HD Models

[s13n1]

Don't comment in my thread any more Sza.

[s13n1]

I'm not Barnes. I've been doing a bit of work with him though.

[MadGypsy]

his method is okay but its taking more time thats why i am not interrested

I'd be interested to see the results of both of your methods in comparison. You speak of time a lot and it seems if anything becomes a bit complicated you are quick to try and find a way to do it faster, unfortunately this doesn't mean you will have good results.

It's too early to say. I will reserve my opinion for some results. If I had to place a bet on which one of you guys would have more solid results, my money would be on s13n1. Simply because he is willing to get his hands as dirty as they need to get and take all the time it takes to achieve his desired results. I can identify with that, greatly.

My rig took me 6 hours to build. Here it is like a week later and it is still not complete but it is BEAST. I have a chain of controllers that add some seriously complex and absolutely realistic deformation to the model with barely any work at all.

I've spent days turning parts of my own body and considering what forces what to move and by how much. Let's take the human torso for instance. You can turn your torso <90 degrees before your hips are forced to follow. I am adding details like that to my rig. If you were to make a rig and find a quick way. Your rig would be pathetic in comparison to mine. fast !=== better or even good for that matter.

[s13n1]

Jesus Christ.

I understand why there was some hostility towards this kid in his Q2 thread. He simply does not listen.

To give you one final answer Sza.

I haven't been sculpting for 6 hours. The pinky took about 6 hours to sculpt and learn MudBox, but took about a week of modeling in max, while i learned how to use max. The pinky is my first ever MudBox sculpt. I've been working on this infantry model for about about 8 days now off and on. Its my second sculpt.

Pushing modesty aside, i think i've done a pretty good job considering my inexperience with MudBox and taking into account your total lack of modeling abilities and displayed lack of MudBox knowledge, then you really need learn when to shut up and listen.

"Put the skin in the game and show me the effect please!"

Your request to see my infantry model in-game is again a clear indication of your lack of understanding of the steps involved. This model needs to be finished 100% in mudbox first. Then i make a low poly version, then i make UV's for the low poly version, then i bake high detail onto low poly, then, and only then, can it be imported into a game engine.

I'm not sure what model you are saying has too many polys, but ill assume you're referring to the picture of the simple wireframe base mesh i posted.

I'll explain this to you again, because its obvious there's either a language barrier or you simply don't understand basic modeling techniques or terminology.

That model is an edited version of the original Quake2 md2 model. It was imported into max, mirrored (symetry modifier), and then some additional detail added to reduce sculpt time. The model was then subdivided in Max before importing into MudBox, to minimize the mesh smoothing MudBox performs when you add subdivide levels.

You can turn off mesh smoothing in Mudbox while subdividing, but if turned off, you wont be able to rebuild sculpt levels or possibly even retopologize. I know this because i learned the hard way.

If i had to make the infantry again, i would have done a lot more hard surface modeling in max first, chamfered the hard edges and then done an overall subdivide of the model, to reduce the smoothing in mudbox. It helps keep the original models volume, to ensure an accurate silhouette.

"but he must to animate everything first. All he have is a sculpted frame from mudbox!"

Animation has nothing to do with the process of sculpting a model in MudBox.

The way you are working is wrong and i know this because you are trying to do this as quickly and cheaply as possible. You are trying to get out of doing any real modeling. You're trying to sculpt an already animated model that's textured and has UV's because you think you wont have to re-animate it or make UV's and textures.

You are wrong. But continue as you please, you will encounter this one day.

Animation comes after the model is made. You sculpt a high poly mesh in MudBox or Zbrush, create a low poly version that's suitable for the engine you're using, then you create UV's for that model. You then import both the high and low detail models into your application and bake the high poly details onto the low poly mesh.

What you are trying to do is like repainting a single frame from a Disney movie and then expecting that extra detail to transfer across all frames. Insanity.

