UGAC - PROP 102 - ULTIMATE CRATE/BARREL - swizzle stick

[DevilHacker]

...It's going to be from a strategy/adventure game where you try to survive as a homeless person in a big city... HaHa Awesome Idea!
Look forward to seeing more.
It should be interesting to see how everything looks with an toon-atmosphere.
http://cgtalk.com/images/smilies/grin.gif

[thesuit]

I'm going to try for a slightly cartoony look, though I'm not sure how well I'll pull that off with a garbage can and its contents.

yet the idea is very cool so i think you've done 50% of the challenge so far...
just half to go...

[Swizzle]

The concept, one of a couple of 5-minute sketches I did:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/concept.jpg

The work in progress. I still need to optimize a whole lot if I'm going to show something it contains. A lot of the stuff on the can itself is going to be cut back substantially to allow for newspapers hanging out of it, boxes and stuff inside, etc. It's going to be a "smashable" object that will make a half-eaten hamburger (or hotdog or something) pop out. At the final stage of modeling I'm going to put some dents and stuff in the can to make it look a bit "used".
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/cans.jpg
The crazy colors are because I'm an amateur at UV texturing and I need to know exactly what I'm looking at. Colors are good for defining what I'm looking at.

Sooo... besides the fact that I have a shiatload of optimization to do on the body of the can, does anybody have any comments or anything? I'm not going to be normal-mapping anything because 1) I don't know how, and 2) it's just a garbage can.

[Swizzle]

Okey dokey, I just spent about an hour cleaning up the mesh because it was absurdly dense before. The current poly count is 888. Kinda funny that you can spend that many polygons on a trash can.
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/garbage6.jpg
I'm going to add a couple of colored boxes to the inside of the can and I'm also going to make a hamburger to pop out of it. The lid is going to rest against the side and the can and lid are going to have some dents. Yay for inexperienced modelers!

[Swizzle]

Hamburger! When the hamburger pops out it's going to be big enough to be visible onscreen at low resolutions. In other words, it's going to be about half the size of the garbage can. :)
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/hamburger.jpg
The total poly count is now 990. I should be able to squeeze some boxes and stuff into the garbage can. Soon I'll add dents and stuff and then it's off to UV mapping.

[Swizzle]

Whoo! I just realized that I mis-read the instructions. 1000 triangles, not just polies. Time for even more optimization!

[cg219]

Whoo! I just realized that I mis-read the instructions. 1000 triangles, not just polies. Time for even more optimization!

Dont you hate when that happens. But anyway, lookin nice so far. Mesh is a bit messy, but you can always clean it up. Nice idea too.

[Swizzle]

Dont you hate when that happens. But anyway, lookin nice so far. Mesh is a bit messy, but you can always clean it up. Nice idea too.I'm completely redoing the burger (partially because it was terrible) and much of the can, much as I hate to. My modeling skills aren't exactly great, but I'm still having fun.

[cg219]

.....but I'm still having fun.

And thats all that counts. :D

[Supervlieg]

Hey, too bad about the quads/tri's mixup. Im sure youll be able to fix it. Maybe put the detail of the ridges of the basket in the texture, perhaps even a normal map. Normal map are great for details that do not show up in the silhouette.

[deadplant155]

did you get the idea for this from earthbound :)?
if that's not where you got the idea then i'm sorry, i just love that game and there's a lot of times when you dig through the trash cans and find hamburgers. nice lookin' models, hope you can get them under the limit :)

[Swizzle]

I've been able to reduce the poly count and still have it look decent. I'm not going to normal map it because there's nothing I really want that I couldn't do with the existing geometry and a bump map. I'm probably going to start texturing tonight, so we'll see how well that goes. I have a few ideas for what I'm going to do, so stay tuned.

I can't remember where I got the idea for it, but I think it was after reading an article about originality in modern games.

I'll have some more pictures soon.

[cg_sprite]

looks and sounds quite interesting. cant wait to see what comes of it when textured.

[Swizzle]

This is a version from a couple of hours ago, but it's still basically the same. I've just added some dents and some other minor stuff. The tri count is now exactly 1000. The lid is not pictured as I'm still trying to decide whether it should be on top of the can or beside it.
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/garbageburger.jpg
That's the final burger and it's shown approximately to scale with the can. I realize that I could get rid of several polies from the burger, but it really doesn't matter since I'm not adding anything else. (well, I don't think I am. The idea of adding some flies above the can seems interesting though.)

[Brownboot]

The flies could just be an animated texture on a plane... If you're trying to be tri-economic...

