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[UDK] Hand Painted - Haunted Pumpkin Yard

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Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
Well it's October already, no better time to start this thread :)

This low poly environment is one of two final projects for my semester I'll be posting here. I'm hoping to replace some older hand painted pieces to avoid an over stylized portfolio.

I'm pretty confident in my hand painting, I just need to push my color variation, speed, and for this piece I'm going for the Blizzard/WoW style.

t3FoOAR.jpg
Concept I spent too much time on...First time doing this really :P
9QUoCxq.png
Blockout! My concept's perspective wasn't correct, so I had to fix the composition while modeling. The trees are just rough placeholders.
7ZJOSX3.png
Props with UDK scale.
uuhmEa6.jpg
Sculpted a tree since doing that in maya was a nightmare. This will go on the right side, entwined with the other tree as they connect to the pumpkin house's stem.

Next on my list is to sculpt the left tree, retopo both, make them connect, UV all my stuff and start painting. I want this to be real spooky.

Feedback/comments welcome!

Replies

  • Fenyce
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    Fenyce polycounter lvl 11
    I really love those props! Can't wait to see them painted!
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    Finished sculpts of both trees, just have to retopo. Can't wait to start painting... Then this thread will be interesting :D

    ceSgFvb.png
  • Pixelatedkiwi
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    Pixelatedkiwi polycounter
    Woohoo go Snafubar7, looking forward to seeing this come together - looking good so far!
  • Rokugan
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    Rokugan polycounter lvl 7
    Wow, I have great expectations for this! Subbed :D
  • Fenyce
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    Fenyce polycounter lvl 11
    Lovely sculpt! That tree looks awsome! Love the twirl on it's trunk!
  • TerryMosier
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    TerryMosier polycounter lvl 7
    I love your concept. This looks like such a fun project.
  • Kalilak11
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    Kalilak11 polycounter lvl 6
    The only thing that I am noticing is that when you changed the composition because of the perspective, you moved the main pumpkin in the original concept back really far. When I look at the 3D composition, there is now a big empty space in the center so my eyes don't know where to focus. If you can't match the original concept due to perspective reasons, I would suggest playing around with different compositions so that your piece has more focus. Other than that I really like your concept, and I think your models are coming along nicely. Keep up the good work!
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    Kalilak11 wrote: »
    The only thing that I am noticing is that when you changed the composition because of the perspective, you moved the main pumpkin in the original concept back really far. When I look at the 3D composition, there is now a big empty space in the center so my eyes don't know where to focus. If you can't match the original concept due to perspective reasons, I would suggest playing around with different compositions so that your piece has more focus. Other than that I really like your concept, and I think your models are coming along nicely. Keep up the good work!

    Yeah the center chunk of it is bothering me too. I don't know what to put there other than the pathway texture with grass alphas overlapping from the side, and some stones too. I'm also hoping that lighting and vegetation will help solve that as well. It's not too late to change the composition.

    Thanks for the encouragement and feedback everyone! Can't wait to nail this thing.
  • Synaesthesia
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    Synaesthesia polycounter
    Post more updates! I'm looking forward to seeing where you take this. :) Great work so far.
  • Auldbenkenobi
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    Auldbenkenobi polycounter lvl 11
    Would love an update to this! I'm doing something similar so it's a lot of inspiration!
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    Alright, back from the dead. I've never been so swamped in a semester that I forgot about this thread, and frankly I didn't see my progress as worth posting. I need to add/improve/redo a lot. Have a look.
    KV8d6S0.jpg
    aEOt1Or.jpg
    Thoughts on my paintover?
    QI2byu0.jpg
    SuOwLtd.jpg
    NE106G6.png
    ornZlO4.png
    Those barrels don't make sense :D Just wanted to see if I could cheat. They will change.
    8NNl0u0.png
    I can't decide what to put on the front of this grave... Suggestions?
    7VVp96W.png
    These props' textures are from my crate and door (which still needs a doorknob!)
    TStfBmR.png
    Silhouette of the focal point.
    0TWoE9A.png
    Seams everywhere on the trees. I've never done something as complex as that. Hoping to cover up seams with props/vegetation (and lighting will help?).