You will not be able to sculpt that model in mudbox without making a new low poly mesh, a new UV and completely re-animating the model.

It sucks, but there is no easy way.

Here is what you need to do.

You need to take that grunt/soldier model and find an animation frame where at least one side of the model is in a pretty natural standing pose. Then you need to select the head and straighten it up. If the legs and arms are not quite right, select them and rote them, moving them into a perfect standing position. You only need to do this to one side (non gun side), then mirror it.

For the gun arm, you will need to hide the gun, mirror the regular arm, and then un-hide the gun and graft it back onto the mirrored arm.

Yes, for this you will need to make new polys in max or some other program.

This will ensure you can accurately mirror-sculpt the entire model, but you'll need to disable mirroring when sculpting the gun or the left hand.

An even simpler solution and one that is beneficial to mirrored sculpting in mudbox, is to use a symetry modifier in max, as this will create a seam down your model and ensure the subdivision across both sides is perfectly even.

Depending on your version of Mudbox, you dont need to create a UV before importing. ONLY when baking high detail onto a low detail mesh.

Get the Unfold3D program i mentioned in my last post. Its gold.

If you are serious about this stuff and want to get good at it, there is no easy way. Or everyone would be doing it, wouldn't they?

Take it from someone who wishes they took the time to learn properly all those years ago, instead of learning only a few months ago and regretting it.

This is the last time i'm responding to you Sza.

Take this advice as you like, but if you dont agree with it, please keep your opinion to yourself and dont reply i this thread any more.

Also please don't edit your previous posts to make your arguments appear more coherent / sane / valid.

And to elaborate for MadGypsy:

"Pelt mapping can result in problems when baking normal maps."

Only when you screw up. Like if you over sculpt an already UV'd model, pushing it past the limits of the original topology. Which is something he will (or already has) encountered when trying to bake a normal map onto the soldier model.

[MadGypsy]

@s13n1 - Sza isn't a bad guy. We all have personality disorders. I used to hate Sza's guts, now I like him just fine and that's amazing cause I'm one of those people that will hate your guts forever.

I'm not trying to say that you should personally feel any particular way about him. I just want you to know that when it comes down to it, Sza is a minor pain in the neck at worst but overall he is "good people" and a talented artist. Kinda like a little brother. You want to beat him up but you also love him to death... KINDA like that.

[LambentHammerBurst]

Your work is damn good. I dont have any suggestions for which model to do though.
The shambler is the most in need of a good HDRemake, but I think thats really down to how difficult it is to make a shambler hd.

There's a few great HD Shamblers out there.

There's some enemies which do not have any HD models yet:
Knight
Death Knight
Spawn
Zombie
Rottweiler
Chthon

Same goes for the expansion enemies
Dissolution of Eternity:
Electric Eel
Guardian
Statue (Reskin of Knight)
Hell Spawn (Reskin of Spawn)
Wrath
Overlord
Dragon

Scourge of Armagon:
Gremlin
Centroid
Armagon

[talisa]

the spawn has actually been re-made by ruohis at one point, and ive made a recolor of it at one time for ROGUE's hellspawn

and for both dog and zombie we have the medium-poly models seven imported from the EW-SOL quake2 mod, with webangels great HD-textures

.

he also converted knight and hellknight models from the mod, but i would personally love a more hi-poly version of hellknight

imo either the knight or hellknight are the ones which mostly need an HD-remake

[MadGypsy]

Re

Remake the Hell Knight.

.

edit: I tried to post just my quote and it told me my message is too short and must be at least one character long. I added that period after and it sent. Does this mean that characters in quote code do not count against maximum number of allowed characters in a post? If so, that's an exploitable oversight. I don't want to make a purposely SPAM post to test it.

