@FrankPolygon thank you so much for this information, I never know floating geometry is a thing since I am also a newbie here. Gotta absorb all this stuff up, this is huge resource for learning, thanks again Frank!
@Varravik it's worth keeping in mind ZacD had shared his solution to enable 'joining' two separate objects modeled with varying number of edge segments, basically faking a smooth transition using 'floaters' (floating geometry) in order to bake detail without generating errors from a high poly mesh too low poly proxy, then…
Float. definitely. If its two peices in real life, No point in making it a single piece in 3d. Even though it may be permanently adhered, That black piece was its own object at one point. So you could treat it as such and be just fine.
Thanks for the tip Johny, think I may be too obsessed with keeping low polys. Thinking about it a bit more though, I dont really need that a part of the same mesh, I'll just have it floating them sunk in slightly.
Yeha I thought it might have meant floating "within" rather than above. At least that effictively answers all my questions about what it is/how it works. Thanks for the links too, I'll have to have a play with them tomorrow
@2300511685 Depends... For example, if you're planning to model those details out as part of a game asset creation process, then look into 'floaters' (Floating Geometry) otherwise search optimized hard surface or gun modeling techniques, there'll be options aplenty too choose from.
first off, you're approaching the high poly wrong, that most that will do the normal map is add a faint 1 px or less line. For that type of shape I'd just use floating geo... http://www.polycount.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1363268&postcount=9
Yeah! @crawl try your luck with proportional editing and see how that goes, there's a few online tutes floating around just hit one up applicable to your app of choice which will also make things a tad ezy'er for yourself in the long run.
Ok, trying to make some louver floating geo, having major problems trying to figure out decent topology for making it not suck. I started with a sphere, which was obviously a bad move, but not really sure how else to approach it! Any ideas?! Many thanks
What do you mean engravings? Like letters? If that's your question, I'd say you can use floating geometry on there. Either that, or do it in PS, run it trhough xnormal PS plugin (or nvidia nm filter) and put it on top of your baked result as an overlay.