Virtual/lias' Sketchbook

[virtualalias]

My sketchbook is going to be largely 2D for a little while until I grow a bit more confident in my 3D skills. I'm fully capable of creating a number of shapes, manipulating vertices and such...It just comes down to getting it all into one mesh and then unwrapping said mesh that I need to learn.

This is a street scene I did tonight. The focus was on getting as many details into one texture to conserve video memory. This texture would be accompanied by 256x256 general purpose textures that would fill in the extra space on the street, sidewalk and grass. So the full set for this would be 4 textures, with any additional textures being added for extra detail work, decals and so forth.

I will attach the Diffuse, Bump and Specular maps. I would absolutely love as much criticism as possible, especially practical criticisms on whether or not this texture set would actually be useful to a modeler. Perhaps some things are too close together, or perhaps there is -too much- on one texture, thereby making it a pain in the backside for the individual applying it to the environment. Perhaps the bump map is too bumpy or not bumpy in the right places, etc.

So please, critique away and don't spare my feelings. I'm here to learn, not rake in false praise.

(Edit to add: All parts of the texture are sampled from my personal library of shots taken by me, on location here in Denver, CO.)

[Craig Lewis]

The main problem with your texture, is that for a texture, it contains too many unique items, such as the grids, and litter. Things like that would be added as decals in the game, and so would have their own separate textures. As for the textures themselves, the diffuse is rather dark (on my monitor anyway) and noisy. If you reduce the noise it'd probably look alright

The specular and bump maps seem pretty rushed as well, have you actually had a look at them all in a game engine? I think that would be the best way for you to judge what needs changing. As for the bump map, the height information looks completely wrong. It looks like you've just taken the diffuse, desaturated it, and played about with the contrast, which isn't particularly the best way of doing it. Try taking a look at this tutorial for creating normal maps. Just follow it up until the point where it says convert the heigh map with the nvidia filter, if it's only a bump map you require, as this is a good way of hand painting a height/bump map.

Hope this helps

[virtualalias]

Originally Posted by Craig Lewis

Try taking a look at this tutorial for creating normal maps.

Great tut! Thank you for the help. I've looked it over and will either post a new version of the current textures, or build a new set for a test-bed. The next ones will, hopefully, be tested in 3D as I do them and I'll post it if it's anything worth looking at.

[Craig Lewis]

Cool, looking forward to seeing what you come up with

[virtualalias]

My first, semi-successful model/unwrap/texture.

Poly: 16

Maps: Diffuse / Bump

Methods: Create a box, Create two smaller boxes, Use Boolean to cut holes, try to optimize. I tried to remove some of the corner edges that connect the holes to the rest of the geometry, but no dice. It covered one of the holes with soup.

It could use some more detail. (Chunks taken out, scratches, battered corners, etc.) I wanted to Normal Map the detail onto it, but I'm having problems getting my normal maps to do what I want them to. I'll be putting more work into that in the near future.

I'd rather paint a height-map and use that to make the normal map, that way I don't have to attempt to model detail into something that's not likely to be a very important asset anyway. So far, that hasn't worked.

I hereby shamelessly beg for CC.

[fabiodan]

Paint some shadows, add some detail, bake ao... And get rid of those black holes, they look ridiculous in your texture sheet. Also in the texture sheet paint in the chamfering of the black holes. After all that, you should remove your smoothing on all faces, to avoid smoothing errors

[virtualalias]

Thanks, Fab. I'll utilize as much of that advice as I can figure out how to. :P I appreciate your time!

[virtualalias]

This was a piece modeled in hi-poly for 2D representation on a soda machine that I am modeling in low-poly.

The theme is obviously dystopian, where not only water, but air has also become a traded commodity, presumably due to the poor air found naturally. (Or perhaps a gimmick for an overly lemming-ized consumer society)



I may decide to add additional detail to the model, like the 'ribs' (not sure what else to call it) that stem downward from the top and seem to bubble out around the where the label starts. I'm not sure yet.

For an advertisement, made for a low-poly 3d game model, it probably has about as much detail as it really needs.

As an asset, it should benefit me moving forward, as I can re-use this bottle over and over with different labels and different contents and, perhaps, even use it as a hi-poly normal pass for a low-poly game asset bottle that could be used as random debris.

Anyway, far too long-winded for a bottle.

[AlexanderSmith]

Looks good. Actually I wouldn't be surprised if such a thing was marketed some day.

[virtualalias]

Originally Posted by AlexanderSmith

Looks good. Actually I wouldn't be surprised if such a thing was marketed some day.

You and me both, man. Scary, really, but not unbelievable.