TRON - SCENE - WarrenMarshall

WarrenM

This is my 2nd post on Polycount and I feel pretty unsure of myself BUT .. I'm in. I'm trying to get better at 3D modeling and a low poly challenge sounds like a good way to do that. I work best with goals in mind.

I'm going to focus on creating a scene with Recognizers in it. I picked SCENE over VEHICLE since this should contain both elements.

Nothing to show yet, just wanted to get my hat in the ring before I chickened out.

Off to watch Tron and refresh my memories...

renderhjs

just post any images that you come across like inspiration stuff here. Its always a good catcher to have any images in a thread.

WarrenM

I started working out the basic shape of the Recognizer after watching Tron last night and looking at a bunch of reference. This seems reasonable to me so I'm going to try adding the lit edges next...




The Recognizers seem to change from scene to scene almost so I've taken a few liberties here and there.

WarrenM

I took a shot at unwrapping the Recognizer. I’ve mirrored the mesh left/right and forward/back so I can maximize the texture space by re-using tons of UV space. Trying to learn how to do this stuff properly...



I can see a bunch of problems here so I’m going to have to dig into the UV islands and get things fixed out. You definitely notice stuff that doesn't look right (there are also a bunch of lines that won't be there in the end but this was a quick test and Photoshop filter-fest). Here’s the current UV map:





I remember seeing a comment in someone else's thread about straightening out the edges of UV islands so they use the texture space better (less stair stepping) so I think I'll have to look into that.

Baddcog

You have a very straight edged/square model, so it's best to keep all your islands square to the grid, it'll make the lines you paint look much cleaner and straighter in the end. Seems like almost everything in your uv is angled somewhere.

The model looks good though.

WarrenM

Thanks for the feedback! Yeah, getting everything squared up will be my next pass. This one clearly won't work...

WarrenM

OK, much better IMO...



Just a few niggles to fix up and I can move on to the next thing.

hawken

very tight model, looking forward to the scene!

WarrenM

Getting started on some geometry ideas for the scene itself.

WarrenM

Yikes.



Yeah, this isn't working at all. I like the main unit piece but the surrounding geometry is making me sad. Gotta think of a new approach here...

renderhjs

maybe sketch something first, which costs less time and might spin your creativity a bit more.

WarrenM

I have never sketched an environment before. Ever.

So I figured ... why not?!

If you can get past how this looks, you can see what I did over a few hours:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/161473/PC_Tron/TronConcept.wmv

As silly as that is, it actually has stimulated my brain so I think I can carry on with this scene now and make some more meshes to fill this out some more.

Thanks for the suggestion!

renderhjs

Why the video? - image would be more accessible and imo. more suited for that. I just hate WMV and MOV files- useless stuff that needs to be deleted anyway after watching. If you insist on videos why not get a Youtube account and upload it there next time. Because you just need to paste the link here at people can watch it instantly.

Anyway I grabbed your concept so most people will actually care and see it.

Dani

My main issue with the concept is the scale of the door in the back. I would make the door smaller as otherwise the recognizer will loose the sense of scale as there is no other point of reference. Maybe make the door smaller and lower the camera angle to where it is on ground level looking up at the recognizer.

Aditionally (don't know if its allowed) you could ad a light bike or just another program to provide the nessescary reference of scale making the scene look much more epic.

WarrenM

Good point on the video. I just thought it would be more fun to see the progression but next time I'll make sure to post a pic as well.

And thanks for the reminder of the scale. That's true. I somehow forgot that recognizers are huge and the scene definitely dwarfs it. I'll try and work up a new concept that better handles that.

Snader

Disagree. The recognizer can't fit through a smaller door. Real life has some really huge doors too, just make it recognizeable as 'huge'. Check hangar doors, industrial gates and the like.

What's more bothersome is the variety in styles. The main platform and secondary buildings are very minimalist and abstract, the landing pad and recognizer are more detailed, in a greebly way, and the gate is something entirely different again.

WarrenM

I'm going to go a different direction. I redesigned the base a little bit and am changing the setting to be more of a gas station/rest stop for Recognizers.



No, it's not a baseball diamond.

Conor

Progress looks good. By the way - recognizers are actually dark green in the movie. Try making the material black with a green specular.

Snader

why so many edges around the main blocks? They don't look like chamfers, I don't see any roundness on the corners...