Self Evaluation for BA3

For a long while, I wanted to learn how to work efficiently in a 3D modelling program and, having gone through this project I feel a lot more confident in my skills now. I really enjoy 3D modelling, even if the brief itself didn't engage my attention as much as the last project did.

Throughout this project, I felt I picked up the technical skills very quickly, which is demonstrated by my choice to do iteration work almost entirely in 3D this time around. I swiftly became familiar with the interface of Maya which helped improve my workflow significantly, meaning I was able to keep up somewhat with developing iterations in a 3D form rather than the 2D that I am used to. Whilst my supporting research was not quite on the level that it was last project, I still made sure to put an effort in and try and create something that makes sense and is contextual to the theme I chose – the Georgian period.

There were definitely some elements I fell short on. Due to my lacking engagement with this project compared to the last one, I felt some of my ideas were a little lacking and that I could have looked up even more contextual research. I also think that I could have put a little bit more effort in to the unwrapping and texturing portion of my final model submission, as I could get more out of my texture maps if I split them up and I could have utilised some of the texture maps better. Plus, in my contextual studies portion, I felt like I was picking up the slack for my partner too much and we couldn't get together often enough to collate ideas.

Based on these shortcomings, I know that for next time I should really plan out my workflow better to make sure I am hitting all the points I should be covering each and every project. I could go about this by making a checklist for me to tick off to make sure I am covering areas such as providing enough contextual research, like drawings from life or mood boards. And since the next year is less about learning the fundamental skills, I can go ahead and plan out my projects more, meaning that everything is on-time and that I don’t rush any particular element. As for technical skills, I should work more on understanding textures and materials, as I believe I struggled a little with that last project as well. I could do some texture and material studies so that I have a better idea of how reflective, rough or textured a particular material is so that my future work is a lot more convincing.

Even so, I had a good time creating my first polished models in Maya. I hope to be able to expand this skill to not just creating a single asset, but whole scenes, as well as working in my previous development and understanding with zBrush to become a polished 3D artist. 

Final Submission for BA3

This is my final creative submission for BA3, showing the completed folly with full lighting and textures. Overall I am quite pleased with what I have made, but I know there is still a lot for me to learn and improve with in terms of modelling and texturing in Maya.

First of all, I am very pleased with the geometry of my piece. I think it is very clean and fairly topologically correct. I thought a lot more about using primitives to map out the forms instead of trying to create the shapes with other tools this time, which really helped build an accurate form rather than rely on guesswork and trying to line faces up. Plus, using instances for parts like the pillars and the balustrades really help in making the UV map a lot more efficient so I could get more detail out of it.

However, there are some big issues that could be addressed. Even though I tried to fit everything in on a single UV map, there are some parts, like the balustrades, which are absolutely tiny on the UV map. During the creation process I had to do some chopping up and more instancing, for example on the base, to try and make the unwrap more efficient and so I would have more space for other elements to fit. It would have been nice to have some texture variations with the pillars and the upper walls but then I would likely have to split it into two separate unwraps to get enough space which, in hindsight, may have been a better idea to begin with. Plus, even though I put a lot of work into the texture I feel like it could still do with some more work to make it seem more worn-down and unique, as right now it still feels a little flat.

Next time, I shouldn't be afraid to use multiple unwraps for my models, as sometimes this will be beneficial to get more detail into my model without having to use absurdly high resolution textures to get the information I need. I could definitely have moved half of the UVs onto another unwrap and gotten more detail and/or have smaller textures. I could also consider more about adding detail with normal maps. I would like to learn how to use ZBrush and Maya in conjunction to get even more detail work into my models without having to fiddle around with converting bump maps. I have explored that area a small bit but I haven't put it into practice yet.

Even so, I am satisfied with the quality of work that I have produced. Considering I have only been working in Maya for a few months now and working with some of these texture maps and concepts for even less, I picked up a lot of the concepts quickly and learned how to incorporate them into my work, which shows here. I would definitely like to revisit this style of work more later.

Final Model Progress 1

This is how far I have proceeded with my final model. I tweaked a few elements between the final iteration and this model, such as thinning out the pillars a little, as well as adding an adornment to the top of the dome and insetting the windows and doors. I felt this made it look a lot more compact and elegant, whilst still maintaining structural stability.

This is how I have constructed my model, each piece being a separate model. My plan is to wrap these individually and then use duplicate special to instance these across my model, saving a lot of time when it comes to unwrapping as I will not have to texture multiple pillars and walls. One issue I will have to keep in mind is the possibility of seams showing up, so I will have to do a lot of checking back and forth when it comes to the texturing process.

