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LOW-POLY ART

polycounter lvl 19
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hawken polycounter lvl 19
This is the sweet spot for your low-poly models. Post 'em if you've got 'em!

Low-poly hasn't really been a requirement in the games industry for a long while now. This thread is for low-poly art style appreciation, so please take note of these rough guidelines:
  • Keep models under 1,000 triangles.
  • Scenes are fine, if all models are low poly.
Some dedicated low-poly modelling tools now exist that make this art style a lot easier to produce; Crocotile3D & Blockbench

Here's a handy list of ways to make your art look right in mainstream 3D software: Low-Poly Art Style Guide

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  • Snader
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    Snader polycounter lvl 15
    BaddCog - Keep size/sides ratio in mind. Right now your wheels and head light both are 8 sided, though the lamp is much smaller.

    MightyPea - considering we're on polycount, specifically in the lowpoly thread, the educated guess would be triangles. Which turned out to be incorrect.
  • Mr_Drayton
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    Mr_Drayton polycounter lvl 14
    A-a-a-awesome, 9skulls! I'd really love to get into Edge Splitters... If only I had time! *___*
  • hawken
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    hawken polycounter lvl 19
    like how thats going Baddcog
  • hawken
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    hawken polycounter lvl 19
    9skulls nice work. the scarf animation is a bit weird though, not so smooth on the eye. A standard wave motion would work better.
  • sketch81
    Fabulous model and idea 9skulls. I'll give it a go.
    Baddcog - looking sweet dude, keep it up!
  • 9skulls
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    9skulls polycounter lvl 13
    @Mr_Drayton, sketch81 Can't wait to see what you come up with! :D
    hawken wrote: »
    9skulls nice work. the scarf animation is a bit weird though, not so smooth on the eye. A standard wave motion would work better.
    Yeah it is weird right? I modelled the scarf to maintain a certain shape, so animating it to flow completelly smoothly would brake the shape and look probably just weird anyways. So instead, I animated it to look kinda stiff plastic or something to emphasize the "toon" aspect of my character. Which, in the end, looks just wrong.

    I may revisit the model later anyway to make some additional animations and will probably redo the scarf while I'm at it.
  • Kurt Russell Fan Club
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    Kurt Russell Fan Club polycounter lvl 9
    Sweet bike 9skulls. No bikes from me, just some WIP enviro work, trying to get the look down. All textures are between 32 and 128. The room totals I'm aiming for 1,500 tris for small rooms up to 3,000 for bigger ones.

    eqtm1.png

    The doorways in particular are total placeholder :)
  • Baddcog
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    Baddcog polycounter lvl 9
    I just noticed 9skulls. Your hubs don't spin.
  • supersamm.
    Working on some new ideas for a game by my studio Raptus Games not decided on pixel style but leaning haha...

    dragons.png

    (this is a bit cheap) but if you like my style check out my indie studio Raptus Games and maybe buy my latest game DRAW: The Showdown on the app store!

    give me some crit on those dragons, cheers
  • 9skulls
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    9skulls polycounter lvl 13
    supersamm. Can you please post the wires aswell? I wanna see where all the tris went :P Oh and what is the size of those textures?
  • Ani
    @9skulls Nice bike!
    @Kurt Great work, liking the colours and simplicity of those environments.

    Just a low poly bust from me, I rarely ever work with male heads. It's very odd around the jaw but that's mainly cause I was messing around with the mesh after uving and I suck at painting shadows :poly136:

    118 tris
    6231708107_f05e1ee8cb_o.png
  • Kurt Russell Fan Club
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    Kurt Russell Fan Club polycounter lvl 9
    Ani: awesome! That guy looks rad.
    Hboybowen wrote: »
    what do you use for you textures creation? I remember you mentioning filter forge awhile back..was that used on this scene too?

    Yep, I used Filter Forge for a lot of the textures on there.

    I started off by blocking in the grey platform in Max using coloured quads to show where major pixels would go. Then I took a screencap (for other assets I sometimes RTT) to get a base and then recreated the texture in Filter Forge, adding details here and there.

