Yup - he's been a total bitch to bake down. Honestly, I think I have the type of personality that would rather just remake something than try and salvage a mess which (along with crunch) is one thing that's making me drag my ass. Definitely a struggle!
With 85 subtools, this guy has been a PAIN in the ass to manage. What Past Gavin thought was a good idea, Present Gavin is calling a n00b mistake. But, here we are, the first pass at a bake - there's still some areas to clean up which I will probably do with a more focused bake in isolated areas then clean up smaller problem areas as I go.
Up next is baking down a hue/shift mask, direcitonal light mask and quickly getting cav maps out of CB before (hopefully, no promises) starting textures this weekend.
On the subject of subtools. Do you have a rule for what should be together in a subtool and what shouldn't? Been having the same problem with too many subtools because of splitting up. Awesome character so far though can't way to see the textures !!!
Swizzle: Damn Straight.
Callesw: Cheers.
Shrew: Yeah...that sounds about right
Morgan: Thanks, I still think the music on your reel was weird. Just sayin'
Rednaz: Thanks!
Nightowl: No real rule, per se, but I do try to group things together that will be baked into an element. So, for an easy example, if the jacket has cuffs, pockets, buttons, etc. I'd just leave that all as one tool most times now - this guy, though, I seemingly did the exact opposite (again, 85 f'n subtools.) I did have things named per group, which made things a little easier...still a huge pain though
the normal bake however looks like has lot of vertex smoothing in it and not really receiving proper normal map. this usually happens if the mesh is not triangulated or the bake is not using proper tangent space.
i see these errors specially on the bullets, jackets cuffs, ends of the hair locks and the bullet belt and the hip belt mainly.
Thanks (again) for really helpful feedback, man. Some of the spots you've picked out are definitely on my radar to fix up - and you've pointed out some new ones. will get on that
Amazing work, guys. Seeing this stuff totally humbles me.
Slipgate, your armor designs are too good. The only thing that bothers me about your concept is that without you saying that it's an elf, we have no way of knowing. It would be nice if there was something else to hint at that. Maybe some stereotypically elven tattoos on the face / arms, or incorporating the 'pointed ears' into the helmet design, which currently has circular shapes over the ears, making it seem even less elven. Some skewed facial structure could also work (though you're a little limited by having parts of the face covered and obscured). Something like what Skyrim did with it's elvish races. Your character is awesome, I just think that while it hits 'near future', it misses on 'urban fantasy'. My 2 cents.
Some texture work that I've been puttering at (some of you have seen it in the google hangout) - there's still some areas I need to fix up and some fussy details I want to add, but, I figured an update wouldn't hurt:
Fucking awesome, Gav. It'd be amazing if you posted a quick explanation of how you went about using you bakes in texturing. I'm especially curious about the black outlines a lot of your details have. I'm guessing it's all procedural, not hand-painted, but it looks really good.
Malus: Thanks!
gir: Oh you - that's just me holding down shift rather than pressing f12. I was tired.
Stromberg: Thanks dude! And, yes, you should - it can be really fun.
dirigible: Thanks, and here you go - let me know if this helps at all.
I usually follow the same process for most things I make, this one is definitely a bit heavy in the baked in lighting department, technically probably way too much as it could probably screw with realtime lighting. I'm also going for a bit more of an illustrated look, and thought the effect worked well.
I start off with my base colours, more or less just selectign the bigger shapes and dropping in colours that I want. not getting too hung up on details and such - just main material changes.
After that I add in detail - patterns, grime, wear and tear, etc. (this actually usually comes after all of the lighting maps are compiled - but I got lazy)
Next, I multiply a medium contrast spec map from Crazybump generated from my final normal map. I set this to Softlight in PS at a low intensity.
Then, I get a higher contrast soec map from Crazybump - which is more or less a cavity map - and multiply it over my texture. This is most likely where you're seeing the outlines coming from - usually I set this really low - though this guy is an exception. I also use this map as a spec fresnel map when it is applicable and in my spec / gloss maps.