The wireframe demonstrates how I cleaned up the model to try and minimise the amount of polygons in my model. Even so, the polycount ends up at around 10 thousand tris. There could be ways I could simplify the model such as taking out the geometry of the balustrade and instead using a texture, but this will mean the balustrade will look a whole lot more flat which isn't necessarily a good thing. But, overall, I think I did a good job in keeping the topology efficient.

Life Drawing 5

In our last session for the year, we were given the task to do a long pose for the entirety of the session. I chose to do a 3/4 length portrait, putting a lot more detail into elements such as her face as well as some of the things she wore. Again, by using mid-tone I could utilise chalk to add in highlights, which worked to some success. However, there are a few accuracy qualms, such as with the face, which seems off. For example, the right eye could be smaller and is a slightly different shape to her left eye. Also, the shading, whilst well done, feels a little flat compared to some of my other mid-tone long poses - I could have gotten away with darkening the left side of the picture a little more, even if it wasn't quite like that in real life.

 Even so, I can see improvement in my observational skills, as these poses look a lot more life-like than some of my first drawings when beginning life drawing.

Final Idea for Creative Brief

Following on from the critique I got about my previous design, I went back to the drawing board and looked more at the mood boards I had collected, analysing some of the follies I really liked and picking out the features I enjoyed about them.

While I liked the detail work in this folly, its small size isn't what I am going for any more, I feel. What does strike out to me are the small double pillars, as well as the reaching spires on the balustrade up top. These sharp features would be a nice mediator for the final folly's rounder shapes, offering a balanced experience that would look aesthetically pleasing to look at.

In terms of the overall silhouette, this folly - which is the Temple of Diana nearby Highclere Castle in Hampshire - suits pretty well for the idea I have in mind. I'm thinking of exchanging the pillar shape on this folly and using something akin to the design in the other image, whilst also throwing in a twist of my own by adding the arch I wanted to include earlier.

This is what I came up with, including improvements from the critique as well as elements from the two follies I analyzed. I incorporated the arch into the pillars themselves, as well as adapting the design from the folly analysis and remixing it into a whole new pillar shape.

The silhouette is fairly pleasing from all angles, both above and below, though it will mainly be seen from below, plus there is plenty more room for people to walk around the folly's base.

While some intricacies of the model can be tweaked, I think I can begin working on my final model for this creative brief.

Creative Iterations 2

Developing on further from my initial iterations, I decided to work further with the design I came to in my last post.

The fundamental elements are there, but it needs more detail. As I said before, I would like to include windows on the 'second floor' to let in light for those who go inside.

 These were two ideas I toyed with first. I tried varying it up a little by making it hexagonal rather than circular. This would make it a lot easier to make modular, but in the end it contrasted too much with the other circular elements and I decided to shelve it. The second idea I had incorporated a lot more curves, as well as thickening out the overall design. The pillars I re-made to work better with the arches that support the 'second floor', but I am unsure as to how to work them in. Either way, I think they are a good aesthetic element and I would like to keep them in somehow.

 These four images show a few variations with a cone roof, as a change from the spherical roof I've been doing for the other folly iterations. However, I believed it deviated too far from the idea of a Georgian period folly and decided to try something else.

Instead I experimented with more of the spherical roof, adding a few variations, as well as shrinking the design down a little vertically as I felt like having it taller was unnecessary and would help balance the folly out a little. Again, I tried the idea of windows at the top, though I am as yet unsure as to what shape to have them. 

I refined the idea into a more cohesive shape, as well as putting elements like the pillars and arches together. The difference between the two is minor, but I added a little trim to the top of the pillars in the right image, so as to match with the bottom of the pillars. Overall, I am happy with the idea and general shape, but there are still some issues to be addressed, which were also pointed out to me in the most recent group critique.

Whilst the folly looks visually pleasing, there are some elements that don't make sense from a design perspective. For example, compared to the door, the thickness of the pillars and their distance from the building means that there is a lot of dead space - space people can't really get to or walk along. They get in the way of people that may want to walk around the outside. The size of the steps around the outside are also very large compared to the door, meaning that, in life, people would have to really reach to climb up. Plus, at the moment, the balcony is inaccessible (intentional, it's not meant to be walked on, but is an aesthetic choice) and if it is meant to act as an overhang, it doesn't offer much coverage.

The above image shows the modularity I had planned for this model. Whilst I do like the design myself, I can agree with the criticism and know I must design the model again, though I do not have to go through the process all over, but use this as a base and tweak based on the criticism I have received.

Creative Iterations 1

Given the ease of working with primitives in Maya, I decided to do the bulk, if not all, of my iteration work in 3D. I decided that, based off of my investigations into Georgian follies, the most defining features of my folly should be a circular design, surrounded by pillars.

 My first iteration was relatively simple and small in design. However, it felt too simplistic and that I could do more, so I changed it up a little.

I then developed it a little, trying to capture the inner arches between the pillars by using the bridge polygon tool with multiple divisions, with a little bit of success. However, at this point I was unsure of how to fill it in after I created the bridges and I felt like it was stepping away from the modularity approach.

 I tried to think with modularity in mind by taking out half of the inner arches so that I could easily duplicate around the centre axis later.

 

I then added in a staircase so that people would be able to climb up to the centre of the folly, and also added in an inner area. By this point, I wasn't sure whether I wanted people to be able to go inside or to just have it as a solid piece of stone.

 

However, in the end, I changed the design to match more with this particular folly, as I liked the concept of the intricate design and delicate details within, which would draw people in for a closer look. Even so, it was far from finished as I also have to consider details. I was thinking that I would add some details up on the fake second level to let light trickle in from above, creating a dark and mysterious interior for those who would enter.

Mood Board - Georgian Follies

I went forth and collected some images of Georgian era Follies. At first glance there are many similarities that stand out to me - a lot of them are circular and feature some form of pillar structure around the main building. Perhaps it would be a good idea to consider a variation of this when creating my folly.

I also noticed that a lot of them share a similar kind of texture. As to what it is exactly, I am unsure. It seems like it would be stone but it would also be difficult to carve and haul such large shapes up to where they are ultimately located, so I am led to believe that it may be some form of plaster instead. Either way, it would be a good idea to investigate both these materials to get an idea of what to use in mine.

Creative Brief for BA3

We have finally been set our creative brief for BA3, where our development of modelling and architectural skills will be put to use to create an architectural piece based upon the research we have been engaged in over the past 4 weeks.

Our architectural piece will be a Folly. A Folly is defined as an architectural structure that is designed to serve as a conversational piece, or is created to lend interest to a particular view or commemorate people or events. They are usually quite small but can vary in size, shape and style, depending highly upon the location and surroundings.

During the next 3 weeks, we will be expected to design, mold and texture a folly using the architectural research we have been doing. In this case, my architectural research has primarily been on Georgian architecture, so this should be my focus for the creative brief.

We have been advised to consider the topology of our final model, as well as consider the following:

• The modularity of the model. Build the parts of the model, if possible, then put it together. Think like Lego.
• The scale of the model. If building in a modular form, is everything to the right scale? Make sure to do the grid.

I am a little unsure as to how to begin creating my folly. I think the best course of action to start is to collect images of existing Georgian follies and analyze them for similarities to get a starting point.

Final Submissions for 4 Model Studies

These 4 models were the final four I selected for submission for the study portion of this project, in order of when they were created.

I had created this initial decorative piece before the window,  but initially I wasn't happy with it. However, I went back and fixed it up a little and smoothed it out by adding a few bevels, but there were still some issues that would be difficult to fix without starting again, such as the odd geometry on the roofing.

The drainpipe was my second selection. Unfortunately, I didn't get time to go back and fix the issue with the ties, but nevertheless I thought it was one of the first studies that I was happy with in terms of getting roughly the right shape.

The memorial pillar was my third submission, with some changes from the last time it was shown. I tried to add a normal map and a simple ground to show how it sits at an angle, but to be honest, they could be a whole lot better done, as the texture for the stone does not look at all what it is meant to look like. The normal map could be toned back a whole lot, as right now there is too much texture for what the material should look like.

This was my final submission, and the one I was most happy with. I went back after looking at the critique I got and tweaked the geometry a little, as well as adding more texture and converting the bump map into a normal map. Whilst far from perfect, I am well on the way to creating realistic looking game-ready assets.

The Difference Between Bump and Normal Maps

 In cases where it would be inefficient to use geometry to capture minor details like the gaps between bricks or floorboards, another kind of texture map can be used which, for many years, was known as a bump map.

 This image shows three spheres. The first sphere has flat and has no texture assigned to it. The second sphere has a simple checker map assigned to the bump channel. The bump map tells the renderer how to light the model, without affecting the geometry. For many years, the bump map was used to create this extra detail, but often it seemed rather flat and unrealistic, especially if it was used heavily in a model. In succession, normal maps were created, which, by defining a lot more than a bump map, tells a lot more information to the renderer which helps it light the model in a more realistic manner. This is what is applied to the right-most sphere and, comparing the two method it is clear which is the most superior.

