===[TASK]=== Bear

[Stan`]

Here is the bear I've been remaking with a walking anim.

bear3.zip

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

Look much better. It have spec and noromal map too?

[Stan`]

Look much better. It have spec and noromal map too?

No specular. For normal maps you need to have GPUSKINNING = true in the options. I haven't made it yet. Will make it if that is worth it.

[Enrique]

The texture is not in the blend file. It would also be great to have the animation data without being baked.

The topology is not ideal for animation, but I guess we'll stick to it unless someone wants to upgrade the model.

[Stan`]

Updated the blend file. For some reason, the clean channels turned sampled keyframes (in light blue) into real keyframes instead of deleting them.

I'd also like to have Micket's touch on that model

bear5.zip

[Micket]

Weeeell.. I'm kinda busy playing shadows of mordor these days.

[Stan`]

Just tweak it a bit

[Enrique]

Weeeell.. I'm kinda busy playing shadows of mordor these days.

Nice to see you still around Micket

No rush at all, we still have a lot of your meshes to animate

[Micket]

I could take a look at this, but, I would likely change it a lot.. as in completely change everything, if I do anything. Meaning all texturing needs to be redone as well. I would be upping the polycount significantly.

I usually make the my models way more detailed than necessary for 0AD zoom level, but it's because I want to have the possibilities for them to be used in other games as well.

But, to wait until someone does a model.. only to redo it, well, that just feels like a @#$% move. It certainly isn't a very effective way to get work done!

[Enrique]

While I understand your point of view, the nature of an open source project entails the disposal of old assets/works in favor of new/improved ones everywhere within the project. Specially for projects that have been so long in development.

Not only in art with models/textures, but also in the code area (see old pathfinder vs new, aegis ai vs petra ai, etc)

There are also different reasons that hurt more than others, i.e. the disposal of the hanging gardens wonder in favor of the gate of all nations because it's more historically accurate and suited for the timeframe of the game, versus the reasons of better topology for animation that this particular case case is based on.

When I added the bear to the tasks that had to be done (or redone in this case) was mainly because of the poor topology the current mesh has and I could see problems arising with the animation phase due to its topology.

Stan's mesh is an improvement from the old mesh in the form of the head and texture, but the topology problems remains since it's so heavily based on the old mesh. Here's the mesh comparision:

I hope you understand that replacing old work with new/improved stuff is not a matter of annoying/disrespect to the author, but for the improvement of the project itself.

[Micket]

I know, and agree with your points. However, just waiting until someone just worked on the texture to throw it out is definitely inefficient.

There are also plenty of animals still left on the list, so unless the bear is an especially important there is no need for all of us to work on the same thing.

[fabio]

I usually make the my models way more detailed than necessary for 0AD zoom level, but it's because I want to have the possibilities for them to be used in other games as well.

Out of curiosity, did you also contributed to other games, which ones, if this is shareable?

[Micket]

I put most of my models on opengameart.org as CC0, so i don't know if they are used elsewhere. It's just a bit of future proofing from my side. Since I've made a halfdecent selection of animals now, with similar polycount, it could probably find some use in mobile games and whatnot.

[Stan`]

@Micket, do you have some advice about improvements to the bear mesh itself ? I could probably fix it myself

[Micket]

Well, about the shape itself, i would simply rely on a lot of reference materials. I always put in a background image of a good profile picture, then try to figure out the 3d shape from the outlines.

It might sound boring, or like cheating, but noone really knows what animals actually look like unless you go through a myriad of references, meassuring all the relative sizes.

If I were to draw even a common animal unprepared, like a cat or a bird, I would completely mess up it's anatomy.

Now, I don't know exactly what species you were aiming for, and from hunting references I've come to appreciate the wide range of anatomy of animals within the same species, but i'd say you overdid the changes to the skull. A quick comparison with some reference off google search

Had this been a model of a human, we would all be able to tell if something is off, like a huge nose, tiny eyes, enormous chin.. but in most animals, our memory alone is insufficient.

For animation, there is some more practical things to try and sort out (and they are not that easy). The biggest challenge i find are the legs relative movement to the body, and here, legs are merged into the body.

For quadrapeds, the stomach kind of "tucks in" behind the thigh. The font legs also needs to have something cut in in-between the leg and torso (up into the "arm pit"), to allow some relative movement there.

Still, with lowpoly, and furry animals, you kind of have to find a good middle ground.

Also, are you working on this without a mirror modifier? that has to be a huge inconvenience.

