What's the workflow here? (Doom 4)

adam

Checked out some leaked artwork from Doom 4 today - - and am wondering what the work flow would be with artwork like this.

Some times they look like the highpoly assets, other times it looks like the baked version of the art.

Either way - whats the workflow here? How would they (or you) create artwork like this and get it down to render mesh specifications?

In my head it would make more sense to bake out the items individually (container, barrel(s), etc. but it looks like it was sculpted as one object (sludge build up on the barrels).

fearian

I think it's high poly sculpts at a lower subdivision level? I can see why you would sculpt on all the barrels together as a coherent damage pass - especially if they're always going to be seen in a trailer like that. But yeah, it does seem odd...

CrazyMatt

It really looks like combined objects all subtool'd to where the major bits stencil'd and the small bits are sub-d a couple times to make some minor indents in with.

ScudzAlmighty

I thought it was concept art that was using a lot of 3d assets. none of it really looked polished enough (to me) to be more than that.

pior

Looks more like 3DCoat voxels than subtools to me !

PixelMasher

hmmmm interesting. seeing as everything gets mega textured, I can see them just polypainting a bunch of stuff at higher res, making unique sculpts of things and having it all get calculated in the mega texture for proper 1:1 texel density at the end.

Peris

It looks like a really bad very time consuming workflow to me
weird how it looks so low res, it does look like 3dcoat voxelstuff

DeadlyFreeze

What background is that from maya?

fearian

I thought mudbox, but it could just be a customized max/maya/modo

Sandro

I don't know, but since their tech calls for every pixel to be pretty much unique (megatexture) and rage seemed to push that handcrafted style it makes sense.

I imagine having nice asset management extension to working 3d app. Grab a barrel, grab container, merge, sculpt, decimate, bake and send it to engine. You still need to give proper attention to this kind of asset if you choose to do it conventionally in engine - move around/assemble meshes together, break them up with texture/shader variations, make decals, blend shaders, various debris pieces e.t.c and still not be able to tie them together like that, so I don't think this technique is too wasteful if you have proper tools/workflow.

Bibendum

http://www.dsogaming.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/buildings_eaten4.jpg

When I first saw this shot I actually thought it looked like 3D Scan data. 3DCoat seems like it would make sense though.

sebas

There's an image called 'ornate_balcony2.jpg' within the RAR file they link, it shows a little message from the program used... which program it belongs to? anyway, he probably was using several programs...

ericdigital

^^ that would be total 3dcoat tool tip status

arshlevon

seems they have a library of high poly assets that they cobble together and then convert to voxels. this can be decimated, uved and baked out. the advantage i see for this is overdraw. if you take 100 objects combine them into one big uniquely textured object you greatly reduce overdraw. since texture resolution is not really an issue with id tech, i see methods like this improving overall performance to make way for more effects, and other things.

3DKnight

technically overdraw means drawing the same vertex again and again and again, like looking through transparent planes (vfx or vtrees, for example)

It would drastically reduce part/object count, since everything can be merged into one object. Load times would be higher though and level starts, having to load up all the textures at once, since they are part of the same file, no matter weather they are close to the player or not.


Megatexturing has it's pros and cons.

Fuse

I think having it all an enclosed mesh helps the stamping process.

mikezoo

wow. seems pretty crazy that the guy would "leak" over 170 assets. hmm