Those artifacts are the triangles that come with a standard sphere. I recommend subdividing a cube a couple times. Use the spherify modifier in max(or something similar in other packages). Then work from there. You will have a quad sphere that is the not noticeably different then a standard sphere and will subdivide nice.
Rough and raw alpha hair cards from hair and fur modifier. Havent been optimized yet, just to see if i got the volume right. I think its pretty decent so far, so i'm going to move on optimizing it manually.
That looks good! Could you share the UV layout, or maybe post a screengrab of the model with a UVW Unwrap modifier so we can see the seams on the model. I know jack about baking mechanical models and it'd be very good reference. :thumbup:
After I re-export to ICONE, I further adjust the color and materials to sharpen the pattern. Of course, the better solution to highlight the pattern is modifying the texture map. Depends on situation, I will adjust it accordingly. However, I will do this texture matters in once and for all.
You might want to also double check that you don't have Edit Poly as a modifier (collapse the whole stack first). It has different hotkeys for some unknown reason so most standard Edit Poly hotkeys will have completely different functionality.
Really appreciate the feedback! I tweaked a few things today. Unfortunately I don't have the time to go modify the geo and re-bake, but I can tweak texture stuff for a bit before I move on to the next project. Does this look better?
Keep shape simple at the beginning, do not got so far into each body parts and detail. More there are tri, more that will be painfull to modify proportions once the entire character done. Once you done on this step, you can keep going on details o_<.
First thing I'd try is to put an Edit Normal modifier atop your mesh, select all normals and 'Unify'. Then collapse back to Editable Poly. If that doesn't work, try using Max's Xview mode to check for various mesh errors through the viewport.
Yeah, especially after resizing the totem from its initial size it's going to feel strangely small. In the end though, unless you plan on modifying default animations you're going to be restricted by the dimensions of the original model so as to avoid serious clipping issues.
"3. delete all but 1 inset, uv mapped that by itself (the top right piece on my UV) 4. duplicate the piece around the mesh." I'm confused as to how I duplicate that around the mesh. Would I use something like the symmetry modifier?