[Stan`]

Now, I don't know exactly what species you were aiming for, and from hunting references I've come to appreciate the wide range of anatomy of animals within the same species, but i'd say you overdid the changes to the skull. A quick comparison with some reference off google search

Funnily enough I used that reference to make the head, but I snapped. I'd say we would go for a standard brown bear, with no particular feature so it can fit every biome. I might want to make a snow bear afterwards too.

Had this been a model of a human, we would all be able to tell if something is off, like a huge nose, tiny eyes, enormous chin.. but in most animals, our memory alone is insufficient.

Yeah and I guess the same applies with the Mandrill you made.

For animation, there is some more practical things to try and sort out (and they are not that easy). The biggest challenge i find are the legs relative movement to the body, and here, legs are merged into the body.

For quadrapeds, the stomach kind of "tucks in" behind the thigh. The font legs also needs to have something cut in in-between the leg and torso (up into the "arm pit"), to allow some relative movement there.

Still, with lowpoly, and furry animals, you kind of have to find a good middle ground.

In that case I might have to do some retopology. I just can't make it raise on its back legs, it just doesn't look good...

Also, are you working on this without a mirror modifier? that has to be a huge inconvenience.

It was mirrored before doing the rigging, and vertex groups for obvious reasons, but maybe I'm missing some trick that would have prevented applying the modifier ?

[Micket]

Indeed. I have no intuition about the mandrill, and since I had to piece together sources from all kinds of places, it's definitely difficult to determine if I totally messed up on some part.

I probably spend twice as long time looking for & at references then I spend modeling.

You never have to apply the modifier.

You should add the suffix _L and_R or .L .R respectively on both the bones and the vertex groups

You can check the Fox, Oryx, or Tiger models i made, which I rigged this way.

[Alexandermb]

Since i don't have anything to do thanks to Maduro i started to work today on the bear, for now i got 4 idles and walk animation ready. i think it could be ready for commit tomorrow or in 2 days.

[Lion.Kanzen]

Just now, Alexandermb said:

Since i don't have anything to do thanks to Maduro i started to work today on the bear, for now i got 4 idles and walk animation ready. i think it could be ready for commit tomorrow or in 2 days.

 

Now how kind madness do that guy?

[Alexandermb]

3 minutes ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

Now how kind madness do that guy?

This is not like December used to be in Venezuela, all you can see in the people is sadness and anger, my own brother went to Colombia because of the little hope we have for the next year. The worst is yet to come, and i couldn't describe what the families of the fallen in April will be today.

[Lion.Kanzen]

Just now, Alexandermb said:

This is not like December used to be in Venezuela, all you can see in the people is sadness and anger, my own brother went to Colombia because of the little hope we have for the next year. The worst is yet to come, and i couldn't describe what the families of the fallen in April will be today.

Yeah I understand that, are hard times... . here we are living little (very little) dictatorship, I hope Venezuela can bring the way.

[Skhorn]

1 hour ago, Alexandermb said:

This is not like December used to be in Venezuela, all you can see in the people is sadness and anger, my own brother went to Colombia because of the little hope we have for the next year. The worst is yet to come, and i couldn't describe what the families of the fallen in April will be today.

Offtopic: Las elecciones son el otro año y como pinta la cosa con tantos casos de corrupcion destapados, la cosa se esta yendo mas para el carajo.  But we still have """""""""""hope"""""""""""

Edited December 25, 2017 by Skhorn

[Stan`]

@Alexandermb I merged it with the old thread of mine. Maybe you can reuse the files. And fix what was wrong with my "Improved" mesh instead.

 

[Alexandermb]

6 hours ago, stanislas69 said:

@Alexandermb I merged it with the old thread of mine. Maybe you can reuse the files. And fix what was wrong with my "Improved" mesh instead.

 

Better yet, i took the bear mesh to my armature since i already have 5 animations ready, i named every bone Ursidae and not the bear/horse/deer type armature for keep the skeleton for every kind of bear we could have (Polar bear, Panda Bear, etc).

 

Bear_Rigged.7z

[Stan`]

22 minutes ago, Alexandermb said:

Better yet, i took the bear mesh to my armature since i already have 5 animations ready, i named every bone Ursidae and not the bear/horse/deer type armature for keep the skeleton for every kind of bear we could have (Polar bear, Panda Bear, etc).

 

Bear_Rigged.7z

There were some concerns about the mesh topology though.