Game Artist Forums - View Single Post - few questions about game art and workflow

Tiros · 08-06-2008, 05:53 AM

1. Hard edges.

(a) Not quite sure what you mean I'm afraid.. but to get nice hard edges without a lot of segments, simply use Smoothing groups

(b) Aye, sculpting things like weapons etc. with hard edges usually isn't a good idea. As you said, creating a highpoly and painting in/generating normals from a heightmap will give the best result.

2. UVs.

Good uv's is indded important. Personally while sculpting a model, I start off by doing the lowpoly and import it to ZBrush and start sculpting right away. Once the sculpt is done, I go down to the subdv my final model will have and export it, then I take it into max and unwrap it. After I've done that, I export it from max with the UV's, and import it to ZBrush at the same subdv.

This will work perfectly and adds your UV to the model while still containing all the sculpt-detail. It'll however fail if you edit the model before importing it to ZBrush again, as it won't recognize it.

As it comes to optimizing, you could optimize it by creating a new model in your desired 3d app, and then take it into ZBrush and retopoligize.

3. Baking normal, cavity, ao maps.

Not sure what to day about that really, never used XNormal either. But I usually bake all my maps in ZBrush if I'm sculpting something. Dunno about AO and Cavitymaps though.

4. Color, specular, emissive maps

(a) It all lies in pratice and recieving feedback, aswell as comparing and learning from others textures. A strong saturation isn't bad at all, depends on what you're aiming for. In a catroony texture for example, you'd want your texture to be very saturated.

(b) It's as you said. The cooured specular map is used both in the Specular Level and Specular colour slot. The brightness defining the amount of specular in the specular level. And the colour adding colour to the specular.

As for a copper texture; it wouldn't look like copper if your specular were to be white.

(c) They're almost the same as an self-illumination map.. the only difference is that from an emissive map, light will actually radiate.

If they have to be perfect or not comes down to the engine itself. For UT3, they don't have to, as there's a lot of options to edit and animate your maps in the engine. It'd be better if it's as good as possible from the very beginning though.

5. Presentation

I'd just go with a screengrab, using Doylle's shader, or the standard DX Display. Preferably Doylle's shader as this handles the maps much better and has some filtering which the DX Display lacks. There's a description on how to use it aswell.

And about xNormal, as I mentioned earlier I never used it.

Hope this helps, and you better be grateful, cause my fingers are aching already!

Cheers!

08-06-2008, 05:53 AM	#2 (permalink)
Tiros Founder of Statspaddling 1,330 - 198	1. Hard edges. (a) Not quite sure what you mean I'm afraid.. but to get nice hard edges without a lot of segments, simply use Smoothing groups (b) Aye, sculpting things like weapons etc. with hard edges usually isn't a good idea. As you said, creating a highpoly and painting in/generating normals from a heightmap will give the best result. 2. UVs. Good uv's is indded important. Personally while sculpting a model, I start off by doing the lowpoly and import it to ZBrush and start sculpting right away. Once the sculpt is done, I go down to the subdv my final model will have and export it, then I take it into max and unwrap it. After I've done that, I export it from max with the UV's, and import it to ZBrush at the same subdv. This will work perfectly and adds your UV to the model while still containing all the sculpt-detail. It'll however fail if you edit the model before importing it to ZBrush again, as it won't recognize it. As it comes to optimizing, you could optimize it by creating a new model in your desired 3d app, and then take it into ZBrush and retopoligize. 3. Baking normal, cavity, ao maps. Not sure what to day about that really, never used XNormal either. But I usually bake all my maps in ZBrush if I'm sculpting something. Dunno about AO and Cavitymaps though. 4. Color, specular, emissive maps (a) It all lies in pratice and recieving feedback, aswell as comparing and learning from others textures. A strong saturation isn't bad at all, depends on what you're aiming for. In a catroony texture for example, you'd want your texture to be very saturated. (b) It's as you said. The cooured specular map is used both in the Specular Level and Specular colour slot. The brightness defining the amount of specular in the specular level. And the colour adding colour to the specular. As for a copper texture; it wouldn't look like copper if your specular were to be white. (c) They're almost the same as an self-illumination map.. the only difference is that from an emissive map, light will actually radiate. If they have to be perfect or not comes down to the engine itself. For UT3, they don't have to, as there's a lot of options to edit and animate your maps in the engine. It'd be better if it's as good as possible from the very beginning though. 5. Presentation I'd just go with a screengrab, using Doylle's shader, or the standard DX Display. Preferably Doylle's shader as this handles the maps much better and has some filtering which the DX Display lacks. There's a description on how to use it aswell. And about xNormal, as I mentioned earlier I never used it. Hope this helps, and you better be grateful, cause my fingers are aching already! Cheers! __________________ - My Portfolio \| Sketchbook Thread \| Spec/Normals Tutorial \| STC #29 - Back Alley - Vote now! - Supporter of good crits blargh!