Poly Cleanup/Efficiency
polycounter lvl 7
Ok, I'm going a lot of directions at once on this so bear with me. I'm making a sort of object vignette off another tutorial. I'm still in learning process with Max, I can make stuff but as far as familiarity with all the tools and methods just not there yet.
The lamp is going to be the focal point of the image but it's just too many polys. Even without it's 820 and I feel like that's pushing it for a small object like that. With turbosmooth on it's past 5k, even with one iteration. Long winded asking but what are the options/tools as far as cleaning up/optimizing polys in Max? That is, other than the obvious use less segments, ect.
I'm transitioning from LW and I was at the point I was pretty good at getting things really low poly but still looking good. In Max I'm getting there, and I'm much better at organic modeling because it seems that's just inherent in Max but my poly counts are insane. My eventual goal is to get into gaming making objects/environments so I know a 5k poly background object just isn't going to cut it. Also put in a still from my lastest project/1st max environment which there are other threads about but same question. It looks ok but the poly count on it is insane.
The lamp is going to be the focal point of the image but it's just too many polys. Even without it's 820 and I feel like that's pushing it for a small object like that. With turbosmooth on it's past 5k, even with one iteration. Long winded asking but what are the options/tools as far as cleaning up/optimizing polys in Max? That is, other than the obvious use less segments, ect.
I'm transitioning from LW and I was at the point I was pretty good at getting things really low poly but still looking good. In Max I'm getting there, and I'm much better at organic modeling because it seems that's just inherent in Max but my poly counts are insane. My eventual goal is to get into gaming making objects/environments so I know a 5k poly background object just isn't going to cut it. Also put in a still from my lastest project/1st max environment which there are other threads about but same question. It looks ok but the poly count on it is insane.
Replies
One of the best ways to get a grip on polygonal density is to play games. No kidding! Play a game that has graphics you like, and spend a lot of time just looking at the models. Get up close, look at it from multiple angles, try to understand the wireframe and texture resolutions.
Another helpful way to approach it is to find an art dump from artists who worked on the game, and look at their wireframes and texture flats. For example recently Rogelio posted wires and flats from his work on The Last of Us. Very instructive, and very inspiring.
Yet another great way to learn poly density is to get a game with a level editor tool. Load the game assets and examine them closely. UDK, Unity, CryEngine, these are all great ways to examine actual in-game assets made by professionals.
For PC games that don't ship with an editor, there are also software tools for reverse-engineering the installed files, or for capturing 3d models while it's running. These tend to only capture 3d geometry and sometimes textures, but you don't get the shaders or animation rigs. Still, can be useful for education.
If you have a highpoly mesh already, you can use re-topo tools to help you rebuild a new lowpoly mesh, using the highpoly as a guide.
http://wiki.polycount.com/CategoryTools#Re-Topology_Software
Edit... there's no shortcut though. You just need to learn how to model efficiently. It's a manual process.
In 3DS Max there are several tools that help you optimize, the main and most important one is if you select a loop and hit Ctrl + Backspace it deletes that edge and the vertices attached to it.
Other handy tools are located in the Graphite Modeling Tools ribbon interface the two i use the most are dot ring and dot loop. This allows you to select every other edge... you can then hit loop and it'll select a nice even amount of edges that you could potentially delete.
I use this often is somebody hands me a model that has had the turbosmooth collapsed into it.
You can practice these tools easily by just creating a cylinder and applying 2 turbosmooths to it & collapsing it. Now try and get it back to how the geometry looked without turbosmooth or something along those lines!