Fort-Bravo assets scene

Jbird

This is my first time posting on Polycount, so it's a little bit scary, but I think I'm ready for it now . (My buddy (karatekodden) kinda got me to do it)

Anyhow, this thread is focusing on assets creation, I'm gonna to create a tiny tiny environment-plattform where's I'll then will display my diffrent assets.

Now let's get on with this.

Jbird

Jbird

Jbird

Thought it would be cool to throw in a laptop there.

Snader

Lots of unnecessary edgeloops. I think you have the same thing on the crate. They could be a lot more poly-efficient.

Jbird

There we go, now you can catch up a little bit to where I am today, this is the current stage of the scene. Weren't to sure about throwing dirt on the laptop texture, but it probably makes more sense with it dirty since sand basically gets into every corner and quick too , if the wind is blowing. Kinda like the look of it now though, especially the screen.








I'm gonna get some more stuff into this little assets-showcase-scene ASAP, thinking about creating a Anti-Tank weapon like the M136AT4 to put against one of the walls. Also thinking about creating some grenades.

Jbird

Snader, thx for the critique, well I tried keeping it more simple at first but the normal map looked screwed up the first attempts until I actually added some more geomtry..

Jbird

Also tried removing some afterwards, but that just messed the UV:s up..

Jbird

Snader, actually worked removing some without messing up the normal map, so I'm gonna take a look at how much i can decrease the polycount without affecting the normal map.. Though first I need to put some food in my belly

Jbird

So I updated the mesh a little bit, decreasing the polycount from 1888 tris to 1272.

snow

laptop turned out pretty ace

your walls look as though they'd benefit just as well with a tilable texture.

Personally, I think the material definition of the crate is a little off, could almost be interpreted as made of some sort of green leather. Did you use any reference for it?

i'm glad your friend made you start posting XD

Jbird

Snow, thanks a lot for the kind words m8, kinda made wanna produce awesome stuff and post the shit out of this thread ( pardon my french).

You are probably right about the walls there, I basically thought it would be fun trying to sculpt a stonewall. But yeah it probably wouldn't hurt the scene to have it tiled as they are pretty much background objects.

About the crate, half-matte plastic material quality to it, tried to achieve something like it, maybe I should decrease the noise in the normal map to make it more smooth? These are the two key reference pics for the model. Cheers!

Jbird

Updated the mesh, normal map and diffuse a tad bit on this one, it has gone from 2 340 tris to 1 662 tris . Now I'm gonna start figuring out what to do next, thinking I'll might do that Anti-Tank weapon...

Cheers!

Jbird

I've started on this one, just outlining some parts and getting the placements right.

Jungsik

I like the idea, its great so far, the wall needs a bit of texture lovin?..it looks a bit weird to me

Noodle!

If these are assets in the same scene they really need to have a more unified resolution. The normals and textures on the wall have extremely low detail compared to the resolution on the laptop.

Furthermore the walls sides have very obvious and bad looking mirroring as it is now, and overall I think the geometry needs to support the sculpt better. Completely black recesses also look unnatural.

I'm not sure if the brighter stuff on the laptop is scratches or part of some camo look for the texture. If it's scratches I think you need to think about how scratches are created and place them a lot more carefully than just going wild with a brush in photoshop.
Same goes for the dust on the crate, the way it has veins now make little sense to me. If you want it to be worn you should probably also add some wear and tear aside from the dust.

The scene where you put your assets also have a few weird bits, such as the three boulders having an extremely gritty texture quite unlike any boulder I've ever seen.

I think before moving on to other assets, you should work a bit more on the ones you have.

snow

I agree you should nail the first few props before moving on, as boring and tedious as it can get, you'll thank yourself for polishing them in the end.

Really quick paint over for how you can still cut a few more pollies out of it. I also desatured and darkened your original colour (we dont want terrorists to see our crate from across the desert do we?), and also put a grey background so its a bit easier on the eyes.

I'd totally remove the detailed normal map, and put all the detail in the spec and see how that works for you.

Jbird

Yo, so I've been trying to decrease the poly count even further without hurting the look of the model. But it ends up messy, do se the diagonal shadowed areas where the new splits are versus the other version? and its even worse on the sides. Can i fix this by painting on the normalmap? or smooth and hard diffrent edges?

I'm gonna see what can be done..

Jbird

so I've changed a lot on the topology and UV-mapped this one again and also i baked some new maps... it's currently at 1308 Tris and I probably can't adjust much more without loss in mesh structure. Now I just need to make a few adjustments to the freshly baked AO and Normal map and re-texturize it :P. But it's looking good now so that's nice..

