Modulerness

Modular modelling is the most important thing in my environment. So I have been looking at various techniques recently to make my environment as less taxing but detailed as possible.

However I reached a tough part with the roofing, while the roofing is not 100% important, it is still a high important feature as they are probably the number one thing that defines Chinese architecture from the western world.

I created a basic model of the roof which can be tiled, my lecturer recommended putting more poly's in it to add details, which is correct and understandable as the Normal map on its own.

The internet user going by the name of "Zocky" created a way creating a higher poly count but using less objects. while this idea "seems good" it is not exactly good for games as such.

hear is an example of his work and optimisation for his roofing.

while the results are indeed decent there are a few problems which are evident. 

The first one is the lighting and shadows. Mainly the shadows, there are some errors which are rather irritating. So in a nutshell, this type of modelling would only be effective if this was the only building in the scene.

However some of the modulating ideas could be used to grate effect, such as the roof planes with Normal Maps on and the roof ends and so on.

In a nutshell, what I will be doing is creating more of a base to reduce high poly count but allow for some additional ploys for higher detail. Hear is a small moulder test for myself to see how difficult the roof would be to model and how much time it would take.

The problem with this is that it has too low a poly count for it to look decent, however the credit for it is that the general shape is there and is sufficient to demonstrate the Chinese architecture.

More to follow.

Traditional Chinese Garden

Havent progressed much since Christmass since the dissertation took over prioraty (better to get that thing dont sooner than later) . So now that thars done, i can (for the time being untill the feedback from the draft) work full time on the project.

So far i created a map for the envioment i have been creating. This is so that i can have a better idea is to which models should be moduler/tilable so this can save space and time, this also gives a better uderstanding as to how texturs will look in the game and which ones need to be created tilable and which need to be more uniqe.

the only problem i have run into was the scaling, as zooming into the photoshop document sometimes dustracts from the scail. While this is only monor and can be easaly fixed, it can still become an issue if its is overlooked too often. Within 3D modeling it should be easaly fixed but what worryed me is the dainger of becoming confused with the geniral map becuse of the scaling.

for the time being i will focuse on the main crossrodes/cortyard section as a starting point and working out from their, if there needs to be changes it shouldent be too problamatic as the layout should be cabable of being easaly changed.

hear are some screenshops so far.