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Sumea Challenge #6 -3D- Conundrum -Challenger8

Submitted by conundrum on

My first idea is for an immense creature controlled by a smaller sinister one which sits on his shoulders. The second idea is a stick insect man. Currently leaning towards the stick insect.

Submitted by conundrum on Sun, 18/07/04 - 2:27 AM Permalink

probably moving too fast, but ive got heaps of free time, so here is my first modelling test, i was looking for some crits about whether its a decent start as im pretty new to game model work.
thanks
[img]icon_paperclip.gif[/img] Download Attachment: [url="http://66.148.2.51/forum/attached/conundrum/200471795342_Stickman-Rende…"]Stickman-Render-2small.jpg[/url]
56.31?KB
[img]http://66.148.2.51/forum/attached/conundrum/200471795342_Stickman-Rende…]

Submitted by MoonUnit on Sun, 18/07/04 - 11:18 AM Permalink

i dont know much about how well your doing for a game model but its damn impressive to be this far into it allready!

Submitted by bullet21 on Sun, 18/07/04 - 7:53 PM Permalink

Great model, especially for a first attempt, but the only thing is, i think you may have a bit of trouble getting it to 8000 poly's, it seems you've got most of the character done and there's not that much detail in you concept. But other than that it's a great start.

Submitted by conundrum on Mon, 19/07/04 - 12:39 AM Permalink

yeah i see what you mean, i was thinking i might redo the concept and then subdivide the model then work at that level of detail. Lots of time though so i maight just use this one as some practice and if it doesn't work, try something else.
thanks for the reply

Submitted by Makk on Mon, 19/07/04 - 1:57 AM Permalink

If you want to add more polies round off any limbs so they are nice and round and smooth. Adding a nicely detialied eyes/mouth would look really cool. Give him a massive tongue!

Submitted by conundrum on Mon, 19/07/04 - 8:48 AM Permalink

had a crack at modelling it at the next level of subdivision and this is waht ive got so far, the polycount is 3204, any comments and crits would be great
thanks
[img]icon_paperclip.gif[/img] Download Attachment: [url="http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/20047188477_Stickman-R…"]Stickman-Render-3small.jpg[/url]
54.71?KB
[img]http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/20047188477_Stickman-R…]

Submitted by Kalescent on Mon, 19/07/04 - 8:53 AM Permalink

YEAH!!! I like this guy! more more!

Submitted by MarkMash on Mon, 19/07/04 - 11:02 AM Permalink

haha, looks really cool!

I was told that generally if a character has 'x' amount of toes, in your case 3, he should have the some amount of fingers. Or vice versa. 4 fingers then 4 toes. Though it's up to you.

Another thing is since his legs are so long, maybe you could consider adding in a second knee joint to make it more stick insecty like what you wanted.

still, coming along sweet!

Submitted by bullet21 on Mon, 19/07/04 - 6:18 PM Permalink

I stand corrected about the getting it to 8000 poies thing ;), but you are going along very well great job. It's looking heaps better.

Submitted by Aven on Mon, 19/07/04 - 6:18 PM Permalink

I bet all the girls like him ;)

Looking very cool. My only complaint so far is that his hands are very flat. Seeing as though it is a WIP, I'm sure they wont stay that way :)

Submitted by Sinister on Mon, 19/07/04 - 9:37 PM Permalink

Wow, 2 days into the challenge and you're this far along. I haven't even had time to think up a decent concept and you're half way through your model. Excellent work Conundrum! While you're working away at him/it, think of a history behind his creation to further his character. I'm likin' what I'm seein'.

Quote HazarD: "more, more!"

Submitted by MoonUnit on Mon, 19/07/04 - 10:12 PM Permalink

damn, thats turning out really great, a true horror character :D

Submitted by Wizenedoldman on Mon, 19/07/04 - 11:50 PM Permalink

Hehe, love his face, coming along well, give him some teeth, real sharp ones!

There's always room for more spikes...

Submitted by UniqueSnowFlake on Tue, 20/07/04 - 1:13 AM Permalink

Looking awesome
please correct me if I'm wrong but it realy doesn't look like 3204 Tri's I think its double that. Add a edit mesh on it and then do you poly count. Like I said I might be wrong it just doesn't look like 3000 to me.