Next - I bake out a hue/shift map using an orange/blue capsule as a light source. I set this very low as a soft light layer at a very low intensity. This helps ground the texture and give it some sun damage.
After that, I bake out a light map and set it as a low intensity soft light. I find this helps pop out details, but can be really dangerous - again - as baked in lights can interfere with real lighting.
Then the ao map, pretty standard, multiplied over the diffuse. In this case, it's fairly high - usually I keep it at a moderate intensity and colorize it.
Again - I think I'm breaking some rules here and went a little wild with lighting information. I'm happy with the results as is, though, and I think it can work for a more stylized approach
I think I know how to do most of what you're doing. The problem I run into is, maya on my computer can't really handle models made of hundreds of thousands or millions of polygons, so it's hard for me to bake lighting information using the high poly model. Do you run into slowdown in Max with that kind of thing?
My current workaround is to use the green channel of a world-space normal map to get lighting information - but it has drawbacks compared to the real thing (no shadows cast, for instance). And I think I rely on it too heavily in my textures.
I bake my normals and ambient occlusion with xnormal, a separate application that doesn't have a viewport - so - practically no slowdown on my machine. If you absolutely need to bake your stuff down in Maya, you could try doing it in pieces of decimated models, that might help
for the lighting maps themselves, I bake them in Max with RTT using my low poly model and my normal map. The mental ray map (hueshift) takes a while...like 10 - 20 minutes but its all pretty light on the machine.
Awesome stuff man, I dig that sculpt a lot! The lighting in your texture doesn't bother me but I think it's extremely dark, and the cavity seems to be causing heavy black lines in some places. On his metal arm bits I think it looks fine but around the boots for example are kind of loosing their detail from a distance because the smaller scale stuff is being drowned out by the darkness of it all.
I like using the crazybump spec maps too, but I usually add a curves adjust in the layer above it which kills some of the heavy dark lines.
Hope that made sense, I'm nitpicking too much! Cant wait for more of this dude.
I bake my normals and ambient occlusion with xnormal, a separate application that doesn't have a viewport - so - practically no slowdown on my machine. If you absolutely need to bake your stuff down in Maya, you could try doing it in pieces of decimated models, that might help
for the lighting maps themselves, I bake them in Max with RTT using my low poly model and my normal map. The mental ray map (hueshift) takes a while...like 10 - 20 minutes but its all pretty light on the machine.
Yeah, I use xNormal too, but I figured that you were baking hueshift and lighting and stuff using your high poly model. It blows my mind that you can do that with the normal map. Gonna have to try that in maya.
Decimation does allow me to work on stuff in maya. I don't normally decimate lower than like 100K tris per object (less for small/simple objects o'course), since past that I start really noticing the loss of detail. For a character like you're making, that level of decimation would still net way more than a million polygons total. I guess at that point I'd either just have to work in chunks, or bite the bullet and decimate down more.
Really, I just wish xNormal had a feature for understanding lights, and baking lighting.
@ Gav, the dark lines on the skin seems a bit too much. it might work you use use a saturated color instead of black, unless this is a particular cel shaded style you are going after ?
Really, I just wish xNormal had a feature for understanding lights, and baking lighting.
@ dirigible - you can just bake an AO in xnormal with ground blockers or any blockers from any angles. basically you would just block uniform lighting and thereby forcing more light from top.
@ dirigible - you can just bake an AO in xnormal with ground blockers or any blockers from any angles. basically you would just block uniform lighting and thereby forcing more light from top.
I used to do this, but stopped recently for a couple reasons
1. it takes forever to bake. Ambient occlusion already takes a long time (in xnormal), and baking with a ground plane or bowl takes even longer
2. the bake usually has some nasty banding and artifacting in it that requires manual tweaking in photoshop
3. the bake is still an actual ambient occlusion bake - meaning I get dark areas where I shouldn't. It also doubles up on my normal ambient occlusion, which gives me some irritating results.
