High Poly, Low Poly

Got more done today retopo-wise. Built the low poly drive shaft and finished up the engine, so was able to start rotating elements into their final positions. Front doesn't connect the way I want, since I've made so many visual adjustments, so I'll have to address that tomorrow. Have some detail elements to retopo (i.e. wrenches, interior radiator). But then I think I'm calling it done and am formally switching to UVs, texturing, beauty shots and onto the next project!

High Poly Hot Rod

Low Poly Hot Rod

I'm happy with the low poly engine, which has been the more time consuming part of the retopo process this project. You'll see the high poly engine first, then the low poly one.

High Poly Engine

Low Poly Engine

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hot Rod, still in the works!

Just wanted to post a quick update on the hot rod project since I haven't posted in awhile! I worked a bit on the high poly. Sculpted the fabric around the shifter, rotated some pieces more into their final position etc. 

More importantly, though, I've been spending a lot of time doing the retopo so that I can have a game-worthy vehicle! Building the low poly cab and engine has been time consuming, but fun. Once I'm finished with all that (should be soon) it's onto UVWs and texturing! I'm not sure why, but I've always kind of liked doing UVWs... I think it's easy to feel accomplished when you have a lovely layout.

Hot Rod Update

I've got a decent amount of work done on the hot rod over the past couple of days. Spent a lot of time making high poly details. A few things I've worked on specifically include the steering column, headlights, front suspension, decorative lights, windshield.

I'm thinking I'll leave off on more of the high poly stuff in order to start doing some retopo. Might take awhile. o_O

Hot Rod Update

Got some high poly modeling done today. Specifically spent time on refining the undercarriage area, the gas tank, tires, and redid in the interior fabric of the cab (which I'm much happier with now).

Unfortunately, I also realized I forgot to copy a low poly version of the cab! I'll have to figure out what I want to do about that. Doh!

Hot Rod Update

Back to working on the Hot Rod now that the Thanksgiving holiday is over!

Nothing super exciting this update, got high poly work done on the cab interior. I'm not really happy with how the ridged cloth on the cab walls looks, so I might redo that later.

Hot Rod Update

Just a quick shot of the entire thing as of right now. Did a little work on the high poly mesh for the cab... really adjusted the flow of the cab to fit this nifty reference I found. With Thanksgiving around the corner I have to admit I didn't get tons done today!

As you can tell from the screengrab, things aren't into their correct positions yet. Going to need to elongate the car a bit to fit the engine details in, the front end of car will sit much lower in final.

Happy Thanksgiving as of tomorrow.  =)

Hot Rod Update: Engine getting there!

Modeled engine light + details. Adjusted detailing around carburetor belt. Also, wasn't fond of the round carb/engine mounts... thought they just looked kind of funny. Fixed to a square shape. Still think they look a little funny due to size... might lengthen to support light more believably.

Want to add more detailing to the light, the shape is a bit too tubular I feel. There's some cool ref out there with ridges on the top and a more protrusive top front lip.

More Hot Rod Engine

Adjusted exhaust, more detail on transmission (not sure if I like the pegs holding up the cables... will address later), added some screws and plates to where exhaust meets engine.

Hot Rod Update

Started in on the transmission.

Hot Rod Update

Hot Rod Update

Got some more work done on the engine. Creating all the little bobbles is super fun.

Kind of random, but useful, things I've learned. dafont.com is an awesome, free font website discovered when creating the lettering for the Hemi logo. Also, after fonts not showing up in 3ds Max (2011 32x) I learned that 3ds Max likes .ttf files for fonts. http://www.freefontconverter.com/ will convert your font files for free so you can drop it on into your fonts folder(s) and all is well. Super handy stuff? I think so.

Hot Rod Update

Hot Rod Update

Hot Rod Update

Started getting some work done on the engine. More time consuming as there's a lot of detail and I'm going fairly high poly. Fun, though! Have no fear.... it won't remain pink forever.

Hot Rod Update

I've been sick for the last week, so not as far along on the hot rod as I'd like! Nyquil, sleep and soup has me on the mend, though. Got some work in yesterday and today!

Obviously it's not rotated into position yet (the front suspension will all line up eventually). Just added in some detail to radiator, spikes on front tires, back end gas tank. I want to add some spikes to the front rod too, I think... not entirely sure what I want them to look like though.

Updated Website

http://april-s-art.com/home.html

I took some time to quickly update my website with screencaps from my latest shipped titles: Forza Motorsport 4 and Modern Warfare 3 (Wii).

HotRod

Got a little more work done on the hot rod. Added brake detailing to front and back, including suspension.

Hot Rod

Start of suspension, increased poly on cab, adjusted headlamps.

More Hot Rod

Got a little more work done on the cab. Up next, the interior rig.

Freetime!

I finally have free time and have decided to scrap what I had on the hot rod and rework. I'm liking the slightly wider and shorter design.

Hot... Well.... More like lukewarm.

Wow stuff doesn't like transferring from 3dsMax 2011 64bit to 3dsMax 2009 32bit.  =P  But! I finally got some of my Hot Rod home. Unfortunately, the geo's all a bit wonky and I have to do a lot of clean up to get working on it again. Lame! However, as promised, here's a quick preview of what I have thus far. Very early blocking stages.

The plan is to go high poly and then down rezzing. Will bake high poly norms to low poly mesh.

Eek I just found a dead spider...

And it's sitting right in front of me between my keyboard and monitors. *shiver* That exciting news aside...

It seems I've been lax in posting stuff. Work and the holidays and life have been keeping me busy. However, I have a couple of personal projects in the works.

Procedural building is of interest to me, so I've decided to try my hand at it. Thus far I only have a few base meshes with very tentative texturing done. Here are some quick renders. Note: These are just preliminary to get the basic "feel" down. No norms, specs, dirtiness yet. I want to go for Korean architecture and am hoping to bring in the story of an old building being repurposed for modern Korean storefront(s). The storefronts are totally untextured as of yet, so I've not included snaps of them.  :)

Aside from these I'm also building a high rez hot rod... I figure hey, I work on a racing game may as well do something related for fun right? Unfortunately I'm building that on Max2011x64 and do not have caps available where I'm at currently. Oh wells, pics of that eventually.