Gas Pump

Stromberg90

Hy everyone

Working on a gas pump here, gotten pretty far on the highpoly, but i dont want to start making the lowpoly before i have heard what you have to say

What i am the least happy with is the what i have framed in the second picture, it looks to simple and boring, but i have no idea what i shall do with it, so a little help would be very apprechiated.

Carter

Looking like a good start! I'd vary the tightness of the edges, give it a bit of variety. For the nozzle maybe add some panels and the corresponding screws and bolts, and add a proper grip on the handle

Looking foward to seeing more

Stromberg90

Carter: Thanks, i have worked some more on it now, going to do something with the edges as you suggested.

raul

It is hard to judge how good this is at the moment, mainly because you are not posting any reference. Are you using any? I say at the moment, it is looking too simple. Youve got the main shapes, but no inner details like knobs, buttons, etc. Are those dents? Also, your edges are looking a bit soft. They read like blob. Overall, i think you are going in the right direction. Just need to give it a bit more love.

Stromberg90

Raul: Good thing that i got a lot of love left in me, i get what you are saying i feel it's to simple aswell.

(Yes thats a funny attempt of dents)

Here is my main refrence, it's not supposed to be a 100% copy, so anything that will make it more diffrent would be nice

c0ldhands

Just how much more gas pumps can polycount bare? Anywhoo I dont see why you should not follow the reference 100%? Its often when you are obliged to follow a certain element from the reference that you are challenged to perfectly copy an element and not shortcut your way trough something. Pluss that its a good exercise for the eye to look at something and try to copy. Just sayin

karera

One idea is to not model the hose laying around like that, but completely straight, and then after you've baked it you can rig it and lay it on the ground anyway you want to. Keep it simple

Stromberg90

c0ldhands: There is alot of gas pumps on polycount, thats why it crossed my mind i guess. Since i already have some things to fix on the model, i might make it like the refrence.

karera: That would make things alot easier than me, since i recently changed to 3ds max from maya that i used for rigging, i dont know how it's done in 3ds max. I might look it up tough

Stromberg90

Update time, keep the critics comming

Stromberg90

Another small update, will start on the lowpoly once i get permision from you guys

Stromberg90

Here is the lowpoly at 2050 triangles

Stromberg90

Here is an update

Kitteh

The white scratching/paint worn off is a bit too thick and consistent and uniform around that edge. There should be a couple spots where the paint isn't completely worn off and it connects through to both sides. Gas pumps don't get thrown around so there's no reason for the edge to be scratched up that badly.

MRico

I don't know if it was on purpose but you misspelled "Chief".

Make sure to make some rusty drips on all those spots you have rust.

Quick question...What's on the backside? I'm going to do a gas pump too and have no idea what is on the backside, is it just the same as the front?

raul

Nice updates! I wonder how much love you've got left in ya! Hehe.

The highpoly turned out nice. One thing u could do to pimp those renders even more is by adjusting the levels of the layer. ( level them out sligtly ) then duplicate that layer. Do filter/other/high pass. Set it to hard ligth. Instant pop!

Now that low poly. Is too high. If this is a folio piece chances r the hose will be stationary. I say you could bring this whole thing down to 1k. Or less. It will show off more that you know where to use the tris.

The textures. I think this is the hardest part of any model. You've got this really cool reference that you kinda glanced at but ur not paying attention to. See if you can match your rust, decals n everything to be exactly like the reference. Don't have to be deadon but it will help you understand what's going on.

You kinda misspelled chief!

I think your getting there mate, just a little more love!

woody_294

Looks really good No idea about the modelling as I'm a newbie on that, but there should be more of a correlation between the paint being missing and the rust. The paint is the protective coat that would stop the rust.

I find it best to do the weathering in order, 1 - Paint weakens and is bleached in the sun 2 - Paint starts to peel 3 - Rusts in the rain etc with some bit knocked out of it for good measure of course

That is a nice colour you've got on it. Been looking at your reference a while now 'cos it's cool! The side and top bits are aluminium so there's no real rust on there, aluminium goes powdery white when it oxidises. Am I thinking into this too much?