[Mirrorman95]

the spawn has actually been re-made by ruohis at one point, and I've made a recolor of it at one time for ROGUE's hellspawn

and for both dog and zombie we have the medium-poly models seven imported from the EW-SOL quake2 mod, with webangel's great HD-textures

.

he also converted knight and hellknight models from the mod, but i would personally love a more hi-poly version of hellknight

imo either the knight or hellknight are the ones which mostly need an HD-remake

Can someone please give me the following information:
1. What EW-SOL stands for
2. Where are links to the spawn, hellspawn, and other mentioned HD models

[talisa]

@mirrorman
1 its the name of some quake mod... eternal war shadow of light
Eternal War: Shadows of Light | QuakeWiki

its where the models seven converted come from. you can find them here:
http://quakeone.com/forums/quake-mod...lacements.html

.

although the hellknight is also implented into seven's SMC as an additional monster which seven dubbed the 'war-lord'
http://quakeone.com/forums/quake-mod...mpilation.html

.

HD spawn can be found on ruohis own site, although atm his site seems to be down
http://www.ruohis.com/models.htm

but you can also find it there in my thread about multi-skins for HD models
http://quakeone.com/forums/quake-mod...sters-smc.html

[LambentHammerBurst]

the spawn has actually been re-made by ruohis at one point, and ive made a recolor of it at one time for ROGUE's hellspawn

and for both dog and zombie we have the medium-poly models seven imported from the EW-SOL quake2 mod, with webangels great HD-textures

.

he also converted knight and hellknight models from the mod, but i would personally love a more hi-poly version of hellknight

imo either the knight or hellknight are the ones which mostly need an HD-remake

The dog and zombie were far from "HD". They were simply upped to Half-Life 1 era poly count. Still great content, but as for reaching HD status; I wouldn't say they are. Knights are the same.
I'm using them as they are great models, but I'd love to see a true HD version of these guys. When you have that HD Shambler, Ogre and the Doom 3 models I ported standing beside these models, just does look right.

[talisa]

yeah they are still far from HD, thats why i said medium-poly

but even though they are still not very high-poly at all, they're a bit better-looking in terms of how choppy they look compared to the original quake-models

they're not super, but they're fine untill someone actually remakes these monsters in hi-poly

.

and yes, i absolutely agree, i would also love a real HD dog and a fancy-looking HD zombie.
but for me personally the hellknight would come first cuz its one of my fave quake-monsters <3


.


EDIT:
just realized i completely forgot about capnbubs improved version of the dog,
which while also still not to fancy in terms of detail is also a nice model
http://quakeone.com/forums/quake-mod...provement.html

[s13n1]

@s13...

The character is almost ready. Better? I can put the normal today in game... and the anims are ready too. I could do this way 2 or 3 characters at one day so please stop to write bullshit because you dont know me... and...



Moron...

I'm Quoting this post so he cant edit or remove it.




Just to clarify a few things before im either banned or I ban myself.

It was never my intention to pick on this kid. I've offered advice the entire time, and through sheer stubborn pig-headed pride, this kid has thrown it back in my face and made a fool of himself by blatantly lying and spreading misinformation about not only his own work, but also my own.

Now i hoped this kid would take my advice and download himself a copy of max, and follow my instructions to make his "t-pose", and learn some basic editing along the way. But he hasn't.

He's instead spent all night working on this, trying to prove he is right and im wrong, by using the information i gave him and downloading Max, learning how to apply a symetry modifier, applied it to a suitable frame (im guessing frame 197?) and produced this:



Note: My camera is not in the exact same position as his, otherwise it would match 100% perfectly.

Now because the models head was turned slightly, the symetry process screwed it up, which is why he has hidden it.

He also removed the arms which were completely screwed up, doubling either the regular arm or the gun arm. For me it was the gun arm.

And notice he's only showing it from directly front-on? That's because the legs are not correct:



Now lets assume im wrong, i've jumped to conclusions and he has in fact got a t-pose and all is good.

First. I want him to show us a picture of the arms and head.

