Well its been a while since I last posted on here. I could do with some input from you peeps. This will probably be a refinement process nothing is even close to finished as I want to use this to push my skills up. So I will be using this as a learning exercise more than anything.

So critique away (could really do with it)

Got a lot still to do. Still trying to learn all the cool things that CE3 can do but got to say really loving the engine <3

Current progress.

Could you possibly post a small breakdown (flat lighting, wires, some textures, etc.) if you have the time? Looks great.

will do soon I've got flats and stuff for some of the props that I made.





I need to fix the spec on this just haven't gotten around to it :P

The post which is barely visible ^^








all textures for props are at 512 the fence is 512x256 and 256x256 will get some other stuff up tomorrow.

You have some issues in your normal maps. There are a lot of gradients in them, which is caused by the low poly shading being taken into account during baking. Your normal maps should have a constant colour of '128, 128, 255', for the most part, with normal mapped details being alternate colours to depict changes in the surface shape of the model.

With those gradients, your models may have strange shading, for example, a surface may not appear completely flat.

However, your scene is looking awesome so far. You have a great sense of material definition and atmosphere!

Thanks I noticed the shading was off on my props when I put them into the engine but wasn't sure what the actual problem was. They looked fine in marmoset so I'll re bake the normals tomorrow and get them fixed.

how do you achieve the light shafts from the lamp post? looking real cool

There is a shader called TemplBeamProc http://freesdk.crydev.net/display/SD...eamProc+Shader

My alpha is similar its tweaked to give it a more streaky,dusty/steam look to it.

Looks great mate.

My fav prop being that wooden pillar.

but one thing was troubling me why you havent left any sace between your UV islands??...they are tightly packed together.Shouldn't we leave some space between these islands to prevent bleeding?

Thanks.

^^ and I went and put it in the background barely visible as well.

There are spaces though possibly not big enough, there isn't any bleeding that I can see so far in the engine so I guess its not a huge issue but in the future I'll try to pad my islands a bit more.

They are some awesome props man! Scene looks real nice too!

Thanks dude long time since I posted on here good to be back

Originally Posted by PogoP

You have some issues in your normal maps. There are a lot of gradients in them, which is caused by the low poly shading being taken into account during baking. Your normal maps should have a constant colour of '128, 128, 255', for the most part, with normal mapped details being alternate colours to depict changes in the surface shape of the model.

With those gradients, your models may have strange shading, for example, a surface may not appear completely flat.

However, your scene is looking awesome so far. You have a great sense of material definition and atmosphere!

been a while since i did any major normal baking but i think your wrong...as the objects are modelled with a chamfer at each corner there will be curved (or gradiented) smoothing across the flat front/side polys the tangents of the surface will need to be flattened by the normal map (why the gradients in the normalmap due to shifting tangents across the flat surfaces). so what you have SHOULD work...

if it doesn't in CE you can try averaging the normals of each plane in the low poly so they appear flat

about the scene... looks good
I would open the door to the club and model a litlle bit of the interior and have light spilling out from it...it also needs lots of rubbish lying around... and i would break up your nice but very clean brick and stone work with tags posters and graffiti, and painted sections (painted over graffiti) to give it a more lived in feel

Thanks
Yeah I've never had any problems with my normal maps in the past. So Its possibly just the normals need tweaking on my low poly. I shall mess around see what the issue actually is in CE

Aye I haven't gotten around to doing the club door properly was intending to change it because it looks like ass .

Anything which adds more light to that area is good in my books trying to create a strong focal point in that area clearly.

Yeah just haven't gotten around to doing rubbish and graffiti. Its on my to do list though, will get around to it soon. I intend to put some wooden planks over the windows near to the club I also want to get in some vents, pipes/wires. Maybe some washing lines between the building. I also want to add some steam effects coming from a vent or pipe possibly coming out of the manhole as well. The brick work at the moment is 1 tiled texture but the building faces are made so that I can do unique sections if I want just requires a little tweaking. I'll possibly do a blend layer for the building or at least a vertex colouring to give some variation in the texture.

wooden planks is a bit of video game trope...maybe just plywood or painted over ;-)

Pleeeease change the fence sign to 'trespassers will be violated'

Haha yeah There is a strip club in Edinburgh on top of Lothian Road it has paintings of girls on the first floor windows might do something similar to that.

@Drav Like it, might do ;)

Originally Posted by Moonshank

Haha yeah There is a strip club in Edinburgh on top of Lothian Road it has paintings of girls on the first floor windows might do something similar to that.

next to the cameo...always joke with my gf that we should go after the cinema but she says no.

Looking really good so far can't wait to see more matey! <3

MOAR!

Cheers Brah! <3

Lighting looks really cool but the overall scene looks a bit empty as it is now. I can tell you have work left so before I make a fool out of myself - what are you planning to add to the scene?

Originally Posted by Moonshank

Yeah just haven't gotten around to doing rubbish and graffiti. Its on my to do list though, will get around to it soon. I intend to put some wooden planks over the windows near to the club I also want to get in some vents, pipes/wires. Maybe some washing lines between the building. I also want to add some steam effects coming from a vent or pipe possibly coming out of the manhole as well. The brick work at the moment is 1 tiled texture but the building faces are made so that I can do unique sections if I want just requires a little tweaking. I'll possibly do a blend layer for the building or at least a vertex colouring to give some variation in the texture.

I'm open to suggestions

I'll probably also add some street sign, lamp posts, fire hydrant, possibly a burnt out car, or a car with its wheels stolen jacked up on some bricks. Working on a broken into shop at the moment. Anything which can make this more interesting obviously it initially was just meant to be the alley way but because I worked on the building parts figured, might as well expand to show the front as well.

I'll work on blocking out all of the things I want to get into this scene in a bit wanting to get this shop front done tonight and some graffiti ect on the walls.

Then there are decals I could do but I'll not even think of those right now.

Lol sorry I missed that post. But cool, that sounds nice!

I was thinking... Judging by the wet pools it looks like it just stopped raining. Or are they pools? If so increse the spec so it actually looks like water. Right now it looks like some matte surfaces that potentially could be water. Some wet papers and glossy trashbags lying around around the dumpsters could work well with the whole 'recently stopped raining theme'. To further increase the sense of that it just stopped raining, you could add some water dripping down the fire escapes. That might look really nice.

I dunno... looking at the scene I think it's hard to judge what it like weather wise. The cobbles look really wet but the brick walls look dry. Better to be consistant with your materials.

Also, FogVolumes do wonders for lighting. It breaks up some unrealistically dark corners just makes it look cool. You got some weird edges around the sidewalk next to the door. A large FogVolume with fairly low GlobalDensity (like 0.01-0.02) could help you get that out. Or simply just change the direction of the light slightly so it doesn't interfere with the sidewalk. Either way I think you should add a FogVolume.

Gonna follow this because it looks really good so far!

yeah I had a rain effect on for a bit but wasn't sure I liked it or not maybe a very subtle rain effect might help sell the wet look further, I keep messing with my materials the brick work did look more wet at one stage must have done something to change that. Those are supposed to be puddles but I haven't done them properly yet as I'm not exactly sure how with cryengine just now. They did have a cube map reflection but I think for some reason its not on in those images or its kind of at an angle where you don't see anything in the pools.

I will add a fog volume just for you will post an update with some changes soon ish. I fixed my normal issue for those that care. I had my green channel the wrong way ^^ so there are no more shading issues on those props.

Those are some nice ideas will look into some water drips would be nice to do it from a drain pipe as well.

Thanks dude its appreciated.

Cool man, looking forward to it! I think it's gonna turn out great.