It's a really cool technique, but it's a lot of trouble for an imperfect result. If I really need to get the results I'll probably go back to it, but all in all I'd like to be able to actually bake lighting.
One thing I noticed is that some of the ambient occlusion info is pure (or near pure) black and in some areas this doesn't really work to well. A good example would be the feathers around the vulture's neck and the guy's dreadlocks, they feel very solid while I'd expect hair and feathers to be fluffy or at least soft. (and I feel like the AO is a bit strong on the face too)
Anyway, great looking model and thanks for the texture breakdown!, so many maps
Thanks guys, all valid points that I'll try to get to when "really" finishing this dude (which I hope will be on the weekend....back to work now :P)
That gradient method is an interesting approach - I might have to try that. I think it's a similar approach to the hueshift / capsule thing that I'm doing, just that it won't double up on the baked in lighting info...which could be good. Thanks for sharing!
that gradient method wouldn't achieve the same results. it would be a close approximation at best.
i think the quickest way to "fake" the same effect would be using the green channel of a bent normalmap as a mask for a gradient adjustment layer in photoshop.
edit: just tested, and that works. it's not as accurate as the way Gav did it, and it can lose some of the darker areas. but it definitely has the correct gradients based on lighting direction.
Looking badass Gav! I agree with what others have said about the heavy black lines on the face. That gradient method LRoy linked is more for a flat gradient without any of the normal details, not sure if that's what you're after, but anyway yea looking great man and thanks for posting the texture breakdown.
Alright, I need to call this guy done. Entering a more busy period at work, I really don't want to put this guy on the shelf again - especially when, i feel, I'd just end up puttering away. I tried to soften up the blacks following the latest feedback, both in the textures and in the final render (I think the lighting setup I was using was blowing things out - along with having crazy outlines painted in )
Again - thanks to everyone for following, I feel like I've progressed and learned so much from the beginning of this guy until now. It's also been a crazy experience putting this guy on and off the shelf so many times - the first time I've had a side project like this that didn't just die when other things came up.
I didn't have a ton of time to do a fancy pose, so I just dropped him out of his base pose and did a nice render set up. I'd love to go back and rig him up proper, but again, really don't have the time in the next coming months.
If you have any questions, just let me know. I'll be watching for feedback and for the inevitable final pieces of my fellow combatants....right...RIGHT!?
Came out looking great, man. I really love the skin texture - very greasy and dirty. Your lighting setup looks really good, are you using a cubemap or did you set up lights in your marmoset scene?
dirigible: Thanks man, and I'm glad someone spotted the Easter Egg(s)
For the lighting set up it's just a group of point lights on either side (pretty much orange group and blue group) with a white light in the back for rim lighting. The beam from his claw is just Marmoset's spotlight.
That fucking bird.. It was worth to wait methinks. Also some valuable info has been acquired during the process. Holding my fingers for the other guys!
Replies
With 85 subtools, this guy has been a PAIN in the ass to manage. What Past Gavin thought was a good idea, Present Gavin is calling a n00b mistake. But, here we are, the first pass at a bake - there's still some areas to clean up which I will probably do with a more focused bake in isolated areas then clean up smaller problem areas as I go.
Up next is baking down a hue/shift mask, direcitonal light mask and quickly getting cav maps out of CB before (hopefully, no promises) starting textures this weekend.
Cheers.
Gav
EDIT> Working on this asset for this long, uncovering a bit of stupid things I did to myself makes me feel like: [ame="
Can we maybe expect some textures say.... December-ish?
Swizzle: Damn Straight.
Callesw: Cheers.
Shrew: Yeah...that sounds about right
Morgan: Thanks, I still think the music on your reel was weird. Just sayin'
Rednaz: Thanks!
