Competition #11 - Addi

[Addi]

First off, this is the best theme for a competition I've seen on these forums while I've been a member, I wasnt really into the crate one, or the wall one, and I was too late for the post-apocalyptic vehicle one, so this is the first I've entered.

I made my building yesterday, a project completed in a day! an unusual feeling, I woke up and had a message on msn telling me to go take a look, I started straight away thinking of an idea and I came up with the idea of a resource holder (they're to increase the amount of resources you can hold, see; total annihilation) or main building (like those where mined gold is taken in Warcraft 3) for a town in a Wild West themed RTS game. I had a scare though after I'd unwrapped and textured the thing and looked on the rules thread and noticed everyone on the first 2 pages talking about C+C eek! ) But anyway, think its finished now, I dont really want to touch this one anymore, if I get the chance tomorrow I might make a second building, perhaps a water tower and barn complex.





Oh and its 759 tris.
Wire
Diffuse 512*512
Spec 512*512

Thanks for looking.

[ae.]

Everything looks rushed, it does not have the kind of quality you would see in an rts, i think you should work on the texture a little more i see several areas in the render where there are alot of stretching going on. also work on the render the lighting is really BAD! its like you put it in photoshop and turned up the contrast. darken it a bit. i hope i could help.

[weasel.acuh5o]

I somewhat agree with arman, the model feels a bit rushed. here's a few points I don't like:

- while there is technically nothing wrong with staying so far under the poly limit, your model will still have to compete with higher detail models. try using the remaining polies to add some more visual interest to the model.

- poly distribution could be a bit different too. main focus is the building, not the horse - try to make the building about the same detail, either in the diffuse/normal or geometry wise.

- the UV space distribution needs work. try to identify the parts you'd see most in a RTS game (most likely roof/store front/sides/back and adjust the space accordingly. example: the bit that has 'bank' written on it gets less space than the horse, but is clearly larger and more visible.

- the texture itself could use some work. the scale of the wood seems to be off (either that or that is some tiny bank) and could use some more detailing to show separate boards etc. the 'bank', well, sign, seems a bit slapped on, try integrating it more into the model. if it's written directly on the boards, wheather it a bit (and possibly change the colors - if the place got dirtier over time, it'd be harder and harder to read, so I'd go with a lighter color), but since it's a bank (aka 'important building') I'd put it on a separate sign .

- might just be me, but the spec map isn't really doing a lot for me.

I like the idea of a western based model, don't get me wrong. the technical execution could use some work though, I'd give a re work of the model (or re do) a thought if you want to score high in the comp. nothing wrong with doing that.

[Talon]

It's a cool idea, but I wouldn't call this final just yet, not by a long way.

You're only using half the alloted polycount and half the alloted texture space. While it's good to not exceed your budgets, you don't get points for it here You could add much, much more to this piece, damage, sagging wood, more detailed flourishes, etc... Even if it's just some subdivisions of flat surfaces so you can tile the UVs up a bit more to get more detail in.

The textures are, as Armanguy mentioned, very rushed. The scale, sharpness, colour and lighting of the wood are all completely different to each other. You also have an entire identical wall with a window in it that you could remove and just have the window itself. You're also missing out on about 262,000 pixel's worth of texture - you've got another 512 texture available to you, make use of it!

[Addi]

Ahhh! alt and back deleted my post, and I was almost finished

Thanks for the comments guys, I really appreciate the detailed responses.

Armanguy I guess I was the only one who liked the lighting, but yes I set up a 3 point lighting rig and then added a sun, madness! verything did just become washed out.

weasel I am proud of my horse but yes it is taking up a disproportionate amount of UV space. The 'Bank' word, I had intended for it to look as if it were 'burned' into the wood, but then as I was trying that it just became so dark I couldnt really read the word against the wood, definatly something to change. And the spec, I dont really see what its doing either, I think its the way I'm making them, I found a tutorial on them in the Q4 engine and its something like... take diffuse -> apply normal map filter -> greyscale -> mess with brightness and contrast, yeah... thats not working so well for me.

Talon Those are great ideas for stuff to add, I modelled it originally and deleted some faces, optimising and such and then looked at the poly count and was surprised, not that I was under but that I was using only half of the budget! And the texture space, well yeah I need to work on that, I totally developed a symmetry fetish this past month with UV's

I'll go back and work on the first model again tomorrow, thanks for the advice, want to help with the model I made today? I spent more time on the texture stitching and moving verts.


This one is a Wagon Repair/Upgrade Centre, think of the moonwells in Warcraft 3 mixed with an upgrade centre, so it would add health/repair your wagons when they're nearby and you could also make upgrades



Wire



Diffuse



Sorry I didnt link to these, I keep getting a 'openDNS' error when I try to hyper link.

[Talon]

Getting better

There's a few wastes of tris around the place, though;
The spokes on that wagon's wheels could just as well be one poly in length (not two) or even just planes with and alpha on them.
You've also welded absolutely everything into one mesh, including the support pillars of the awning and the hitching rail, which you really don't need to do.

No windows?

The texturing is much better this time around, but you've still got double that space available to you.

[theQiwiMan]

I say if theres a 1500 tri -budget, thats already pretty strict, so to really push your model and get the most out of it possible, I'd say keep adding details until you're right around 1500 tris. Its amazing what a few extra polys in the right place can do. :-)