Introduction
In our Trello (a collaborative panel that can be edited by group members), I found that we had to complete all the models two weeks before the deadline. Because we wanted to synchronize with the game development progress, we slowed down the production speed. But this means that at our current speed, we cannot complete the model in time. So, I decided to finish the poster in two weeks.
Anyone is welcome to watch our Trello, but this is in Chinese:
https://trello.com/b/j6I1KmLb/collab-unit-project-tom-eckersley-poster
Tasks:
Complete four posters’ models
Process
At the beginning of this week, Zhu asked two questions. One is that Yu’s panda does not have a head, even if the FBX file that Yu sent to his panda’s head alone is useless. Yu asked me to check it. I took a look at the model. This is the same problem as the last time I had it, because the model was not deleted in history! The channel only retains SkinCluster and Tweak.
The other problem is more troublesome. Zhu reported if he put our model in the game, the game will crash, the reason may be that the model has too many primitives. His reference model has only a few hundred primitives, but mine actually reached 50,000! I had to export my models one by one to check, and finally found that the font actually produced a lot of primitives. But this does not solve the problem of running slow. Finally, Zhu found out that it was because our model (thousands of primitives) could not directly create a collider. Otherwise, we would create a mesh for him, or he would modify the original mesh. He is really a good partner, because he always wanted to reduce the workload for us, and finally he solved the problem by himself, but he didn’t need us to do anything.
These questions tell me one thing, I want to make my model with as few primitives as possible.
Now let’s take a look at our progress. There are a total of twelve posters, which are equivalent to twelve models. We have completed the five on the right. According to the original plan, I should have finished Cat and Miss Orange with Yu this week. But these two models are relatively simple, so I think in addition to the muscle man, I can also make the target on the left, the arrow and the fish. Because the target and arrow are made in the same way as Miss Orange (yes, we named it). With my experience in making monkeys, the production of fish will not be complicated. Even if we are clear, these three posters may not be made into games in the end.
Miss Orange and Sombra are made in the same way. First, create a plane, then use muti-cut to cut out the required shape on it, and finally form a block similar to a jigsaw puzzle! Moreover, I will try to use the least number of faces to create my model. But when I cut, I forgot to choose the right point, or I can’t cut it out.
And what we are going to make is a moving lady, and the basket will move with it and catch the oranges falling from the sky. I found that my model is not suitable for this game. So I rotated my arm and enlarged the basket so that the collider of the basket and oranges can operate normally.
This is my first edition of Miss Orange.
Even though the types in Maya have many pritimitives, I made them to show the effect. There is a Type Manipulator function in the font creation, this can change each letter individually. This means that if the font spacing and size are different (as shown in the picture), I can modify it according to my own ideas.
At this time, I think my model is too flat, maybe the visual effect in the game is not very good. So I scaled it, made some minor adjustments, and imported it into the Unity to check model. As a result, I found that the model that I saw in Unity lacked some primitives. I didn’t think it was a normal problem at first. Later I discovered that I started two sided lightening, so the normal problem was not seen. After modifying the normal, there is no problem with my model.
The next step is to make targets and arrow. These two models are hardly difficult, but I also encountered a big problem. As shown in the picture below, my poster has a big color difference. I thought about it for a long time before I remembered that in order to realize the linear workflow in Houdini, I downloaded OpenColor to use ACES, and the color space is no longer sRGB. Because this software is universal, color space is also replaced in Maya, I just need to convert it. But this affects my modeling. Every time I open the texture, I need to adjust it, but I don’t know how to switch off it!
The chromatic aberration problem was solved, I also successfully made these two models, and they were imported into unity without any problem.
After finishing these two relatively simple models, I finally started my fish! To be honest, this is my favorite model. Even though I know we don’t have time to make a game of it, I want to make it a good model. The upper body of the fish is very simple, I only used a sphere and insert loop edge to complete it. But the tail part of the lower body is difficult for me. The fish’s tail needs to change direction, and my wiring becomes very messy because of this. I had to delete it and do it again. This time the effect is much better, but the fish tail is still a little bit stiff. So I used the grab tool and smooth tool in sculpting to modify the lower body of the fish, which looked much better.
