Eesh, youve had it rough I think. Too rough, for a guy whos just showed up to the scene (and modestly I should add).
Im still in agreement that the cigarette doesnt work. I also agree with Apocol that instead you should make a lollipop for him (possibly toothpick). After all, when I first viewed the image, I thought it was a lollipop!
Of course, well have to run this by the scouts Public Relations Specialists (and Physician), who Im afraid youve already deeply offended. You would also have to make an animation for it to truly work -- which could be rough being as youre just starting out.
*PS
Dont be discouraged by the outpouring of negative feedback. All of the upper-tier modelers here were once right where you are now; the only difference is that they didnt have the guts to post their WIP.
Got the bones somewhat sorted on the demoman kilt; Still a bit of modification to do, might have to ditch the little black bag as i can't get it to clip properly:
looks very nice.
how do you guys add texture and detailed colors to your models? i'm not at that stage yet.
originally intended to be part of the medieval collab but you may notice that the deadline is today (anyone who still hasn't submitted stuff, hurry up!) I'll try to make it by the drop dead deadline, but even that's a stretch for me... no big deal either way
this was testing clipping in model viewer with an automatic unwrap so ignore the ugly AO bake
cleaner AO render
at this point, I want to see if I can optimize a little (3744 tris currently) but other than that the geo should be final - if anyone has any suggestions speak up before I move to UVs
You've got a few harsh angles on your snakes that could probably be fixed with a little vertex manipulation.
The wings on the Caduceus (thankyou Google) symbol are usually set above the snakes and have a broader section attaching to the staff. It might be worth playing around with it a little so you can get it a little closer to the iconic design.
I think the idea was to have it resemble a caduceus and a crossbow at the same time. In which case moving the wings to the top would be a step away from the crossbow-silhouette. I agree on the snakes being jaggy though.
Something like this could help:
Rotating loops a bit can help it seem like there are more sides, but it might be a lot of work to apply it to a complex shape as the snakes.
Also, don't forget to collapse a few vertices at the end of the tail, where it thins down.
ODD Couple looks awesome, the malpractice hat is awesome but the color should fit the details on his suit instead of going for a full on black. I would love to see some ingame screens too
Anyway, got me some textures and as recommended removed the cigerette, may be replaced later on
I think you went the wrong way with the glasses mate xD they look more modern now ahaha but as for the cigarette, api suggested a toothpick which would work perfectly me thinks
ODD Couple looks awesome, the malpractice hat is awesome but the color should fit the details on his suit instead of going for a full on black. I would love to see some ingame screens too
i would love to see some in game shots as well - but i just lack the time and patience to actually get them in game. why won't valve just release a model swapper for testing? pretty please.
as far as your glasses go - have you thought of a more fuller look (like closer to the nose) and a fake mirroring? think cartman's glasses in the south park episode where he dresses as a cop shouting respect my authority. just a thought, i am digging it.
IMO the glasses part of the glasses should be bigger
instead of a Color No. 216-190-216 /light reddish frame I'd go for a yellow from that teams part of the pallete shown on the contribute swatch because in contrast to the black the frame looks positively Color No. 216-190-216 and thus slightly less manly
@GG_Underscore:
When you mean getting them ingame, do you mean the actual compiling or just swapping the weapons?
Cause if its the weapons you can use the "testitem" console command to easily swap the weapons out for your ones. Like on item_test. More on the wiki if thats any help: http://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/Item_test
@Macgta maybe swap the color of the pants where the kilt covers them and just make them a tad brighter or something looks a bit too washed out atm and give the tartan team yellow in between the black lines, too look more like the tartan on the hallmark. and don't overdetail the texture, it kinda clashes with the simplicity on the playermodels. also the bag looks kind of odd, try to make it fit the other pouches on demo, and less flat. but other then that great! we sure as hell need a kilt for demo, maybe make a version with pant-less legs too, that way valve might do like with the shoes on scout
Redone the textures, added a different colour to the stripes on the kilt; The black blotch is part of the AO bake that doesn't fit anymore cos the kilt moving, forgot to remove that
still don't like the texture, the blue looks the wrong color and they still look to washed out, also the yellow on the belt and pouch should match that of his armlogo/grenades (note that there's a different shades on the teams) also clothes doesn't have paint strokes in tf2, atleast not on the players, if it were a weapon sure but since its a piece of clothing it should match the playermodel and i still want the middle lines to be the same yellow as previously mentioned...
