Assignment 1 final

So I am as always late with this but I finally finished this one as well and in doing so is at least finished with the blog posts for assignment one, after assignment two no less.

So first we go through the different kind of maps used in most 3d games.

Firstly diffuse map.

I went through this quite well in the last post but anyway quick recap.  Diffuse maps are the base of the texture the colors that it starts off with. One can add some soft self-shadows but adding to much shadows on the diffuse will ruin the experience if you look at it from a certain direction and the shadow is all wrong.

Here is my diffuse map

Normal map.

Normal maps are one of the reasons you do not need a lot of shadows on the diffuse maps. It simulates concave and convex shapes on a flat surface making light behave as if the surface was not really flat. This helps keep polygon counts low.

This also means that the outline of the object you are creating in the most important since the “hoax” can be quite easily spotted. What this means is that it is very important to make a good silhouette for the model and it also means that making concave surfaces or other insets with normal maps is smarter since they don’t break the silhouette in the same way.

Specular map.

Last but not least we have the specular map. It describes how much light the area should reflect and is therefore highly useful when differentiating between materials such as metal or wood.

The normal map was made with crazy bump and was as such calculated from the diffuse map, The other main method of making normal maps is t omake a Highpoly version of the model and ”bake” the normal map onto the lowpoly model.

Making a normal map from a diffuse can be troublesome sometimes but it turned out quite well for me, although some hand work was needed to fix the really horrible UV seam I discussed last posts

My specular map is not all that impressive since the thing is mostly wood and the majority of the metal parts are blackened the only real reflective parts are the “edges” on the nail heads.

I started out with a specular made from the diffuse using crazy bump just like the normal map. After a first test I then made it all a very dark shade to make sure that the wood would not reflect that much light and I then painted in the reflective surfaces on the specific parts of the nail heads where the wear and tear had made the shiny metal sticks out.

Hopefully the shininess will help the player pick out the boxes, and the shiny parts being X shaped and paced in the manner they are hopefully makes them easy to recognize. Once again even if it is just something stupid like the reflection people remembering the crates in your game is a good thing.

Also tada! Have a finished crate.