===[TASK]=== Cheetah

[zentaoaki]

Hello everyone:

I show the level and details of cheehat´s wip. See attached files...

I make the 3D model following http://trac.wildfiregames.com/wiki/ArtDesignDocument

Cheetah_INT - This pose is only for introducing... I try that... "anything smaller than a human hand should not be modeled but included in texturing".

Cheetah_UV - png, 512x512, There are mistakes (see nose or skin spots...)

Cheetah_wire - Faces 494 (<700)

Cheetah_ANI - This is the pose whitch animator need?

I need help with:

Comment/improvements or anything witch I forgot...

Scale?

[Lion.Kanzen]

Beautiful, work, me gusta le da una elegancia.

[Ludo38]

Very good work Zentaoaki !

The general shape and texture are excellent.

Three improvements that I suggest :

-the eyes are sort of non-existent, for now it's more like a dark hole. Can you try them another way ?

-the shape of the head can be improved, it looks too flat and messy at the top. On this photo we have a good idea of the head's shape :

-The texture around the neck is blurry and less colored/contrasted than the rest. Judging by this photo, the neck looks like the rest of the fur :

[Enrique]

Hello Zentaoaki. Nice start!

Forget about poses, there's no need to do them now focus on the model

Try working a little more on the head shape and texture mapping. The proportions look good. Get rid of the eye sockets, there's no need for them. You'll find it easier to get the shape of the head correclty and the mapping too. Remember to add at least 3 edgeloops on each "joint" in the legs where the mesh is going to bend when it's animated, this way minimal stretching will occur.

The better way to get the correct scale is to import a unit/animal from the game so you can have a reference of how big it will look in the game.

I see you used projection mapping? If this is the case, I have to ask you if the texture/image you used to make the texture have the proper licenses (CC-BY-SA 3.0) or public domain, which are compatibles with the game's license. This is a must requirement.

If you can't find a good texture that meets the required license, we can always help you

Keep it up!

------

Hola Zentaoaki, Buen comienzo!

No te preocupes por las poses por ahora, céntrate en el modelo

Intenta trabajar un poco más la forma de la cabeza y el mapeado de la textura en ella. Las proporciones están muy bien. Elimina los agujeros para los ojos en el modelo, no hacen falta, los ojos serán parte de la textura. Recuerda añadir 3 loops de aristas donde el modelo se doblará cuando esté animado (los codos de las patas, etc...) para minimizar el estiramiento que sufrirá cuando se anime el modelo.

La mejor forma para encontrar el tamaño adecuando es importar una unidad o animal del juego para saber qué tamaño es el correcto.

Usaste projection mapping? Si este es el caso, tengo que preguntarte si la textura/imagen que usaste para crear la textura está licenciada bajo CC- BY-SA 3.0 o si está en dominio público, que son las licencias compatibles con el juego. Éste requerimiento es importante.

Si no puedes encontrar una buena textura con estos requerimientos de licencias siempre te podemos echar una mano con ellas

Sigue así! tiene muy buena pinta

[zentaoaki]

Hello, thanks for your nice comment....

About texture origin:

I make the texture. Using the UV image (attached) export from Blender in 512x512 png.

In Gimp I use a piece for a cheetah skin pic from internet (attached) and I make a fotomanipulation

Finally, I painting skin hole and some spots with Gimp.

Gracias por la buena acogida...

Acerca de la textura que usé:

Exporté de Blender una imagen UV (adjunta) de 512x512 en png.

En Gimp usé una parcela de una foto de piel de gepardo de internet (adjunta) y fuí cubriendo con ese trozo el area UV.

Finalmente, pinté los huecos de la piel y algunos lunares o puntos con Gimp.

[Ludo38]

Whenever you need some public domain or free to use material, think Wikimedia Commons, it's probably the best source for these licences.

Here is the section for cheetahs :

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Acinonyx_jubatus

And here is a good side view that is public domain.

Cool that you work with Gimp. darn, I'm now impressed by how many people are using it. It's an always growing community, it's so cool...