    (Incoming post-mortem of my semester. Skip if you want, read to learn from my mistake)

    At first I was ashamed and angry with myself, but then I took it as a learning experience with time/task management. This project was supposed to be done by the end of fall semester for my environment modeling class. The instructor quietly relied on us to set our own pace to have one environment completely done and lit with collision by the end. We all relaxed, "easy. 3 months? pfff, cake." ... No one finished. We all were terrible at managing our time with this class since our other classes were heavy and the instructors for those classes were actually assigning us homework and grilling us to do it. It became real easy to skimp out on our environments to make more time for those other classes. Despite none of us finishing, our grades all sat in the B range the entire semester. Most didn't even have textures or lighting. It's definitely our fault for doing so poorly, but we should have all failed, seriously. My unfinished final (first image) was a B+, and other students with zero textures or lighting got a B+ as well... The instructor knows a ton of stuff, really experienced and a great artist, just not a strong teacher -- plus the language barrier didn't help. At least he unintentionally taught us all what time management really means. It was certainly a reality check for self control and how fast I can work with a fire under my ass. I modeled and painted textures for 4-5 props a day on top of my other homework for a week up until the deadline, so that helped gauge how fast I can work...I just wish the circumstances of that lesson were different.

    TL;DR: I learned a bit about time management and I'm a big boy now.


    Comments/feedback welcome.
  • locater16
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    locater16 polycounter lvl 8
    A. That grass texture tiles something obvious.

    B. I'm also not sure you need put anything on the grave, maybe a bit of faded stuff that looks like it could be writing if only you could see it clearer.

    Looking good for the most part though!
  • TerryMosier
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    TerryMosier polycounter lvl 7
    The paint over has me pretty excited to see this project when it is finished. There isn't anything that I dislike about it honestly.

    I personally think that the grass tiles just fine. It's only noticeable in the background and that seems to be a normal thing. Once props and grass and the path are added that won't be noticeable either.

    The silhouette of your trees are awesome but I don't care for the texture too much. I think its just the grooves in the bark are too dark and have too much contrast?

    Your doing great and I hope you continue to flesh this thing out.

    Subscribing so I can get updates :D
  • Megacorpse
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    Megacorpse polycounter lvl 8
    Regarding your trees, I think you should start with cylinders for the trunk and branches, unwrap them first and then add loops/crook them, as it will allow you to paint a straight texture and let the bark follow your polygon curves. Unless you really insist on retopoing from your HP (I really like how the shape reminds of skeleton fingers)
  • Ferg
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    Ferg polycounter lvl 17
    I got excited and did a paintover without really reading the post... so here's some completely out-of-context art critting:

    I did a little paintover of your trees to give you some ideas regarding how you approach hand painted, stylized objects. Mainly, to avoid using black as a shadow color (use real colors instead), and try to paint more to the shape of the object. Zbrush's polypaint tools or programs like bodypaint 3d can be helpful for hand painted textures on complex objects, especially for organic shapes like this with seams in hard-to-hide places. You did fine with that on your other props, but I've got a soft spot for stylized trees and had to do a little paintover.

    polycount_treecrit.jpg

    Also, that time management thing is, as you saw, something pretty much everyone learns the hard way. It's ridiculous how important that skill is, and how few professionals are actually good at it.
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    Ferg - Wow, thanks for the paintover! Redoing the tree textures is pretty high on my list. I've never used anything but photoshop for texturing, so my trees are littered with seams. I'm skeptical for some reason about polypainting, as if I would lose flexibility or I won't paint as well as I could in photoshop. I suppose I should just try it :)

    Megacorpse - I had that method in mind when I started my trees, but the shapes of the trunk/branches were much easier to achieve in zbrush. Making those branches in maya was a bit nuts.

    TerryMosier - Thanks a lot! I can't wait to redo the tree textures.

    locater16 - I'm hoping to break up the grass with some different tiling ground textures (dirt path, dead grass patches, leafy/rocky etc) alaong with props etc. I'll see how it goes. Thanks for the suggestion on the grave! I had the same idea. I might go with that plus a dead leafy looking engraving.

    I really appreciate the responses, good stuff!
  • Ferg
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    Ferg polycounter lvl 17
    Yeah, I definitely wouldn't recommend a 3d painting program to make finished textures, but they're great tools for laying down the initial shapes in a texture when you're working on an object with such weird shapes and un-intuitive unwrap.
  • foredea
    I have two opinions for you beautiful scene, Snafubar7.:)

    1. How about change the size of the house pumpkin?
    I really like your 2D concept art. There are many props and trees in the scene. But my eye goes to the pumpkin house, because it is BIG!! However, it seems likely your tree are taking over the whole scene in 3D. In 3D layout, I'm not sure where I should look at.

    2. How about change the direction of the small pumpkins?
    If you think that the house pumpkins is the main object, please consider to change the direction of the small pumpkins. If small pumpkins are facing to the pumpkin house, it would be good guideline for viewers.
  • seforin
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    seforin polycounter lvl 17
    oh man I love everything about this, the color use is so well done. And the shapes are really fun.

    My only complaint is I wish this was out during Halloween and not January!

    Kidding asside though, your terrain needs a bit of work to make it intresting, a few bumps and patches, a few little vines here and there, nothing major just stuff to break up its so flat and repeating.
  • Jessica Dinh
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    Jessica Dinh polycounter lvl 10
    Hello! This is a cool idea! I love pumpkin patches ^_^ Anyway, here are some thoughts.

    I think the main thing is trying to get your focal point to read. Make that pumpkin wayyyy bigger! I see that you plan to add a path, that will help a lot with directing the eye.

    Another thing that will help your focal point is the lighting. Right now the lighting is kindof flat. I would light up the main pumpkin more (torches?), and also make the forest feel like a darker, more claustrophobic place - adding more trees in the bg (could be painted on planes), suggest a canopy, hide the sky.

    The trees are also pulling away from the focal point. They have a fun style, but they stand out a lot and that is to do with the contrast. Your value range for the tree texture seems really wide; I would make the darks less dark, and pull back the highlights a lot.

    Spend some more time on the main pumpkin texture too, it currently seems to have the level of detail of the little pumpkins when it should have more. Little unique characteristics like scratches or warts or dimples or whatever - but subtle!

    The composition of the props along the path is nice :) they help to tell a story. Don't forget to add little mundane things like long grass and pebbles to the compositions to help everything feel more natural.

    p.s. I love the gravestones textures, they have a ton of character =D

    p.p.s. While you are painting your textures, try to remember how they are all going to fit together in the big picture. Like let's say you are painting more details on the pumpkin. If you aren't careful, it can just become noise if you make the details too small or too contrasty or too many. I have done this a lot of times, so I know to try to pay attention to this now D: haha
  • Jessica Dinh
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    Jessica Dinh polycounter lvl 10
    BTW, I didn't realize you weren't going for a forest until I looked at the concept again (which appears to be more of a hill path with trees on it?) But currently your 3D scene is neither here nor there - it looks more like a big grassland with some random trees in it. I would either push it toward more of an enclosed space, or continue with your path on a hill idea!
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    Peter + Jessica - Great to have both of your feedback, I loved your entries to the first blizzard contest! You both seem to agree that I should scale up the pumpkin, and I think so too. Peter, I'll see how pointing the pumpkin faces towards the focal point works out. I like that idea a lot actually, thanks!

    And Jessica, I hadn't really thought about the forest vs. hill path element. I wish I could have both... hahah. Maybe the path on the hill leads into the forest where the pumpkin house sits? so not as many trees on the hill, but many more the path leads left. As for clutter and mundane stuff, I'll need to get on that soon. I'm brainstorming up some small storytelling clutter. Also, I was looking at your gravestones from the escape challenge when I painted mine :)


    seforin - Man, I was shooting for it to be done around halloween (maybe a bit after), but that's when I thought I could play it by ear and float by just fine (WRONG!) hahah. I was thinking I should break up the terrain a bit with some steep inclines with dirty/rocky/dead texture on the slope/side, maybe a ruined grave on top.

    I'll post screenshots by tomorrow night. Yell at me if I don't!
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    So I got the mini-farm area to 80% done, it needs little pieces of grass and vegetation alphas in it, and along the border to connect it to the grass texture as well.
    odkt4FU.jpg
    Also started re-doing the trees and I'm having trouble for some reason. I started with an outline of my bark shapes and when I went to color/shade, it was really hard get rid of the outlines. Here's the WIP texture of the unique tree bark. I feel like I forgot how to paint over my small break.
    2m4aJEo.jpg
    I took what Ferg said into account with my shadow color looking less black, and it looked wierd for a while and threw me off. I also recorded my painting process on justin.tv: http://www.justin.tv/snafubar7/b/495843267

    Tomorrow I should have this texture done and I'll post it then, and I'll start working on new 'regular' trees to replace those crappy ones...I need to get faster.