But the fish also has a mouth. I checked the mouth topology of the human body, but it didn’t fit the lines of my model. Maybe it was a wrong decision for me to model without considering the position of the mouth at the beginning. I had to rely on my own feelings to use grab tool to make the head and mouth the same as the reference, but then the head became deformed and very ugly. I had to delete it again and use the original model to make it.
Although there are five sides in my model, I made the mouth. Even if the fish’s mouth is not the same as the reference, I believe it can be modified by adjusting the controller after I bind the fish.
The next step is to cut UV. To be honest, I haven’t divided UV by myself before, and I rely on Maya to unfold UV automatically. But as a role of fish, I have to cut it myself. According to what Yann has shown before, I first create a UV through the camera, and then use cut and sew to cut out the UV lines. Finally, use unfold and layout to get the final UV of the fish. But after I added the checkerboard material, I found that there was a problem with the UV. The texture on the back was incorrect, and it on the arm disappeared in the UV editor. I checked it for a long time and didn’t know what was going on, so I had to make it again, and the UV was successfully displayed.
In Photoshop, I used different brushes to paint the texture completely. This is not a difficult task, but it takes a lot of time. I have been drawing for a long time, and I am happy that I re-imported the UV map into the model without any problems. My fish looks better all at once!
The next step is to create bones and weights for the fish. With the experience of making monkeys, I have a good understanding of this process, except that I did not check the weight properly because of my anxiety. I also modified the weight of some points in the component editor, which is an accurate way of making weights.
Also, I haven’t made the bones that control the mouth. The bones I created at the beginning cannot control the mouth, so I had to unbind and recreate the bones. This is so sad. Because I painted the weight many times this night, I feel that I have been accumulating experience.
At this time Yu has finished her final model and showed it to me. I hope I can import it into Unity to see if there is any problem with the animation of the model. If you are interested in her production process, you can go to her Blog.
With the help of Yann and Yu, I successfully made my fish model! As a result, they used my model to pose a variety of strange shapes, which also shows that they like my model very much!
I almost forgot to mention it. Yann used TeamViewer to help me check why my eyes cannot use aim constrain. Since the fish’s eyes were created with the duplicate special instance at the beginning, they couldn’t freeze, so I recreated the eyes. The next step is whether there is a problem with the rotation tool. We found the answer on Google. My eyes and body have used parent constrain, so I can no longer use aim constrain. Finally, Yann thought of a good way to make eyes: first create a group for the eyes, and then squeeze the eyes in the group, so that rotating the eyes themselves can be viewed from different angles. In the end, create the aim constrain with the group and controller, and create the parent of the controller and main controller. I don’t know how to describe it, so I used a gif to display it directly.
I checked the model again the next day, and I felt that the joints of the model could be optimized. So I used hammer skin wights to optimize the fish’s joints so that its rotation is more natural.
After finishing the model and binding, I can start to make animation. Thank God, this is what I want to make the most. In order to make this fish look exactly like the poster, I spent a lot of time optimizing it as much as possible. Because the fish’s movements are not complicated, I pay special attention to the overlapping of the body.
This is the final result, I am really satisfied! I think it looks exactly like the poster! ! ! In fact, my partners like my model very much, and even they want to make a game for him, but I rejected it because other games are more important.
Conclusion
There is no difficulty in the production process of this fish, it just requires a lot of patience. But I think I can make it without the help and encouragement of my classmates. Compared to our first model, Yu and I have made great progress! Our two models are almost finished, and then we have to take care of other tasks, such as finding dubbing and sound effects.
Specially thank to Crystal, she told me how to design model! If you are interested in her model, welcome to her blog: