A reasonable poly count for Skyrim models?

[Matth85]

lol No one is talking about if you have actually triangulated the faces or not. What has that that got to with anything lol.

 

'polygons' is a bit undescriptive, Say quads or tris so no one has to ask: is that tri?

 

So when you say polygon you aren't giving an accurate count is what you are saying.

 

You are complaining "polygon" is not accurate enough for you. Even though it is standard to think about quads.

So, my point was simple: A "polygon" is most likely a quad, or the few tris you got, before the mesh is triangulated. So I fail to see why you find in inaccurate to say "polygons". If you do not work with tris, you work with quads. If you work with quads, a quad is a polygon. If a quad is a polygon, what are you complaining about?

 

It is standard to count polygons on your model as it stands. Wether it is half tris and half quads, or all quads. If somebody says the mode is 4k polygons, they mean 4k "mostly quads, but perhaps a few tris". I struggle to see why somebody would need to tell you "It is 4k quads or 8k tris!" since it is irrelevant. The model is at 4k polygon when you check it, and won't be tris before it is triangulated. Therefore "polygons" is as accurate as you want it to be.

 

That said, it is very, VERY, common to work with quads. If you are able to work with tris, then good for you. You can't ring or loop with tris, and it is generally backwards. So I do not see why anybody would use tri when talking about polygons. Which means I do not see why you means it is inaccurate, since nobody works with tris anyways.

 

This must have been the first, out of many, forums somebody have questioned if "polygons" means tris or quads. I am baffled. Wether it is tris or quads mattes litte, if you are able to get your model down to 4k polygons. Even then it is 95% sure to be full of quads. There has never been a reason to say "There is 4k tri polygon and about 25 quads!". You would say "There is 4k polygons.". If this is before export you know it is mostly quads, and if it is after you know it is triagulated and it is all tris.

 

Sorry, again, OP for derailing your topic. Getting a habbit of doing so!

That said, I suggest you low poly model your model, and try not to go overboard with the polycount! The model is not that huge and complicated that it needs too many polygons.

[Ghogiel]

 

It is standard to count polygons on your model as it stands. Wether it is half tris and half quads, or all quads. If somebody says the mode is 4k polygons, they mean 4k "mostly quads, but perhaps a few tris". I struggle to see why somebody would need to tell you "It is 4k quads or 8k tris!" since it is irrelevant. The model is at 4k polygon when you check it, and won't be tris before it is triangulated. Therefore "polygons" is as accurate as you want it to be.

 

That said, it is very, VERY, common to work with quads. If you are able to work with tris, then good for you. You can't ring or loop with tris, and it is generally backwards. So I do not see why anybody would use tri when talking about polygons. Which means I do not see why you means it is inaccurate, since nobody works with tris anyways.

 

All poly meshes are tri. Even if the faces aren't connected and it's a mix of ngons, quads and tris. Please stop talking about modelling in tris or quad and why you would model in quads as that is irrelevant to the count. Edited December 25, 2011 by Ghogiel

[Matth85]

All poly meshes are tri. Even if the faces aren't connected and it's a mix of ngons, quads and tris. Please stop talking about modelling in tris or quad and why you would model in quads as that is irrelevant to the count.

You model in quads, you count in quads. Why are you then complaining about the fact "polygon count" is accurate enough without naming tris or quads? Consider you are the only person I know off that seem to need to know that bit of information.

[Ghogiel]

I would say quads if I meant quads.

 

Import a nif: what is the polygpn count?

 

 

read the first line in the Polycount wiki

 

http://wiki.polycount.com/PolygonCount

Edited December 25, 2011 by Ghogiel

[Hagroth]

I don't understand this issue with these ribs, I don't even know what I am looking at or is supposed to be looking for.

Sorry, I know the image can be a bit confusing. The ribs are only supposed to be visible on the inside of the ship. They are just planks going across the floor on the deck, so naturally I don't want them to poke through the hull.

I first made the upper lines of each rib, that is, the top of them. You know, the part that you walk on if you are aboard the ship. What I need now, apart from the top surface of the ribs, is a surface going from the top of the planks to the deck/floor surface. So I get whole planks, not just floating surfaces above the deck.

In order to do this, I can only figure out two ways. One is to make an outer line (the bottom end of the planks or the bottom side if you will) and make it go inside the hull. I'd then generate a surface between the top side and this new bottom side. It sounds easy, but the hull is very narrow, so I just can't do this. The other way is to not care about if the bottom side pokes through the hull - I'd just extend the hull temporarily and create a boolean object by subtracting this huge hull from the ribs/planks. So the part of the ribs inside the hull (or outside of the inner area of the ship) would disappear and they'd be cut off along the deck.

I uploaded a better image, so I'm posting it here as well: http://imgur.com/eZHyY

 

That said, I am generally confused of the workflow outlined here. I really don't get the strength of it.

You outline the shapes with splines, and then it calculates the mesh, using multiple thousand polygons? Why not simply start with a box, or a plane, and build it from scratch -- having full controll of your polyflow. Being clever with modyfiers, and you could also turn the high poly model into the low poly in 2 clicks.

I am sorry if it is off topic, but could anybody explain what workflow this is, and why it is preffered for some?

