Low poly game characters for iOS

Beazel

Hey guys.

I am doing my FYP at the moment for University. The overall aim of the project is to recreate 3 high-poly characters into next-gen handheld characters. I am aiming to use the characters with iOS, on the iPad and iPhone. I hope to rig the characters and get some example animations working. And then touch wood get the characters displayed on my Ipod using UDK.

The characters I am planning on re-creating are; Gordon Freeman, Kratos and Master Chief. I know God of War has been made for the PSP but I am a big fan of the character so I wanted to get him in there.

I aiming for a 1000 trangle limit, and 256 texture maps. I plan to also get normal maps working on the characters. I am wondering how effective the normal maps are going to be.

Here is Kratos (WIP). Currently on 997 triangles. Trying to work out the best way of doing the deformable joints topology. I have been reading Ancient Pig's deformation tutorial but I am a bit stuck on my 1000 triangle limit at the minute.



C&C greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Piesandbombs

You're Kratos seems to be coming along nicely, but I'm no character artist, so I'm not of much help there.

I'm interested to see how you handle both Freeman and Master Chief, especially with Master Chief's armor having so many edges.

Good luck mate, I'll be checking in!

Harry

optimisation wise, i feel like some of the edges in the shoulder/pectoral area would be better used in the loincloth type thing, and maybe the ankles could have reduced sides

gilesruscoe

You can take about half the polys you currently have out of the shoulder/back area and also a few from the pectoral area too. Might be worth welding the belt verts too, as that top edge is very small and wont be visable greatly on ios (and its eating up a fair few tris). Personally i would have gone with less sides in the arms also. another thing that stands out to me is his spikey shoulders, could do some rearanging to smooth them out a bit (unless there is some kind of shoulder pad there).

Beazel

Updated the model with your suggestions.

@Pies Any feedback is welcome man! Master Chief will be a bit of a challenge I have started his legs so far but decided I would go down another route. Hopefully I shall have an unoptimized version of him up tonight. Thanks for the boost.

@Harry Big fan of your low poly stuff Harry. I agree about the shoulders and the pecs. I dropped it down to a more balanced topology now. I am trying to keep that loop under his pecs to help with the normal map. Dropped some more polys into the loincloth should definitly help when it comes to skinning/deformation. As for the feet/ankles. I looked at the feet in general and had a bit of a redesign. I looked back on what I had done for a previous model (http://img5.imageshack.us/img5/417/theflashdetailsheet.png) And decided that approach would save a load of triangles. I am thinking wherever or not it's worth moving the cut towards the toes for toe deformation. I know the bone limit for a single skeletal mesh is 75 bones but dunno if it is worth popping a toe in there. Thanks for the C & C. Much appreciated Harry.

@gilesruscoe Thanks for the advice. I cut down the back. You were right there were way too many polygons not affectting the silhouette back there. As for the belt I am planning on keeping it extruded as I am going for a third person with an over the shoulder view, so you do come quite close to the model. (http://www.sirlin.net/storage/post-images/infinity_blade_enemy.png?__SQUARESPACE_CACHEVERSION=1292636570435). Sorry should have mentioned that in the post. The infinity characters are around 8k polys pretty crazy! hopefully I can still get similar results with my limits. I sorted out his shoulders. It's still a bit messy up there but I have attempted to get a smooth shape going on. Thanks again for the feedback.

Hopefully I will have some pictures of Gordon up in a few hours. And I am gonna attempt to get some Master Chief WIP up as well. Thanks again guys.

PogoP

I'm not too hot on topology when it comes to characters, but as far as I can see, it looks like it will deform well. The silhouette looks great, it reads really well. One thing I would say, as I mentioned before, is that the boots/sandals look a little blocking and straight. Apart from that though, no crits whatsoever.

I think it's important to get this stage nailed properly, and other people will be able to help with that. I have no worries about the texture of this bad boy, I've seen your other stuff and it is very good texture-wise, so I can't wait to see these models textured!