Just playing round with the colours at the moment, I am finding it pretty difficult to get these colours right tbh, it's a lot harder than i thought concerning colours ,
also making the yellow buckle/metal bit the same colour as his armlogo actually looks a lot better now
i know it can be dificult i'm a texturer myself, just try to copy the general style of the playermodel, sample the colors and don't modify too much, if the red kilt was more saturated and perhaps a little darker it'd perfect i think
ahahaha I love that, it's so sad and true if I make anything worth submitting to valve, I'm going to ask they somehow make it only paintable by colours other than bright pink, green, orange.. anything hideously out of place
Com, try to come up with something else to chew on then? cigarette is the spy's thing and while it would be historically accurate, it's somewhat weird to think of now a days.. and a guy posted pics of glasses before you updated them, those would work really well in my opinion don't try and go for a "cool" look, try to go for unique that fits in
that kilt isn't half bad mate the only problems in my opinion are the fact that it looks so very square very blocky both in texture and model, the texture seems to be painted on which in the TF2 world only really happens with objects that would be really painted in real life, try to tone down the contrast between the random brush strokes
@Contrails: Whoa...ornate medigun...that's awesome! But then there's no mechanism for the handle at the moment though so he's going to have some issues operating it. The handle will clip straight through the snake in front of it as soon as he starts healing anyone.
@GG_Underscore: One of those medics is going to have the other for breakfast. There's hope regarding tools for getting stuff in game though, they're working on some. Quite how they're going to work, and when we'll get to play with them is anyone's guess though.
@Pogo: He needs a duck so he can find out who's a spy...
@Macgta: Tartan generally seems to be a lot darker than that, and with the colour a lot stronger. It looks like really worn fabric at the moment.
@comomomo: The positioning of the lenses is a lot better than before but still seems very off. I've attached a paintover of some suggestions, but I'd also recommend taking a good look at some real glasses, they aren't quite as simple as they first appear.
I finally got around to doing a sheet for my rifle (submitted it last week):
I was aiming to do a technical sheet too but I haven't figured a good way to get around the XSI Mod Tool's watermarking of wireframe screencaps/renders. I really need to move to full software...
love that sniper rifle Elbagast, distinct but not outlandish
@GG_Underscore: very nice pack! hah "malpractice suit" i like it if you already have them compiled, it isn't much of a stretch to see them in game. With the item_test they don't even have to be named properly. if they aren't compiled, well that is another story.
@Macgta: if you are having trouble with color selection, just sample from the actual player model texture. Also, in the TF2 character design, the bottom half is meant to be darker. you can see a slight gradient even in the pants as they start lighter at the hips and end darker by the boots. might want to keep that in mind too when you choose the color combinations.
Haven't had chance to work on it much today apart from making the weightmaps a bit smoother; I will have a mess around with the colours tomorrow, Working on multiple projects at the moment
i like the red and blue, the accents seem a bit off though - the stripes on the blue are too drab/green and the yellow-orange stripes on the red are a little unsaturated
ok got around to putting together a promo for my pack:
@ColonelBD - Thanks for the comments . Actually, the scissors were not round, but I needed to work out the smoothing groups. But I modified the geo a bit anyway, and worked on a new texture and grabbed colors from the Amputator, and added edge highlights, still far from being a good texture, but I think it looks better :P
On another issue, here's what I'm working on with Rada...
I know it resembles the Spartan a bit, but I liked the idea anyway :P
It's about 1500 tris right now...
thanks for all the positive feed back. i somehow missed that test item, thought compiling will now be the issue to frustrate myself with.
Elbagast @GG_Underscore: One of those medics is going to have the other for breakfast.
it is a my devilish scheme - would you sacrifice any offensive ability of the medic for a purely health conscience play style or would you become more aggressive ignoring the well being of your fellow players for a more powerful reward (provided you are a good enough player)
BAWHAHAHAHAHAAHAAHAHA!
nice rifle BTW. my only complaint is that it is for a sniper. because i hate snipers. because they always seem to kill me.... and spys....