[Enrique]

By the looks of it and the watermark of the image that almost sure a copyrighted image.

- Por la marca de la imagen que linkeas parece ser que está protegida por copyright.

Here you have some wikimedia commons sources in the public domain that you can use:

- Aquí te dejo unos links a unas imágenes de wikimedia commons que puedes usar libremente:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Herberstein_Gepard_048.jpg

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Herberstein_Gepard_034.jpg

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Two_cheetahs_together.jpg

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Young_Cheetahs.jpg

By the way, did you know you can clone the texture while texture painting in blender? It's like cloning in gimp, but directly in the model, which helps hiding seams and stretching. If you're interested I can link you some tutorials about it (in english)

- Por cierto, ¿sabías que puedes clonar la texture directamente en blender en el modo "texture painting"? Es como clonar en gimp, pero directamente en el modelo, lo que ayuda a esconder marcas entre UVs y estiramientos. Si estás interesado te puedo linkear unos tutoriales sobre la técnica (en inglés)

[Lapuente]

Looks beautiful

[SDM]

As long as zentaoaki isn't copying the cheetah exactly, it should be okay.

http://painting.about.com/cs/artistscopyright/f/copyrightfaq7.htm

EDIT: Clicking other links from that same site, it seems that it should be a free reference to begin with:

http://painting.about.com/od/artistreferencephotos/Reference_Photographs_for_Artists.htm

leads to

http://painting.about.com/od/artistreferencephotos/ig/Reference-Photos--Cheetahs/

And here is About.com's terms of use for their photos:

http://painting.about.com/od/artistreferencephotos/f/FAQTermRefPhoto.htm

Edited October 22, 2013 by SDM

[sanderd17]

As long as zentaoaki isn't copying the cheetah exactly, it should be okay.

http://painting.about.com/cs/artistscopyright/f/copyrightfaq7.htm

He's copying a real part of the image (small, but nonetheless real), and then editing it. This falls under derived work. Btw, WFG wants to play safe. We barely have enough to pay a single programmer, we won't have enough to pay a lawyer.

@Zentaoaki, you model looks great though.

[SDM]

My mistake. I was paying attention to the spots, and noticed that it wasn't exact and thought it was more of an inspiration than a copy. But since we have other resources, I'm hoping to see a less controversial cheetah.

[zentaoaki]

Thanks LaPuente, SDM y Sanderd17 for kind comments.

Sorry, about texture I think is an overcome issue... I´m just working in cheetah #2 and I will use pics recomended by Ludo38 and Enrique...

I thanks learned take care using pics in this texture (at moment i think it´s never mind) and I will use free pics in the future because I learned where I can find its.

[Micket]

Looks very good.

Dont feel like you're required to stick to all quads. With a few triangles you can easily cut down the unnecessary slivers of quads along the tail, and you can improve the topology of comples areas, like the face.

In the end, its all triangles anyway, and there are some graphical artefacts from the distorted quads.

For example, join the red areas, and cut up the quads marked in green

[Mythos_Ruler]

A cheetah texture should be relatively easy to paint in Photoshop or Gimp, especially if the artist already has a texture for reference.

[zentaoaki]

Hello Micket:

Thanks for your comment and suggestion.

You have a very nice model of animals. I visit your posts to learn and improve and you give me help. Thanks.

When I started in Blender I made triangles and quads equally, but the triangles anytime make trouble with modifiers or texturing. Now my way is make quads usually, and make triangles is an exception.

Anyway, for cheetah #2 I made a new UV image by using better the 512x512 png space. I will thank you comments an suggestions when comming soon I will post it.

[zentaoaki]

New Cheetah #2 - See attached images:

Cheetah_2_bones.png

Loops: I think that is the bones posing; Edge = bone (left). Therefore there are 3 loops in bones join (right).

Faces: 762 (> 700), is a problem?

Cheetah_2_UV.png

Change of UV image by using better the 512x512 png space, improve details of texture and included new loops.