After I'm done with this I will look over all the other things you guys mentioned before moving on with the next asset. Grateful for your C&C.
Peace!

Jbird

Thought I might answer some questions while I'm at it.

Noodle!, You're absolutely right about the walls in relation to the other props in the scene, I'm gonna look in what to do about them, I'll probably just redo them and make a low poly that follows the shapes of the hi-poly in a better fashion.

About the texture for the computer, the bright things are just supposed to be sand, I liked the computer clean and fresh at first . But I thought that it might make more sense and add more story to it if I add a lot of sand to it, since if there's a sandy environment it would probably get into every little space possible if a wind blows up.

The texture on the crate as it is at the moment does feel a bit flat to be honest and I'm not entirley satisfied with it. I just had a hard time figuring out what sort of wear and tear that would have gotten this kind of an object and how it would affect a plastic surface like the once on the ref-pics. As I'm going to redo it I'll be sure to put some more time and effort into making it look better. Also as i mentioned in the previous post I'll look into what to do with the boulders and walls after the crate is in better shape and style.

Snow, yeah tedious indeed, kinda wanted to cry a bit when the crate was F-ing with me (well not really, but almost) . But it's pretty much as you are saying, put more effort into making them look good now and I'll feel better about them later on.

hehe nah we definitely wouldn't want that, we want to surprise them, or something.. I put some thought into the choice of color though I admit it could use some a desaturated look. But as for the color in general you might think why have a green crate in a desert-type environment? I thought that it would be kinda boring if everything went in the same lame sandy color and sometimes resources are running short and all that sand camo gear might already be taken. Actually saw that in the HBO series Generation Kill where's the marines hadn't gotten their sand-como kits so they where running around in forest green pants and jackets with sand-camo kevlarvest, helmets and other shenanigans.

Jbird

So I redid this one, its currently on 1308 tris. I also did a completely new texture for this one, a little more desaturated green with lots of dust covering it and laying around in the corners and foldings. I think i turned out pretty good, but I don't know what you guys think.

I'm currently going back and changing the rocks a bit and redoing the walls.

cheers!

3DVlad

Hi Jbird. I think your storage compartment is way to bright for military environment. It looks almost like lime, and all the details like the dirt and scratches you've put into it are kind of unreadable as a result. Why don't you just use normal military olive green of darker color, that way your bright sand/dirt is really going to pop. Also add some white scratches on points of contact and make them dark in the spec do give prop more history and make it more interesting.

Jbird

3Dvlad, thanks a lot for the critique, I thought i post this pic with the environment to get a better picture of the ambiance, mood and lighting ( even though i can't stand the look of those lo-res ugly walls ). I had the same lights for the individual pics of the crate so that might contribute to the bright looking colors.

though, now I actually changed the diffuse colors a bit, made the overall green a tad bit darker, made the spec a bit darker where the sand is to decrease the shininess where the sand is located. Also a added some of the sand parts, like the "swiped" areas to make it pop some more and make it more interesting.

Jbird

So I have made some changes to the scene and kinda feel I'm getting there. I went back and redid the walls from scratch now with a more drayed clay/mud like structure (seen those in a bunch of photos from areas around the world but mostly in the middle east area)

I also added a hint of vegetation and some rubble beneath and around the walls. Also changed the diffuse and normal for the boulders a bit (not so noisy anymore). Also did a few changes to the normal and diffuse of the ground, reducing the darkness of the pre-baked AO and adding small bits and piece to enhance the diffuse.

So what does my unofficial board of Art Directors think about all this?

Cody

that's much better for sure. The laptop and box are well done, and also the plant and terrain look nice. The rock texture however, i think is too low res compared to the other textures in the scene. as far as the style of the wall, maybe try something like this -> http://us.123rf.com/400wm/400/400/brozova/brozova0906/brozova090600050/5118466.jpg

keep working, looks good.

Snader

3 questions:
-can we see a closeup of the clasps?
-will the box ever get opened?
-does the box have an inside?

Jbird

Cody, Thanks for the critique, I'm gonna see what I can do about them rocks but for now I think I'm gonna keep that wall since I'll be putting more stuff in the scene the walls will probably not be as big of a point of interest as they are now. But if I feel it brings down the overall impression I surly change it.

Snader, first: there's your close up, second: It won't ever be opened and third: it has no interior.


have a good one!

Jbird

So I have gone back to working on the AT-4. I still have a lot of stuff to do on this one, but this is it's current state. The Idea here is to make a FPS view version of it, hopefully it doesn't look too weird with it in the Fort-Bravo scene. If so I might make a "Pick up" version of it too, but we'll see about that.

Cheers!

