Critique on my artwork
node
Hello, this is my first ever render done in Maya 2020 (Vray renderer). I've applied just smart materials, there are 3 separate texture sets. My first question is, can this render be enough of a quality to be published on Artstation, and to send as a portfolio for a studio i want to apply. Also, i am aware that the materials are too basic, and that i need to work on them, bear in mind i just wanted to finish the render.
Replies
You can post it and send it anywhere but the quality is not there. Maybe, if its an indie studio that does low poly minimalist art then you might have a chance. But its just one asset. Its better to have a portfolio with a few assets.
You seem to be aware of the low quality of the materials but still you think that it might catch some eyes...
The modeling is passable if you want to use this in a top-down or isometric game where the camera is far away from the model.
I strongly suggest looking at some tutorials (ex chamferzone's gun tut) before even considering applying for a job.
Sacboi, thanks for the support, im finishing up another model, and once im done with that one, im picking up where i left off with the AK!
Sooooo... here is the newest project i've done. It's an Mycenae Armor circa 1400 BC. I've stylized it a 'lil bit', but pretty much its historicaly accurate. Whatcha think bout dis son?
Im relatively new to SP, so for new i've just added smart materials, some alphas, paint here and there, to add a lil bit of style. I do agree that the geometry needs to be better, on some parts you could still see cubes. Today im gonna add a new light, add some geometry try to render it alongside a HDRI Image.
Modelling done in Maya, textured in Substance Painter, rendered in Arnold. Pls post ur critics. Any feedback is much appreciated!
from the top to bottom in the image. the pattern on the arms goes in a different direction to the cloth, which does feel really strange. The chainmail on the body seems to be missing some texture maps? The normals information seems to be missing, or in the very least it looks a lot different to the chainmail on the shoulder/neck region. The shadows are also acting very strangely, I am not sure if this is just a quirk of the renderer you are using, but its drawing my focus in a bad way. Finally the seams on the bottom also feel "amateur" and would not be good in a portfolio setting.
I would suggest for your next project, keep the scope low, but the quality really high. Some objects that come to mind is a knife, sword, pump action shotgun, fire hydrant etc.
For the chainmail, im not entirely sure whats wrong. When i applied the chainmail texture, and set up the parameters, it looked fine, but when i put my materials up in hypershade, something is always missing. I thought it was the Height map, which i did include, but nothing changed, it still looks 'weird'.
Ye, i agree 100%. My scale of projects is a bit big. I like to do big stuff immediately, which kinda slows me down. For my next project i am definitely gonna do something more simple. Thank you so much for a reply
LP model of a Hoplite. The C. mesh is not mine, its from Zbrush library.
Autodesk Maya, Substance Painter, Arnold
Modelling done in Maya, textures in Substance Painter, render in Arnold
I want to achieve renders like this stock photo. But all of my renders always look like they are made of clay for ex. and not steel or iron. Am i making errors in Arnold settings, or do i need to work more on my textures. Or maybe both?
Any feedback is much appreciated!
I've done this one using UDIMs. And also here are two renders from SP. I didnt include the height map in hypershade(Maya), maybe thats causin the issue here?
Any feedback/critique is much obliged!
Generally you should avoid all those vertical lines as most of them are unnecessary.
I'd suggest you to start with something simpler so that you can really get comfortable with topology.
Dunno, maybe im just doing it wrong, but all of this u see here, can not hold without these loops.
https://www.artstation.com/marketplace/p/XGGA/handgun-for-video-games-tutorial-complete-edition
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/9mKmzL
Thoughts?
To parrot what others have said, I think the proportions feel off, specifically with the previous gun you created. What kind of references did you have when creating it? Did you seek out technical diagrams with measurements to check your proportions, or just eye-ball it using image references?
The katana proportions don't seem too out of whack. The handle might be a bit thin and the guard should maybe be more like a circle than an ellipse, but other than that I think it's good.
Specifically with the katana, I think the lighting is hurting the presentation quite a bit. Are you primarily relying on an hdri environment map for lighting? If so, I would suggest reducing it's effect, using it as fill, and use other lights to showcase the material definition of your textures better. The handle feels quite flat, all the metals seem unblemished. The sheath has some nice wear to it, but I'm not sure it's true to a real katana: it looks like rubber to me, which I don't think it should.
It might be useful to simplify things before jumping into creating more complex objects. Try to nail the high poly, low poly, proportions, materials, and rendering of a super simple item, like a shotgun shell maybe (just a suggestion).
Thanks! For the rifle i followed the side view, and some photos of the parts, pretty much got them right but not thickness also, my parts are way thicker than they should be, i corrected that and the rifle feels a lot better to the eye. I noticed that issue when i just tried to put the bullets inside the magazine, and the rifle was atleast 3 times thicker than the bullets, where in reality its maybe 5cm on both sides. LOL
For the katana i used Vray sky, adjusted the strength and got this. I will get back to both projects a bit later, next i will try something super simple next for sure.
So i took up the advice, and made a shotgun shell. And now i truly know how my lighting sucks!!
As for the shotgun shell, I'm not sure what your references you are using, after all not all shells are the same, but in my opinion it's lacking some details that contribute to realism. The materials need some work as well. The red area is very flat, and the overall roughness is wrong. The brass area has some wear, but it is too regular, in my opinion. I think it should vary more. I happen to have a shotgun shell, so I can show some things that might be worth trying to match in your model.
image reference (with completely necessary arrows):
macro shot for material detail reference:
And just to comfirm, you are using subd modeling (link to wiki) to create your high poly, right? Zi0 mentioned that other techniques might be supplanting subd in creation of hard surface models with complex closely interacting shapes, as is the case with weapons. Although I do think subd will still continue to be useful is many cases, the options they suggested can be much quicker and do not require worrying about topology issues. It might be worth looking into if you are serious about working as a 3D artist in the video games industry (fusion 360 or zbrush hard surface modeling techniques).
And to be honest, what @Zi0 mentioned i don't even understand what he meant ( my bad). The pipeline i followed for the Gewehr for example, i created a HP version, then used quad draw to go as low as possible with tris, UVed it and smart materials.
With SP, there is nothing wrong with using smart materials as a starting point, but in most instances you should add more unique variation into the material on top of that.
One way you to make the ridges in the red area is to use mesh displacement, a decently highly subdivided mesh, a proper texture, and model UVs to match the ridge scale you want. Here's how it's done in blender, I attached the texture I used to this post:
Zi0 shared some links to tutorials to the two techniques in his post, although one is not free. His suggestions relate to the high poly creation part of the process.
However, im far from done with this one. Got a bunch of ideas what i can add to go with this bad boy.