The "What Are You Working On?" Thread

yRjmqvG.jpg


I've just been doing it the same way Kunos cars are AFAIK (judging by their wireframes in Content Manager). Not sure of any other way to do it, but I just use the quad chamfer tool with 0 edge tension, which is quite quick for me.

It also works great for LOD B, because you can just remove the two edges either side of the panel gap, but keeping the same geometry.

Here is a pic of a Kunos mesh - No idea if there is a more tri-efficient way of doing it, but its simple so I stick with it.

qsLoZrD.jpg
Topology of the car is perfect man ,
And the industry standard way of making cuts and shamfers , its correct leave it ,
If anything add more on curves and cut it back in with triangles :)
 
Yeah it looks like you've got a support loop into the edge, which you can probably skip, and then have a geometrically more accurate 'curved' poly flow with a 45deg chamfer.
Then for LOD B just not have a perp row. So saving one row on each edge on LOD A/B.

**BUT** I've yet to try this... haha... so ignore me for now unless you're into experimenting and tinkering with things a lot :D

I think I mentioned this on your Transit thread haha.


Do you have a project folder set up that I can have at all? Mainly I just want something I can drop my FBX in from Max, and run AC and select a car and it just show my mesh.
At least that way I can check the method and see how good it looks?




PS, I'm not sure how familiar with all the tools in Max (16/17?) but I really like WrapIt by Matt Clark.
It makes retopo work really nice, but the 'flow' setting tools for adding/removing loops, extending edges and generally making your topology neat nice and quickly are really great.
Apparently Max increasingly offers these features built it, but I still find Matt's plugin more reliable, faster and generally very useful for the money.
Also he still fully supports it, it was around from Max9 iirc, but he still updates for the latest versions too!


I'll have to start my Z4 WIP thread moving a bit and then I can at least post pics of it and we can start discussing pros and cons of different techniques etc... not many people seem to have gone through different chamfers and efficiencies/visual results so I think it'd be worth doing?!

Cheers

Dave
Yeah I think you mentioned this to me before on the Transit. When I first began modelling I tried with 45 degree chamfers, but found it would mess up the normals upon using smoothing groups. I guess there are ways to get round this, and no doubt will save a ton of tris, but it all seems a bit beyond me at this stage (I'm still a beginner really, only using the most basic tools within 3ds and not strayed towards any kind of plug ins etc).

I'm all for it if there is a tried and tested way of saving tris yet keeping an neat appearance, that is simple enough to use in 3ds, but I think I'll leave it to you to experiment with at this stage :roflmao:

As for a project folder - have you used the KsEditor yet? You can import your .fbx to that (and obviously export that to a .kn5 for use in-game).

PS. I saw your post on the other thread, I get what you mean now - I'll hopefully sort it!

I think your working standard is a little different form mine though :roflmao: I've been using Kunos models as a reference point, and some of them are janky as hell when it comes to getting nice linear reflections... So I've just been aiming for that, perhaps I need to really up my game and aim higher.
 
Yeah I think you mentioned this to me before on the Transit. When I first began modelling I tried with 45 degree chamfers, but found it would mess up the normals upon using smoothing groups. I guess there are ways to get round this, and no doubt will save a ton of tris, but it all seems a bit beyond me at this stage (I'm still a beginner really, only using the most basic tools within 3ds and not strayed towards any kind of plug ins etc).

I'm all for it if there is a tried and tested way of saving tris yet keeping an neat appearance, that is simple enough to use in 3ds, but I think I'll leave it to you to experiment with at this stage :roflmao:

As for a project folder - have you used the KsEditor yet? You can import your .fbx to that (and obviously export that to a .kn5 for use in-game).

PS. I saw your post on the other thread, I get what you mean now - I'll hopefully sort it!

I think your working standard is a little different form mine though :roflmao: I've been using Kunos models as a reference point, and some of them are janky as hell when it comes to getting nice linear reflections... So I've just been aiming for that, perhaps I need to really up my game and aim higher.

I don't think there's anything you need to change in your style, it's already so good. :) Of course fewer polys is good thing but I find the current "recommendation" for tris already pretty roomy, 125 000 tri exterior + 125 000 interior or something like that. There's usually not much detail that needs to be sacrificed in order to be within those limits. (And if optimization is done well it probably doesn't hurt to go even little above if necessary).
 
