[UDK] Bombed Brownstone house
polycounter lvl 14
Okay! So I finished my last project after an insane amount of time! But the I really got a energy boost of finishing it up, so I'm jumping straight onto the next one!
I will be using this panorama for reference and concept. It's done by http://www.3t-studios.com. I've asked for there permission to use there scene just now. So I'm waiting and hoping for them to OK it. Otherwise I will delete this thread.
This time I want to do stuff right. Plan stuff out, meet deadlines, be efficient and smart in my modeling and texturing and most importantly keep things modular (I will be doing hard variations on stuff and use them just once, but use the first module as a base) and maybe do something even bigger with this in the future.
I started of by separating materials and objects trying to completely wrap my mind around this.
THE plans this far
I have a tendency to do stuff more complex then they really are, like zbrushing flat plaster, so I will only be using zbrush were i feel i greatly benefit from it.
I will also try to document everything I'm doing in the highest possible way. I know how much I would've liked a thread like this when I just started with environments and stuff. I'm far from mastering this kind of stuff, but from everything you, Polycount, have teched me i know that i can make this into an interesting thread for all of us
I'm highly encouraging you to ask questions
Next up is a whitebox, a time plan and some texture planning!
I will be using this panorama for reference and concept. It's done by http://www.3t-studios.com. I've asked for there permission to use there scene just now. So I'm waiting and hoping for them to OK it. Otherwise I will delete this thread.
This time I want to do stuff right. Plan stuff out, meet deadlines, be efficient and smart in my modeling and texturing and most importantly keep things modular (I will be doing hard variations on stuff and use them just once, but use the first module as a base) and maybe do something even bigger with this in the future.
I started of by separating materials and objects trying to completely wrap my mind around this.
THE plans this far
- I'm planning on using a vertex color blend shader for the plaster with bricks as a base.
- The concrete pieces will be handled with a simplified version of the one showed by Timothee "roosterMAP" Yeramian. I will be making debris and such with this. It would be easy to make some other props like roadblocks and what not to.
- Make use of decals for leakage, cracks and bullet/explosion holes.
- As shown in the material definition image i will be adding a floor of some sort into the house. I think it will be a wooden floor with beams sticking out. Or just concrete with damaged pieces handing from it..
- Right now I think I'm going to use UDK since I have some limited knowledge about it already. But the looks of CE3 is a bit tempting I have to say.
I have a tendency to do stuff more complex then they really are, like zbrushing flat plaster, so I will only be using zbrush were i feel i greatly benefit from it.
I will also try to document everything I'm doing in the highest possible way. I know how much I would've liked a thread like this when I just started with environments and stuff. I'm far from mastering this kind of stuff, but from everything you, Polycount, have teched me i know that i can make this into an interesting thread for all of us
I'm highly encouraging you to ask questions
Next up is a whitebox, a time plan and some texture planning!
Replies
I've also started to plan the textures. The texel density is 64px/unit.
This is the textures i got so far. I think i can get some foliage in there somewhere to..
Other then that I've started to outline the time estimation, can't say I'm very good at that..
This is what should be done for every object and texture
Though good plan, looks very promising, and it is nice you planned out your texture usage in advanced.
Passerby:cb is crazybump
Anyhow, I jumped straight onto the concrete thingy course I was curious how it would work. The damage is done in Zbrush, so that part got normals. The flat concrete didn't get any yet, since it's just a photo from CGtextures atm. This is how that looks. Not super happy with the damaged part. I think I'll think some more on it and visit it later
And I've done a better blockout. Problems and possibilities is flying over here!
But was it intended to make such lowres textures for the concrete pile? its really blurry and details vanished, cant even notive zbrush detailing there
Good luck with this promising project, I will keep an eye on it.
I started on the bricks that will be under the plaster. The sculpt is done and i tried to use the textures from zbrush, but i got two nasty seams on all of them so i don't think i can use them this heavily.. This is what I've done since the last post..
I'm planing on doing the plaster into a gray texture and just multiplying it in UDK instead. Maybe add a dirt/grime and a leaking layer in the shader. Right now I have one channel for the thorn parts and an other for the cracks, but since they should show up as falloff from the thorn pieces i could bake them together.
Feels good to get into UDK again!
And yes, I'm going to do a better splatter map. I have zero gradients atm. I'll play around some and see.
Rendered out cavity, highlights, a soft shaded map, AO and a normalmap from Zbrush. Also baked AO and Normalmap from xnormals.
Setting the cavity to overlay, highlights to lighten (removed everything darker then 50% gray), soft shade as a base and AO as multiply.
Then I toke a brick texture from cgtextures I thought had a nice contrast and color. Did a smart blur, removed everything but the bricks and did a padding on it. That gave me a solid color layer that I set to blend with the shaded texture.
Thank you sltrOlsson, your organisation is inspirational.
As a disclaimer all of the techniques i use are mixes of different ones gathered on polycount and in tutorials. They're in no way my own
/subscribed
In other news I got an email from the company producing the panormas, and no i can't use it. So what I will to is just keep this image in my head as insperation and use the planing and what not I've allready done for this and apply it to something similar.
I'm thinking of a little wider house, different windows and stuff. Maybe a "concrete-garden" and a house that have been hit by a nuke, which haven't exploded. I'll see if i can draw something up later. Right now there's life poke on my attention.
Can't wait for more updates!
That's... pretty fucking lame. Imho, you change up the silhouette a bit and you're good to go, considering their model is effectively a representation of existing architecture. I mean really, that strikes me as pretty fucking lame of them.
Whatever the case, there's plenty of good brownstone reference available so you don't need to let your already-done work go to waste. Looking forward to more updates, and good luck with the class enrollment!