Submitted by Wizenedoldman on Tue, 20/07/04 - 1:25 AM Permalink

Yeah it does look a lot higher than that, especially in the hands, they're quite dense.

Submitted by conundrum on Tue, 20/07/04 - 1:35 AM Permalink

yeah, sorry about that. its 3186 quads, so it ends up about 6372 tris at this stage, thanks for all the replies

Submitted by conundrum on Tue, 20/07/04 - 3:11 AM Permalink

bit of a slow day today, ive mainly only worked on the head, as you can see ive removed the lower jaw and made the sides of the mouth into large fangs/tusks, as a result i will probably leave rest of the mouth empty as, with the tusks, nose and more teeth it will look overly cluttered. as usual c&c is appreciated
thanks
[img]icon_paperclip.gif[/img] Download Attachment: [url="http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/20047193118_Stickman-R…"]Stickman-Render-3-Headsmall.jpg[/url]
54.93 KB
[img]http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/20047193118_Stickman-R…]

Submitted by LiveWire on Tue, 20/07/04 - 6:12 AM Permalink

you have a crap load of polys in the hands (particually the palms) which you dont need and not many in other areas. need to distribute them a bit better.

Submitted by conundrum on Tue, 20/07/04 - 6:39 AM Permalink

yeah, ive noticed that too, i will probably build all the detail i can into the model, then go back and refine it, but your right about the hands being the main problem
thanks

Submitted by conundrum on Tue, 20/07/04 - 11:07 PM Permalink

i just wanted to see which of these triangulated (think thats the word[?]) is the best from a game model point of view, the first is 6446 polies and the second is 6354. sorry about the file size.
thanks
[img]icon_paperclip.gif[/img] Download Attachment: [url="http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/200471923629_Stickman-…"]Stickman-Render-Trismall.jpg[/url]
73.78?KB
[img]http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/200471923629_Stickman-…]

Submitted by xyz on Wed, 21/07/04 - 4:08 AM Permalink

Nasty. Very nice. Reminds me of the shadow feinds in the manga movie Ninja Scroll. You cold give it some objects like it had killed and kept the spoils. skulls or a pink umberella to get back to the survival horror theme and make it macbre. A t-shirt that says I love the wiggles covered in blood.

I find this high res concept problematic. Often using mesh smooth / triangulate or hsb modifiers, doesn't really help you or the model. I think someone mentioned this. You really have to think nurbs or sub divisions right from the start, which is another ball game.

Submitted by MoonUnit on Wed, 21/07/04 - 8:44 AM Permalink

lol personally id go without any clothing on the chest and back, if any then minimal. I dont think this guy carries his lunch, he goes hunting for it ;)

Submitted by Kalescent on Wed, 21/07/04 - 8:59 AM Permalink

It looks good so far, but ill be picky.

I know you have 8500 odd tri's to work with here, but I can see so many polygons used that arent actually helping define the models surface.

The model is a great design, but the mesh could be built and look no different with less than half of the count you have at the moment.

Look at the area on the backs of his arms, there are hundreds of tri's there that arent actually adding any detail, or going to be used for deformation.

Submitted by Malus on Wed, 21/07/04 - 8:59 AM Permalink

I'd have to agree with Moonunit, the cloth isn't as good as the hunkering beast it was before. [:)]

Submitted by conundrum on Thu, 22/07/04 - 1:11 AM Permalink

alright, i have a new question, when making texture flats, does the uv map have to be a whole unwrap of the object or can i select individual polies and uv map all the different parts of the model individually, i will of course still make it within the 2x 512 limit.
ps-im using lightwave.

Submitted by conundrum on Thu, 22/07/04 - 2:02 AM Permalink

sorry about posting so much, but here's the background of it.