If he cant. I predict it's because the head and arms are like i said, and are screwed up and not usable.

Second. If im wrong again, and he has learned max and did things the proper way and manually moved all the polys and vertices to align either side. Then this sculpt of his would bake nicely onto the original low poly mesh and because the process only takes about 30 seconds, he should be able to provide a picture of the bake.

If he cant. I predict its because i'm right about everything and because MudBox requires both the source and target mesh to be almost identical in volume, to ensure correct transfer of details, the lack of matching body shape, means that he will never be able to bake this detail onto the low poly model.

He will also be unable to use the original low poly mesh he applied the symetry modifier to, because by doing so, it would have completely removed the original UV's, making it impossible to bake anything onto it without making new UV's. These new UV's would need to be made identical to the originals, so he could retain the original skins, but again this couldn't work because the head and arms are all screwed up.

NOW.

Had this kid been honest in the beginning and said that all he was trying to do was use mudbox to make a normal map for the original models, i would have offered advice and told him he has a few options, some of which will still require some basic modeling skills to achieve, but some are very simply and can be done in minutes.

He can either A: Learn some basic modeling and..

Take the original model and take his time to manually select the arms, legs and head, aligning polys and vertices and try to and make a symetrical t-pose. Not very hard to do, but would take a long time and you could never be sure that the model would mirror-sculpt in mudbox properly. But the advantage of this method is you could extract your edited frame, and it would still have the original UV's in tact. Import this into MudBox, make your sculpt adding some minor details, and then bake them back onto you original edited frame.

Things to be careful of using this method: Over cooking the mesh (like he has under the arms around the chest), can result in errors when baking onto the original UV's. This is because your sculpted topology has strayed too far from the original, and wont project correctly across the UV's when baked.

B: Skip learning the basics, do things easier, but take twice as long:

Save yourself the effort of having to learn very basic editing, and sculpt a single frame of the model, with UV's intact. You wont be able to mirror-sculpt, doubling the time it takes, but you wont have to mess around with max. You will still need to be careful to not overcook the mesh though, otherwise it wont bake properly.

C: Do it in minutes, don't learn anything.

If all you want to do is create UV's for the original models to add some extra details. Why not make a UV from the skin? Load it into something like CrazyBump and tweak the levels. You can even load a single frame from the model and view it on the model as you work. You WILL need to buy CrazyBump though. About $99.

Or, you could use a photoshop plugin like nDo. Use the original skin as a base and make a high res normal map over it. Very good plugin and will allow you to create a very good normal map. You already know how to use photoshop im assuming, so you dont need to learn max. This will cost you about $99 also.

With those options though, you still have the issue of the original skin being low res. No matter how good your normal map is, it will look like shit with the original low res skin over it. Even if you resize the skins in photoshop and filter the shit out of them, you cant make them more detailed, you will instead make them worse.

Let me guess, you're going to remake the skins?

This is again a waste of time, because of the way you're doing it.

You have already said you don't know how to model, so we can only assume you cant make UV's too, otherwise none of these problems would exist. So lets assume you're planning to make new skins over the original UV's. Bad idea.

The original UV's are rubbish and you will be losing about 65% of any potential detail you could make because of distortion and poorly utilized UV space.

Instead of wasting your time sculpting details onto unusable models, and then adding immature abuse to them to come back here and try to stick it up me. Why didn't you instead spend the night learning Max to make a proper t-pose?

Why haven't you downloaded the Unfold3D program i recommended and learn to make a new high quality UV? It took me about an hour to learn and produce great results. Get the demo version 7 and you save yourself $1000 on buying the full thing.

You've made yourself look like an absolute fool here, and i've quoted your original post so you can't edit it.

Now before you completely destroy any remaining respect any members here have for you, why not go off and learn some of what ive told you and come back with some good stuff to show?

Fark me.

[webangel]

Some things makes me sad...

[Tea Monster]

s13n1, we are not all like that.