New Bow Mesh - Advice/Feedback Wanted

[LivewareCascade]

Hi everybody. Looking through the amazing weapon mods for Skyrim, I've been inspired to get into meshing and texturing. Please bear in mind I'm extremely new to this - I have beginners skills with both Max and Photoshop, and I've been prodding my way around Nifskope for some time now.

I've been working on a flatbow/longbow for Skyrim, and I feel like I'm finally done with a basic low poly mesh. I'd very much appreciate any feedback or advice people can give me, as well as any help people are willing to offer. Before I proceed to the next stage of my workflow, I'd like to see if what I've done with the basic geometry is acceptable - for example, I notice nearly every nif I see for Skyrim is made up of tris, yet my polys are quads - is this a problem? Is the aspect ratio of the polys a problem? etc, etc. Basically, if you're a modeller or texturer that has experience with Oblivion/FO/Skyrim meshes, then I'd greatly welcome any comments that I might not find on, say, a general 3d modelling forum.

Below is a render of the bow, and below that, a link to the .max scene
http://i.imgur.com/7kpVP1m.png
http://www.sendspace.com/file/px7kqs

[Twizzler77]

Hey Lord Bishek,

 

Looks pretty good from what I can see! I didn't download the scene and I can't say too much without seeing a wireframe, but it looks pretty solid.

 

As far as using mostly quads, it's not a problem at all. Once you export the mesh, the engine will triangulate it anyways. The aspect ratio isn't a problem either. Typically, long and thin polys/tris can be difficult for the GPU to transform and render, but it's an edge case and not really something to worry about.

 

So what's next? Are you going for a high poly or going to jump straight into texturing?

[kennyimpala]

let me ask you a question, do you know of the 90 degree rotation problem there is in nif skope once you translate from a 3ds max format into a nif format?

you will most likely encounter this problem. so whatever you make remember to rotate it 90 degree on nifskope.

 

input, the bow looks simple, and poly friendly, I would go with more faces, they usually do not hurt the engine too much. I have created a mask that consisted of around 1200+ faces, and that was for fallout, imagine how much it should kill FPS or even make the game crash.

 

an eye for detail doesn't hurt, at the end you can always "cheat" and use normal maps with big textures to create the smaller details such as bolts that only add inconsistency in the final render.

[LivewareCascade]

Hey Lord Bishek,

 

Looks pretty good from what I can see! I didn't download the scene and I can't say too much without seeing a wireframe, but it looks pretty solid.

 

As far as using mostly quads, it's not a problem at all. Once you export the mesh, the engine will triangulate it anyways. The aspect ratio isn't a problem either. Typically, long and thin polys/tris can be difficult for the GPU to transform and render, but it's an edge case and not really something to worry about.

 

So what's next? Are you going for a high poly or going to jump straight into texturing?

 

Thanks for the advice man, a relief to hear it's faces and stuff are OK. I was mortally afraid that someone might tell me I'd have to start over again.

As to your question regarding what's next, see below, I'll answer both of you at the same time

 

let me ask you a question, do you know of the 90 degree rotation problem there is in nif skope once you translate from a 3ds max format into a nif format?

you will most likely encounter this problem. so whatever you make remember to rotate it 90 degree on nifskope.

 

input, the bow looks simple, and poly friendly, I would go with more faces, they usually do not hurt the engine too much. I have created a mask that consisted of around 1200+ faces, and that was for fallout, imagine how much it should kill FPS or even make the game crash.

 

an eye for detail doesn't hurt, at the end you can always "cheat" and use normal maps with big textures to create the smaller details such as bolts that only add inconsistency in the final render.

Hi there, yes, I'm aware of the rotation problem, I hadn't bothered to rotate or scale the bow since I found it easier to work with in this orientation for the time being. Once I import a reference skeleton to use I figured I'd start the match up then.

 

SO WHAT'S NEXT:

 

OK, so both of you have now talked about normal mapping and detail work, and this is now where I'm a bit stumped. Put simply, I have no idea what the next stage in my workflow is, but I have foreseen a few potential issues.

 

1. The bow in it's current state is generally serviceable enough that I could whack it into the game as is, right now. However, I was hoping to do a bit more detail work. The current standard for high-quality bows that I have seen is The elven longbow from the LOTR mod: http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/5727

 

InsanitySorrow's steel/Iron bows

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/29647

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/32725

 

The elven bows from Addonay's Elven Weaponry:

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/13234

http://static.skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/images/13234-4-1332650886.png

 

 

I would love to have a level of detail for the metal furniture of the bow, like the patterning that you can see on default steel or nordic weapons.

