Low poly cars - advice please
Hi all,
I have been working on three different low poly cars. I'd really appreciate some feedback and advice on how I can improve them. The models are for a browser based software engine, with no realtime lighting, and also they are very low poly (300 tris max). I'm using Max.
I would like some advice on how to bake good looking lighting. Ideally something to make the texture look more metal/reflective, plus some subtle specular highlights etc.
I've been experimenting with lighting. I have used a directional light on the white Lan Evo (as shown in the pics - some glitches shown on the bottom 2 pics, any idea what is causing this and how to remedy it?).
The other two are shown in Max with flat lighting. The black Skyline is causing me most problems with lighting.
I'd really like the get the feel of a sleek, shiny black car.
Any critiques of the modelling/texture would would be much appreciated, or pointers to useful tutorials and resources would be great.
Thanks
Lan Evo:
FC
Nissan Skyline:
I have been working on three different low poly cars. I'd really appreciate some feedback and advice on how I can improve them. The models are for a browser based software engine, with no realtime lighting, and also they are very low poly (300 tris max). I'm using Max.
I would like some advice on how to bake good looking lighting. Ideally something to make the texture look more metal/reflective, plus some subtle specular highlights etc.
I've been experimenting with lighting. I have used a directional light on the white Lan Evo (as shown in the pics - some glitches shown on the bottom 2 pics, any idea what is causing this and how to remedy it?).
The other two are shown in Max with flat lighting. The black Skyline is causing me most problems with lighting.
I'd really like the get the feel of a sleek, shiny black car.
Any critiques of the modelling/texture would would be much appreciated, or pointers to useful tutorials and resources would be great.
Thanks
Lan Evo:
FC
Nissan Skyline:
Replies
I've had some advice so far :
"basic Bitmap reflection would do a lot for the glass, chrome, etc. Try applying that in Max and baking it into your diffuse as well."
(and)
"A trick I use too, is to apply a subtle gradient map, working planar on UV2, black at the bottom of the model (although you won't want this affecting the wheels), white at the top. Full self illumination, then render to texture to your UV1 mapping. take the resulting map of your gradient into PS and subtley overlay."
I worked on these....I found a tutorial on bitmap relections. The result looked pretty distorted on the skyline, and I wasn't sure how I would bake this (if/when it looked good) onto my diffuse. I'm very new at Max and a self learner, so any help or links to useful tutorials would be great.
With the second piece of advice, I'm going to have to research UV1 and UV2, as I've not used this technique so far. Does anyone have any advice here? I have simply been texturing in PS and using this as my diffuse. I'm guessing this is a way to layer/blend UV textures in Max.
I'm trudging through Google for tutorials, and it's a bit hit and miss.
Thanks again. Creamcheese.
You've obviously get the skills there to model and texture them, so spend a little more time shaping them better.
They don't look enough like their real-world counterparts mostly because they are out of proportion.
The RX7 is by far the best in this regard.
The EVO is far too long. It almost looks like you could literally just squash it lengthways and it'd work. At first glance I thought the EVO was an old 90's Celica from the back, it wasn't until I saw the Evolution badge that I realised what it was.
Something doesn't seem quite right with the Skyline either. It kinda looks more like a 200SX or something now. I think again it is the length of it along with the height of the roof.
They look good overall, but just shaping them out a little to better represent the real versions would really help I think.
Also, I notice you have some really bad N-gons. You absolutely need to split your Ngons into tri's and quads, don't let Max do that for you behind the scenes, you don't have any control there.
For the textures, I have never done this myself, but I have an idea on how i'd do it:
first off, you need better light bakes, and you will need to paint on them yourself. Basically you want to paint in light that falls from directly above. I can show you an old texture that has this: http://www.laurenscorijn.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/cougarbodymaps.jpg
Notice how it's not just AO, but more top down lighting. This is because cars most of the time just stand on their wheels and this sorta lighting will look right. The texture i'm showing is a bake, your geometry just doesn't have a lot of those details, so you'll have to mostly paint it yourself. Just think about every pixel "how much will this face upward, how much light will it catch?"
Once you have the lighting, that will do a lot already. For the Skyline: don't use pure black as the base color. Never do that! It just leaves you no room for value variations. Pick a really dark grey instead.
The next step would be to paint in generic highlights/reflections. This is MUCH harder because these are things that normally depend on your view, which means in real life the reflection differs based on your viewing angle, but you can't do that in the texture, it's always static. I've never actually painted reflections, but I'd just study a ton of photo's and renders, and then try and replicate the sort of reflections you see at angles that your model will be most viewed at. I was atcually looking at some cars that had this a few days afo, totally don't remember where though.
I have painted some faint specular in myself, this mainly just involves painting something that looks like spec on areas that would very like catch spec; convex, rounded areas to be precise
But the rear looks more like a toyota celica. The spoiler is also not any thing that is from any model evo.
Just overall doesn't give off the evo vibe.
The rX7 is quite nice, but the rear hatch reminds me more of a proche 944 (both the porche 944 and RX7 were quite similarly shaped for that generation). Only other thing is depending on the model you were trying to model- it is missing the hood scoop... And the wheels look like RX8 wheels.
The skyline looks fine from the front.. but the rear looks miss matched.