The story begins several years ago when a government funded research project is trying to create a hybrid of metal and bone, for obvious military reasons, but also to help the rejuvenation of bone and cartilage in people who have severely broken bones and other such problems. This is where the real ordeal begins; in order to properly test the effectiveness of the treatment, the bone hybrid is merged with a sinew which is artificially developed from stem cells. The experiment is a complete success with the two merging much faster than anticipated. Unfortunately the scientists underestimated the versatility speed at which that number of stem cells can develop, before long they have begun to develop into a mixture of the many animals they were taken from (each chosen for their physical attributes which directly corresponds to their cell development and growth). This creature grows and advances swiftly then develops a taste for the bones from which it originated. Unfortunately the scientists fear to destroy the abomination as it will negate all of their research. Instead they feed its hunger with all the bone hybrids they had created so far. Finally the inevitable happens; they run out of bone to sustain it; one by one the researchers are torn apart by the monster which devours their bones while discarding the flesh and sinew.

This is when we go back to present time and a group from an unknown organization is investigating the abandoned research centre, which resides in a now empty region. As the team first enters the facility they are hit by the putrid smell of something rotting. As they delve deeper they are confronted with the source of stench, lining the walls and floor of the corridors and rooms are piles of human flesh and muscle, with no skeletons to be seen?

Submitted by Jackablade on Thu, 22/07/04 - 9:39 AM Permalink

Eek, never use subdivide when you're making low poly models. Especially don't use triangle based subdivide, it'll make your character nightmarishly difficult to work with. Always try and work with quads. You get a cleaner, easier to rig and animate mesh and it makes modelling a hell of a lot easier too.

As was mentioned earlier, theres a lot of polygons in there that you don't need at the moment which will make things harder to work with. If I was you, I'd go through and strip as many out as possible at this stage while you haven't got all that much detail on him and then just cut in the edges that you actually need.

All that said, I really like your model. He looks kind of like a tree monster to me with those long spindly arms and huge branch like hands. perhaps you could work in some gnarled branches and leafy alpha plains to soak up some of your excess polygons.

Submitted by conundrum on Sat, 24/07/04 - 5:49 AM Permalink

heres a tiny adavancement, ive been working pretty slowly cause im happy with the overall body shape and im just refining it. So far i have added a bit of deformation to the creature and detailed the arm to make it substantially smoother. I also worked how to remove those pesky polies, so now the problem with the bck of the arms,palms and eyelids is ealt with. now its just a case of how to use the remaining 2000 tris.
[img]http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/200472354819_Stickman-…]

Posted by conundrum on

My first idea is for an immense creature controlled by a smaller sinister one which sits on his shoulders. The second idea is a stick insect man. Currently leaning towards the stick insect.


Submitted by conundrum on Sun, 18/07/04 - 2:27 AM Permalink

probably moving too fast, but ive got heaps of free time, so here is my first modelling test, i was looking for some crits about whether its a decent start as im pretty new to game model work.
thanks
[img]icon_paperclip.gif[/img] Download Attachment: [url="http://66.148.2.51/forum/attached/conundrum/200471795342_Stickman-Rende…"]Stickman-Render-2small.jpg[/url]
56.31?KB
[img]http://66.148.2.51/forum/attached/conundrum/200471795342_Stickman-Rende…]

Submitted by MoonUnit on Sun, 18/07/04 - 11:18 AM Permalink

i dont know much about how well your doing for a game model but its damn impressive to be this far into it allready!

Submitted by bullet21 on Sun, 18/07/04 - 7:53 PM Permalink

Great model, especially for a first attempt, but the only thing is, i think you may have a bit of trouble getting it to 8000 poly's, it seems you've got most of the character done and there's not that much detail in you concept. But other than that it's a great start.

Submitted by conundrum on Mon, 19/07/04 - 12:39 AM Permalink

yeah i see what you mean, i was thinking i might redo the concept and then subdivide the model then work at that level of detail. Lots of time though so i maight just use this one as some practice and if it doesn't work, try something else.
thanks for the reply

Submitted by Makk on Mon, 19/07/04 - 1:57 AM Permalink

If you want to add more polies round off any limbs so they are nice and round and smooth. Adding a nicely detialied eyes/mouth would look really cool. Give him a massive tongue!

Submitted by conundrum on Mon, 19/07/04 - 8:48 AM Permalink

had a crack at modelling it at the next level of subdivision and this is waht ive got so far, the polycount is 3204, any comments and crits would be great
thanks
[img]icon_paperclip.gif[/img] Download Attachment: [url="http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/20047188477_Stickman-R…"]Stickman-Render-3small.jpg[/url]
54.71?KB
[img]http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/20047188477_Stickman-R…]

Submitted by Kalescent on Mon, 19/07/04 - 8:53 AM Permalink

YEAH!!! I like this guy! more more!

