Asian Apothecary Shop [WIP/Maya/UDK]
Hi everyone, here is a development thread on my first ever modular environment that I'm making for one of my briefs at uni. Just a heads up, I'm quite new at 3d modelling and was introduced to it only back in January, so I'm not great with technical talk yet and a bit nervous, although I'm learning as fast as I can. 
Down to business - I chose to make an asian apothecary shop as a modenv, mostly because I felt comfortable doing something interior for my first environment. Had to sketch out a couple of concepts first before diving into modelling, will put them up here for all to see (developing the bottom one now):
I want to create a dim and musty, old atmosphere, and I need at least 50% of my assets to be reused, so I'm clogging up the room with medicine bottles, boxes and the like. I have 15,000 tris to play with and 1024 x 1024 textures. I've never done normal maps before, but I want to give them a try if I have the time. I have another two weeks to complete this environment.
Any feedback or critique will be much appreciated, but please bare with me if I don't understand all the Maya/UDK terms yet, I'm still learning and I'm trying to be a huge sponge and take it all in. ^_^
Will post some screenshots of the modelled environment in the next 5-10 mins, so stick around!
Down to business - I chose to make an asian apothecary shop as a modenv, mostly because I felt comfortable doing something interior for my first environment. Had to sketch out a couple of concepts first before diving into modelling, will put them up here for all to see (developing the bottom one now):
I want to create a dim and musty, old atmosphere, and I need at least 50% of my assets to be reused, so I'm clogging up the room with medicine bottles, boxes and the like. I have 15,000 tris to play with and 1024 x 1024 textures. I've never done normal maps before, but I want to give them a try if I have the time. I have another two weeks to complete this environment.
Any feedback or critique will be much appreciated, but please bare with me if I don't understand all the Maya/UDK terms yet, I'm still learning and I'm trying to be a huge sponge and take it all in. ^_^
Will post some screenshots of the modelled environment in the next 5-10 mins, so stick around!
Replies
Edit: There will also be a couple of carpets on the floor, some asian posters on the wall and some eastern style curtains and cloth. The door will be 1800's style, dark with carvings and again with panels on the inside. This is the theory anyway, hopefully as I model it will slowly become more oriental.
But yeah, just tried to get one asset all the way through the process today, just so I know what I'm getting myself into.
It just looks so awkward imagine you wear a coat and there's a word "coat" on it...
Besides, is that an ink bottle with a goose quill on the desk? Chinese never ever used that!
Which leads me onto what I've done today; textured the walls, ceiling, beams, skirting boards, floor and put them all into UDK. The positioning is all off atm as I've only just got past the "maya objects imported into UDK are tiny" phase - since the screenshot I've corrected a few things.
This is from inside UDK. There's some sort of messup with the lightmapping maybe on the vertical plank, but I haven't figured out why it's there or where it's coming from yet. Changed the lantern design to cherry blossom with gold paint and metal.
A bigger view of the room...
And lantern again.
Let me know what you think!
P.S. The ceiling is there, but I took it off for the first pic so you can see the whole scene.
To push it further, you could add more detail into the blocky shelving units, and maybe a few more edges in the curved parts.
The shop is extremely small, but I guess that's what you're going for, and the intimacy does fit nicely. Some neat modelling so far, well done.
I think you have some scale issues going on here, mostly with the door. Here are some typical door dimensions based on some random Googling I did:
And here's a guy in your shop, assuming your door is standard height:
He looks pretty giant! Try picking a height for the counter, like say 3'6", and scaling the door based on that so it's around 80". Also, I think your doorknob is a little low on the door; maybe try moving it so it's just a little under halfway up the height of the door.
Speaking of the door, doors are generally flush with the wall. The trim around the edge of the door probably shouldn't be so thick, you seldom see door trims that protrude more than an inch or two. Also, if the door opens inward, you'd be able to see some hinges from the inside.
The shelves in the bookcase-looking pieces of furniture standing against the wall feel a little thick.
How does the shopkeeper get behind the counter? If it's the section without shelves underneath, it will need a break and some hinges. Also, they probably wouldn't set anything large on top of the hinged section since they'll likely be moving through it often.
Most shops generally have a 'back' area, so you might think about extending the shop laterally to make a doorway leading to the 'back'. Of course, it would probably be plausible to say that this shop doesn't have a 'back'. But if not, I'd add some administrative clutter and supplies somewhere in the main room... whatever would be the 1800's equivalent of extra pens, cash register paper rolls, cleaning supplies, etc.
Also think about, where does the shopkeeper put their coat? Where do they leave food they bring to eat during the day? What do they do when a customer isn't in the shop? This could help you decide what kind of clutter to place. (If you had a back room, you could get away without a lot of this stuff, because we can assume it's all kept 'in the back'.)
Not to mention, you can't go wrong with a rug and some wall decorations/paper notices.
I'm looking forward to seeing where you take this, it already has a neat atmosphere!
If I had another week I would have added some more knicky-knacks around the shop like what you suggested Broadway, but now I'm really running out of time, and still need to put all this into UDK and toy around with lighting and particles (niether of which I've never had experience with before in UDK, so gonna need some time to practice before Friday's deadline). I might end up making this a portfolio piece after the deadline though, it's definitely my strongest piece of 3d yet, although I have a lot to improve.
So enough text, sorry! Here are a couple of top-down pics:
All normals, specs and lightmaps are ready, now it's time to import into UDK!