Jbird

Hellu! So this weekend I've took some time to work on this guy, I'm pretty much calling it done as far as the hi-poly i concerned. Well unless you guys can find something ridiculously ugly or some minor errors that I can fix before moving on.

auf Wiedersehen!

Jbird

So this is how the bake turned out after some tinkering with the mesh and settings and other stuff. Some stuff that needs a little bit of a touch up but all in all i can work with this. Its on 4201 Tris, as i mentioned earlier it's meant as a FPS-view weapon model. Crits and Comments are most welcome, any help, tips I can get is great!

Jbird

hello and all that , So I've finished up the textures on this one, been having some friends come visit over the weekend and been dealing with other stuff, so haven't put any effort in documenting the whole texturing process since i figuered I should focus on getting this one done instead . Anyhow I feel pretty much done with this guy at this moment, it landed on 4225 tris, as always, critique, comments are welcome. Gonna see how it fits in my assets-scene aswell. Cheers! :P

Drav

Your props are good, the walls and scenery dont match the quality of the props tho, they need more work imo.

Jbird

Thanks Drav, yeah people keep saying that, :S personally i don't think it's that bad, since my main focus has been three particular assets. I'll see what to do about it, It's all marmorset so it's not super handy to create nice environments in it. Maybe all just stuff the scene full with hi-tech war assets so you don't see the crappy environment parts . Cheers!

Contrails

The environment is still important because it is such a big part of your presentation. If the quality isn't on par with your props, it draws away attention and generally gives a weak impression.

AT-4 turned out well - just FYI, if it's not actively being used, the ironsights should be folded in. I don't know the reason, but they're popped out as part of the preparation to fire (along with pushing the gazillion safteys )

Jbird

Thanks for the Critique, Although it would be helpful if you could be a little more specific and maybe come with own tips on how to achieve a better look. You're not alone, see this not only in my thread but all over the forum, people saying like "that looks wrong.. I would change that and that..." but not giving actual tips on what that person would have changed, why and sometimes actually giving tips how that is achieved. Usually when I ask my friends they say stuff like "I would add that to get a more realistic look, or but some crap into that texture.." and that was some critique on your critique . Seeming I have changed my tiny environment some times now it kinda looks like I'm running out of ideas how to "easily" fix it.

When I made the rocks for the scenery I looked at the rocks in the Modern Warfare 2 map called Afghan and tried to match their looks (not to fancy imo) as I'm going for like a FPS quality I thought it would make sense. What would you guys want to see change, how and why? that would be helpful for me.

About the AT4 Contrails, I looked at the Battlefield 3 episodic gameplay trailers and they had them up even when given to from another game character, on my version you could fold them in and same goes for the front grip. Gazillions safteys indeed, makes sense though, accidently fiering one could most likely cost your life. cheers

Jbird

A little update on the scene, probably gonna use shots that are a little bit closer since you can't really read the different props that well from a greater distance.

ParoXum

I'm not sure about the size of your rocket laucnher in this. Looks like a tiny version of an actual one.

I think individually the assets work, but somehow when all put together it doesnt blend nicely. It's lacking proper composition I guess and attention to detail between the different objects like your ground and wall, plant and sand, tire marks on sand (why the hell?), etc.

Envart

nice, this is a vast improvement on the original versions! Box stands out as too clean in that scene though. It also needs detailing imo, scuffs, toe print where it was kicked, slight dents, scratches, small stickers, catalogue numbers. All that good stuff. Love the rocket launcher!

Jbird

Okey doodes...

ParoXum, I scaled them up slightly they are not very big in reality though so bare that in mind, it's not like the good ol'bazookas back in the day. I can understand some of the stuff you are pointing out. I thought I would add some story by adding the tire marks as if some one dropped all this equipment and then driven away. Though the tracks wouldn't really appeared like that, more likely it would have been deep trails in the sand, though depending on how deep/packed the sand is. Easy solution = remove them from the diffuse and normal map or the more time consuming way, redo the ground from scratch. Ill see what i do about it. thanks for the critique though, and big ups on the nice environments you've created.

Yo Walrus, thanks for the kind words , yeah some more dirt and grittiness on the box would make it more coherent. right now I'll probably jump in on my next prop for this scene. I have noticed that once added more stuff to the scene it effects everything so I'll prolly start working on my next prop and rework some textures along the way.

thanks for leaving your comments dudes, till next time, keep it real






some reference of that AT4.




This one is even tinier than the AT4, it's a M141 Bunker Defeat Munition or "BDM"



and just for the sake of scale, here's a uber long bazooka.