These are the textures that were assigned. Bump maps worked in greyscale, where how light or dark an area defined how 'displaced' an area was on the model. Normal maps work a lot differently. By simulating light hitting an object from three different directions, it is a lot more detailed, but also harder to replicate by hand.

 This is a visualisation of a normal map. This model is simply a cube with a torus laid on top. There are multiple lights that are rendered. First, there is a white ambient light. Then, in three directions, lights for the three primary colours are placed. Often blue faces straight down, with red and green being the other two. Finally, lights with the same colour but negative intensity are placed opposite of the directional lights.

However, this is often not how normal maps are generated. There are multiple ways that they can be made.

First of all is the most simple - converting a bump map into a normal map. This is not a perfect method but for most cases it works fine. Programs such as Crazybump and xNormal are able to do this.

The second method is creating both a high-poly and low-poly model and projecting the detail of the high-poly onto a normal map using the low-poly model's UV unwrap. You can do this with xNormal or even directly in the sculpting program zBrush, with a few tweaks.

Despite the versatility of normal maps, they must be used in moderation. When creating them, one must consider how much the detail will stand out and whether it is possible to get away with faking it without people notice. Sometimes it is flat-out better to use geometry as these maps do not change the geometry and all illusion is lost once you see it from an angle that isn't intended.

Life Drawing 4

This session we had another model, and our first task was to draw something like a character sheet, where we draw the person from four different general angles to get an idea of what they look like from each angle. Again, I had the issue of needing to warm up before I could begin drawing in a way that I was happy with, but beyond the first botched drawing I believe I did a fairly good job on matching the parts of her body up to keep each pose level with each other.

The second task this time was another long pose, and again I picked mid-tone paper. I am particularly happy with this due to the use of blending to create varied shadows and lights throughout the piece. For example, the shadow created by her arm as it lies across her stomach is a lot sharper than the shadow that is created as her thigh and stomach fade off into darkness. This, I feel, makes the lighting seem a whole lot more convincing and life-like.

5th Model Study

This, I decided, was to be my fifth and final model study, after which I would select the model studies I deemed most successful and submit them. This time I chose to do another window.

I picked this one primarily because of the difference in texture as well as an opportunity to use the knowledge I have learnt about the different texture maps. The most notable three I used here were the diffuse, specular and bump maps.

I got the general shape and texture of the window about right, but as was said to me in the group critique, it looks too straight and geometrical, so that is something I will have to fix later.

This is primarily showing off basic usage of the specular map. This shows the difference in specularity between the window and the bricks, which I managed to achieve by using a light area where the windows are on the specular map, with the bricks being a darker shade so they won't be as highlighted.

This shows off both the specular and bump map. Since, by this point, I wasn't quite aware of how to convert a bump map into a normal map, it still looks a little flat and odd, but much better than have it remain flat.

This is the geometry itself. I tried to keep it relatively low-poly and cleaned up as I went by using the merge vertex tool. However, there are some issues where there are a few long and thing polygons, which can prove to be an issue if I am not careful with how I use them.

Understanding Different Texture Maps

In order to create life-like models, multiple different types of textures must be considered. Here, I'll be talking about three different maps which can control how an engine renders your model.

As shown above, there are five spheres, all with different basic textures assigned to it. The first 'basic' sphere has no texture assigned to it, and has just a simple 'blinn' material attached. Blinn is a better choice than the program's default lambert because you have a lot more choice with assigning different texture maps.

The second sphere, the diffuse sphere, is a sphere with just a diffuse texture assigned to it. The diffuse defines the colours of the model and is probably the most important for basic models.

The third sphere has only a specular texture assigned. The specular controls the intensity and colour of the lighting that is placed upon a model. This is best used to create materials convincingly, such as metals. It is also very useful for models with different materials within it, where you can define how shiny different parts of a model are. For example, with a sword, the metal sword blade will be a lot shinier than the hilt, which means the specular texture will be brighter.

The fourth sphere has a gloss texture assigned. The gloss defines how rough part of a model is. This texture is only greyscale as colour in this texture does not make any difference to the rendering of the model. The roughness is defined as how large the specular highlight - the shiny area - is.

The last sphere shows how the specular and gloss work together. As the gloss is larger here, the specular highlight is very large in areas where the specular texture is also white. Using and experimenting with these methods can create a wide range of materials.

 

In Autodesk Maya, these three textures are under various names. The Diffuse is fairly self explanatory, located under 'Common Material Attributes'. By clicking the checkered square on the side of the diffuse slider you can select the choice to choose a file to load. 

The other two textures are located under 'Specular Shading'. The Specular map can be accessed by using 'Specular Color', whilst the Gloss map can be accessed by using 'Eccentricity'.