Great stuff.

Oniram, Erik, Earthquake : Massive thanks for the feedback. It's definately set me thinking. I'm going to take another pass at the low. I know perhaps its not essential but it seems the right thing to do.

frell, adprince0418 many thanks glad you like it

Have you though about what size texture you plan on using? I'm curious how other artists judge what size they should use for their models.

I was planning on using a 2k sheet. probably a little high but its a personal piece so I don't care too much.

generally you don't get to make the choice, your given a spec and you squeeze the most you can from it. if you want a guide take a look at an existing title and see what they used.

Nice work look forward to seeing this textured up.

If this is a FPV weapon, 2k is about right. For brink the guns were 1x2k, + 2-4 extra 512's depending on customization. 2k is fairly common for a PC game, console would probably be 1K.

also don't forget: you can always scale down, but never scale up.

I'm curious, how do you build a lowpoly for that? What I mean is, is that just a single contiguous mesh built with some retopo tool or do you just build a bunch of floating pieces that are just arranged together? Or perhaps a little of both?

Originally Posted by greevar

I'm curious, how do you build a lowpoly for that? What I mean is, is that just a single contiguous mesh built with some retopo tool or do you just build a bunch of floating pieces that are just arranged together? Or perhaps a little of both?

with the exception of a few small bits is a contiguous mesh derived from the high poly, basically i stripped the support loops from the HP and collapsed un needed edges. the Graphite optimise tool is great for this.

(The few small bits being the barrels, and the front grip.
There are also a couple of little floaters that need integrating, which im doing.)

like EQ said, 1 contiguous mesh means no overlapping geo which means less wasted uv space.

r_fletch_r really nice model dude. It's coming along great. The bake is looking nice too. It will be very interesting to see the textures you put on this bad boy.

Right now I'm trying to do a high-poly of the M7 Assault Rifle. I was wondering how you get those clean lines or fine details in your high poly. Example areas below, sorry I blasted your piece with red squares, heh. (If you have time of course to explain, when a chance occurs, thanks!)

There isn't really any secret to it. Its really just down to how you break down the shapes. once you model the individual elements you get the seams naturally.

What I would consider important when approaching something like this breaking it down into its basic 'physical' parts, never model 2 separate parts as the same mesh if they are not 'physically' connected. The reason being is that when your sub-D modelling its best to keep the individual form's topology separate, this way you only every have to think of the local topology and not worry about how new loops effect the model as a whole.
Its also essential to block first, that way you allways have a base to work to.


pics: (edit- for some reason photobucket compressed them to death )






the blockout is just a load of spline shapes with booleans cut from em. horrid topology but it lets me get the shape right before even thinking about topology

Nice Gun. If you had showed me the lowpoly without any wireframes and said it was HP I'd totally believe it..

But all that talk about your avatar... makes me wonder what it actually was..

Originally Posted by bb0x

Nice Gun. If you had showed me the lowpoly without any wireframes and said it was HP I'd totally believe it..

But all that talk about your avatar... makes me wonder what it actually was..

It was a photoshopped version of a guys face who was stealing folks art.

awesome high poly, such a clean bake on the low, the handle's topo could use a bit more work. cant wait for the textured version. keep it up!

Show the FPV, damnit.

very nice! You have inspired me to start my Mass Effect weapon I've been meaning to make. Looking forward to textures.