You have the GTR front, but the back is from a GTS or something. It is missing the spoiler, the signature GTR badge, and the tail lights are wrong. The tail lights should both be the same size.
I think you need to fix the proportions
re: The proportions - I've tweaked these a lot, I'll look over them again. I know what you mean about the skyline, the roof and back I'm still not happy with, but can't quite pinpoint it. I'll look at the Lan Evo. I actually thought this was the better one, but I obviously need to look at it again.
My main problem is finding ref. images. I've been using pics I've found on google/flickr/car forums, but I'll use the front of one car and the back of another, because I can't find clear head on shots of the same car!
I am sure I've used the same model for each car (ie. the pics came from different people but the model was the same)- I will look through my ref. photos.
Does anyone know of anywhere where blue prints can be found?
I'll split the n-gons. I think they are causing me problems with lighting (I tried lighting the FC and it was all distorted round the wheel arch). What are the main reasons for splitting n-gons manually?
I thought about dark grey rather than black - and I've tried some hand painting of lighting. Finding it hard going on the maps. Will carry on trying. (Xoliul - the link, is the left hand map lighting all painted on then? Not done in Max?). I thought there might be a better way to light them in Max.
I can work on blueprints in orthographic view can't I? Sorry if this is obvious, but I don't want to be making these basic mistakes again
I've found some blueprints from the site mentioned. When I import these into Max (onto a plane) - the model looks all out of proportion, whereas using the orig reference photo in orthographic (as I was) it matched up (but obvoiusly looked all wrong as a finished model). So yes, that was my problem.
So thanks Xoliul (and vprime for the link).
If so, make sure you reference plane to which you've applied the image has the same dimensions as your reference image. Or at least the very same ratio.
For example, if your image is 450x800 px, then make your plane 450 x 800 units.
You also want to check the front/side/top images line up, an easy way to do this is using guides in Photoshop and then cut them out, and make sure the relevant images have the same dimensions. For example, if your front view is 500px tall, then your side view will obviously want to be 500px tall also.
And yes working in the orthographic views against your ref images is the best way to work, use the perspective for checking the model in 3D. Don't try to model in the perspective view unless you're using the axis lock on the tools, or are using edge constraints, and are sure you know what you're doing otherwise your mesh could get very screwed up.
I think what Xoliul meant was not to use photo's in your orthographic viewports as photographs are oviously taken with a field of view and focal length, amongst other factors which result in perspective distortion. So while a photo may be taken from the 'side' of an object, it won't be a proportionately accurate reference to the exact side orthographic of that object.
So I will use blueprints in ortho - thanks.
I had wondered for a minute if xoliul meant I should use photos in perspective view - but figured that was a misinterpretation.
Having intersecting geometry would also allow you to smooth out the tire silhouette with this trick:
where the glass would be the car geo and the inset the wheel.
As this is a racing game (right?) you'll want to focus on the rear of the cars. This would mean that the 4 sides you have on the front of the FC's front bumper could be knocked down to 3, or even 2.
I would also advise to not have a cut in the middle of the roof, as this bend will make the front and rear windows look weird.
A good idea is to have a camera set up at the 3rd person player perspective, and keep that view open at all times, so you can spot big issues from the most common angle.
Texturewise I think you're making the lines in the body too obvious, thick and black. If you look at cars from NFS 3 Hot Persuit, you'll see that they have a lot subtler lines:
It also looks like they painted black around the wheels to get the housing to look smooth.
One last thing you'll want to take into account is to not use very pure colors. White is never pure white IRL, and black always has some sheen. And even car photos are generally not as bright yellow as your texture:
while this SV is very bright yellow, the sides of the car in this shot are darker and less saturated than your texture. you'll also notice that the black spoilers are actually 50% bright grey and the tires are about 20% bright.
Thanks, some good pointers there. I haven't used a camera set up yet, so I'll do that.
I can't have intersecting wheels as the engine (3D Flash) doesn't support z buffering. I need to look at how the cars appear in the engine and sort out this problem
One last thing you'll want to take into account is to not use very pure colors. White is never pure white IRL, and black always has some sheen
Yeah, I want this sheen. It's going to be a vital part. I'm not entirely sure how to go about this - handpainting, lighting in Max or a mixture of both. I've had advice about handpainting especially specular lighting. I'm going to work on this. (I have already but I need more work).
One more question.... I plan to have flat windows to keep the polycount down. When using the blueprints, do I come to the exact edge of the image as shown on the blueprint, or halfway between for a compromise?
I assume that the part of the front/rear window that you can see would normally be acheived by curving out the front window. But what if I'm not building a curve there, what should I aim for when shaping the side view?
Here's an example of what I mean:
Thanks :santa:
This car is 292 tris.
Make sure you spend polies wisely - for instance chamfered corners on the front of the rood improve the silhouette lots, and a geosphere/very triangulated approach for the large round shapes is cheaper than working with quads.
Also, if you're using flash you can use alpha maps for the wheel guards - I heard it was practically free, and it would save a bunch of polies.
Snader - for the front part, did you start with a geosphere, or did you manually triangulate and shape that part?
Lots and lots of looking at small changes from several angles. Especially from the player perspective. Because with racing games (and most third-person games, really) the back view is the most important.