Stromberg90

Kitteh:
Thanks alot for the critics, i have had some problems with that edge mainly because of poor uv mapping, dificult to make it line up. Going to redo the uv's after i have fixed the lowpoly some more

AutospySoldier:
I have no idea how i managed to missspell that xD I had the refrence right there on my other monitor, i guess lack of sleep can do wonders tough. I will make sure to fix the rust About the other side, i have no idea, mine is completly flat :P

raul:
Thanks alot, i got alot left btw I will try what you said about the highpoly renders, cause i had some problems with making them clear and contrasty.
I will go back and redo some of the lowpoly, since i know that you are right, the hose is what i worked the least on, and it's defently worth it's share of love.
I realy love the way the refrence myself, it's so full of detail, i kinda messed up during the uv map stage, going to redo some of the uv map aswell after i have fixed on the lowpoly

woody_294:
Glad you liked it
You are right, i do have sort of a layer system going like you described, it is a nice color, i did think to go with the classic red, but i ended not todo so

Thanks everyone for the great critics

c0ldhands

Nice improvement dude, much better!

Stromberg90

c0ldhands: Glad you like it

Update on the lowpoly, it's at 1450 tri's dont know if i can push it any lower.

raul

nice, i see some parts on the nozzle that could be reduced a lot more. Specially the cylinder that come out after the main cage. A few bevels on the main body area that you could get rid of.

The silhouette of the hose needs some more loops across. Right now it looks faceted.

Here is a paint over i did, to kinda give you some ideas of what could be done to bring it lower.

Stromberg90

raul: Thanks a lot for taking the time to do a paintover
"is there a back???" if you are wondering if there is a back side of the main body, the answer is yes.
I have tought of removing it, so i'm going to do so if thats what you tought of.

I will make the alpha planes you suggested aswell, i do alreay have one above the noozle for the spring thing, i have a feeling that would shave of some poly's.

And once more there is one thing i dont understand, might be because english is not my first language as you may have figured :P

"Could try just castin take away" and "Fix sihole or" i dont know what you mean about that, hope you take the time to clear that up for me

raul

"Fix sihole or" - lol...well i was having technical issues with my new wacom. What i meant to say is "fix the silhouette". By "casting" i mean, when you bake your normals. So whats gonna happen is that when you cast your normals. The bottom will look faceted. And wont match with the base. The bottom of those pieces should be rounder. Which is why i said that maybe you could just get away by just casting onto the geometry.

Sorry about that.

Stromberg90

raul: Thanks for clearing that up
One thing that will make a difference next time, i forgot that i have to flip the green channel in the normal map for udk(or bake it with the right settings from max), once i did that i looked better

EarthQuake

There is a pretty common misconception that if you can save a few tris by using alpha, its worth it. This however, is quite misguided.

1. If you're keeping the alpha'd bits on the same UV layout, you're going to DOUBLE the texture memory on a compressed diffuse texture. A 24 bit .dds is 1/2 the size of a 32 bit .dds

2. The increased shader complexity and need for alpha sorting is going to be much less efficient to render than a small amount of geometry, in virtually every modern game engine(may be different for portable systems).

3. Adding a 2nd smaller texture is still going to eat up memory, and also introduce a 2nd draw call for your mesh, again which will likely hurt performance more than a few extra tris.

So, moral of the story, do not use alpha unless it is absolutely necessary, and especially not to save a few tris.

Stromberg90

EarthQuake: Thanks for clearing that up, good to know. I might drop doing the alpha's exept for the 2 i already have

Stromberg90

Update, fixed the silhouette on some pieces.
Deleted the backside and removed some of the bevels and removed some edge loops from the noozle.

Tricount: 1516


I can upload the obj file if anyone wants to have a look, just ask

Stromberg90

Update on the new uv, and removed some poly's it is at 1499 triangles now.
Here is the uv.

