"Spirit" Sniper Rifle - FPS

TnT · Oct 2012

Hey everyone, I have been working on this for a little while and want to get some crits. I am pretty sure I have some loops which are probably too tight and am in the process or hunting them down and changing them. This is going to be my first FPS weapon so I am trying to cater it as much as I can, but I am hitting a road-block as I have never done it before.

Anything which would make this a better portfolio/game piece would be very much appreciated.

Estimated POV angle.

Shadow3035 · Oct 2012

Looks great - looking forward to seeing the low poly. Don't forget about the trigger.

praetor187 · Oct 2012

Man this is looking really cool, im not a gun guy so unfortunately I cant tell you really how to improve it, but I am really digging the design of the rifle overall, sexy work man.

JoshWilkinson · Oct 2012

Beautiful design, love to see where you take this. I could be mistaken, but I've only ever seen bipods fold forward. Was this design choice intentional?

TnT · Oct 2012

Thanks for the compliments!

As for the bipod it does fold forward. After trying to move it into position I realized I need to modify the plate a little more as it penetrates the mesh if I try. Thanks for pointing that out. Also, I found need to integrate the barrel into the muzzle brake or at least change that up a bit as it looks odd.

Thank you for making me take a closer look into it haha, much better to find this out now than need to modify my low poly significantly later.

Also, if anyone who has made high quality work I do have a question.

What is your pipeline? I am still relativly new to the high/low pipeline and I work like this.

1. Blockout for proportions
2. Mid Poly (Making some details but none of the supporting edge loops)
3. High poly
4. Low Poly (Either start from the mid poly or create a new mesh)
5. Unwrap
6. Bake Normal/AO
7. Texture

I am looking for new ways to speed up my workflow and would appreciate any advise you all have.

Add3r · Oct 2012

What reference are you using? As like said above, the bipod looks off folding inward. The piece where the stock attaches to the rear section of the receiver looks extremely flimsy and a little weird. The construction of the body and recreation of the PRS stock is pretty awesome though. This has a ton of potential, just the two parts that I pointed out

TnT · Oct 2012

The bipod was made by this reference

Full disclosure, I am starting to think I may have folded them the wrong way haha. Though the second picture makes it look like they do fold inward. I am not 100% sure

And the majority of the weapon is based off of this weapon. Savage 110 I grabbed a pic of the stock meeting the main body. I do agree though, it is one of the weaker points of the model and I have been thinking of ways to make it look more secure/strong.

TnT · Nov 2012

Hey all you gun makers, I have a question. I have been trying to loosen my edge loops on this rail system and I have gotten it to this point. I am worried that I will not have enough pixel data to get a good normal off of this. If i move the loops too far apart it starts to lose its form and not look like a rail system anymore. I am wondering if any of you have tips for me or if I am going about this in the wrong way.

EDIT*** Added my loops

JoshWilkinson · Nov 2012

If I were you, I'd bake out those normals and test it. Until you get to the point where you can eyeball the right edge width, that's really the only way you can sure. But good on your for knowing to consider edge widths prior to the bake; you saved yourself some headaches down the road.

TnT · Nov 2012

Haha, yeah. I have run into issues like that a while back on a vehicle and vowed to never do that to myself again. What would be the best way to make unwraps for something like this. It has a ton of rails visible from the first person POV. Should I make a 4-5 Rail unwrap and just tile them, or should I still make their UV's unique? I know unique would be much better for adding texture detail but I think that if I make them one solid chunk or even break them up to be unique it would take up a lot of my UV space.

This is all stuff I should probably worry about as I go down the line, but I like to try and plan it out so there isnt going to be a ton of UV re-packing in the future.

JoshWilkinson · Nov 2012

You're definitely thinking smart, that's great. Jonathan Fletcher did a beautiful gun model earlier this year and his texture flats do a great job of illustrating a professional unwrap. One very important thing to notice is that he has four rail panels but tiled two of them; given that only 2 panels could be fully visible at any point. And while those panels attach to rails, the individual rails aren't actually modeled underneath because they're concealed. Little things like that greatly enhance his optimization.

My personal philosophy is that if the tiling is unnoticeable, tile away, but a little noticeable tiling is excusable (look at Battlefield 3's weapons) in exchange for texture resolution. All this to say I'm not sure what the best way to go about unwrapping your model is, but you're thinking like a game designer!

Add3r · Nov 2012

I think this is coming along great to be honest. It is a very solid model so far, and the more I look at it the more I enjoy it. As for the bipod and the stock... I have both of them on my DMR M4

that is why I was pointing the two out. The stock is a PRS Magpul stock and the BiPod is a Harris sniper pod. As BringMeASunkist pointed out, even if the tiling is slightly noticeable, its still okay if the textual density is worth it. Just hide the tiling and the seams with decals, damage/wear etc. Google M4 buffer tube to receiver connection points for the stock connection point and the bipod does fold forward. The only bipod that I know that folds backwards, are the pods that connect to the rail. Keep it coming man, love me some hard surface gun modeling.

TnT · Nov 2012

Progress on the Low Poly. I have not really started any real intensive optimization, mostly removing support edge loops. I am at 12,000 tris right now. My budget is 10k, I am aiming for anywhere from 8,500 - 9,500. I also did a little research and did notices that the bipod was not supposed to be going inward so i changed that. I may need to make some changes on the front of the bipod as it looks a little strange now.

Any input would be appreciated.

TnT · Nov 2012

Little update, Finished unwrapping, now comes the packing. The gun is does to 11k. Going to do some animations (maybe) and see what parts are wholly unnecessary and remove them. Sorry for the slow progress shots, hopefully I can get these coming in a more steady fashion soon.

***EDIT: I swear that gray one is unwrapped, I just did not put the material on it.

TnT · Jan 2013

Update, I have had to take a long break from this project as work as had me busy. I am hoping to have this done by Friday this week. Let me know if you see any glaring issues.

Normal and AO only

Normal/AO with tiled metal diffuse

"Spirit" Sniper Rifle - FPS

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