I really appreciate the step-by-step breakdowns on this. I'd thought of trying the Zsphere/Polypainting/DM workflow before but shied away from it due to various concerns, especially regarding polypainting and OCD over lowres mesh cleanliness. Well, this workflow appears to be very "traditional artist/forget the maths" friendly and what can I say? The results speak for themselves and look fantastic, painterly, and organic. This is definitely inspiration to dig deeper into the methods you've presented.
Very nice thread, I feel grateful to you for starting it.
Millah, above, made some rightful observations, imo. I think that if you'll take them into consideration your already good work shall improve further.
Hey Darkrusader love your work! , I would just like to ask , How do you get a good and convincing GOLD material that i can see on some of your assets like the whirly collumns near the Entrance/Exit of the room ?
Hey guys...thanks again for all the great comments and crits. There is many things I would do different if I were to do this scene again, but it was a great test to see how far I could push Zbrush to make an environment for Unreal.
About my specular technique, I basically used my polypaint bakes from zbrush, then hand painted in where I wanted them to be especially shiny. Here is an example of one of my spec maps that had gold in it
You can get a much more dynamic looking specular if you paint your spec properly. Also, use color! Here is an article that goes into much more depth on how to use color properly in your specular channel
Inspiration at its best, awesome work man. Thanks for the breakdown on your workflow
Quick question: For the pillar breakdown, how did u go from 1-B to 1-C? It looks like you used boolean but kept the topology clean. I always have trouble modeling in a dip/hole on a complex hard surface model.
This piece looks absolutely wonderful!
You have managed to create 3D assets that look like a matte-painting. I look forward to your next piece (considering this was a while ago, I've probably just yet to find it :P)
Inspiration at its best, awesome work man. Thanks for the breakdown on your workflow
Quick question: For the pillar breakdown, how did u go from 1-B to 1-C? It looks like you used boolean but kept the topology clean. I always have trouble modeling in a dip/hole on a complex hard surface model.
He used ProBoolean rather than bog-standard Boolean. While not entirely perfect, it is worlds better for clean topology.
Thanks guys! SirCalalot is correct that ProBoolean is much cleaner for creating subtractions. I would like to add to that, to keep your geometry super clean, keep it on the grid! If you look at my subtraction mesh and my base mesh, you will notice that the topology is already very similar. That means that it is minimal work to clean that up after I do my Boolean operations.
Just thought I'd let you know,Darkrusader, that I'm using a similar workflow inspired by your floor bricks.
I'm creating a cluster of floorboards for a scene I'm working on that can be slotted together and flipped just like your floor in this.
I love the final UDK scene. Very loyal to the original Concept.
Only thing I noticed that I would personally change are the massive stones on the floor. If you have a look at the steps on the stairs, they are quite small, as for a normal human foot. But when you look at the floor, it seems that a normal human being would fall in between those massive spaces between the stones! I would scale it down a bit. Other than that, I like it a lot ;-) Good job!
Man....I wish I could understand how to get this level of quality with the textures in UDK. When I see a stage like this it just makes me remember that I really need to work on my materials. Great job.
Fantastic article!
I tried the specular previewing trick in photoshop but i can't seem to get it working thou. I put all the layers exactly like that ,but once i move the white spots ,nothing happens.. any clues anyone?
Amazing work and final look. Interesting to see your approach to all the parts especially using decimation master as the sole creation point for you lowpoly meshes.
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but you get a 10/10
Millah, above, made some rightful observations, imo. I think that if you'll take them into consideration your already good work shall improve further.
Cheers .
About my specular technique, I basically used my polypaint bakes from zbrush, then hand painted in where I wanted them to be especially shiny. Here is an example of one of my spec maps that had gold in it
You can get a much more dynamic looking specular if you paint your spec properly. Also, use color! Here is an article that goes into much more depth on how to use color properly in your specular channel
http://www.manufato.com/?p=902
Great link btw
Quick question: For the pillar breakdown, how did u go from 1-B to 1-C? It looks like you used boolean but kept the topology clean. I always have trouble modeling in a dip/hole on a complex hard surface model.
You have managed to create 3D assets that look like a matte-painting. I look forward to your next piece (considering this was a while ago, I've probably just yet to find it :P) He used ProBoolean rather than bog-standard Boolean. While not entirely perfect, it is worlds better for clean topology.
I'm creating a cluster of floorboards for a scene I'm working on that can be slotted together and flipped just like your floor in this.
Thanks again for posting
Only thing I noticed that I would personally change are the massive stones on the floor. If you have a look at the steps on the stairs, they are quite small, as for a normal human foot. But when you look at the floor, it seems that a normal human being would fall in between those massive spaces between the stones! I would scale it down a bit. Other than that, I like it a lot ;-) Good job!
I think your scene should be lit by regular fire.
Are you a professional Artist?
You sure work in the Game Industry, or?
Fantastic article!
I tried the specular previewing trick in photoshop but i can't seem to get it working thou. I put all the layers exactly like that ,but once i move the white spots ,nothing happens.. any clues anyone?