Texture Creation: an age before Color.
polycounter lvl 17
I have been told time and time again that my textures look too muddy. This is just when people are looking at the Diffuse texture, never accepting that the Specular texture next to it will embolden it's effect.
Is it wise/common for artist to place/paint a certain amount of light and specularity into a texture from the start (as if the asset were last gen and not having the benefit of a specular map)?
All this comes from my watching of the 1950 film 'Julius Caesar', with Marlon Brando. It is a black and white film, and while I played with the contrast some in my media player, I am noticing a wide array of tone and brightness as one would.
Therefore. In considering a texture and its brightness/specularity, do some artists make their maps in greyscale first; so as to clearly see where the texture is muddy, Adding color on another layer?
What advise do you have for those who are constantly being told that their textures are muddy or lacking specularity? Additionally, isn't this what the spec maps is -for-?
Thank you for your help in advance, I eager to hear you thoughts and professional opinions.
-Andrew
Is it wise/common for artist to place/paint a certain amount of light and specularity into a texture from the start (as if the asset were last gen and not having the benefit of a specular map)?
All this comes from my watching of the 1950 film 'Julius Caesar', with Marlon Brando. It is a black and white film, and while I played with the contrast some in my media player, I am noticing a wide array of tone and brightness as one would.
Therefore. In considering a texture and its brightness/specularity, do some artists make their maps in greyscale first; so as to clearly see where the texture is muddy, Adding color on another layer?
What advise do you have for those who are constantly being told that their textures are muddy or lacking specularity? Additionally, isn't this what the spec maps is -for-?
Thank you for your help in advance, I eager to hear you thoughts and professional opinions.
-Andrew
Replies
People today really like to add dirtMaps (cavity, AO,...) and to some extend one could say depending on your mix and blend modes that it´s also about tuning a little bit of light (aside from the shadows and dirt) into your texture. Just to get a little xtra boost in your final image/ shot.
Perhaps people told you so because you rather use earth or greyish tones ,- maybe post an example.
These are not examples of my current work, as I have learned more about texture creation and UV space management. However, these are some of the examples I was told that the texture is "muddy". Given the combative nature of the game, we did not choose bright or interesting colors and we wanted to make it someone like camo.
Looking at these two years later makes me sad. Luckily I can say I have improved in some ways.
http://www.andrewchason.com/andrew/pics/3D/A_Heavy_FIN.jpg
http://www.andrewchason.com/andrew/pics/3D/A_Textures.jpg
http://www.andrewchason.com/andrew/pics/3D/D_Heavy_FIN.jpg
http://www.andrewchason.com/andrew/pics/3D/D_Textures.jpg
http://www.andrewchason.com/andrew/pics/3D/Pump_FIN.jpg
http://www.andrewchason.com/andrew/pics/3D/Pump_Textures.jpg
http://www.andrewchason.com/andrew/pics/3D/A_Rifle_FIN.jpg
http://www.andrewchason.com/andrew/pics/3D/Rifle_Textures.jpg
My main question is, how many people make their textures in grey scale and then add color so they can be certain of the inherent brightness/specularity of a thing. Or, I suppose another way would be to have a Hue/Saturation Layer Filter at the top of your stack, with the Saturation turned down, and to turn this 'on' when you want to see everything for its luminosity.
The diffuse map can be muddy, thats all fine and good. A decent diffuse should be a little bit color, a little bit source(fine detail, etc) and some good ambient occlusion. You dont need or want a lot of lighting painted directly in.
The spec map is where you really define the material in most cases, unless its an object that has little specularity(concrete for example, you want to do most of the work for that type of material in the diffuse and normals). For things like metal, this is where a lot of the detail needs to come through, fine details, scratches, scuffs, surface variation all of these things go great in a spec map. Right now your spec maps are pretty blurry and detailess and thats a much bigger problem than having a muddy-diffuse.
Oh, and to answer the question about grayscale or whatever:
I dont personally paint in greyscale, i think a lot of people used to do that long ago but its sort of died out. I'm constantly tweaking value/hue/contrast/etc for specific areas of my textures, its alot of back and forth and really trying to keep lumonisty or whatever consistant on your texture isn't really what you want to look out for. You want to make sure your levels are correct ingame with the diffuse/spec applied, so i do a lot of back and forth tweaking the levels on my diffuse as i'm nailing down how shiney a material should be for example, because i dont want a really bright diffuse and bright spec a lot of the time, its good to have that contrast from dark diffuse and bright specular in a metal material or whatever.
Its late and i may be ranting a bit, so sorry for that. But hope this helps.
Don't take this as me dissing you, because all i'm doing is hoping to motivate you to push yourself.
The Model: the model can use a lot of love, its very bland and boring. there is zero edge flow, and i don't even wanna know whats going on there on the side of his head, look thru the forums and look at how the more skilled modelers aproach edge flow . The whole guy looks marshmellowy and puffy. research anatomy and armor types and come up with a great design. keep working on this in about 50 models down the road you could have some pretty sweet stuff
UVW: his head, which is tiny on the model takes up more uvw space than his torso. this is sometimes common when working with smaller texture sizes to allow details to focal points. but on this guy theres plenty of room for most things to be unwrapped relative to the size they are on the model (some exceptions, you can make the bottom of the feet smaller and such)
Difuse: this difuse is nothing but black lines and splotchy brush grunge. sometimes a blandly colored diffuse can look good with a good normal and spec (you have neither) but i would advise you spend sometime and practice on your painting as well as modeling. check out the link at the bottom of my post, of rawks dom war 1 entry. and look at the detail in that diffuse.
Normal: this is the worse offender. anytime i see someon just take and run a diffuse thru a photoshop filter i just want to take their computer and shove it down their throat and then roll them up in an old urine stained rug, set it on fire and throw of a bridge.. into a wood chipper. if you really want to be a viable artist in the industry now days you either need to learn to do your high poly models to generate your normal maps, of focus on hand held / cell phone games where you don't need to mess with normals. this is horrible.. just LOOK AT IT
FREAKIN LOOK
problems.. the photoshop tool does not know what is depth on your model.. it looks at dark and makes that depth and light and makes that heights.. now your eyes, which are sunk in on your model, are lighter on your texture, which makes the normal map makes them bulge out. the painted letering on the shoulder should be smooth, but the normal don't know this, so poof its now puffy craft paint letters. chest logo poof also puffy paint. (look at rawxs textures posted bellow, look at the dif between his normals and yours. they define real shapes, this is the benifiet you get from modeling your details. then baking)
Specular: i won't say much about this cause i'm getting bored of typing. don't just greyscale your diffuse, think about the surfaces and why what is shiney, don't be afraid to put some color in your spec also.
http://www.gameartisans.org/dominancewar/1/interviews/rawkstar_5.htm
Your fervor is not unfounded. Looking back at that work, which was done a few years ago, I too want to punch myself the the balls and turn my skull inside out (and whatever other manner of bad things you had said). Nowadays I tend to use Crazybump more, and no I am not missing the point, for those things it -does- to better than the Photoshop Filter; though I -do- understand that high poly asset comparison is a must.
I think people, myself included, need to realize it is -ok- if it takes you 30-50 hours to create an asset. It is better that you spend more time on it and make it look like 'teh sex' than make it in two, and stand there smiling like a jack-ass holding his own feces.
Watching that 1950's 'Julius Caesar' I saw a lot of neat columns, and statures, and potter that was inspirational in creating a scene, but moreover since it was in black and white I feel, personally, that helped me focus on the texture and material better. Filmed more than 50 years ago, you could still tell what each material was made from based on its specularity.