    Here's a quick visual explanation:

    VvzzM.png

    I've blocked in all my environments to get the colours I want and now I'm using about six different filters to block in the details in the same way :)
  • supersamm.
    the wires....
    wires.png

    basically its for the animation planned for the character. Texture is just 128 with plenty of space for little addons.
  • Baddcog
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    Baddcog polycounter lvl 9
    @supersam, I like him, but you could kill 80 tris easy by welding the top verts of the spines (leave square from side view) and it wouldn't be noticeable at all really.

    And how bendy will his arms/legs be?1 bone per segment?
  • Cap Hotkill
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    Cap Hotkill polycounter lvl 13
    He probably made it that way so he could tile the texture all over the body.
  • Snader
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    Snader polycounter lvl 15
    Sure, but at this point you gotta ask yourself: is it worth doubling the amount of triangles to use a 64² instead of a 128x64. And if this is going to be run on a device that uses 1000 tris as a normal amount, he'd be better off with a 128² or even a 256².
  • thatanimator
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    thatanimator polycounter lvl 6
    supersamm. wrote: »
    basically its for the animation planned for the character

    those "spikes" on his back are not gonna come out well at all once you start animating the back and tail..since they are not part of the same mesh as the rest of the dragon, they're gonna be sliding all over the place once you start animating/(offsetting) the vertices which make up the body.

    I had this problem with the wyvern I did. I quickly changed to having all my spikes as one with the rest of the mesh, as they were sliding around during subtle movement and straight up becoming floaters when rotating joints a lot.

    I know you wanna keep it low poly and all and you did a good job with everything, but unless you know of a technique that I don't when it comes to stuff like that, I'd say you'd have to start cutting into edges :poly122:
  • Fomori
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    Fomori polycounter lvl 12
    9skulls: Awesome model, presentation and post. I was entertained!

    Ani: wonderful as usual. Reminiscent of something from Zelda.
  • supersamm.
    so with the dragon if i choose him for the character design he will have a bone in each segment of the body from there another bone will go to each spike the rig will be made to have his body seperate for funny animations.
  • Mr_Drayton
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    Mr_Drayton polycounter lvl 14
    supersamm. wrote: »
    so with the dragon if i choose him for the character design he will have a bone in each segment of the body from there another bone will go to each spike the rig will be made to have his body seperate for funny animations.

    But this would make an huge amout of bones, too many! o_o

    Since you're on a mobile platform, you should use as less bones as possible to get the best performance.
    The most detailed character(s) in the game should not use more than 20 bones for the entire body (chest, limbs, head, etc)...
  • supersamm.
    im using unity according to the info on the website it recommends no more than 60 bones per character.
  • 9skulls
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    9skulls polycounter lvl 13
    those "spikes" on his back are not gonna come out well at all once you start animating the back and tail..since they are not part of the same mesh as the rest of the dragon, they're gonna be sliding all over the place once you start animating/(offsetting) the vertices which make up the body.
    ^ this.

    Unless you add extra loops for every single joint in the tail, the spikes are going to pump up'n'down in extreme positions. Though it would look even worse if you made the tip of the spikes (the top 2 vertices) use 50-50 weight of two bones instead of one.

    IMHO even bigger problem is the tail itself, since it is not going to look too good without dem joint loops...

    tb-render-1.giftb-render-2.gif


    EDIT
    Oh god what have I done. They look like suffering worms. PLEASE LET THEM OUT OF THEIR PAIN :'(
  • Snader
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    Snader polycounter lvl 15
    supersamm. wrote: »
    im using unity according to the info on the website it recommends no more than 60 bones per character.

    Recommendations are usually to stay around 30. And that's for laptop/desktops, not really for mobile devices. Around 15 bones for a mobile device is more reasonable. 3 per leg, 3 per arm, 4 in the tail, 3 for the spine and 1 as the head - something like that.
  • Hawt Koffee
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    Hawt Koffee polycounter lvl 13
    Ani wrote: »
    @9skulls Nice bike!
    @Kurt Great work, liking the colours and simplicity of those environments.