[fanton]

the bin probably takes more polys than the burger. you could have reduced the number of edges on the bin.

the burger lookes nice with bites in it :)

[Swizzle]

the bin probably takes more polys than the burger. you could have reduced the number of edges on the bin. Very true. I've seriously considered reducing the number of ridges, but decided that it would be too much of a hassle. I'd have to rebuild the can from scratch, and I'm not too keen on that idea. The can took a surprising amount of work for such a relatively simple object.

I've decided that I'm going to do the flies. Each one is just going to be a black dot on a floating triangle that I'll have moving above the can. In the game they'd move around and always be facing the camera.

In other news, I've started working on the UV map. While time-consuming, it's actually easier than I thought it would be. Heck, it's even kinda fun because I'm learning new stuff and I'm immediately seeing the results of learning. Whoo!

[JamesMK]

The flies are a great idea. It'll probably be that small detail that makes the whole thing go 'pop' somehow :thumbsup:

[Swizzle]

The flies are a great idea. It'll probably be that small detail that makes the whole thing go 'pop' somehow :thumbsup:I have my litte brother to thank for the idea. Thanks Peter!

[fanton]

I've decided that I'm going to do the flies. Each one is just going to be a black dot on a floating triangle that I'll have moving above the can. In the game they'd move around and always be facing the camera.

very cool. could you post a small animated gif file, i'm really curious. the model looks very nice, and very low poly :)

good stuff :thumbsup:

[Swizzle]

Okey dokey, the texturing is going well. I unwrapped it last night and learned a surprising amount in a very small time.

Here's a render with the current texture. It's a bit blurry right now, but it's still largely unfinished.
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/render1.jpg
You can see one of the flies above the can there. I was able to squeeze in a decent picture of a fly on the UV map, so maybe I'll add a little Easter Egg type of thing with my face flying around with the flies since I still have some room. :D Fanton, I'll try to do that as soon as I can.

[fanton]

looks cool :bounce:

if i would have read your post yesterday, i woudn't have known how you've done the texturing. today i spent all my time unwrapping. so i know what you're taking about, i think.

very well done. the paper looks to white though. a yellowish paper would look more "garbagy" :)

i really like the dirt oozing out from the bin.

you could also put the lid at the on the ground resting on the bin. and get a render from a a higher position to see what's inside. i'm curious how the inside looks like. i wanted to see the burger thingy textured.

[Swizzle]

The texture's pretty far from being complete right now, but I've certainly made progress. As of now, only the outside of the can, the lid's handle and the lid itself are textured. The fly is also there, but I'm not sure I'm going to keep the current version or the fly. As for the inside of the can, it's still just a brown surface color with a couple of boxes on the inside (see the earlier pictures).

The hamburger isn't textured yet, but I'm going to scan in a couple of hamburger buns and see what I can work out. As for seeing the hamburger, it's not actually going to be visible most of the time. The point of the can is that it gets smashed or knocked over and the burger pops out. I'll make sure to include a picture of the textured hamburger next time I update here.

The paper's going to be a piece of newspaper, so it's going to be a kind of lined light gray. That's just the color I gave it in Lightwave with an alpha map applied.

[Swizzle]

Texturing is going nicely, if a little slow. I need to find a decent picture of some cooked hamburger, but I already have some buns. In fact, I put a bun on my scanner (on top of plastic wrap to keep the scanner bed clean) and just scanned it straight into photoshop. It was a wonderfully easy way to get textures.

Here's a small (665 kb) movie demonstrating the bump-map, spec map (only on the sesame seeds) and texture on the burger. QuickTime .mov format. Should work for most people. If you want a .avi or any other format just let me know and I'll probably be able to get it up. If you save the movie and set it to loop it'll do it seemlessly.
http://www.cowlook.com/burgerbump.mov

And, finally, a render for a size comparison of can vs. burger. The burger's big so it'd actually show up well on a TV screen or other display. Giant burgers are also cool. :) I know I have some texture stretching going on around the edges, but it's not that much of a concern right now. The newspaper comes complete with an amazingly narcissistic and creepy-looking picture of myself.
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/canandburger.jpg

On the 'things to do before it's finished' list are the top and bottom of the lid, the outside edges and bite of the burger, the garbage, and the bottom of the can. I also need to seriously tweak the bump and specular maps so that the can has just the right amount of bumpyness and sheen.

Edit: Oh, Lord, I just realized how wrong those first few sentences could be taken.

[Supervlieg]

Looking good. I think you have to rough up the barrel a bit more. Make it dirty, and add scratches and stuff. Basically, make it look like it has been through hell. Look for pics of dirt on google and add them to the texture. It will make the can more alive.

And I like the flies too!