@ColonelBD - Thanks for the comments . Actually, the scissors were not round, but I needed to work out the smoothing groups. But I modified the geo a bit anyway, and worked on a new texture and grabbed colors from the Amputator, and added edge highlights, still far from being a good texture, but I think it looks better :P
On another issue, here's what I'm working on with Rada...
I know it resembles the Spartan a bit, but I liked the idea anyway :P
It's about 1500 tris right now...
very nice. how do you check how many tris your object is?
@JZeeba
I really love the Centurion helmet. I wouldn't worry about it being too similar to the Spartan, I'd say that it's distinctly different. There are five different kinds of tricornes anyways, so don't worry about it.
@Dashtoronto - Thx . There's an option in 3dsmax that lets you configure your viewport to show the total triangles in your scene or/and current selection.
@CidTheNinja - Thanks . Yep, I guess the horizontal crest makes it a bit different.
I was thinking in adding that strap seen on the right of the reference picture but I can't see the detail very well, and it would probably be at least 150-200 tris more.
@BuRn:
I can't help you much on the animation field, but you don't have to have all the uvs joined together in one big clump.
Finally unwrapped the damm thing. Pleaseignore the seams, I just found out how to fix those but unfortunately don't have the time to do it at the moment. Hopefully have a seamless version tomorrow.
The checker boarded parts are glass and "self illuminum" glow parts.
What's with that floating stuff? Are you planning to model the connections between them later? Most of the weapons use the same model for the viewmodel and the worldmodel now so floating stuff like that won't work.
WIP of a hat I've been working on a bit over the past few days.
It's a bicycle helmet for the Pyro. It's playing towards his (Possible?) stupidity similar to the way Pyro's Beanie does and messing with the gender confusion similar to his description and a few of the other Pyro items in TF2. The flower pattern on there now is just a temporary image that I edited a bit to test out how well it'd work. Later today or tomorrow I'll make my own more refined pattern. It's going to be paintable with the paint affecting the straps and the flower pattern. I've kept the straps white and the pattern black so the painting will work as intended when it's time to put compile it.
It's a bicycle helmet for the Pyro... playing towards his (Possible?) stupidity
by bicycle helmet + stupidity do you mean: ?
seems a bit harsh, i've thought of him as childish/wacky/eccentric more than retarded
poor pyro can't catch a break :poly142:
I know it resembles the Spartan a bit, but I liked the idea anyway :P
It's about 1500 tris right now...
Having just made a helmet with an elongated back, i can tell you that you are going to have some big clipping problems the way the helmet is positioned now. The soldier is a slouch and the way he is posed when holding a weapon means that the back side will probably poke through his collar. If I were you i would get that into the model viewer before you make the uvws and adjust the geometry accordingly. here's what i went through when making mine:
the ref looks ok but the other poses are messed up. there should be a substantial gap between the collar and the bottom of the helmet while in the ref pose. the way he stands in game is quite different.
Strike that lol, Had a quick go at the colours from the palette mixed with the colour from a screenshot of the demo, before i go bed nighty nite ;
I like the length much better now, and the color as well.
I just think the green is slightly too dark, make it just slightly brighter and more green. VERY slightly.
@BuRn:
I can't help you much on the animation field, but you don't have to have all the uvs joined together in one big clump.
That wasn't really what I was trying to say. For now my model is divided in two elements, one for the main model, and one for the handle. When I try Unwrapping it, I get to different maps since they're are not attached one to the other.
I'm not sure how to attach both of the elements together, but still be able to make the handle rotate freely so that I only get one UVW Map but still do my animation.
Thx for your time, and if no one can help me, no big deal :P
Awwww hell I put up the AO bake mesh by accident, heres what its supposed to look like:
Note to self: get more sleep.
@BuRn: Uhh what are you using? because in Blender you use ctrl J to join the two meshes and together along with the uvs, and in modo you should have two uv maps in the lists/uv maps collumn, and your supposed to select the second one, copy it onto the first one, then delete the second one. As for ones like max or maya I can't help you there im afraid.
Macgta: That really is looking nice, especially the blue one, personally the green looks fine to me.
Replies
Im still in agreement that the cigarette doesnt work. I also agree with Apocol that instead you should make a lollipop for him (possibly toothpick). After all, when I first viewed the image, I thought it was a lollipop!
Of course, well have to run this by the scouts Public Relations Specialists (and Physician), who Im afraid youve already deeply offended. You would also have to make an animation for it to truly work -- which could be rough being as youre just starting out.
*PS
Dont be discouraged by the outpouring of negative feedback. All of the upper-tier modelers here were once right where you are now; the only difference is that they didnt have the guts to post their WIP.
Hang in there
looks very nice.
how do you guys add texture and detailed colors to your models? i'm not at that stage yet.
Lil paint over, bit awful, but i think the kilt would look more identifiable at far distance
Would mean to find smthing else for blu ofc
also, there's a bit of green :poly136:
Of course the smilie face needs to have some teeth
Caduceus medigun
originally intended to be part of the medieval collab but you may notice that the deadline is today (anyone who still hasn't submitted stuff, hurry up!) I'll try to make it by the drop dead deadline, but even that's a stretch for me... no big deal either way
this was testing clipping in model viewer with an automatic unwrap so ignore the ugly AO bake
cleaner AO render
at this point, I want to see if I can optimize a little (3744 tris currently) but other than that the geo should be final - if anyone has any suggestions speak up before I move to UVs
The wings on the Caduceus (thankyou Google) symbol are usually set above the snakes and have a broader section attaching to the staff. It might be worth playing around with it a little so you can get it a little closer to the iconic design.
Something like this could help:
Rotating loops a bit can help it seem like there are more sides, but it might be a lot of work to apply it to a complex shape as the snakes.
Also, don't forget to collapse a few vertices at the end of the tail, where it thins down.
Anyway, got me some textures and as recommended removed the cigerette, may be replaced later on
instead of a Color No. 216-190-216 /light reddish frame I'd go for a yellow from that teams part of the pallete shown on the contribute swatch because in contrast to the black the frame looks positively Color No. 216-190-216 and thus slightly less manly
When you mean getting them ingame, do you mean the actual compiling or just swapping the weapons?
Cause if its the weapons you can use the "testitem" console command to easily swap the weapons out for your ones. Like on item_test. More on the wiki if thats any help:
http://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/Item_test
You may recognise from Monty Python & the Holy Grail. Sir Bedevere's helmet
Now let's go weight a duck
edit:
it works with the beak too: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/18271121/Screenshots/item_test0007.jpg
plus everything in my last post
also making the yellow buckle/metal bit the same colour as his armlogo actually looks a lot better now
It's the color palette for TF2
let me fix that link for you
http://img834.imageshack.us/img834/8526/1296826906504.png
ahahaha I love that, it's so sad and true
Com, try to come up with something else to chew on then? cigarette is the spy's thing and while it would be historically accurate, it's somewhat weird to think of now a days.. and a guy posted pics of glasses before you updated them, those would work really well in my opinion
that kilt isn't half bad mate
Current state of the glasses.
Changelog:
-played with the size of the glasses
-added toothpick
-reduced polygons
i laughed, sadly its true though
@GG_Underscore: One of those medics is going to have the other for breakfast. There's hope regarding tools for getting stuff in game though, they're working on some. Quite how they're going to work, and when we'll get to play with them is anyone's guess though.
@Pogo: He needs a duck so he can find out who's a spy...
@Macgta: Tartan generally seems to be a lot darker than that, and with the colour a lot stronger. It looks like really worn fabric at the moment.
@comomomo: The positioning of the lenses is a lot better than before but still seems very off. I've attached a paintover of some suggestions, but I'd also recommend taking a good look at some real glasses, they aren't quite as simple as they first appear.
I finally got around to doing a sheet for my rifle (submitted it last week):
I was aiming to do a technical sheet too but I haven't figured a good way to get around the XSI Mod Tool's watermarking of wireframe screencaps/renders. I really need to move to full software...
The mod version is available here.
@GG_Underscore: very nice pack! hah "malpractice suit" i like it
@Macgta: if you are having trouble with color selection, just sample from the actual player model texture. Also, in the TF2 character design, the bottom half is meant to be darker. you can see a slight gradient even in the pants as they start lighter at the hips and end darker by the boots. might want to keep that in mind too when you choose the color combinations.
Haven't had chance to work on it much today apart from making the weightmaps a bit smoother; I will have a mess around with the colours tomorrow, Working on multiple projects at the moment
ok got around to putting together a promo for my pack:
@ColonelBD - Thanks for the comments
On another issue, here's what I'm working on with Rada...
I know it resembles the Spartan a bit, but I liked the idea anyway :P
It's about 1500 tris right now...
Elbagast @GG_Underscore: One of those medics is going to have the other for breakfast.
it is a my devilish scheme - would you sacrifice any offensive ability of the medic for a purely health conscience play style or would you become more aggressive ignoring the well being of your fellow players for a more powerful reward (provided you are a good enough player)
BAWHAHAHAHAHAAHAAHAHA!
nice rifle BTW. my only complaint is that it is for a sniper. because i hate snipers. because they always seem to kill me.... and spys....
very nice. how do you check how many tris your object is?
I really love the Centurion helmet. I wouldn't worry about it being too similar to the Spartan, I'd say that it's distinctly different. There are five different kinds of tricornes anyways, so don't worry about it.
I'm in the process of doing my first contribute item and I now have a couple question for you experienced folks.
1. Are there any good custom animation tutorial available, I want to do a custom Draw animation for my weapon.
2. When creating my UVW map, do all the weapon components have to be attached together?
Thx a lot in advance for anyone who is willing to help me out with this
Keep the the good work everyone
@CidTheNinja - Thanks
I was thinking in adding that strap seen on the right of the reference picture but I can't see the detail very well, and it would probably be at least 150-200 tris more.
I can't help you much on the animation field, but you don't have to have all the uvs joined together in one big clump.
Finally unwrapped the damm thing. Pleaseignore the seams, I just found out how to fix those but unfortunately don't have the time to do it at the moment. Hopefully have a seamless version tomorrow.
The checker boarded parts are glass and "self illuminum" glow parts.
Anyway great job, I like the concept !
It's a bicycle helmet for the Pyro. It's playing towards his (Possible?) stupidity similar to the way Pyro's Beanie does and messing with the gender confusion similar to his description and a few of the other Pyro items in TF2. The flower pattern on there now is just a temporary image that I edited a bit to test out how well it'd work. Later today or tomorrow I'll make my own more refined pattern. It's going to be paintable with the paint affecting the straps and the flower pattern. I've kept the straps white and the pattern black so the painting will work as intended when it's time to put compile it.
by bicycle helmet + stupidity do you mean:
seems a bit harsh, i've thought of him as childish/wacky/eccentric more than retarded
poor pyro can't catch a break :poly142:
Having just made a helmet with an elongated back, i can tell you that you are going to have some big clipping problems the way the helmet is positioned now. The soldier is a slouch and the way he is posed when holding a weapon means that the back side will probably poke through his collar. If I were you i would get that into the model viewer before you make the uvws and adjust the geometry accordingly. here's what i went through when making mine:
the ref looks ok but the other poses are messed up. there should be a substantial gap between the collar and the bottom of the helmet while in the ref pose. the way he stands in game is quite different.
I just think the green is slightly too dark, make it just slightly brighter and more green. VERY slightly.
That wasn't really what I was trying to say. For now my model is divided in two elements, one for the main model, and one for the handle. When I try Unwrapping it, I get to different maps since they're are not attached one to the other.
I'm not sure how to attach both of the elements together, but still be able to make the handle rotate freely so that I only get one UVW Map but still do my animation.
Thx for your time, and if no one can help me, no big deal :P
Note to self: get more sleep.
@BuRn: Uhh what are you using? because in Blender you use ctrl J to join the two meshes and together along with the uvs, and in modo you should have two uv maps in the lists/uv maps collumn, and your supposed to select the second one, copy it onto the first one, then delete the second one. As for ones like max or maya I can't help you there im afraid.
Macgta: That really is looking nice, especially the blue one, personally the green looks fine to me.