    Just a low poly bust from me, I rarely ever work with male heads. It's very odd around the jaw but that's mainly cause I was messing around with the mesh after uving and I suck at painting shadows :poly136:

    118 tris
    6231708107_f05e1ee8cb_o.png
    Whoa That's awesome!
    Could we see more wireframe angles and maybe the texture aswell? :)
  • rooster
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    rooster mod
    RE number of bones advice- lets not give too specific advice when we don't know what the game setup is. If there's a bunch of characters in the game then it's one thing, but if it's a game like this: http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=70830 with one central character close up, more bones seems perfectly feasible. I think Davision's facial rig here had quite a few bones, set up with dynamic physics to boot

    9skulls: that actually doesn't look too bad to me! depending on the animation style/speed and camera angle it could work fine. I'd agree in close-up long-held poses it could look weird, but fast animation at mid-distance I imagine it would be perfectly servicable
  • thatanimator
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    thatanimator polycounter lvl 6
    9skulls wrote: »
    EDIT
    Oh god what have I done. They look like suffering worms. PLEASE LET THEM OUT OF THEIR PAIN :'(

    wow! that's beautiful!
    excellent gif! :) I should of course have taken the time to do one (at work? ya..), but you did and it was awesome! :poly142:
    the effect wasn't AS horrible as I thought it would be, but it was still present. perhaps, at this level you'd get away with it..

    awesomely informative gif! :D
  • Wendy de Boer
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    Wendy de Boer interpolator
    the effect wasn't AS horrible as I thought it would be, but it was still present. perhaps, at this level you'd get away with it..

    I think so too, because animal tails can't actually bend anywhere near this sharply in real life. Unless ofcourse you want to do funny stuff in the animation, like having the critter hold a soda bottle with its tail and drink it. :D!!
  • achmedthesnake
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    achmedthesnake polycounter lvl 17
    Hey DemonPrincess - when are you going to get 3d portfolio?
  • Wendy de Boer
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    Wendy de Boer interpolator
    When I finish more models/textures that don't suck! :poly142:

    Which seems pretty tricky, because every time I finish a new piece, I think the previous one sucks. :poly122:
  • Snader
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    Snader polycounter lvl 15
    Nonsense. All 6 models in your hidden PF are totally appropriate for ingame use. Sure, the recent ones are a bit better, but that doesn't mean the older ones are bad.

    BTW, you're living in Kuala Lumpur now?
  • Wendy de Boer
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    Wendy de Boer interpolator
    I'm mostly fine with the meshes, but the texture I hate, honestly. :poly137:

    Indeed, I'm living in Kuala Lumpur now! :)
  • 9skulls
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    9skulls polycounter lvl 13
    What, updates you say?
    __________________________________________________

    So here is a small but image heavy update. Since no other bikes have yet emerged, I need to push updates for my own one :poly145:

    biker_r1.jpg
    motorbike_r1.jpg
    texturesheet_r1.jpg

    What I did there was that I remodelled biker's head, scarf and hat (just a bit) and gave him a weapon. I also remade his whole texture, which is more nicely packed now than what it was originally.

    I also tweaked few vertices here and there for the bike and edited the texture just a bit. You can see that the texture is a bit "loose" but since it doesn't look too bad, I am going to leave it as it is --- for now.



    Turntables and animations, WHERE ARE THEY!?
    __________________________________________________

    Here.

