=[TASK]= The Pantheon of Marcus Agrippa

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

If someone would like to tackle the challenge, it would be great to have the Pantheon in Rome added to the game (perhaps as part of a group of wonders for a possible "Capture the Wonder" game mode). For DE I'd like to use it for Augustus' wonder (I'm able to change wonders and other things based on who you choose as a hero).

 

Shape.

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

Statuary along the roofline and in the pediment.

 

Bronze Rooftiles.

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Mozaik 3D replica.

https://us.mozaweb.com/en/Search/global?search=pantheon

 

Edited December 28, 2022 by wowgetoffyourcellphone

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

Yes, there is a Pantheon in the game, but I think a new model would be better.  

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

bconreportfinal-150711060306-lva1-app6892.pdf

 

PDF about the construction of the Pantheon.

Edited July 2, 2021 by wowgetoffyourcellphone

[nifa]

I've tried my luck with the pantheon and this is what it looks like:

I think it's quite ok for the start. It's my first project so it'll probably still have some flaws I'd be happy if some people could give me a feedback, I'll attach the blender files so maybe someone can also give me some technical advices. For everyone who wants to try it in Atlas, you can just copy the folder to your mods folder:)

About textures... I think the mesh could have less triangles, maybe dissolve some faces and so on, but what I kind of struggled with are the textures. First I tried it with the texture of the existing pantheon and added a roof of rome_struct.png. Then I was thinking about creating a new texture file just for this building, but my texturing skills are too limited. In the end I ended up using four of the existing textures that I found already in the game. That's why in the end the mesh is sliced up in so weird props:D Anyway, it somehow worked, but still I got some unclean parts of texture on the mesh.

The one on the left is the original one, the one the middle new mesh with old texture:

So for the future, what would be the best workflow for texturing? First unwrap everything and make a perfect UV map, then paint a texture? Or use an existing texture and scale the UV islands according to it? How important is it to save disk space by using existing textures? Thanks a lot in advance!

Pantheon.zip

[Stan`]

45 minutes ago, nifa said:

 

So for the future, what would be the best workflow for texturing? First unwrap everything and make a perfect UV map, then paint a texture? Or use an existing texture and scale the UV islands according to it? How important is it to save disk space by using existing textures? Thanks a lot in advance!

Usually the best workflow is to use one texture, maybe two for props.

 

[Stan`]

On the model 12k tris is way too high. Maybe 4k-6k would be acceptable.

Congrats on removing the unseen faces, it's usually where stuff goes wrong. You forgot to remove those from the inner roof though...

Your building is way too round with faces, you should use smooth shading instead.

There might be a way to get away with less faces on the front porch.

[nifa]

5 hours ago, Stan` said:

Usually the best workflow is to use one texture, maybe two for props.

So I'll have to make a new texture? I could try to lay it out nicely for someone with Gimp skills

5 hours ago, Stan` said:

Congrats on removing the unseen faces, it's usually where stuff goes wrong. You forgot to remove those from the inner roof though...

Thanks, I can remove those. It's just two faces which are partly inside so i didn't know if it's better to get rid of it. I guess hidden textures are even worse than a few additional tris?

5 hours ago, Stan` said:

Your building is way too round with faces, you should use smooth shading instead.

I tried using it on the dome, unfortunately it kills the stairs on top. Using mark sharp works but doesn't get good results. Nevertheless I cut down tris of the dome by half, let's see how it looks in the end. Object data properties -> Normals -> Auto Smooth is greyed out for some reason.

5 hours ago, Stan` said:

There might be a way to get away with less faces on the front porch.

Yes definitely. I think the columns especially have a lot. I'll cut it down. At the beginning it's hard to estimate how many segments a cylinder should have and i thought it would be easier to delete than to add geometry. I might lower the tris of the inside as well as it is only visible through the hole anyway.

[Stan`]

7 hours ago, nifa said:

So I'll have to make a new texture? I could try to lay it out nicely for someone with Gimp skills

In theory yes but ideally you'd reduce the number by making compromises and using a texture set as much as possible.

 

7 hours ago, nifa said:

Thanks, I can remove those. It's just two faces which are partly inside so i didn't know if it's better to get rid of it. I guess hidden textures are even worse than a few additional tris?

I mean the round roof has all its faces and some subdivisions in the cylindrical part. Can probably remove some.

7 hours ago, nifa said:

using it on the dome, unfortunately it kills the stairs on top. Using mark sharp works but doesn't get good results. Nevertheless I cut down tris of the dome by half, let's see how it looks in the end. Object data properties -> Normals -> Auto Smooth is greyed out for some reason

You need to split the part that needs to be round from the rest using the Y key.