    Btw I highly recommend streaming/recording your work. It helped me focus on my work more and stay on track -- because what am I going to do, record myself checking facebook? that's lame.
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    idIsU31.jpg
    PRjbuM2.jpg
    Getting rid of the black outlines was a pain in the ass :( it took forever. recording here: http://www.justin.tv/snafubar7/b/496008701
    In the future I'm not starting with a black outline.
  • GOBEE
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    GOBEE polycounter lvl 10
    This has a lot of promise. Looking at your portfolio, it looks like you have a little bit of experience painting wood? Just a bit? Maybe once or twice?

    Looking forward to seeing the final product. Good luck.
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    GOBEE wrote: »
    This has a lot of promise. Looking at your portfolio, it looks like you have a little bit of experience painting wood? Just a bit? Maybe once or twice?

    Looking forward to seeing the final product. Good luck.

    Thanks! Haha yep most of my pieces are wood-heavy...Luckily I get to downsize my portfolio once this environment is finished.
    OYTPJn6.jpg
  • Jessica Dinh
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    Jessica Dinh polycounter lvl 10
    Wow! The improvement from last year is pretty awesome to see xD. I would suggest adding a gradient up your tree btw, to help ground it. Also, I notice your tree texture is kinda big, you probably only needed 256 x 1024 - for future reference, if you wanted to save time!
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    Thanks Jessica! I would add a gradient up from the bottom and some extra ao to separate each limb but I have no idea how to with these UVs.
    w9ah3Hp.jpg

    Today I'm redoing the outer trees, I'll try 256 x 1024 :) Or maybe just use the empty left half of my unique tree's texture sheet. The outer trees probably should have a different style bark?
  • AbKI
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    AbKI polycounter lvl 6
    I love seeing progress pics, that's quite a big improvement!

    Looking good. :)
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    Thanks abki! and thanks again for following my stream. They moved my channel to justin.tv where I'll show up under their 'creative' category. I had 25-50 viewers watch me paint yesterday. Definitely helps the focus and momentum. On twitch.tv I wasn't playing a game, so I wasn't listed anywhere lol.
  • nofacej
    This is really coming along.
    I'm not really a 3D artist so I can't comment much on geometry or other aspects unique to the medium, but there are a few things I wanted to say:

    - Firstly, I think your trees look far too healthy. I would try and stay away from rich saturated browns as much as possible.

    - I also think hand painting gives you a real opportunity to push the variance in hues between shades that you haven't really taken advantage of in your piece. If you look at the art from Blizzard which uses a similar style, they unify all the disparate elements of a scene by tinting their highlights and shadows certain colours depending on the mood they're going for (this is particularly noticeable in Diablo 3) and then separate individual objects through mid-tones. I understand a lot of this can be done in post production with lighting in 3D scenes, but you can achieve a greater degree of subtlety and control in your textures.

    - Lastly in regards to the grass texture which I understand is temporary, I think it's far too detailed for the scene you're trying to create. I don't have a 3D reference, but I think the approach used in this http://www.pixeljoint.com/pixelart/82572.htm could lend itself well to the 3D medium as well. Actually I think everything is suffering from an over-saturation of detail. The human brain is very good at filling in missing detail, and you can use that to your advantage to keep your scenes clean.
  • foredea
    Very impressive! Not only your art work has improved a lot, but also I can see that you are trying your best to consider to people's critics and advice. I know how hard it is.

    Perhaps, now is the time to think about the layout of the submission. I'd like to say that please make it professionally.
    If you are not good at wire-frame or some texture are not best quality, make it smaller than others or don't show it in the final layout. Few idea sketches and drawings would be the best way to show your creativity and your idea develop skills.

    If you can put animation on the props or visual effect, it would make you an exceptional artist.

    I'm looking forward to see your final. :)
  • Nefarius24
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    Nefarius24 polycounter lvl 6
    Awesome stuff Snafubar! :D I really like the direction this is heading! It was neat seeing your progress over the past year too! Can't wait to see your final product. :)
  • Eliteabix
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    Eliteabix polycounter lvl 5
    Im thinking those trees would actually look better lower poly - like very low poly.
  • AzzaMat
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    AzzaMat polycounter lvl 9
    I would suggest painting the gradient into the vertex colours, Then multiply it in through shader. To get a nice gradient fill the vertex colours in black, then paint in red, green or blue at the top, then use the blur tool to get a nice transition. It's really easy to implement in UDK! Just create a new material and multiply the vertex colour node by the texture. Texture is looking really nice btw I look forward to seeing more!
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    AzzaMat wrote: »
    I would suggest painting the gradient into the vertex colours, Then multiply it in through shader. To get a nice gradient fill the vertex colours in black, then paint in red, green or blue at the top, then use the blur tool to get a nice transition. It's really easy to implement in UDK! Just create a new material and multiply the vertex colour node by the texture. Texture is looking really nice btw I look forward to seeing more!

