M-308 Gunner (Metal Storm) critique

[ScottMichaelH]

Hello I'm a first time poster here on 3dtotal! This the M-308 Gunner from The IREM NES title "Metal Storm". I had a blast making this and I have to say its the first time I've done a game portfolio piece that I've been happy with. Any thoughts, critiques, advice or otherwise are welcome. I decided to sort of take the old school game, anime and next gen ideas and try to bring them together. This is based on an old NES Japanese game and when I had created a basic diffuse I realized it was missing something. I figured this could be the mech after years of battle or being lost in space ... and I figured a clean mech wouldn't impress anybody.

The textures are all 4096. I used 3ds Max, UDK, and Photoshop (and a little X-normal). Any advice specifically on the way to display this in UDK (is this default daylight too much? Should I use a still turnaround?)

Thanks!

[ScottMichaelH]

I added more wear to the feet, hands and a tad to the cockpit. I took away details from some of the back areas. Any last thoughts?

Thanks!

[Perversonality]

It's not bad but I think some of the dirt on the texture is distracting from rather than adding to the look. Perhaps if the dirt was more streaked so that it looks like it has been effected by movement and speed it would look better

[ScottMichaelH]

Thanks

[ScottMichaelH]

Here's an update. Do you guys think this is better?

thanks!

[ScottMichaelH]

Here's another. I managed to get the tri count down to 7,611 with the coils. The daylighting is gone and the spec is less hot.

[TekNeek]

I like the design, dude.

For me, this'd be cool for some RTS game ,or something the like, but I really would like to see some more details in the model and normals.

General rule -Silhouette - Medium Details (tubes, plating, etc) -- Micro Detail (wires, screws and bolts).

It adds to the scale, realism and overall sells the product.

You also could have saved a bit of texture space by reusing the UVs. As in, having the same uvs for the legs, so that texture will be mirrored.

Especially since, outside the dirt you put on, there's very little asymmetry in the model.

Working for games, you have to cheat a lot, like, when Texturing a head of a character, only texture the half of it then call it done (of course, this varies, but you get the idea).

But, I want to point you towards --this tutorial-- regarding mechanical texturing, it's a real good place to, at least, start.

Good luck dude.

[ScottMichaelH]

Here's a really cleaner version. Whats the honest opinion as to what looks best of what I've posted so far? If nobody has any feeling that it's getting better I will have to end it at some point for my sanity's sake and move on to the next thing before the summer ends. I guess I feel at this point that I'm just wasting hours changing it without improving it.



Thanks

[ScottMichaelH]

I'm feeling revitalized with this update. Going with a darker base on the white areas helped a lot as well as putting more pronounced color in the spec. I again painted scratch marked around edges, some dark paint around all the outer rims of the islands to help accentuate the "gradient" of the light, put some long scratch marks finely all over (will probably go in and erase them on some areas), and added an emissive for the yellow lights. I suppose one big question is just how to get an interesting look in a game editor for something not dirty all over? Most of my experience is with advertising and high res stuff so I normally would just use a mental ray arch material, throw some white planes in the air and get some cool reflections on the shiny surface. I will go over the whole mesh one more time thinking of little things I might be able to do to add visual interest (I'll probably add vent holes in those big blue chest pieces).

Thanks!

[ScottMichaelH]

OK,

1) I remodeled the highpoly details
2) Reoptimized the lowpoly, now at 6,766 (The pink areas are over 2,900 and the yellows are over 2,000).
3) Rebaked normal and AO (including dealt with all kinds of bugs)
4) redid the diffuse, spec and normal

My first impression in comparing the last two versions I've done is a little disappointing I admit...I think I like the cleaner version better. I'll give it a little time. What do you guys think? Not sure how much longer I'm willing to keep revising this since I was supposed to be done by the end of June.

Thanks!

[ScottMichaelH]

I'm happy overall with the outcome at this point. I believe it was worth working through the revisions to get to this point and have learned a lot from the process. I was originally going to make the gun for it but at this point I need to move on. Maybe later.

The only question I still have now is about UDK lighting. In the pedestal perspective render above...is that really the only shadow I can get? I just can't seem to get anything around the feet to stay after building the lighting. Am I missing a button somewhere? I've tried cranking dynamic direct light shadows, inside and outside renders, a bunch of over things. I've seen cast shadows on game grounds all the time but I can't get it here myself at all.

Thank you!

[TekNeek]

Love it!

I notice you're putting in light here and there on the guy. You could try using a glow map (it's called emission map if I remember correctly in UDK).

But,I think this is awesome dude

[ScottMichaelH]

If you mean an "emissive map" for the yellow and blue glow lights then yes I have one of those in there now.

Thank you. That means a lot! I learned a lot so it was all worth it.

[Perversonality]

Much better with the new texture. Nice job