7 hours ago, nifa said:

Yes definitely. I think the columns especially have a lot. I'll cut it down. At the beginning it's hard to estimate how many segments a cylinder should have and i thought it would be easier to delete than to add geometry. I might lower the tris of the inside as well as it is only visible through the hole anyway.

You can import other existing models to compare

[nifa]

Thanks for the help I cut it down from 12k to 7.4k tris. I imported the Columns from the roman Civic Center and used them for the Pronaos (the temple part). They look better now, but still have 2.8k tris only for the 16 columns, probably still to much considering they are much smaller.

I could try to further decrease the number of tris or to do a texture rework if needed. Just need to know what I'm aiming for so let me know, I'm open to any kind of feedback I'll attach the files incl. blender files again.

On 27/01/2023 at 8:04 AM, Stan` said:

You can import other existing models to compare

Btw, why are imported models often scaled so small and how can I see the seams of them?

Also is there a way to unwrap uv-islands on top of each other?

Pantheon2.zip

Edited February 1, 2023 by nifa

[nifa]

I reduced the number of tris of the model to 6k, should be fine now in terms of poly count. It's only one mesh now, with the golden dome as a prop. Remapped the UV as well. Is the UV map looking how it should be?

@wowgetoffyourcellphone Are you still interested in this? Would you like making a texture for it or tell me how to do that?

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

The best thing to do would be to use the existing Roman diffuse textures, honestly, rather than making an all-new texture for it, which would probably just reuse/mix n match elements from the existing textures anyway. I think from things @vladislavbelov has said, it would be better for graphics RAM to have a few more actors and models than to have yet another large texture (texture switching and loading taxing the graphics card heavily). I know @Stan` suggested one new texture, but let's see what Vlad says.

 

The one new texture I think would be the inscription along the architrave: 

M. AGRIPPA. L. COS. TERTIVM. FECIT.

It would have been gilded in bronze.

 

If you look really closely, you can see a second, much longer, inscription below it, painted in red:

Imperator Caesar Lucius Septimius Severus Pius Pertinax Augustus, Arabicus, Adiabenicus, Parthicus Maximus, Pontifex Maximus, with tribunician power for the 10th time, acclaimed Imperator 11 times, consul three times, Father of the Fatherland, proconsul, and Imperator Caesar Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Pius Felix Augustus [Caracalla], with tribunician power for the 5th time, consul, proconsul, restored with all its refinement the Pantheium, deteriorated by old age; 10 Dec. 201-9 Dec. 202 

 

We're not gonna bother with that, lol, it being added much later.

Edited September 3, 2023 by wowgetoffyourcellphone

[nifa]

13 hours ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

The best thing to do would be to use the existing Roman diffuse textures, honestly, rather than making an all-new texture for it, which would probably just reuse/mix n match elements from the existing textures anyway.

Well, not really. Depends on how precisely we would want to make it. If we use just the existing texture, it looks somehow like this, using only rome_struct.png:

But then besides the inscription there is a relief on the front of the pronaos (maybe an eagle with a civic crown), which is missing. Also some of the references you posted have different textures for the walls on the different floors, which aren't existing in the roman texture. Rome_struct.png has only one wall brick texture. I think it would look nice to give each (especially the highest) floor its own texture. The other existing roman texture isn't more useful.

How would we include the inscription when using the existing texture? Not at all? Or with a prop? I thought that's bad for performance as well?

Anyway, I'm fine with both, just want to have it finished (and committed). Let's see what they say

[vladislavbelov]

20 hours ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

I think from things @vladislavbelov has said, it would be better for graphics RAM to have a few more actors and models than to have yet another large texture (texture switching and loading taxing the graphics card heavily). I know @Stan` suggested one new texture, but let's see what Vlad says.

Generally yes, it's better to avoid many textures. Also it's possible to combine a single 2k texture from 4x 1k textures if it'll be reused for many actors with the same material.

[hyperion]

There is a quality option for textures, if set to sad there should indeed be done what can to reduce memory requirements, but if set to stellar it would be a shame to compromise historical accuracy to this extent. After all this is not just a random house.

[nifa]

12 hours ago, hyperion said:

After all this is not just a random house.

Exactly. If it's used as intended, then it's also not part of the roman set of buildings, instead supposed to be capturable to all civs.

[vladislavbelov]

On 05/09/2023 at 11:31 AM, hyperion said:

There is a quality option for textures, if set to sad there should indeed be done what can to reduce memory requirements, but if set to stellar it would be a shame to compromise historical accuracy to this extent.

Unfortunately that option doesn't affect CPU cost of a pipeline state switches.