Nightowl: No real rule, per se, but I do try to group things together that will be baked into an element. So, for an easy example, if the jacket has cuffs, pockets, buttons, etc. I'd just leave that all as one tool most times now - this guy, though, I seemingly did the exact opposite (again, 85 f'n subtools.) I did have things named per group, which made things a little easier...still a huge pain though
the normal bake however looks like has lot of vertex smoothing in it and not really receiving proper normal map. this usually happens if the mesh is not triangulated or the bake is not using proper tangent space.
i see these errors specially on the bullets, jackets cuffs, ends of the hair locks and the bullet belt and the hip belt mainly.
Thanks (again) for really helpful feedback, man. Some of the spots you've picked out are definitely on my radar to fix up - and you've pointed out some new ones. will get on that
Gav
Slipgate, your armor designs are too good. The only thing that bothers me about your concept is that without you saying that it's an elf, we have no way of knowing. It would be nice if there was something else to hint at that. Maybe some stereotypically elven tattoos on the face / arms, or incorporating the 'pointed ears' into the helmet design, which currently has circular shapes over the ears, making it seem even less elven. Some skewed facial structure could also work (though you're a little limited by having parts of the face covered and obscured). Something like what Skyrim did with it's elvish races. Your character is awesome, I just think that while it hits 'near future', it misses on 'urban fantasy'. My 2 cents.
almighty_gir: Hah, well noticed xD can it be when changing camera or lighting in marmoset?
gir: Oh you - that's just me holding down shift rather than pressing f12. I was tired.
Stromberg: Thanks dude! And, yes, you should - it can be really fun.
dirigible: Thanks, and here you go - let me know if this helps at all.
I usually follow the same process for most things I make, this one is definitely a bit heavy in the baked in lighting department, technically probably way too much as it could probably screw with realtime lighting. I'm also going for a bit more of an illustrated look, and thought the effect worked well.
I start off with my base colours, more or less just selectign the bigger shapes and dropping in colours that I want. not getting too hung up on details and such - just main material changes.
After that I add in detail - patterns, grime, wear and tear, etc. (this actually usually comes after all of the lighting maps are compiled - but I got lazy)
Next, I multiply a medium contrast spec map from Crazybump generated from my final normal map. I set this to Softlight in PS at a low intensity.
Then, I get a higher contrast soec map from Crazybump - which is more or less a cavity map - and multiply it over my texture. This is most likely where you're seeing the outlines coming from - usually I set this really low - though this guy is an exception. I also use this map as a spec fresnel map when it is applicable and in my spec / gloss maps.
Next - I bake out a hue/shift map using an orange/blue capsule as a light source. I set this very low as a soft light layer at a very low intensity. This helps ground the texture and give it some sun damage.
After that, I bake out a light map and set it as a low intensity soft light. I find this helps pop out details, but can be really dangerous - again - as baked in lights can interfere with real lighting.
Then the ao map, pretty standard, multiplied over the diffuse. In this case, it's fairly high - usually I keep it at a moderate intensity and colorize it.
Again - I think I'm breaking some rules here and went a little wild with lighting information. I'm happy with the results as is, though, and I think it can work for a more stylized approach
Gav
And thanks for the breakdown!
I think I know how to do most of what you're doing. The problem I run into is, maya on my computer can't really handle models made of hundreds of thousands or millions of polygons, so it's hard for me to bake lighting information using the high poly model. Do you run into slowdown in Max with that kind of thing?
My current workaround is to use the green channel of a world-space normal map to get lighting information - but it has drawbacks compared to the real thing (no shadows cast, for instance). And I think I rely on it too heavily in my textures.
dirigible:
I bake my normals and ambient occlusion with xnormal, a separate application that doesn't have a viewport - so - practically no slowdown on my machine. If you absolutely need to bake your stuff down in Maya, you could try doing it in pieces of decimated models, that might help
for the lighting maps themselves, I bake them in Max with RTT using my low poly model and my normal map. The mental ray map (hueshift) takes a while...like 10 - 20 minutes but its all pretty light on the machine.
