Test Fail , but gonna fix it

seforin

ok so you might have seen this test floating around here before, but I got offered to do this test at net devil.


so the test specs were a bit unusual but.


Specs:

Model, texture, light and render gnarled tree image or couch image (NetDevil_test.jpg) or (NetDevil_test2.jpg)

Use Glowing Fungus image as style guide for some of the color use that we use in our game zone (Color_Use.jpg)

No poly limit- (if you think it looks good in High or low poly trust your gut instinct).

512x512 map(s)

Due Monday 10-27-08 10am MTN

3 view Jpg, Texture files, plus maya or max file.



Note: Style over photo-realism. I’m not looking for photo-rips for textures. Use color or vert tint to add life to the models. You can use any techniques you need to create a clean efficient game ready model. Really concentrate on making the very best textures you possible can and don’t rely on model to show all details.



Based off the concepts given and the color pallet I was figuring this was for a more MMO based spec and I tried to keep it nice and still low on geo and such.






so this is what I turned in using vertex lighting and such (yea I decided to add in the lego guy , which did wind up shooting me a bit in the foot but not majorly)








So after I got the email today I emailed back asking what exactly they didnt like, there major gripe from what they told me was that the colors were to ambient light and not enough shadows or highlights in the texture itself and not enough lighting baked in.



So after talkign with a few people today and getting some advice I re uniquely unwrapped my model and baked out a pass of lighting into the texture itself and a AO pass on the model (keep in mind now there is no overlaying parts)

And this is without any Vertex lighting to the model at the moment....so better step in the right direction or no?



I really wanna see// learn what I did wrong so I can resubmit this maybe make a impression or something.

Gav

Man, I can't really give much advice in the way of improving the art...it's really not my forte...but I think the older version is a lot better for my personal taste. It has a lot more contrast and really pops out this newer one seems harder to read. Based on their feedback, I would take your older version and maybe bake in some shadowing..not blacks but maybe deeper browns or something.

Ghostscape

All of your coloration is very monochromatic and does not match the richness of the provided concept art at all. Really push the vibrancy and range of the colors you're using, right now it looks like you're dodge/burning your details instead of painting with highlight and shadow colors.

j4polaris

I agree with Ghostscape and Gavimage. Try to look at the concept art that they've provided and try to adjust your textures to match. I would try to up the contrast on your wood texture to help it pop out a bit more, especially when viewed from a distance. You also might want to try your hand at painting some shadows right into your texture, rather than going for a separate ambient occlusion pass.

I'm sorry you didn't get the job Seforin. You're in good company though. I actually applied and was rejected from NetDevil a few weeks ago. Generally what I've found with art tests is that companies aren't really looking for a lot of embellishment; if they give you a piece of concept art, they want you to match it as closely as possible.

All in all though, you've made a great first-pass on your test. The model is good, it just needs a few tweaks on the texture.

seforin

ok well I believe the unique unwrap was a bad idea...I think that it would be nice for a AO map but really the AO map dosent make this pop necessarly as much as one would think...


So a friend of mine showed me a method a method to bake lights in to the vertex coloring (I never knew you could do this till just a bit ago)

so he showed me a quick setup and gave me a idea of maybe making this a bit of a darker time of the day and such.


so heres the more newer angle im going with, really playing with lighting and baking in vertex colors.

Im thinking something a bit more swampy during the daytimeisk...

better or worse at this point?






ghost: Im believe the texture should pop but I believe what they wanted to see more is more depth with the lighting of the textures...so gonna see if I can add in what you said

polaris: Thanks man , but to be honest the people who gave me this test just seem to nice to me about reapply so I think im going to just push it the extra step even if it is a waste of time.

Ged

hmmm I dont know do you think maybe they want more lighting information in the tree bark texture etc? like maybe dont just follow the concept but actually add alot of light and colour detail to the texture? thats what it sounds like to me, playing with the lighting like this is just drowning the model in atmosphere in my opinion and I cant see your skills very well now

Joao Sapiro

add color in the texture itself, add highlights or something, make stuff pop , right now it seems you are texturing a next gen asset, but without normals or specular !

Kawe

copy and paste one of those mushrooms and put next to the tree thing. I don't think they'll match at all... and that's where the actual problem lies. the most important color is probably the one from the ground where the mushrooms are standing. it'll tell you quite a lot about the environment and what color the tree could have.