Topology of the car is perfect man ,
And the industry standard way of making cuts and shamfers , its correct leave it ,
If anything add more on curves and cut it back in with triangles :)

Is there such a thing as industry standard? Surely it depends on the rendering engine and other features of it? And eventually what the end results look like vs other approaches.
I'm fairly sure on the Forza meshes I saw recently, they were using a flat surface (the panel edges) and then a 45deg chamfer edge, and had the normals for the entire curved bit (0 > 90deg) done via the normals over that 45deg geometry part.

I've yet to try this in AC. Maybe AC doesn't support per-vert normals?!

It's just a technique that should be more volumetrically accurate (as in the mesh follows more closely the real one at chamfers), and easier to author, and easier to tweak meshes, and easier to texture map, and saves polygons, and is just better in every way.
You just need to manage the modified normals using appropriate workflows (pita in Max, maybe why people avoid it?!)
normals.jpg


So here is a mesh with a chamfer, roughly.
Purple = normals set by the average of the face directions per vert.
Green = modified normals.
Yellow/red lines are the apparent normal flow.

Having an extra row in there, and technically wrong geometry, to 'fake' the normal flow to look like a curve, when the geometry can actually be closer to reality, be averaged better to the real average of the chamfer (45deg), and explicitly set the normals to achieve that.


If this is industry standard, it's old industry standard.

As said, there is a polycount thread on this that is years old, and I'm fairly sure Forza H1 and Forza 3 were using this technique for the realtime models.
For photomode they actually appear to use high density curved chamfers.





On the cutting in more triangles for panel edges, do you do this so the new triangle normals are co-incident with the accompanying face it was cut into?
My only concern with these cut in triangles is the normal flows can get quite kinky right where you notice bad normal flows into curves/creases etc, if the new triangles contribute to a more curved edge into the panel edge/crease etc.

I'm not sure if it's better to run the loop further back to a flatter part of the car (1d curvature) and then have the triangle there where it won't contribute to wonky normals.
Ie, door handle scoop outs often have a load of triangles cut in, but they're essentially on 1d curved surfaces so are almost invisible.

I'll admit I just add extra triangles and tweak till it looks ok, but the normal flows can look a bit squiffy despite it being geometrically as close as it can get.

It's just a fairly different discipline to run loops back a bit before creating the triangle in a better location.
 
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I don't think there's anything you need to change in your style, it's already so good. :) Of course fewer polys is good thing but I find the current "recommendation" for tris already pretty roomy, 125 000 tri exterior + 125 000 interior or something like that. There's usually not much detail that needs to be sacrificed in order to be within those limits. (And if optimization is done well it probably doesn't hurt to go even little above if necessary).

I agree, the work is very good from Gary!

That's the only reason I'm recommending these processes because they are relevant concerns once you're at this kind of level of quality and want to go higher, which I'm sure he will want to do given his background.
 
Is there such a thing as industry standard? Surely it depends on the rendering engine and other features of it? And eventually what the end results look like vs other approaches.
I'm fairly sure on the Forza meshes I saw recently, they were using a flat surface (the panel edges) and then a 45deg chamfer edge, and had the normals for the entire curved bit (0 > 90deg) done via the normals over that 45deg geometry part.

I've yet to try this in AC. Maybe AC doesn't support per-vert normals?!

It's just a technique that should be more volumetrically accurate (as in the mesh follows more closely the real one at chamfers), and easier to author, and easier to tweak meshes, and easier to texture map, and saves polygons, and is just better in every way.
You just need to manage the modified normals using appropriate workflows (pita in Max, maybe why people avoid it?!)
View attachment 179872

So here is a mesh with a chamfer, roughly.
Purple = normals set by the average of the face directions per vert.
Green = modified normals.
Yellow/red lines are the apparent normal flow.

Having an extra row in there, and technically wrong geometry, to 'fake' the normal flow to look like a curve, when the geometry can actually be closer to reality, be averaged better to the real average of the chamfer (45deg), and explicitly set the normals to achieve that.


If this is industry standard, it's old industry standard.

As said, there is a polycount thread on this that is years old, and I'm fairly sure Forza H1 and Forza 3 were using this technique for the realtime models.
For photomode they actually appear to use high density curved chamfers.
Not sure how other engines work , But I know of 3 now , that dont use modified normals , non whatsoever . specially AC
 
@Brownninja97 Student lyfe :p

Also, Max has had conform, polydraw, loop and flow tools etc. ever since it introduced the Ribbon interface, which first appeared in 3dsMAX 2011 I think (which came out in 2010)

I think the ribbon was in in Max 9 maybe? or Max 2009? It's definitely there in Max 2010.