    That sounds tasty. I hope I have time to get that working!

    Thanks for the feedback guys, I'm laying out my lightmap coordinates for UDK, sorry I haven't updated with new screenshots. My next shots will be renders from UDK.
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    Update!
    BvaVqJB.jpg
    Took forever to get this scene set up in UDK due to learning skydomes/lightmaps/udk and troubleshooting other stuff. Something feels like it's missing. I have a much better shot on my viewport than when I hit "Play in viewport window" and then fly around with some different FOV angle...

    Barely any difference, but here's what I set up with one viewport on my other monitor, while I went around and arranged my scene in another viewport on my main monitor.
    mKWwdXH.jpg

    Thoughts/crits welcome.
  • CarlK3D
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    CarlK3D polycounter lvl 7
    Looks Great! 100x better then when I 1st saw it
  • Pixelatedkiwi
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    Pixelatedkiwi polycounter
    Agreed big improvement! I like the colors and overall mood, I really like the way you've dressed the scene with the props too. It would be nice to get some fill lighting onto those foreground elements as some of the texture details are getting lost in dark. Looking forward to seeing the finished result :)
  • LANKUS MAXIMUS
    Dayum.... What an update!

    Loving the progression :)
  • Nefarius24
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    Nefarius24 polycounter lvl 6
    Oh wow, this is looking awesome! :)
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    Submitting this to the blizzard student contest. Thanks for all your feedback/support guys!
    dsKCBJM.jpg

    I'm still going to be adding onto this scene to make a good flythrough for AAU's spring show, so I'll be filling in the rest of what's off camera. Also I'm learning particle effects now, so some low fog and maybe a chimney with smoke puffs will be added later.
  • Gannon
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    Gannon interpolator
    You win, only complaint is your composition is broken with the large pumpkin being dead center. Fix it please - lol.

    Edit - To add the gradient to the tree you've got two main options. Use the second or third UV set, multiply a gradient using a texture coordinate specifically to the UV channel with a planar projection over the diffuse.

    Second way, Add vertex color information in the software of choice and import in the mesh, then multiply a vertex color node with your diffuse texture. Pretty sure that will work as well. good luck!

    Edit edit - Just saw somebody else said the same thing , oh well :p
  • Tobbo
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    Tobbo polycounter lvl 11
    This is looking great Snafubar7! That improvement is massive! Keep going! :)
  • Jeff Parrott
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    Jeff Parrott polycounter lvl 19
    Gradient on the skydome. Gradient on the tree like Gannon says. Gradients of everything!

    Also I'd focus the lighting a bit more on the larger pumpkin. The orange pumpkins should darken some as they get further away from the big pumpkin.
  • Eliteabix
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    Eliteabix polycounter lvl 5
    This looks great!
  • Fenyce
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    Fenyce polycounter lvl 11
    WOW. So much improvement over the last year!
    It looks just great. But some gradients could really help the seen to be even better!
    This will make a lovely piece for your portfolio!
  • moose
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    moose polycount sponsor
    Scene is looking cool! some feedback:

    My biggest comment is that the scene is very flat, and the pumpkins have a lot of forced shading on them, which makes them feel awkward. Its hard for the eye to rest in the scene, hard to dance around and find things, when the values are pretty even. Its also missing a lot of atmosphere, feels very sterile. The stuff in the background is fucking great, wish it pulled more into the foreground!

    I honestly did not see the door on the side of the pumpkin until i stared at the image for about 10 minutes. I wonder if pulling some saturation and contrast back from the surrounding elements, and adding some candles to the top of the overhang + some extra lighting contrast to it would help draw attention there.

    Also feel like the two branches in the center leading to the pumpkin aren't doing great things, and feel a stalk of sorts could help weigh it down some?

    finally, the colors overall are a little all over, feel like you could pull back a bit, give the scene a bit more spooky tone with cooler colors throughout.

    paintover thumb illustrating comments:
    snafubar7_po.jpg
  • Snafubar7
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    Snafubar7 polycounter lvl 8
    Thank you so much man. I'll be making changes to this scene and updating soon. I've got five classes in my final semester so I might be slow.
  • rock
    Wow, that is some really nice progression there! Good luck with the next update, really looking forward to this.
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