Wells

the base texture itself needs some lovin before you go tweaking vertex lighting and AO bakes. i like what you're doing with the stylized wood grain, but it looks like preliminary scribbles with a black brush. very unpolished and unfinished, and monochromatic. Same with the gold trim. It looks like a flat color fill. Look at the side of the lid - how much uv space does that have? It looks like you forgot to texture it. parts of your tree texture seem to have the grain going counter to the way you've modelled it. you either forgot to alpha out one of the vines, or didn't bother erasing the daker gray render background. the lego minifig is a nice idea, but proportions are off. head and arms look too small.

It's a good start, but I wouldn't called this a finished project. with a little love and attention it stands to be a nice little set piece, but you just need to buckle down and paint - forget the fancy work-arounds.

bounchfx

yeah, I like the first one but I think what they mean is more contrast in the base textures. otherwise I think it looks pretty neat dude

rjhalvorson

On the chest itself before lighting, I would paint in some of your own AO. I do this sometimes on objects where I have a height change but not a geometry change. In photoshop, take one of those rectangle textures and add an inner shadow to mimic AO on a high poly model. Next you'll need to do the same thing for the side of the yellow bars, in essence, back in the shadows rather than try to monkey with lights and AO passes because if there isn't enough geometry, you won't get the desired effect. If you can get a good AO pass you can layer them if it's not enough, but I sometimes paint them because it's easier than trying to get exactly what I want with a light rig.

To be honest I think your first one was headed in the right direction. You weren't auditioning to be a lighting artist, you were auditioning to be a model and texture artist. The company told you the problem was that you didn't even enough contrast on the model itself. Look at your original model, there is hardly a change of contrast anywhere from lights to darks. Just slight variation.

For Example. The red inside of the chest is the exact same color as the red outside of the chest. This doesn't look right and it's that kind of detail that the company probably didn't like.

Otherwise, I think it's pretty cool and I wouldn't beat yourself up about it. It is really good. Just missed on one element.

Mark Dygert

I thought it looked pretty good.

But after reading some of their feedback, I agreed, the base texture needs some lovin and I think uniquely unwrapping a lot more of it would give you that freedom. Expecting vertex lighting to pick detailed shadow info on a really low poly object? I'm not sure that would turn out better then hand painting in some details. I don't think the texture reuse is really helping the piece if its keeping you from getting specific with details and lighting.

A lot of the UV pieces could be scaled down and others blown up and rearranged with very little impact to the current pixel density. At the very least pieces could be sewn together to reduce the seam count.

Also it looks like this would be placed in a swamp so it needs to reflect that. Wetness, dirt, grime, moss, slime ect, but keep that painterly lego feel. It might be wise to go a bit over the top and impress. That way they know what you can do, and its not hard to have someone dial it down a notch. I

Right now you have each color firmly locked into its place with very little hue and saturation difference, paint bucket fill style. The concept says "gnarled tree" but the gnarls aren't really pronounced.

The shape of the tree is off also. The trunk is fatter then the concept. The concept looks almost like a bunch of vines are clinging and twisted together in the shape of a skinny tree.

paint over:

Michael Knubben

Personally, I would try to disregard Vig's paintover, as your first attempt was much closer to the style-guide.
I'd suggest you just keep working at that first version, adding contrast and depth. Also, you might want to try to add some sharpness and angularity to your texture, as the concept has more of that going on than your final texture, which reads more like something from Kingdom Hearts. As a base it's good though, just work some more 'bite' into that soft-edged first go.

seforin

ok im playing with the texturing trying to darken it a bit more, since I cant exactly paint a 100 % AO due to the unwrap having overlay points im faking those points with the vertex coloring....

is this looking a bit better?





first version is with vertex lighting and shading on and some additional lights in the area to add to this



2nd version is just the diffuse with no vertex lighting and shading turned off as well to just show how much AO I painted in and how much I darkened to add it



(im like really lost at this point to be honest guys)

Joseph Silverman

Sef, you're improving as an artist lately.

This needs some work, but it's a solid base. Check out vig's paintover, it's spot on.

You're kindof vaguely adding color or lighting in hopes it changes things -- that's not what is needed right now. You need real depth and color variations in the forms.

It looks like you got a good base and are scared to mess it up. Just start a new layer, 100% opacity brush, and start painting. Bulk up some form, detail, and color in those shapes. Imagine you're sculpting -- you wouldn't just cut thin lines into a smooth surface, would you? Those knots and lines in the wood need depth and thickness.