Contrails

here are some more specific crits - hopefully they help, sorry I wasn't too specific the first time around

- the transition between the wall and ground is a little obvious, especially in the texture - most visible on the left side of your above screen - making it all one combined model may help
- rocks are low poly and texture could be improved, especially that huge crack - if you're going to keep it, alter the geometry a little so it's indented along that crack to help with your normal
- in regards to the overall composition, like paroxum said, it is lacking in composition and a story - if you're aiming for discarded equipment left on the side of a road, it should be battered up more and not as perfectly laid out (why discard perfectly good equipment?)

- my personal recommendation would be to base a scene around a compound occupied by troops for use as an OP or something. It would be a lot more interesting with buildings, more vegetation, and generally a more lived in look - pots and pans, water bottles, and trash scattered around along with the actual military equipment.

it would mean a lot more work, but it's just a suggestion

(here is some ref as well as a good story: http://www.michaelyon-online.com/precision-voting.htm not exactly what I have in mind, but you should be able to get the idea)

as for the AT-4, I'm not sure what battlefield 3 is doing, but it seems to be SOP to prep the ironsights in the preparation to fire - just checked the AT-4 wikipedia entry, it's in the operation section

Jbird

Contrails, way to go! glad you took the time, this is the stuff I'm looking for. A lot of valid points there, the transition between objects isn't super sexy and not the rocks either, kinda thinking I might not show them anymore since showing them also means getting further and further away from what i actually want this to focus upon (specific selection of props).

I think I haven't been super clear about what this small bit of scenery is supposed to be. The main idea here is to create game assets with a theme (modern warfare) and then display them in little nicer fashion than just put them against a black/grey background. Think of it more as a show window, I wanted a little nice setting for them to be displayed in altogether. Don't get me wrong now peeps, i don't want it to look bad just because of this but making a banged up city block with destroyed cars and burning buildings wasn't quite the plan here ( FYI I would probably have chosen a engine more suitable for that stuff too if that was the case, like UDK).


This is like the pic that I have had somewhere in the back of my head when creating this scene, think i had this pic as a wallpaper back in the day when i was like 10 years old or something like that.

Still very grateful for you guys taking the time giving feedback on ma stuff, its nice. cheers!

Jbird

So I finally got some time left over to work on this guy, had some visitors here over the weekend and the weather was great so we have mostly been out seeing what's going down in Stockholm.

Anyways, this is still a quite heavy WIP, lots of stuff left, straps, snaps, zippers and some detailing and what not. Figuered it might be nice to show you guys that I'm still alive and kickin'. Cheers! :P

mikhga

I really love your high-polys, especially the laptop.

Maybe it's not the kind of look you're going for, but I would like to see the AT-4 with a little more wear and tear, just my personal opinion. Other than that your props look great.

Lycka till i forts

Jbird

Mikhga, thanks a lot, I'm glad you do. I can see your point with the wear and tear, I definitely increased it for the "pick up" version of the AT-4 in the scene just to make it fit a little bit better. I don't think it would hurt the main model with some more wear and tear but I'm still quite happy with it, it's always a little bit of a balance thing there.

Hur som helst, tack för din feedback, har du någon sida där man kan kika på vad du har gjort? alltid kul att se lite vad folk pysslar med. Ha det fint!

mikhga

That sounds great. Do you have any plans for how large the scene is going to be or are you just thinking stuff up as you go? I really hope you take this scene to it's maximum because I think it's going to look amazing with a few more props/weapons stuffed in there.

Faktiskt s

Jbird

The overall scene size will probably remain something like this, but I will add stuff and mix things up as I go on. I'll send you a PM regarding your portfolio and university stuff.

chrisradsby

I don't know, I like the assets but the scene looks kinda out of proportion to me. Place something that resembles a human in there. I'm getting confused haha xD Mainly because a wall like that resembles something you take cover behind. Guess I'm just too used to playing video-games with walls up to the players hip xD

Wesley

I know you've changed the topology of the equipment case a couple of times already... but, why don't you just have those handles as separate geometry? I looks like the locks already are.

Edit: Woah, did not see that second page there, heh. :poly136:

n88tr

ur laptop reminds me of the COD MW2 one

Jbird

Okey guys,

Chrisradsby, Yeah I know what you mean, it has kinda made myself a bit confused at times, but the wall is slightly higher (check the image). By the way kudos on the cool stuff you are making.

Wesley, they have been separate from the box the whole time, anyway cheers!

N88tr, Well actually I kinda had that predator missile laptop from COD MW2 in the back of my head when doing it.

This one's for chris .




And here are the final pics of the hi-poly backpack, man my crappy ass computer really had to struggle with the final sessions in Zbrush.

n88tr

the front snaps on the backpack, ones across the chest, look really small and fragile