But iirc, that was just official integration of polytools (or something, can't remember the name), that was available as a free plugin since Max6 or so? They were tolerable as a freebie, but Autodesk integration seemed to be just that, they didn't perfect them.

The set edge flow specifically. In Max I just seem to get ripples saw tooth patterns the more I press the smooth button. The first press gets you half way there, great. The second, hmmm, getting some noise in there. Third, ok it's got intervals better, on average, but it's noisy as hell.
WrapIt on the other hand. One press and it's perfectly done and seems to very nicely preserve the underlying shape of a surface it's used upon.

So Max has those features, and some work really nicely, but others are horrible.


For car jobs I'd definitely recommend adding free scripts or something like wrapIt to extend some basic functionality missing (or not very good) in the default Max tools.

These are very good for example, well worth having there for Max car work!

http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/scripts/extend-borders


Dave
 
Not sure how other engines work , But I know of 3 now , that dont use modified normals , non whatsoever . specially AC

Oh rly?

I'm half surprised, and half not surprised :D

If AC has no explicit normals support then yes, that method Gary posted on the bottom of the last page would seem the best you can do :D :(

Dave
 
AC 100% uses modified normals on some cars; I remember the_meco detailing his use of them with the Porsche...
That was a mod , now its official , so how exactly is this still the case ?
I could make a mod now show everyone , make 5k custom normals , tell everyone about it ,
Then sell it to a game company or AC bla bla ,
Does not mean they will still keep your exported settings ,
Max is really bad for normals , way worse than blender for example ,
But some software do not even use explicit normals , custom work ect ,
Its generic smoothing .
 
Just want to say I'm grateful for any advice given from anyone (especially the many talented and experienced guys here), but lets not turn it into an argument.

@Mr Whippy Really appreciate the advice, will probably look into it in future when I dive deeper into 3ds, as I'm obviously barely scratching the surface right now - But for now I'll just be sticking to what I know until I have a bit more experience. :)
 
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Just want to say I'm grateful for any advice given from anyone (especially the many talented and experienced guys here), but lets not turn it into an argument.

@Mr Whippy Really appreciate the advice, will probably look into it in future when I dive deeper into 3ds, as I'm obviously barely scratching the surface right now - But for now I'll just be sticking to what I know until I have a bit more experience. :)

Right on, no need to get over your head, your work is great! You'll keep improving as you go, just like we all do.
Otherwise we can start talking about weighted normals and everything will go to hell :)
 
Right on, no need to get over your head, your work is great! You'll keep improving as you go, just like we all do.
Otherwise we can start talking about weighted normals and everything will go to hell :)
I can make parts in minutes or hrs , depending how complex they are obviously ,
But these normals are a pain in the ass ,
Specially when cutting in triangles , sometimes enough to make you want to scream :roflmao:
 
I can make parts in minutes or hrs , depending how complex they are obviously ,
But these normals are a pain in the ass ,
Specially when cutting in triangles , sometimes enough to make you want to scream :roflmao:
heh yeah well, that's what I've meant let's not make Gary crazy or he'll start throwing things at his screen :whistling:
 
Max is really bad for normals , way worse than blender for example ,
Up until 2.75 blender didn't support editing normals at all, sure you could do it (since it's just data in the object structure) but it would delete that data whenever you save. Now it lets you create vertex groups and modifiers that store the edited normals but it's still not particularly convenient.


AC does something bad to normalmaps - calculates one of the axes wrong or something, plus inconsistent treatment, for example from GIMP's normalmap generator you have to rotate 90 degrees to get red/green to match how AC calculates them, but vertex normals are exactly how you write them to fbx so you can do whatever you want as long as your editor will save them to fbx.


I've thought about the 45 degree edge with custom normals thing but unless there was a much better tool for setting them (eg. flag faces/edges as not part of normal calculations so I can just set the entire chamfer as I do it, or a normals algorithm that knows to weight edges by their length) it's not really worth the trouble. I imagine in that regard the official models are the same, unless the tools make it as fast as doing 2 rows of faces they'll never do it. On panel gaps they're already compromising to make them look decent vs. having them be realistic. I just do the 90 degree 2 row of faces chamfer on panel gaps, or 3 rows of faces on prominent sharp edges.

When I modeled purely in triangles in ZModeler I had to do custom normals up the center seam of the car because when you have /|/|/| meeting |\|\|\ it generates bad normals but in Blender I've had no way to do that so I just avoid it (but blender supports quad/polygon faces where the internal edges are ignored, so it's easier)
 
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