Again, reference vig's paintover, and just dive in and start painting.

Joao Sapiro

here is an example of bobotheseal work that also has a vibrant palete for Depths of peril , might inspire you

Mark Dygert

I think the problem you'll run into with vertex lighting is not having enough verts to properly bend with. You'll either need to break up some of the big/long polys or push more into unique unwrap territory and get crazy painting, (you know which way I would take it).

I'd do more big veins/ribs/vines and not so many small strands. big vines will read better at a distance, small vines blurs into visual noise.

Ghostscape

stop using vertex color. You'll use that to color the scene, you shouldn't be doing that for the asset so much.

Look at vig's paintover. notice how he has greens, reds, and oranges in the wood. It makes it much more vibrant. Look at the mushrooms - see how the green one has different greens and yellows and browns?

you should be painting with those colors and stop trying to mess with different lighting techniques. The problem is the monotone textures. Adding AO (which shouldn't be black, especially for this) or vertex lighting is just putting lipstick on a pig.

AnimeAngel

Well Sef, I know how you feel lol. I see though that you had about the same issues as me with this one, and that was nailing the style. I think you got closer then me though and I thought for sure you would pass.
I will be working on mine again tonight, trying to nail it down better also. Skype me later if you feel like it, and we will talk it over

pior

Also, don't trust default 3d programs settings too much. See how the bottom of that branch gets pitch black? You totally want to avoid that. If Bobos model was displayed under such presentation it would look like ass since it would loose all that vibrant quality.

Take the time to take a step back and look at the screengrabs and try to point out what work and does not. There is always a fix!

Wells

i can has paintover too



more or less just elaborating on what i said earlier.

seforin

well I think I'll take another stab at more color values

just a FYI: Vertex lighting this asset WAS part of the test. But I believe the texure will bring this out more...I'll do what I can later tonight...is the newer version (bottom one) going in a better direction to anyone though?

Jeremy Lindstrom

and just remember how most bark grows it's a vertical thing not usually in rings horizontally, it can swirl as it goes up, but try not to make it just circle the tree or branch horizontally.

my .02 cents.

seforin

ok spent some time working on this tonight...really took alot of the advice


first off I painted in some more colors (reds and greens and some yellow hints)


I then took some the of the advice given above and some of the paint overs and took a combination of what I liked best


and I also fixed up the model proportions a bit...


so this looking better or am I just going backwards at this point?





For the record I want to break any lego I see now.

Jeremy Lindstrom

no breako my lego, looking much better in my opiniono

Saidin311

Looks pretty sweet. Not really qualified to comment, but a quick google search for "treasure chests" brings up a ton of inspiration to really make the chest pop. The gold material looks really flat. Secutar's paintover really showcases the purpose of this prop (a chest) by adding some details and brighter gold to the chest.

Mark Dygert

Oh yea that's looking a lot better. I like the deeper detail, you're moving in the right direction, but it might help to zoom out and look at it from a distance maybe squint. When I do, I'm starting to see some of the details pop out but its still kind of muddy.

Some of the root base chunks still seem fat compared to the ref. The chest could use some tiny bits of green grime and wear. It still looks pretty much paint-bucket-fill. But the work you put into the trunk is paying off.

I also think you should add in the details on the chest Sectaurs painted in, rivets and corner guards. for the corner guards you might want to toss a few floating polys in that area, uniquely unwrapped. Might be able to get away with just doing the one corner?

stimpack

Im gonna go out on a limb here and say , i enjoyed your very first one the most. It was more cheerful and kid like, which embodies what legos are to me. Not sure why u failed. i liked it.

seforin

stimpack wrote: »

Im gonna go out on a limb here and say , i enjoyed your very first one the most. It was more cheerful and kid like, which embodies what legos are to me. Not sure why u failed. i liked it.

I thought the same thing but they said more details and lighting in the texture itself so Im doing what they want

rjhalvorson

Seforin, you are getting closer to the right idea, but I think you should read a little bit about the way light behaves. From what I've read, the company didn't approve the art because it didn't look good, or because you didn't use the right colors, they didn't approve it because the variation of the texture or lighting makes it look like someone stamped "CG" as a watermark over the image.

Real life scenes never have lighting that illuminates everything equally, and the majority of hue changes in real word objects does not come from their color but from the variations in the color of light that bounces off of them, and the level of intensity.