 

My problem begins when I consider how t start unwrapping the UV's of the bow:

 

In the case I've attached, it would be a simple planar map for the side of the bow, another for the front, and one more for the back. Mirror as appropriate, and bam, simple - at least, I think. Actually, what I'd like to try to achieve is a smoothed version of the mesh. If you go ahead and apply NURMS to the scene, or a turbosmooth modifier with an iteration value of 1 - the result is a much smoother mesh, but I cannot for the life of me work out how I'd go about unwrapping it. Because the sides now blend into the front and the back, I don't see how I can use a planar map - and I don't see how a cylindrical map could work either. This is something that I could DEFINITELY use a bunch of advice on. As for the detailing I mentioned above - well, it would be lovely to have that level of detail, but it's something much further downstream of the workflow, and really, the only reason I mentioned it was to give people a sense of what I'd like as an end result, and also so that people could warn me if I'm doing something now that could influence it then. As a short term goal, I'd be well happy if I could achieve texturing quality similar to what artisanX has done with his bows:

 

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/32405

 

These bows seem to be simple in both geometry and texture, yet have good quality to both.

 

So, to summarise: What do YOU guys think should be next?

[Twizzler77]

Lord Bishek,

 

So there's a couple of points to address: smoothing out the mesh, UV'ing, and normal mapping. I'll address each one individually.

 

Smooth Geometry

- If you want a smoother mesh, simply add more geometry where needed. I would not add a meshsmooth or nurms to the in-game mesh; that will add unnecessary geometry, will make UV'ing more painful, and will change the silhouette of the bow which is not something you want. Use the Connect Tool and move the verts by hand. If the mesh looks faceted, then use Smoothing Groups. This will make it appear smoother by changing how lighting affects the geometry, but will not add geometry.

 

UV'ing

- When it comes to UV'ing, 90% of my UV'ing process is planar mapping. I use a combination of planar mapping and then Relax Tool on the individual UV islands. There's no perfect auto-unwrap tool, it's just something you have to grind through. A bow like this is pretty simple and once you get the hang of the workflow, should go pretty quick.

- Don't be afraid to break up the UV islands too. Using artisanX's bow as an example, I would break up the UV islands where the bow transitions to the grip and again where the bow transitions to the detail at the ends. . It's a great place to hide seams.

- Mirroring UV sheets is typically a smart thing to do and nearly every game has some sort of mirroring going on. However, since this bow is up in your face, I would be cautious about mirroring in such a place where you'll see the seams. It really depends on what details you are planning on having and where those details will sit.

- When UV'ing, be sure to add a grid texture or some texture map with a repeating pattern on it. When you are unwrapping, you want to scale the UV's in such a way that the pattern is equal across all parts of the mesh. This will help keep consistent pixel density across the asset.

 

Normal Mapping

- Normal mapping is a big one. If you are not keen on making a high polygon mesh, then you'll need to use one of the following programs to generate your normal maps: nVidia Normal Map Tool, Crazybump, nDo/dDo, and/or xNormal. In short, you'll paint/generate all your details in grayscale, throw it through one these programs, and it'll spit out a normal map. Rinse and repeat until you have all your details looking the way you want.

 

So to sum up, your workflow will probably look like this:

 

In-Game Mesh > UVW Unwrap > Texture > Rig/Weight

 

Hope this helps!

Edited April 15, 2013 by Twizzler77

[LivewareCascade]

Thank you, this is great. Would it be possible to do some patterning like on the vanilla steel weaponry without using a high poly mesh? I wouldn't mind creating a high poly mesh, but I'm uncertain as to how I could begin taking patterns from vectors or textures and converting them into 3d geometry without doing it all by hand - or is that how people do it usually? Surely for extremely fine detail, there may be a tool to convert 2D patterns to 3D geometry? If not, I've suddenly gained even more respect for modellers than I had before.

[Twizzler77]

Yes, it's absolutely possible but potentially limited by which details you want to include.

 

Using a Grayscale to Normal Map conversion tool, nVidia Normal Map Filter for instance, is great for small details. However, there's a point where it's ability tapers off. The larger (deeper) the details get, the less effective it becomes at generating a convincing normal map. Other conversion tools are more effective but I typically don't use them as I'm already building high poly mesh anyways.

 

There are 2 basic routes to adding those smaller details (filigree, runes, patterns, etc.):

1 - Creating them as part of a high poly mesh (Workflow = High poly mesh > low poly mesh > UVs > Generate Normal/AO/Cavity Textures > Final Texture)

2 - Using a conversion tool in Photoshop or another image editing program. (Workflow = Low Poly Mesh > UVs > Final Texture)

 

What matters most is the end result. Creating a proper, well-built high-poly mesh for generating normal maps can take a lot of time depending on the complexity of the asset. The benefit of this is being able to generate normal, ambient occlusion, and cavity textures all at once. Generating these details with a Grayscale to Normal Map conversion tool is much faster and the results can be just as good, albeit limited.

 

It really comes down to personal preference. Personally, I build in as much details as I can into the high poly. 90%+ of my normals are generated from a high poly and then I use conversion tools to fill in the details if needed.

 

Hope this helps!

[LivewareCascade]

Hi Twizzler, thanks for your detailed input, what you're saying seems to tie in a great deal with what I've been hearing from other places too. Somebody mentioned displacement maps as a way to get detail/carved patterns onto the model, which I intend to look into. I think I plan to do the high poly method to achieve better quality, but I'll need to decide on the actual artwork and detail before I start sculpting.