Projecting Normals Question:

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  Gestalt polycounter lvl 11

  Dec 2012

  Once you have a low and high poly, and if you want the high poly details on the low poly mesh, you take both of those meshes bake those details to a texture (a normal map) using something like xNormal (a great free map baker). If you just want to do the retopology to get a nicer flowing mesh with better edgeflow and consistency or something then you'd subdivide, but it doesn't seem like you're doing that.

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  David Wakelin

  Dec 2012

  Ok great!
  
  When I clock project mesh on a lower poly it makes it as close to the mesh as possible... And attempt to exgaggerate the lower poly form...Would I do this before I export or avoid doing this at all?

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  Gestalt polycounter lvl 11

  Dec 2012

  You want your low poly to be as close to the shape of your high poly as it can be for baking the details.
  
  What you have above would be good topology to subdivide and sculpt, but for a low poly mesh you probably want to make something that describes the forms and silhouette as accurately as possible while using minimal geometry.
  
  You can get a feel for low poly meshes by looking at other people's wireframes. If you would like to exaggerate things you can make subtle changes after you've baked your details to a texture and applied that texture to the low poly mesh. Generally you want your low poly to describe the forms how you'd like them to be emphasized before you bake.
  
  If you need more specifics about the process the polycount wiki is a very useful reference.

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