    Riding - Isometric:
    v3_riding.gif

    Ride 'n' Shoot 'em! - Isometric:
    v3_ridenshoot.gif

    Who's your sheriff, huh? - Perspective:
    v3_gunstand2.gif
    (» see the other angle here «)


    Oh yeah. Low res stuff like this make me go :polytwitch:
  • Mr_Drayton
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    Mr_Drayton polycounter lvl 14
    9Skulls, I'm saving EVERY image you provide of that biker... It's totally rad! :poly142:
  • Piesandbombs
    @9skulls;

    I'm gonna make a biker to ride with, no worries. I've got some time off work for about 4 days, and the time I'm not spending out partying will go towards that.
  • amsmntparks
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    amsmntparks polycounter lvl 18
    robots.png
    Just a quick screen grab of some models for a game at work. The models are inspired by the amazing World War Robot designs. Each robot has a 256 texture. Two more coming...
  • Jernej
  • Jernej
    sorry for the double post. 9skulls could you post some wires of the biker :) it would be really great. What modeling package do you use ? if it's not a secret. Again great job man :)
  • premium
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    premium polycounter lvl 13
    9skulls: You rock!!! I'm really lovin' your stuff. :poly121:
  • paradise.engineering
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    paradise.engineering polycounter lvl 11
    Banner_HalloweenContest2.png
    Mr. green just launched the Lowpoly Haloween Contest
    those interested should join us here
  • 9skulls
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    9skulls polycounter lvl 13
    Mr_Drayton Haha cool! I assume you are just gathering some inspiration for your own bike eh? ;)

    Piesandbombs
    Hey hangover inspiration is the best kind! Looking forward to it!

    amsmntparks Looks nice! Though that red-green color combo hurts my eyes a bit, lol. Are those going to be in a game or..?

    Jernej @ premium Thanks. My original post is just couple of pages before (or, look at my sig) where you can find the wireframe renders aswell. I've since tweaked few vertices here and there but the basics are still the same. It's Blender all the way baby :thumbup:

    paradise.engineering Thanks for the heads up! I'm definatelly going to carve sum pumkins ლ(́◉◞౪◟◉‵ლ)
  • Zoid
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    Zoid polycounter lvl 14
    9skulls wrote: »
    Riding - Isometric:
    v3_riding.gif

    everything looks great but the polys on the tire I can't help but find too distracting.
    I thought maybe 12 sided rotated would help

    tire.gif?attachauth=ANoY7cooAwdtOs6CknbHxZiMvot0UYx1AxFGuPqDl3hY8IJUgZsH1fwSActzCxx11Ho7vzSHpULSdfWDC4gZcvk37XXqKZ8DdyEndN406h1_2mevlFF87rb9JVkhWozhVluUkYhxJie7xiDoNJma78O5wiaUBsV5AnXXZgBWjIfvRxWVbp7BiDyrcRtHy3p5w90IvonHtNN-&attredirects=0
    is the animation working for you guys?
    probably just a blur texture going through 3 frames, don't even bother rotating the geometry
  • Tigerfeet
    9skulls wrote: »
    Since no other bikes have yet emerged, I need to push updates for my own one :poly145:

    Um, I think Baddcog made a bike I don't know though, was it for your biker gang? http://www.polycount.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1441977&postcount=7354
    9skulls wrote: »
    v3_riding.gif

    Anyway... challenge accepted!
  • Baddcog
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    Baddcog polycounter lvl 9
    Yeah it is, still needs textured :)

    (9skulls, your hubs still don't rotate- I find that more distracing being a biker than the polys clipping fender)
  • 9skulls
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    9skulls polycounter lvl 13
    Zoid wrote: »
    everything looks great but the polys on the tire I can't help but find too distracting.
    I thought maybe 12 sided rotated would help
    Thanks for your input!

    I think it is only a matter of taste. Those wheels could be lot rounder, sure, but I prefer them to have some roughness to it. IMHO it would create a bit too notable contrast to have such smooth 'n' round tires in such a low poly model, don't you think? Sure they are a bit sharp on the edges but it is a low poly model. It is supposed to be that way.

