Wanton Hubris

Optimizations continue. It’s getting down there but I have a few meshes left to make low poly versions for. I’m going to re-make the textures over the weekend and get this wrapped up, hopefully, sometime on Sunday.

So after taking a savaging on a few message boards, I’ve decided to re-dedicate myself to this scene. I’m going to be working on getting the polygon counts down to video game levels as well as working on the visuals. I hope to have a much better scene put together after a week or so of this.

We started off at : 12,358 triangles / 47,495 inst. triangles

Where we are today:

This is going to mean redoing a few of the assets but I think it will be worth it. Optimization is definitely a valuable skill. Doing this will help me to get it more right the next time.

Hooray! Brought this one across the finish line and I feel that I have definitely leveled up as a result! I’ve learned SO MUCH about creating 3D art by doing this project. From sculpting to optimizing to leveling textures to … well, everything!

I’m excited as I think this project turned out really well.

Now to figure out what to do next…

Got started on the area I had been dreading and it wasn’t that bad! Just have the roof and the gate left to deal with, really. After that it’s all deco and lighting.

Wasn’t sure what to do with the top part of the gate and I think I have a plan after some color sketching in Photoshop. We’ll see!

The black trim matches with the trim on the base of the piece (which is now black, you’ll see that in the next update). And the orange tiles will provide some nice contrast … I think. Here’s hoping!

OK, I think I’m getting the hang of this! It’s awesome being at this stage of development because I’m an empty shell basically – there’s always a ton to learn and every time I try something I get a little bit closer to competence.

I think I’ve got this texture issue on the ropes now…

It’s the wrong color, I know, but that’s just an RGB value in the material. I kind of like it light colored though so it might stay. Anyway, must get going on the rest of the modeling soon!

Work continues on the outside columns.

To be honest, I’m not happy with the look of that darker texture now that I see it on a bunch of pieces. Not really what I was going for but … I dunno. I think what I’ll do is finish the scene up on my current track and then maybe re-visit the textures at that point.

Working on getting the pieces of the gate itself done now. I’m learning a ton about the process and I’m trying out new things to see what is easier and what yields better results. It’s coming along but doesn’t feel natural yet. LOT of steps. I’ll keep refining…

For example, the gate looks OK from here but the UVs are -terrible- and stretchy. Need to figure out how to make a mesh like that so that the UVs are evenly distributed and not stretched.

I worked out what I think I want that middle piece to be. You walk across the butterflies like they’re sort of leading you into wherever this gate might have led into. I found a good butterfly stencil online and used and abused it.

Got a start on creating the assets today. I started with the diorama base so that I could establish a workflow for Max/Mudbox/Photoshop that would work. I’ve never done a complete scene before so this is new territory for me!

Here’s what I have so far…

As you can see, the middle is still missing. I’m still trying to come up with a way of building that piece that doesn’t go wonky either during sculpting or texturing. For fun, here are the 5 meshes that make up this scene so far: