Toehead
interpolator
hey all.. haven't posted in a while.. but i whipped up this one this week after work. this is still a work in progress, but i have a idea of what i eventually want.. give him some clothing and weapons.. and i'm really trying to nail my depth maps.. map sizes are 512's.. just got crazybump and i think it's going pretty well.. let me know what ya think.. thanks
miles
miles
Replies
CB is a powerful program, but do not rely on it to do the texturing for you.
It's not good practice to simply grayscale a diffuse and feed it into CB. You'll need an actual height map so that CB can generate an accurate normal map based on that bump data. Though, looking at your diffuse, it wouldn't take much to turn the diffuse into a workable height map since alot of the depressed areas are dark(er) anyway.
You also generated your AO and Displacement maps in CB. Did you also generate the Spec maps in CB? Did you overlay (Multiply) the AO over your Diffuse?
Once again, it looks like CB did the bulk of the texture work for you.
oh yeah yes.. actaully.. when i finished unwrapping my model, i baked out an AO map to put in the diffuse so i could see the shadows better.. but then in CB, i actually created another AO map w/ the surface detail of the diffuse, and plugged it into the self illumination channel of my maps tree... i actaully really like the effect from it.. i think it really solidified the surface, but i have it cranked down to 75% so that some light info still reads on the surface.. tried to make it a subtle balance
it's a trial and error thing at this point.. could you tell me a little about a good process and practice to making my maps? i took a look at your portfollio and you really look like you know what you're talking about.. thanks for the crits
@pixelpusher: haha yeah man i definitely wanted to strike a little fear into people when they saw this.. cute and creepy.
miles
When dealing with characters you can't in most cases get away without having a high poly to bake normals from. You should only use CB's normal map as an overlay for small surface details and get your main normal map and your AO map from high poly model.
you've lost some of the thick/thin proportions on the legs from the original concept. it just looks like a stump now.
i think what it needs is less complexity and more perfection put into whats there. here's my input
you're using too many maps. don't teach youreslf everything at once. i get the feeling that you're adding more components with hope that as you do so, the quality level will be raised. unfortunately, this isn't the case. try using just diffuse, normal and specular maps. in fact, for a start, just work with diffuse and normal. your normal map looks like it was generated in photoshop, and you're trying to compensate for it's flatness by painting lighting into the diffuse map. painting lighting into the diffuse map is cool, and you can get some great styles from it but this is not one of those cases i think. do you have a high poly model? try using zbrush and push some of the forms a little bit more. your normal map could be more punchy, in short.
your diffuse map is ratha flat and the texture you have on it is very simple. haha i hate giving these types of comments because.. you kinda know that already i think but it's just a pain in the ass to hear... so here's the thing:
if you dont want to paint perfect detail and get an immaculate thumbprint on your model, don't. that sounds so goddamn borring that i'd sooner die. BUT
if you put a level of detail into your object, it needs to be precise. don't put in incorrect or sloppy detail. if your'e goign to work on a large, broad level of detail, then make sure your forms, general color and value shifts are right, but don't even bother and put in finger-print detail.
I bet you are.
the plan is to push the diffuse..
question.. what are proper techniques for pushing the depth of colors (in this case skin) without making it look like there's specularity?.. and i really dont know what it takes to paint believable skin.. mainly what i'm doing so far, for painting the character's skin, is having a dark base color, a mid tone, and a highlight tone.. for crevasses i paint a dark color complimentary to the dark base color.. i also work in dark greens and reds.. and i tend to keep these subtle.. i also add noise and RGB difference clouds in a layer for color variation..
would it be a better idea to push spek highlights into a diffuse texture that wont be layered later with a real spek map?.. i mean this model.. being just shy of 2k polys.. would a spek map even be worth creating?
and for the nomral map.. say, for instance, i didnt sclupt the high poly model, but i wanted to add one.. what would be a good way to go about doing this.. creating a height map.. i mean.. both normal maps and displacement maps go hand in hand right?.. how do you create a height map?
@ rhoymand.. yeah.. thick wrists.. almost pop-eye style thick wrists.. and yeah.. i see what you're saying about the loss of proportions.. when i translated the drawing to the model, i adjusted in the model what i thought to be better proportions, better form.. like kinda changed the model a little as i went.. but i see you're point.. keep the to the likeness...
i recently had a buddy from work come up to me who saw the model and gave me the idea that all of his limbs should be fingers.. jointed like them, the whole nine yards.. which would multiply the creepiness of toehead by about 83
@ laheen... lawl
well again, i really wouldn't wory about a height map. a heightmap is a displacement map, and you really dont need to use that unless you're doing paralax mapping or something like that, I THINK. i dont know for sure, i haven't really worked with that technology. i can tel you one thing for sure -- you don't have to use that here. DEFINATELY you'd want a spec map before a displacement map or anything else.
i think that's pretty cool that you're playing around with crazy bump, trying to see what kind of results you can get. however, if you're looking to put a normal map on this guy, you're not goign to get it to really look high poly without generating it from a high poly model, even if you just take your low poly and sub-divide it (probably not a good idea though)
without any color, displacement, depth, what ever the hell, you should be able to put a normal map on that model and get it too look, form-wise, the way youw ant it to. you shouldn't need to paint any more depth into yoru diffuse map, you shouldn't need a depth map or something like that.. as long as your scene is lit well, the model it's self should look complete with a normal map and nothing else.
at that point, if your model looks flat under reasonable lighting, then you need to edit the model, or work with the normals. displacement maps will do nothing, i'm afraid.
as far as skin, the best thign to do is to get a nice picture of human skin and focus deeply on it. notice the color variations. turn up the saturation in photoshop if you need to to see it all. find out what makes skin look like skin and just paint that.
specular is important for skin. take a look at some of the spec maps that are created for various models. i know you can dig something up. it looks like you're on the right track already, more or less. when ever i work with spec, i put color and intensity in the same map. light blue is powerful, dark blue is subtle. i use a gloss map to control the size of the hit.
i dont see any reason why you can't do this model with --
diffuse
normal
spec
gloss (scaled down)
oh also -- that texture overlay you have everywhere is flatting things out. it's blending all the forms into each other. remember. detail needs to be specific. if you dont know exactly why a pixel should be there, just leave that area blank.
i also want to work at painting some really sharp details in.. i was talking to a friend today about toehead and she gave me some ideas for different color schemes too.. so i'm gonna play around w/ those ideas.. more work and post tonight... and again all.. thanks for the great comments.. stay tuned
maybe a toeprint tho ^^ xD
did a little retopology work... changed the legs a bit so that they loop a bit nicer..
creepy as all hell, but I love it. really like how you handled the legs.
his toenails are ridiculously dense compared to the rest of him.
textures need a lot of polish, but that seems to be covered heavily in this thread.
i want an SDK
I love it.
So you gonna make the nail in the back all yellow and nasty? Ahhh man I can't wait to see this guy finished. Keep it up, I think it's pretty creative. I'm grossed out a bit, but I still like it.
miles