry. I'm definitely at least going to try to cut the poly count in half. 1200 sounds like quite a challenge, but I'll give it a shot. Thanks for the paintover.
the tail needs more segmented love.. looks pretty low poly when it's bent compared to the legs etc.
@ Electro - thanks, yeah there have been a lot of changes, see below.
Updates : Here is the updated, poly-optimized model with the tail fixed, a new unwrap, and normal map updated. Still untextured, let me know what you think.
The take a look at the finger tips for optimization, the bottom of the other joints only need one square at the base, and the first joints coming off the body. Lastly maybe some from the under side.
Remember 1500 is not a hard number if you start killing the silhouette in the name of a poly budget its not worth it.
And a note on the texture. I think the detailing you've put on the texture is great. No complaints there at all. However, I do think you would benefit from some more color variation, especially on the underside of the face hugger. The underside of the face hugger is supposed to have a lot more pinks and marroons in it. I believe they used fish organs, kidney skins, and a few oyesters for that area in the original Alien film. So I'm thinking a little more variety in the coloring would punch it up a notch.
@ Richard Kain - The fingers actually got worse when I did the last optimization, I'll figure that out tonight. As for the texture, It definitely needs more color variation, but there isn't any...because there isn't a texture yet. The normal map is carrying the whole thing. Once I have the model geometry nailed down, I'll hit the diffuse and spec map to finish this thing. Those are good ideas for things to look at for color inspiration, I'll definitely do that.
@ Shepeiro - Good point, will definitely hit that.
Updates later tonight! I want to get this hammered out so I can really start on my DWIII entry.
@ Soul - Wouldn't bringing the fingers down to 3 sided jack the mapping for the normal pretty badly? It might not be too bad if I re-render it...
@ Shepeiro - It's supposed to be flexible, however I must admit I've been barely moving it when I do pose it. Could definitely cut some of that out.
On to the updates!
Second to last update, I hate being behind on my personal stuff, I've has some other projects I had to work on first. This is getting pretty close though, here are the updates.
Every hand painted attempt at the texture was failing, so I ultimately decided to render out a lightmap from max, use that as a base, then just change the color. This way it looks pretty good without the normal at all, with the normal just adding to it. Seems to work out pretty well. I'm going to do one or two more tweak passes on this from the feedback i get then call this one done so i can move on.
But your textures are very strange. There is much too much ambient in you diffuse, there are allready black shadows in it! You allready defined the lightsource with that and a the dynamic lightning and the normal makes not much sense anymore! Same with the specular, There is almost only black and white. Dont know why the specular isnt showing up in the screens though, didnt you put it in?
When you change the diffues, make the ambient much lower and change the shadeing to a brown color. Also make more slightly hue changes in the texture.
i agree with vertexguy's comments about color variation. the diffuse could use more surface complexity in that regard, and also could use a better feeling of density. i think you would be better off using a gloss map to tighten your spec map instead of trying to fake hilites.
@ Davision3D - toned down the baked in shadows and still playing with the spec, thanks for the comments.
@ vertexguy - Thanks for the color suggestions, they were really helpful. I still need to address the normal map a bit, that will probably be the last thing I do.
@ Conte and Gauss - I get that response a lot, especially from people not familiar with the Alien universe.
@ vividly_pathetic - thanks for the comments.
@ demoncage - could you elaborate on 'density' for the surface complexity? I'm not sure I get exactly what you mean, thanks for the help!
UPDATES:
Made some major map adjustments. My spec still isn't quite done, but getting close. Also, no more max screens/renders. Here is the model in Unreal3. The background assets are from the packages that ship with UT3, just showing off the facehugger model.
And I agree with Ged, if you combine your first and last spec maps it'll look much better!
Great work, especially on the details of the high poly mesh.
Looks good.
what i meant by density was just that i think the surface could use a finer surface, in the form of slight noise in addition to what you have so far. but definitely more color variation would look cool:
To Sean: I never really understood why people use color in their specs. It always seemed that the color of the light source mixes with the surface color in about the same way as I've observed in reality.
The normals and diffuse are a little harsh for this to be an organic slimy object. The diffuse map especially looks like paper rather than some sort of flesh, try softening the shading your diffuse and have it shift hues more instead of darkening the map in the wrinkles.
There are also some very visible seams on the bottom of the side "flaps".
Giving it a better specular map like the other's mentioned will help as well, also increase the specular power value to make the highlight tighter, it'll help the illusion that it's this slimy organic object.
@ Sean McBride - I'm used to seeing the old school greyscale spec maps I think, I'll definitely try adding color to the spec on my next project, fiddling with it now might be dangerous -_-^
@ demoncage - ah, I get you now, sorry for the misunderstanding. I added in a little bit of freckles and such to it, but it's pretty subtle (unreal really washes out that kinda stuff) and if I come back and spend some more time on this, I'll definitely paint in some little details to break up that skin a bit.
@ tinman - Thanks for the suggestions, I had been putting off fixing those seams, I addressed it this evening, although even with a consistent value along those seams, it still shows up at the wrong angle. I think the problem is in the unwrap it's self (where I choose to make the seam), next time I'll use the leading edge. The new spec map helps a lot with the tighter highlights (along with some adjusted setting in my material editor in unreal)
UPDATES
Ok, so I've decided this will be the last round of updates to this for now. I'll definitely come back and revisit this once I've gotten a few more things finished, I want to make an egg pedestal for it and implement a few more of the suggestions give here and elsewhere. I've been working on this for awhile and I need to move on if I ever want to get that portfolio together so I can get an art job (I can't do QA forever -_-^). So here are the last round of updates for now. I still would love feedback, as I will return to this in awhile. Thanks for everyone's feedback and support up to this point, I really appreciate it and have learned a lot!
And for those who might be curious, my next project will be to complete my Dream Painter model's textures. She's almost done too!
I think the key here is nailing that translucency, and maybe just carying the colour in the spec amp, if that'd work.
I think transmission would be very cool for this, you can make that quite easily in the UT3 Material System. Define with a black and white Transmission mask where the light can scatter through and put a red textur in the transmission slot. Make the Transmission where the model is thin and where bones cant stop the light from shining through.
Yeah the greenish is too much!
I think transmission would be very cool for this, you can make that quite easily in the UT3 Material System. Define with a black and white Transmission mask where the light can scatter through and put a red textur in the transmission slot. Make the Transmission where the model is thin and where bones cant stop the light from shining through.
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QTF- do it