Stromberg90

Here is the normal and AO bake

Kitteh

Make the top of the thing have more polies. It's very noticeably blocky and it wouldn't cost you more than maybe a few dozen polies to make it smoother. Make the little cylindrical metal thing on the left side with the lever coming out of it have less sides if you need, since that's quite a bit more round than it should be to fit with the detail level of the rest of the model.

Stromberg90

Kitteh: Thanks for the tips, i will go back to the lowpoly and fix thoose things

Stromberg90

Update time

Stromberg90

Just started on the texturing, the rust is going to be darker btw.
Critics and tips would be very apprechiated

raul

Very cool!! This is a huge improvement from the last textures. One thing tho, is that the rust at the bottom is so linear. Try to break it up a little here and there ( erase some of it away ). Right now it seems like all you did was slap it accross.

On your reference.


You can see how the rust rules the bottom of the object. Is not just rust that goes in there there is also dirt and dust and water stains. Think in gradients. Things will get darker as you are going down ( i would actually create a gradient layer just for this ) and make it fade from top to bottom. Also, adding this dark will blend the rust better.

And of course there are still a lot of other things that you are missing, but i know you just got started on it. Overall i think you are up to a great start! Keep it up!

DOG-GY

I feel you could make your UV use the space a lot better than it is right now. Here's how I crammed it all together. With this solution you could scale it up more, and there's quite a bit of space for edge padding that you would need ingame.

The red are pieces that I laid over each other seeing as they're the same. You have enough room to put them elswhere, however.

I'd recommend not following what I did exactly, but finding your own solution to the issue. It's looking good so far, but it could be made a lot better!

My final suggestion is taking some polygons off of the cylinders that you have, and putting some more on the actual pump's line. Right now it feels to blocky for a larger object and the smaller cylinders feel like there's to much for such a small part of the mesh.

Cheers!

Stromberg90

raul: Thanks for the critics
Worked some more on it now, hope it falls in good taste.

Stromberg90

DOG-GY: Glad you took the time to do that, i am not sure i will go back and redo the uv's and baking now, but you never know
If i do i will take all that into account, i did change the uv's some after i posted them so i'l post what they look like now.

Stromberg90

Update, worked some on the specular and the uniform rust on the bottom.

n88tr

i like it a lot. the AO turned out nicely. maybe some harder dents in it or bullet holes. the white piece on the nozzle looks awfully white to me. maybe yellow it some

Stromberg90

n88tr: Thanks I can see it aswell, going to darken it some on the texture

Keep the critics comming want to iron things out before i bring it into UDK

Stromberg90

Well here is a few screenshots from the udk, not perfect but might be worth posting

Kitteh

The color looks all washed out in-game. Weird lighting?

Stromberg90

Kitteh: Yeah, i think it's a combination of my custom post effect and dull lighting xD

Stromberg90

Here you go

Kitteh

Looks cool, but that AO is way too strong. Looks like a cheesy game asset and not realistic.

Add some brown/orange grime to the chrome, especially in the crevices.

Stromberg90

Kitteh: I realy cant seam to get good lighting in udk, will work on it when i get home and add some dirt as you said

raul

very cool! is not only that your render looks odd. but also the crappy textures that its sitting on. I think you should loose the wall and the concrete ground. and just have a dark background and plain texture on the ground. Kinda like those eat3d renders for their pillar and that other dvd on texturing.

Or make a cool background! :P

Stromberg90

Thanks a lot raul, and i cant tell how much you critic meant for this project
I do regrett on doing the udk renders, since i would need more of an scene to show it of properly.

So i did a new screenshot from max, thanks to Laurens Corijn for he's amazing shaders and post process.

I am about to call this one done, and heading to another project soon

Taylor Hood

Awesome textures dude.

ajr2764

Really digging your texture work on this. Dropping the old presentation that you had was a good choice because the latest simpler one does it more justice.

Kitteh

Yeah, awesome texture work. The chrome is still looking pretty bland, though.

Stromberg90

Glad you liked it

ajr2764: Thanks I am glad i did drop it to the udk render turned out horrible xD

Kitteh: Thanks I should have made more use of the cubemap, but i completly forgott.