[fanton]

looks very nice :bounce:

I think you have to rough up the barrel a bit more. Make it dirty, and add scratches and stuff. Basically, make it look like it has been through hell.
The trash can must be darker.

looks at http://www.electricwomen.com/hunterspoint/images/7-trash-can.jpg
(http://www.electricwomen.com/hunterspoint/images/7-trash-can.jpg)
accidentaly, it's also a crate around there :)

[Swizzle]

Fanton was asking about texturing the models with a 512x512 map in cale_oglesby's thread, so here's the example I was talking about. It's the texture sheet for the garbage can, burger and fly.
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/textureexample.jpg
It's still unfinished, but it's coming along nicely. Now, I must be off.

[fanton]

how do they do the transparency then? and the glowing effect. since this is but a model with a skin.

i have something simmilar, except i'm working backwards. i am doing the unwrapping first, then i'l copy it into photoshop and do the painting there.

yours its pretty small though. i have so many elements.

[Swizzle]

I'll tell you exactly what I did. This is from Lightwave (7, I really, really, really want to update soon. *sigh*), but there should be very similar stuff in Max.

For each part that I knew I wanted to have a specific texture for, I created a new surface. That is, I colored each part that I wanted to have a separate image for differently from the rest of the model. (see the early progress screens for examples) Each one of these surfaces I then selected individually and unwrapped onto the same UV map, one surface at a time. To make sure that I'd only need one image for each surface, I made sure that no polygons on the UV map were separate if they were on the same surface.

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/uvtut.jpg

Feel free to ask any questions you want regarding my method.

Edit: Oh, I forgot to mention this. You definitely want to do it so that you unwrap it and then paint it in Photoshop. In fact, I really don't know of any other way. You're not doing it backwards. :)

[fanton]

thanks swizzle stick. it took me two one day to figure it out, another two days to find the right way of unwrapping. i think i have it right. i only have about 5 pieces, before i had about 50. and i'm puttin the texture on. right now is afternoon, i think i will be done by tonight, just a demo. tomorrow will be there.

thanks very much for the small tutorial. nice. :thumbsup:

my questions: is there a way to export the unwrapped map directly to an image. i had to print screen. it worked, but its not professional. i'm using 3ds max 7 without foreign plugins. RAW 3ds max :)

[aphexx]

hey swizzle stick :) this game has a cool concept.. superb! i would definately buy it, when you are ready with it ;) very fun idea, although for the homeless its no fun to be homeless..but thats another thing.
you garbage can looks a bit flat. how about some normals? btw. you could realize the ripples on the side of the can only by a normal map! this would save you plents of polys for the inside stuff.

[aphexx]

hi once again, i couldnt hold my fingers to show you the advantages of a normal map!:

68 triangles:

http://www.tms-studio.de/forums_pics/cgtalk/crate_challenge/garbagecan/garbaecan_render.jpg


here a wire:
http://www.tms-studio.de/forums_pics/cgtalk/crate_challenge/garbagecan/setup_garbagecan.jpg

you could even leave out one of the two middle segments for polyreducing.
here you can have a look at the texture. it was created in photoshop, your texture as source.
btw. i also used the diffuse texture for the specualrs in this case. because the diffuse tex is nearly all grey for the can.
here your texture:
http://www.tms-studio.de/forums_pics/cgtalk/crate_challenge/garbagecan/textureexample.jpg

and here the normal:
http://www.tms-studio.de/forums_pics/cgtalk/crate_challenge/garbagecan/textureexample_normal.jpg
http://www.tms-studio.de/forums_pics/garbaecan_render.jpgcgtalk/crate_challenge/garbagecan/

[fanton]

looks way better with normal and specular.

[Swizzle]

I've not really been concerned with normal mapping because I know what I can achieve with the texture and the bump map. I also don't need to save a lot of triangles because everything is so simple. So what should I do? Should I investigate doing a normal map for the can just so that I can put more polygonal oomph towards the hamburger? I don't even know if there's something out there that will work with Lightwave 7.

So, what should I do?

[aphexx]

you want to know what to do?
well...do what you want to!
if you are seeking for some confusion i can tell you is what i would do. :scream:

go for less polys on the can and more normal map in every aspect..also on the burger..(perhaps the flesh in the burger itself could be out of normalmapping?! think of a x-axis tileable normal map which represents the burger profile)
putting some papersheets and junk in the very surrounding of the can.
model the booze and some half empty french fries "paperbox"(sorry dont know the word) as items to pick out the can. try to achieve some "deeper look" through the junk from above inside the can.
go away from the cartoonish look..

thats what i would do..

and try this link (http://developer.nvidia.com/object/photoshop_dds_plugins.html) for a photoshop plugin to produce normal maps from (best greyscale) textures. this is always a good helper!

[Swizzle]

Well, I decided that I'm not going to do a normal map--mostly because I haven't been able to get them to work! :D The normal map that sascha henrichs made was very useful as a bump map, though. I'm going to incorporate it into the final bump map since the color seems to make the bumps more pronounced (or maybe I'm just going crazy, whatever).