Thanks,

 

Matth

I'm a beginner at 3ds Max, and I just thought that seemed like the easiest way to do it. I just draw the silhouettes in minute detail and the program generates the surface for me. I can't even imagine making this model from a box or something. I'd have to pull one vertex to one place, and measure the distance to where I want to next one, pull it over there and make sure I get the curves/beziers right from all angles and the alignment... It'd be a true pain. :(

 

I've been working in Solidworks before and you always started with sketches before extruding or whatever. You have a lot more control over angles and measurements and all that.

 

When I made the wooden frame and the rock for the anchor, I made the base model from splines and surface, and then I used poly editing to make it more random. I had control over the amount of polygons and didn't get many. But needless to say, I don't have much experience with the poly editing method.

Edited December 25, 2011 by Hagroth

[Matth85]

I would say quads if I meant quads.

Good for you. If somebody say polycount, they mean the polycount they currently got before export. Which is quads.

 

Import a nif: what is the polygpn count?

 

It is what the polycount say, which would count tris. Before export it would be quads.

So if I say "There should be max 4k polygons", it is understood I mean when you make the model, which would mean whatever you model it as. Most likely this is mostly quads.

 

"

When a game artist talks about the poly count of a model, they really mean the triangle count. Games almost always use triangles not polygons because most modern graphic hardware is built to accelerate the rendering of triangles.

Which means: You would count it as tris because a game engine turns the model to tris. However, if I say "4k polygons", it is before triangulation.

We are currently talking about this model pre-export. By that I mean there is no proof this will ever get into the game, so triangulation is out of the question.

 

My point is simple: When somebody say "Polygon", they rarely specify it is "quads". If they mean tris, they usually say "and X tris". At least that is how I've seen it, over at the 4 forums I hang out over the last few years. An example is Game-Artist.net. There it is very common to specify "tris" as tri and "polygon" goes as an universal term, or quads.

 

My general point is that it is not inaccurate to say "polygon" without specifying tris or quads. It is, however, not accurate to assume it is tris when you say polygon. Then you would most likely say it is tris, so people know this is the final polycount after import/triangulation.

 

Let's keep it at that. You understand my point, I understand yours. We are really getting off topic from this topic now. If you really want to get more out of it, sent it via a PM.

 

It'd be a true pain.

 

You would make a blockout of the model using a box and you could then start getting in the curves and details with loop, ring and connect tool.

Or you could use a reference, start with a box and just build your way out.

It might look like a pain, but it is clean and quick. I am a personal fan of using a single plane, or cylinder, and working from that. From there I draw out polygons by selecting an edge and shift dragging. Goes quite fast. If I then want to high poly model, I add controll edges and add a turbosmooth modifier.

 

Though I can't really say which method is better, since I never tried the one you are doing. I started modelling with a box, and moved towards using a poly plane. I use a spline or two to make complex tube shapes.

Edited December 25, 2011 by Matth85

[Hagroth]

It'd be a true pain.

 

You would make a blockout of the model using a box and you could then start getting in the curves and details with loop, ring and connect tool.

Or you could use a reference, start with a box and just build your way out.

It might look like a pain, but it is clean and quick. I am a personal fan of using a single plane, or cylinder, and working from that. From there I draw out polygons by selecting an edge and s*** dragging. Goes quite fast. If I then want to high poly model, I add controll edges and add a turbosmooth modifier.

 

Though I can't really say which method is better, since I never tried the one you are doing. I started modelling with a box, and moved towards using a poly plane. I use a spline or two to make complex tube shapes.

It does seem less painful with a reference plane I guess. I haven't even heard of these loop and ring tools you mention so I guess it's a good method once you've learned it. I'll give it a try in future models (this ship is the first one I'm doing on my own).

 

And Ghogiel, here is a better image to explain what I meant: http://imgur.com/eZHyY

[MrMino]

Hi all, I would like to know and really appreciate if someone could tell me what the maximum recommended polycount for an armor model is and how many would be needed for performance to be badly affected?

would something over 7k cause major slow down on older comps?

 

thanks.

[Matth85]

would something over 7k cause major slow down on older comps?

Around 7k-10k is okay. Anyting above that, and it should be pretty good.

 

By the way, a single model will hardly slow down a computer. Unless it is a 35k model with a 4096x4096 texture size. It's only when you start to have a few models at a high polycount things get hairy.

A single armor set at 10k wouldn't have much inpact on any system.

[rudiymax]

Around 7k-10k is okay. Anyting above that, and it should be pretty good.

 

By the way, a single model will hardly slow down a computer. Unless it is a 35k model with a 4096x4096 texture size. It's only when you start to have a few models at a high polycount things get hairy.

A single armor set at 10k wouldn't have much inpact on any system.

Right.

Even a 64k tris model with a 512x512 texture size will hardly slow down a computer. Even 20 of these models are possible with Skyrim, and slow down only slightly (tested with Nvidia GeForce GTS240). It's only when you start to have a few models at a high polycount and high resolution texture size things get hairy.

 

BTW: Check the models with NifSkope.:

- nightingale 15k (triangles)

- steel 15k (triangles)

 

Around 7k-10k quads is okay. Anyting above that, and it should be pretty good.

Edited January 31, 2012 by rudiymax