Your original test image did not have a shadow on it. It looked like everything was ambient, meaning, the color that was on the texture is the color that was emitted. This doesn't happen in real life.

Stop reading this and look at the room around you. Look up in the corners of the walls, notice how the walls change color as you get closer to the corners? This can be emulated with AO passes baked into the textures. Look at shades near a window. Notice how if the blinds are drawn, the color of the walls near the sides of the window have blue in them?

their major gripe from what they told me was that the colors were to ambient light and not enough shadows or highlights in the texture itself and not enough lighting baked in.

Now, your latest try just adds variation to the colors which is somewhat of a good idea, but if you look at the work as a whole, it hasn't changed the elements the company was talking about. The lighting is flat, the texture is just darker.

Set up a good lighting rig to really add contrast to the scene, add an AO pass to your original texture to bump up the shadows. And then once it's looking really sweet, render the lighting to a texture. I know there are tutorials that show you how to do this, but this is what they are talking about. Your 2nd attempt merely shifts the tone from bright to darker, it doesn't add much more to contrast.

Sectaurs paintover is below. This is the direction you need to move in. Notice the right side is much brighter than the left. Which side you choose and how you choose to place your highlights depends on the lighting. Use your reference images from the company to make these aesthetic choices.

g

stimpack

Post above answered my question on why you failed. This paintover is a stellar crit. Wish all crits were this constructive and well illustrated!

seforin

*gun in mouth*

need to fix gold more...

doing what I can for the wood...

vertex lighting on..




Repainting more again tonight....


The more I do this the more I just think im doing this incorrect to begin with.I wish I had help with mentors around me so I could push this more...Thanks for all the help everyone.

Rhinokey

i liked your first one better,

seforin

Rhinokey wrote: »

i liked your first one better,

agreed


well I sent out this version last night (I promised I would resubmit to them by wednesday so I couldnt stretch it out anymore)

I sent out the max files but heres a screen shot



fixed vertex lighting , AO , and gold before one final send out, I did the best I could in the time I had with the wood, I appreciate all the help everyone gave me, I hope this new version makes these guys happy!

Joseph Silverman

I really think you made it too dark, you couldve had a lot more contrast if you went brighter with your highlights.

That said this is definitely higher quality painting than the previous two iterations, good luck.

Mark Dygert

Rhinokey wrote: »

i liked your first one better,

Unfortunately submitting the first again won't get him the job =/

Good luck, I hope it pans out this time!

2 cents too late:
- The new version is pretty dark. But has more contrasting values. First you did full bright hardy any shadows, now full dark with lots of shadow. (Which might be what they're looking for?)
-I think if they are looking for something slightly more realistic?
- I think you did a pretty good job of getting some shadows in there but going in and painting some high lights might help it pop a little more and provide some light direction.

Michael Knubben

Realistic? In a lego game? with the extremely fullbright colours of the stylesheet they provided? I'm doubtful of that, but let's see what they say.
You made the contrast much better now, but I don't think you've really nailed their stylesheet at all, and that's probably the thing you did right the first time around.
Frustrating to hear, I'm sure, but a mix of old and new might be best.

Mark Dygert

MightyPea wrote: »

Realistic? In a lego game? with the extremely fullbright colours of the stylesheet they provided? I'm doubtful of that, but let's see what they say.

Really? Because the lego games I've played have semi realistic organic environment pieces. Not everything is made out of lego bricks.
Examples:
The Buildings in Mos Esley
Dagobah
More Dagobah
Even more Dagobah
Even more Dagobah
Indiana Jones Swamp
Indiana Jones Jungle
Buildings in Indiana Jones
More Buildings in Indiana Jones

So I think its safe to wonder if they where looking for something a bit more realistic for something that blends into the background which more then likely won't be made out of lego blocks...

BUT it is a bit worrisome because someone else did this same art test a while back in a more next gen realistic style and they didn't bite either. So I'm interested to see what the hell it is they're looking for...

seforin

well to be honest I agree with all of you but well see what happens at this point still no email yet


im hoping that someone from there might see the frustrations/determination I went through to make this look better and maybe that might mean something to them? All I can do is hope for the best right?

Mark Dygert

/me pissing on all your hopes and dreams...

Something tells me the frustration/determination might work against you. They might want people who can effortlessly crank out props, not have to do them a few times over =P