Submitted by MarkMash on Mon, 19/07/04 - 11:02 AM Permalink

haha, looks really cool!

I was told that generally if a character has 'x' amount of toes, in your case 3, he should have the some amount of fingers. Or vice versa. 4 fingers then 4 toes. Though it's up to you.

Another thing is since his legs are so long, maybe you could consider adding in a second knee joint to make it more stick insecty like what you wanted.

still, coming along sweet!

Submitted by bullet21 on Mon, 19/07/04 - 6:18 PM Permalink

I stand corrected about the getting it to 8000 poies thing ;), but you are going along very well great job. It's looking heaps better.

Submitted by Aven on Mon, 19/07/04 - 6:18 PM Permalink

I bet all the girls like him ;)

Looking very cool. My only complaint so far is that his hands are very flat. Seeing as though it is a WIP, I'm sure they wont stay that way :)

Submitted by Sinister on Mon, 19/07/04 - 9:37 PM Permalink

Wow, 2 days into the challenge and you're this far along. I haven't even had time to think up a decent concept and you're half way through your model. Excellent work Conundrum! While you're working away at him/it, think of a history behind his creation to further his character. I'm likin' what I'm seein'.

Quote HazarD: "more, more!"

Submitted by MoonUnit on Mon, 19/07/04 - 10:12 PM Permalink

damn, thats turning out really great, a true horror character :D

Submitted by Wizenedoldman on Mon, 19/07/04 - 11:50 PM Permalink

Hehe, love his face, coming along well, give him some teeth, real sharp ones!

There's always room for more spikes...

Submitted by UniqueSnowFlake on Tue, 20/07/04 - 1:13 AM Permalink

Looking awesome
please correct me if I'm wrong but it realy doesn't look like 3204 Tri's I think its double that. Add a edit mesh on it and then do you poly count. Like I said I might be wrong it just doesn't look like 3000 to me.

Submitted by Wizenedoldman on Tue, 20/07/04 - 1:25 AM Permalink

Yeah it does look a lot higher than that, especially in the hands, they're quite dense.

Submitted by conundrum on Tue, 20/07/04 - 1:35 AM Permalink

yeah, sorry about that. its 3186 quads, so it ends up about 6372 tris at this stage, thanks for all the replies

Submitted by conundrum on Tue, 20/07/04 - 3:11 AM Permalink

bit of a slow day today, ive mainly only worked on the head, as you can see ive removed the lower jaw and made the sides of the mouth into large fangs/tusks, as a result i will probably leave rest of the mouth empty as, with the tusks, nose and more teeth it will look overly cluttered. as usual c&c is appreciated
thanks
[img]icon_paperclip.gif[/img] Download Attachment: [url="http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/20047193118_Stickman-R…"]Stickman-Render-3-Headsmall.jpg[/url]
54.93 KB
[img]http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/20047193118_Stickman-R…]

Submitted by LiveWire on Tue, 20/07/04 - 6:12 AM Permalink

you have a crap load of polys in the hands (particually the palms) which you dont need and not many in other areas. need to distribute them a bit better.

Submitted by conundrum on Tue, 20/07/04 - 6:39 AM Permalink

yeah, ive noticed that too, i will probably build all the detail i can into the model, then go back and refine it, but your right about the hands being the main problem
thanks

Submitted by conundrum on Tue, 20/07/04 - 11:07 PM Permalink

i just wanted to see which of these triangulated (think thats the word[?]) is the best from a game model point of view, the first is 6446 polies and the second is 6354. sorry about the file size.
thanks
[img]icon_paperclip.gif[/img] Download Attachment: [url="http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/200471923629_Stickman-…"]Stickman-Render-Trismall.jpg[/url]
73.78?KB
[img]http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/200471923629_Stickman-…]

Submitted by xyz on Wed, 21/07/04 - 4:08 AM Permalink

Nasty. Very nice. Reminds me of the shadow feinds in the manga movie Ninja Scroll. You cold give it some objects like it had killed and kept the spoils. skulls or a pink umberella to get back to the survival horror theme and make it macbre. A t-shirt that says I love the wiggles covered in blood.