I like using the crazybump spec maps too, but I usually add a curves adjust in the layer above it which kills some of the heavy dark lines.
Hope that made sense, I'm nitpicking too much! Cant wait for more of this dude.
Yeah, I use xNormal too, but I figured that you were baking hueshift and lighting and stuff using your high poly model. It blows my mind that you can do that with the normal map. Gonna have to try that in maya.
Decimation does allow me to work on stuff in maya. I don't normally decimate lower than like 100K tris per object (less for small/simple objects o'course), since past that I start really noticing the loss of detail. For a character like you're making, that level of decimation would still net way more than a million polygons total. I guess at that point I'd either just have to work in chunks, or bite the bullet and decimate down more.
Really, I just wish xNormal had a feature for understanding lights, and baking lighting.
@ dirigible - you can just bake an AO in xnormal with ground blockers or any blockers from any angles. basically you would just block uniform lighting and thereby forcing more light from top.
I used to do this, but stopped recently for a couple reasons
1. it takes forever to bake. Ambient occlusion already takes a long time (in xnormal), and baking with a ground plane or bowl takes even longer
2. the bake usually has some nasty banding and artifacting in it that requires manual tweaking in photoshop
3. the bake is still an actual ambient occlusion bake - meaning I get dark areas where I shouldn't. It also doubles up on my normal ambient occlusion, which gives me some irritating results.
It's a really cool technique, but it's a lot of trouble for an imperfect result. If I really need to get the results I'll probably go back to it, but all in all I'd like to be able to actually bake lighting.
Feel like I'm hijacking the thread, sorry guys
http://www.polycount.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1673060&postcount=40
One thing I noticed is that some of the ambient occlusion info is pure (or near pure) black and in some areas this doesn't really work to well. A good example would be the feathers around the vulture's neck and the guy's dreadlocks, they feel very solid while I'd expect hair and feathers to be fluffy or at least soft. (and I feel like the AO is a bit strong on the face too)
Anyway, great looking model and thanks for the texture breakdown!, so many maps
That gradient method is an interesting approach - I might have to try that. I think it's a similar approach to the hueshift / capsule thing that I'm doing, just that it won't double up on the baked in lighting info...which could be good. Thanks for sharing!
i think the quickest way to "fake" the same effect would be using the green channel of a bent normalmap as a mask for a gradient adjustment layer in photoshop.
edit: just tested, and that works. it's not as accurate as the way Gav did it, and it can lose some of the darker areas. but it definitely has the correct gradients based on lighting direction.
http://www.topogun.com/Docs/docs/UserGuide.Bake.htm
@ Gav - the fingers on this guy looks too skin and bones, may be fatten them up a bit to balance better with the rest of the body.
Alright, I need to call this guy done. Entering a more busy period at work, I really don't want to put this guy on the shelf again - especially when, i feel, I'd just end up puttering away. I tried to soften up the blacks following the latest feedback, both in the textures and in the final render (I think the lighting setup I was using was blowing things out - along with having crazy outlines painted in
Again - thanks to everyone for following, I feel like I've progressed and learned so much from the beginning of this guy until now. It's also been a crazy experience putting this guy on and off the shelf so many times - the first time I've had a side project like this that didn't just die when other things came up.
I didn't have a ton of time to do a fancy pose, so I just dropped him out of his base pose and did a nice render set up. I'd love to go back and rig him up proper, but again, really don't have the time in the next coming months.
If you have any questions, just let me know. I'll be watching for feedback and for the inevitable final pieces of my fellow combatants....right...RIGHT!?
Final:
Breakdown:
Oh you.
Came out looking great, man. I really love the skin texture - very greasy and dirty. Your lighting setup looks really good, are you using a cubemap or did you set up lights in your marmoset scene?
For the lighting set up it's just a group of point lights on either side (pretty much orange group and blue group) with a white light in the back for rim lighting. The beam from his claw is just Marmoset's spotlight.
Spark