Beazel

@PogoP Cheers man. I will take a look at the sandals and re arange some verts. I think I know where you are coming from. Looking forward to texturing. Used to doing 128 maps for handheld so I am looking forward to seeing the results from a 256 map. Thanks for the feedback dude.

Here's Gordon so far. Bit messy around the chest. Need to weld out the symmetry verts. The leg shape is bothering me at the moment. Trying not to go too muscular afterall he is just a scientist. Hope you like it so far guys.

gilesruscoe

Looking alot better on tri usage now on both characters. deforms should work just fine with your current edge loops

ah_lex

You're right, legs are girly at the moment, if you can afford it you could have extrusions to show the suits panels on the legs in the same way you have with the arms. The chest panel comes up a bit higher round the neck in the concepts and renders I've seen - the way you've got it looks a bit like a swat vest rather than a protective suit. Head's a bit fat from the side, wont know till you start on the texture but the jaw shape is vital in this characters make up.

Bruno Afonseca

getting better! but i don´t really understand what you've done to the knee joint.
I do mine like ben does:

3 rings on the outer part, 2 on the inner (the polies between those 2 is going to colapse inside the geometry when flexed)

Beazel

@fonfa Cheers bud. Yer I am a huge fan of Ben myself. I must have got mixxed up along the way and followed on from my own doings. Should be all fixed now. I plan to get them all rigged in the next few days so should be able to see the deformation in action. Thanks for giving me a heads up.

@ah_lex Hey Alex. Yer I originally had the leg panels extruded but I took them out cause I wasn't really sure about what will be indistinguishable at the distance it will be shown. I think like you say about I won't know much till I start texturing so yer see how it goes. Shouldn't be an issue if I do apply an extrude as it will a tiny ammount anyway so shouldn't cause any issues with the unwrap nor the texture. I am pondering over this though glad I aint the only one. As for the chest, I looked back on my references and you are right the chest does come higher up around the neck, well spotted. The head I have scaled in the Y axis, hopefully looks more like Gordon's now. Yer the Jaw is gonna be the key notifier of the head shape. Like you say won't know for sure until I have the texture down.

Thanks for the feedback guys. Definitly helping me in creating these models as well as in the long term. Here are the models as they stand at the moment.

MrNoOne

Deformation loops are wrong on the elbows, you want it the opposite of the way the knees have it. Elbows don't bend in the same direction as your knee you know, unless you broke your arm... ow.

Beazel

@MrNoOne Doh! Well spotted. I had them orignally the other way around on Gordon and must have changed his and then followed on with the others. Thanks for the shout man.

Beazel

Hey Polycounters.

Characters are pretty much finished.

The first shot below is the normals baked using xNormal with an ambient occlusion applied. Extra normal map detail was applied using nDo inside Photoshop. The next 3 shots are the characters at a suitable iOs resoultion; textured with diffuse,normal maps, spec maps and alpha maps (where needed). Will post up more shots later on today with better view of the speculars and texures and so on. Master Chief doesn't have a specular applied yet so will post that up once that is done.

Normals


Screengrabs.

Kratos

Gordon Freeman

Master Chief


Thanks guys.

Memory

I like these, especially the master chief. Your Kratos seems to be losing a lot of the normal information. Depending on how you plan to use this on iOS and in what engine, you may want to add more contrast and light/shadows to your diffuse (really depends on if you need to 'fake it')

Beazel

@Memory Thanks. The characters were planned to be used in UDK. I was tempted to add highlights and shadows like you say, as well as going around the muscles with a light grey brush to help the muscles "bump out" more.

@himadri_sm I read about it here.

ah_lex

Looking good, masterchief is the strongest, main things I can see is the faces on the other two are a bit weak, Gordon's silhouettes is still a bit tubey and thin like a ballet dancer and I agree with Memory's points on Kratos and Gordon.

Addieo

your texturing really picks the models up and brings them up to a really nice quality. Good Job

PogoP

Loving Gordo and Master Chief! Nice work man. Kratos is the weakest atm and could do with the skin texture touching up a little, he looks like stone atm.