I think I will use this pic in texture: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Herberstein_Gepard_048.jpg

I don´t texturing until new UV image will be approved.

Thanks for comment/improvements or anything witch I forgot or mistake...

[LAVS]

Nice work!

[Micket]

The only modifier i can think of that might cause problems is the subsurf modifier, for which only quads are preferable.

I'm not sure what sort of problems you have with unwrapping and texturing this thing though. In the GPU, they will be all triangles anyway, so your quads will be triangulated in some way in the end. I usually split the quads in some critical areas beforehand if it looks like it might make a big difference (i.e. the quad isn't perfectly flat).

The design document is a bit dated, so you can go over the polycount there; however, it specifies *triangles*, so you're actually at 2*762 = 1524 triangles right now, which is a bit high (compared to, say, the tiger model with 686 tris).

[Mythos_Ruler]

The geometry of your cheetah looks great, zentaoaki. As micket mentions, I'd be a lot happier if you could get it below 1000 tris, but it's not a massive concern, since you're likely to only see maybe 2 or 3 of these on-screen at any given time. Still though, it's always good to have as few triangles as possible without degrading the aesthetics of the final model too much. I can see immediately that the tail could be optimized.

[zentaoaki]

LAVS, Micket and Mythos-Ruler, thanks for nice comment.

Micket:

You are right. I need change my mind. There are triangles not faces.

You are right too in triangles are troubles with modifiers. In only texturing I dont know certain, because I texturing on a mesh with subsurf modifier has been applied.

I saw the tiger and wolf models (awesome) but... I didn`t saw 3 loops in bones join...

Mythos_Ruler:

You are right. I can and I must get it below 1000 T

So, I'm on it....

[Micket]

Yes, I've found that 3 loops around joints is unnecessary. In the part of the joint where it folds in, I think it's even better with just 1 loop. On the "front" of the joint, for this detail level, I think 2 is just fine.

And, well, triangles are definitely not trouble. The catmull-clark smoothing algorithm isn't perfect, but that doesn't even matter in this case. For painting the texture I don't see any possible issues with triangles.

(I wrote a Stam-Loop/4-3 subdivision modifier for Blender last year, which looks good for both quads and triangles http://i.imgur.com/7xwRO.png, but noone seemed interested in including it in blender, so the stigma against triangles continues.)

[Enrique]

I think 3 edgeloops helps the model to deform way more smoother than having only one. But they have to be more separated than they are right now or the stretching will remain obvious. There's also no need of such edgeloops in the "torso", since it's not going to bend as much as the legs.

[zentaoaki]

Hello... This is the last Cheetah (attached)...

Triangles: 888 (444 with mirror modifier not applied). I think edgeloops in knee and ankle are right, but can be more separated ...

Edited November 5, 2013 by zentaoaki

[zentaoaki]

Hello:

I have been working on the Cheetah texture, using 2D graphics program and the Blender´s texture paint tool. This tool don´t have pecision and sometimes make some serious mistakes on areas already completed. It may be the unwrap, but I do not ...

After two months without significant progress, I uploading the cheetah´s files. Perhaps someone can be to continue and finish.

I don´t know make details on few triangles. I think maybe my working way is wrong. I think I don´t know how finished

Hola:

He estado trabajando en la textura del gepardo tanto con un programa gráfico 2D como con la con la herramienta de pintura de textura de Blender. Esta última, por lo que he comprobado, no permite mucha pecisión y a veces dá unos errores graves que estropea zonas ya terminadas. Puede que sea debido al unwrap, pero no lo se...

Después de dos meses de demora, sin avances significativos, y sin perspectiva de cambio subo, los archivos con los que he trabajado y en la situación en que han quedado por si alguien quiere y puede continuar y acabarlo.

No se como lograr detalle en tan pocos polígonos y puede que mi forma de trabajar no sea adecuada. No me veo capaz de continuarlo...

[Lion.Kanzen]

The head have correct proportions?