I find this high res concept problematic. Often using mesh smooth / triangulate or hsb modifiers, doesn't really help you or the model. I think someone mentioned this. You really have to think nurbs or sub divisions right from the start, which is another ball game.

Submitted by MoonUnit on Wed, 21/07/04 - 8:44 AM Permalink

lol personally id go without any clothing on the chest and back, if any then minimal. I dont think this guy carries his lunch, he goes hunting for it ;)

Submitted by Kalescent on Wed, 21/07/04 - 8:59 AM Permalink

It looks good so far, but ill be picky.

I know you have 8500 odd tri's to work with here, but I can see so many polygons used that arent actually helping define the models surface.

The model is a great design, but the mesh could be built and look no different with less than half of the count you have at the moment.

Look at the area on the backs of his arms, there are hundreds of tri's there that arent actually adding any detail, or going to be used for deformation.

Submitted by Malus on Wed, 21/07/04 - 8:59 AM Permalink

I'd have to agree with Moonunit, the cloth isn't as good as the hunkering beast it was before. [:)]

Submitted by conundrum on Thu, 22/07/04 - 1:11 AM Permalink

alright, i have a new question, when making texture flats, does the uv map have to be a whole unwrap of the object or can i select individual polies and uv map all the different parts of the model individually, i will of course still make it within the 2x 512 limit.
ps-im using lightwave.

Submitted by conundrum on Thu, 22/07/04 - 2:02 AM Permalink

sorry about posting so much, but here's the background of it.

The story begins several years ago when a government funded research project is trying to create a hybrid of metal and bone, for obvious military reasons, but also to help the rejuvenation of bone and cartilage in people who have severely broken bones and other such problems. This is where the real ordeal begins; in order to properly test the effectiveness of the treatment, the bone hybrid is merged with a sinew which is artificially developed from stem cells. The experiment is a complete success with the two merging much faster than anticipated. Unfortunately the scientists underestimated the versatility speed at which that number of stem cells can develop, before long they have begun to develop into a mixture of the many animals they were taken from (each chosen for their physical attributes which directly corresponds to their cell development and growth). This creature grows and advances swiftly then develops a taste for the bones from which it originated. Unfortunately the scientists fear to destroy the abomination as it will negate all of their research. Instead they feed its hunger with all the bone hybrids they had created so far. Finally the inevitable happens; they run out of bone to sustain it; one by one the researchers are torn apart by the monster which devours their bones while discarding the flesh and sinew.

This is when we go back to present time and a group from an unknown organization is investigating the abandoned research centre, which resides in a now empty region. As the team first enters the facility they are hit by the putrid smell of something rotting. As they delve deeper they are confronted with the source of stench, lining the walls and floor of the corridors and rooms are piles of human flesh and muscle, with no skeletons to be seen?

Submitted by Jackablade on Thu, 22/07/04 - 9:39 AM Permalink

Eek, never use subdivide when you're making low poly models. Especially don't use triangle based subdivide, it'll make your character nightmarishly difficult to work with. Always try and work with quads. You get a cleaner, easier to rig and animate mesh and it makes modelling a hell of a lot easier too.

As was mentioned earlier, theres a lot of polygons in there that you don't need at the moment which will make things harder to work with. If I was you, I'd go through and strip as many out as possible at this stage while you haven't got all that much detail on him and then just cut in the edges that you actually need.

All that said, I really like your model. He looks kind of like a tree monster to me with those long spindly arms and huge branch like hands. perhaps you could work in some gnarled branches and leafy alpha plains to soak up some of your excess polygons.

Submitted by conundrum on Sat, 24/07/04 - 5:49 AM Permalink

heres a tiny adavancement, ive been working pretty slowly cause im happy with the overall body shape and im just refining it. So far i have added a bit of deformation to the creature and detailed the arm to make it substantially smoother. I also worked how to remove those pesky polies, so now the problem with the bck of the arms,palms and eyelids is ealt with. now its just a case of how to use the remaining 2000 tris.
[img]http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/conundrum/200472354819_Stickman-…]