I've started to make the texture for the can really grimy and disgusting, perfect for a big-city back alley trash can. Supervlieg's suggestion of searching for dirt on Google was great, so thank you.

I can't upload any pictures right now, but I have some good ones and they'll be up in a few hours.

[Swizzle]

Ah, I just love sharing a computer with other people. Makes timing posts just wonderful, even more wonderful if you get your browser window closed on you.

Anyways, here is the current texture and bump map applied to the good ol' can.
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/newestcan.jpghttp://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/newestcan2.jpg
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/newestcan3.jpghttp://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/newestcan4.jpg

In that last picture you can see the seam of the texture. I'm going to take care of that momentarily. I'll probably have pictures of the lid's texture and bump up tomorrow, as well as the finished burger.

Another brother came up with yet another idea: some sort of greasy liquid oozing out of the bottom of the can. Thanks Ben! I'm going to put an alpha-mapped plane below the can for a shadow and the liquid is going to be part of it.

[Swizzle]

Bwahahahahaaaa! Hamburgerage! Bumpage! Specular... -age? Specularness? Specularism? Ah, screw it.

After taking the last week and basically throwing it away to real life (lunch with a friend, swimming, drawing, yeesh! What am I thinking?!), I finally decided to take one last crack at this can and get it completely done. Well, I failed. It's only mostly done. Luckily, I'm used to getting up early so I'll be finalizing everything early tomorrow morning.

Here we are with the finished burger, the finished can and lid, and the flies. We loveses the flieses. I was unable to do liquid spilling out of the bottom of the can since it would've looked terribly blurry, but the shadow is there on an alpha-mapped plane.
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/garbage%20can/burger.gifhttp://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/garbage%20can/flies.gifhttp://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/garbage%20can/can.gif

The texture and bump map need polish and the specular is kinda boring. That will be remedied tomorrow morning. Until then, goodnight!

[hanzo]

dude pretty cool.. IT'S A MESS'TER PIECE! haha without a doubt


:twisted:

[aphexx]

hey it comes out pretty nice! :thumbsup: and the flies are lovely.
perhaps you could do something on the contrast of your diffuse texture. but anyway.
thumbs up!

[Swizzle]

hey it comes out pretty nice! :thumbsup: and the flies are lovely.
perhaps you could do something on the contrast of your diffuse texture. but anyway.
thumbs up!Say, I've been wondering about that. I've looked at it on a few different monitors and on some it's really light and others it looks more "normal". Think I should darken it?

[Swizzle]

Here's a straight copy 'n paste from my entry:


Since this is so late it probably doesn't qualify, but what the hell. I finished everything early yesterday, but "family issues" prevented me from posting mere moments before I was going to hit the 'submit' button. Here it is for posterity if nothing else.

Game description:
This is a garbage can and its contents for a third-person game in which you play a homeless person trying to live in a big city. I haven't really worked out what sort of genre that is.

Concept Sketch:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/concept.jpg

Progress Screens:
Screen 1 (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/cans.jpg), Screen 2 (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/garbageburger.jpg), Screen 3 (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y29/xkostolny/thecan.jpg).

Final renders and texture sheets:
http://www.cowlook.com/presentationlow1.jpg
http://www.cowlook.com/presentationlow2.jpg
The diffuse texture has an included alpha. Note that the hamburger would only be visible if the can got knocked over or something.

And that's it. As I said before, I'm probably disqualified for being so late but it doesn't matter to me anymore.


Edit: Heh heh, exactly 1,337 views.

[fanton]

looks very good. you did a great job! :thumbsup:

i see a lot of trash inside, very cool. i like it.

the meat in the hamburger looks kind of flat, and too shiny. the meat and the bread should not have had any reflections, only the sesame seeds. the meat should have almost NO specual map, and the bump map shuld be very bumpy, like meat is, not flat. the meat is not really shiny. only the juices are. you only see juices if you byte a pice. laying flat you won't see so much shininess.

but it looks good though. and one can see you worked a lot on the trashcan so i enjoy it

try to add submit it.

[Swizzle]

I was trying to make the meat look nice and juicy like a good hamburger should be, but maybe I failed at that. I was also trying to get it to look like a patty of hamburger meat off a grill, but maybe I kinda screwed up the texture somehow. I dunno. If you look at the spec map you'll notice that there are a bunch of dots; those are the sesame seeds. The bun has no specular highlights at all, though the bump map sometimes makes it look like it does.

Eh, it's over and I'm never going back to this project again. I'm going to hide it deep on the hard drive and try not to think about it or the events that led to me submitting it late.

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