    Tigerfeet wrote: »
    Um, I think Baddcog made a bike I don't know though, was it for your biker gang? http://www.polycount.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1441977&postcount=7354
    Sorry my bad, I thought it was a w.i.p poly142.gif
    Tigerfeet wrote: »
    Anyway... challenge accepted!
    thumbup.gif

    Baddcog wrote: »
    Yeah it is, still needs textured :)

    (9skulls, your hubs still don't rotate- I find that more distracing being a biker than the polys clipping fender)
    Pfft... Well... You... They... WELL I GOT LAZY OKAY, YOU DON'T NEED TO SHOUT OKAY :'(
  • amsmntparks
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    amsmntparks polycounter lvl 18
    robots2.png
    The last two of the set. These are for a game, but I'll probably recycle them into more than one project.
  • Tigerfeet
    9Skulls, I've never done any low-poly modeling before so I decided to emulate your style, I hope you don't mind :)

    Here's a preview, her bike isn't done yet:
    BaseColors.png

    How did you set up your textures for rendering? I'd like to do the same but I'm not sure how.
  • Zoid
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    Zoid polycounter lvl 14
    Tigerfeet wrote: »
    How did you set up your textures for rendering? I'd like to do the same but I'm not sure how.

    you want to use no lighting, 100% self illumination.. so max ambient tricks. or luminosity(incandescence)
    make sure to turn texture filtration off

    it is actually pretty easy to do, Max or Maya?
    if using maya make sure to use power² textures as nonx² textures will get a pre-filter blur applied to them (at least in the view port which makes editing harder)

    as for png output to have a good transparent outline with anti-aliasing and no ghosting you will need to set "pre-multiply" (i think that is in the camera setting?)
  • 9skulls
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    9skulls polycounter lvl 13
    Tigerfeet wrote: »
    9Skulls, I've never done any low-poly modeling before so I decided to emulate your style, I hope you don't mind :)
    Hey no problem! As long as you throw in some boobs 'n' stuff it'll be just fine :poly108:
    edit: okay, realizing that you were actually not he but she, I'm might've sounded like a douche there :D
    Tigerfeet wrote: »
    BaseColors.png
    ... Which you seem to deliver already. I like it :D

    Seriously if this is your first try at low poly, you are doing great already! Post dem wires too so we can see how you've built it. Judging from the shapes it seems like there should be everything alright.

    Can't wait to see the complete texture on her... and her chopper too :polytwitch:
    Tigerfeet wrote: »
    How did you set up your textures for rendering? I'd like to do the same but I'm not sure how.

    The first thing I do is to make sure there is no anti-aliasing when rendering the final image out. That of course is done by unticking the AA checkbox:
    72162216.jpg


    Then I select my object and go to the material-tab and make sure it is shadeless. This is because I want my object to appear flat in colour (meaning: no shadows on its surface etc):
    23127568.jpg


    Then, with that material selected, I go to the texture tab and make sure the texture is set to "Premultiply". I'm not exactly sure what it does, it probably only affects how the image alpha is handled, but I've noticed that it makes the texture look better so I tend to have this on all the time. Next step is to make sure there is no image sampling going on, so I untick the MIP-mapping and interpolation options as well as set the filter size to as low as possible, just in case. Mapping should of course be set to UV if you plan to unwrap your model.

    54408064.jpg


    And that's about it, I guess. I usually go to the program settings and set the mip-mapping option off there too so that the texture will look crisp'n'pixelated in the viewport aswell.
  • Zoid
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    Zoid polycounter lvl 14
    9skulls wrote: »
    H"Premultiply". I'm not exactly sure what it does
    It tells the software to blend the background color with the objects outlines, it causes ghosting if you composite it without accounting for this feature

    2011-10-15_1321.png
    what software are you using? i don't recognize it
  • 9skulls
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    9skulls polycounter lvl 13
    Zoid wrote: »
    It tells the software to blend the background color with the objects outlines, it causes ghosting if you composite it without accounting for this feature

    2011-10-15_1321.png
    Thanks for clearing that up! So what practical use could that be of...? Just a "poor man's way" of doing edge outlines?
    Zoid wrote: »
    what software are you using? i don't recognize it
    Only the best of one out there, Blender :)
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