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Jon Alma
Monkey-Butler
Joined: 09 May 2005
Posts: 50
Location: The Sunny South of France
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 Posted: Tue Apr 22, 2008 7:15 am Post subject: Legends - New NPC Models |
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Having previously 'borrowed' NPC models from other games I knew that at some stage I would have to have a go at working on my own. With the plan being to release a demo in the not too distant future (next ten years knowing me!) the moment to remove the 'place holders' has come and I've started working on the first new model as shown below.
Still a few things to work on (the hands need to be worked into the rest of the model better, the hood is a bit too regular and uniform), but I'd appreciate any feedback you might have.
Cheers,
Jon.
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Hajo
Demon Hunter
Joined: 30 Sep 2003
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Location: Between chair and keyboard.
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| Posted: Tue Apr 22, 2008 7:46 am Post subject: |
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This is definitely way much better than any human model that I made so far :) No idea how much that says in a more objective way, but I'm definitely impressed.
Detail level looks good to me. I wouldn't detail the model much more unless you have frequent closeups views in your game.
A question of curiousity: How long did you need to make this one model? I'm asking since I spend some 20+ hours on older models of mine and I'd like to know if that is a "normal" time to make a human model, or if there would be tricks to be faster. More precisely, 20 hours on the mesh, not skinned or rigged yet.
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DeveloperX
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Joined: 04 May 2003
Posts: 1626
Location: Decatur, IL, USA
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| Posted: Tue Apr 22, 2008 1:02 pm Post subject: |
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Looking good man. Not much more tweaking needed to be a very good model. I'd tighten up the texture map's pixels a bit more in the face, and perhaps tweak the torso a little more, but thats just me.
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Verious
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Joined: 06 Jan 2004
Posts: 409
Location: Online
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| Posted: Tue Apr 22, 2008 1:13 pm Post subject: |
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Looks good so far, but the knees could use a bit more definition. The feet also seem a little small in relation to the size of the body (but that could just be the perspective).
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Jon Alma
Monkey-Butler
Joined: 09 May 2005
Posts: 50
Location: The Sunny South of France
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| Posted: Tue Apr 22, 2008 2:29 pm Post subject: |
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| Hajo wrote: | This is definitely way much better than any human model that I made so far :) No idea how much that says in a more objective way, but I'm definitely impressed.
Detail level looks good to me. I wouldn't detail the model much more unless you have frequent closeups views in your game. |
The game is played in first person perspective so some close ups are possible (but no extreme close ups during dialogues for examples). I've actually decided to downgrade the level of detail in the mesh itself a bit (for instance the model has 'mittens' rather than fingers). From profiling I found that while frame rates were fine overall, the drawing of the NPC models was taking up a very large chunk of the time available and as the code is about as optimised as I can get it on my own I decided to save some processing time by cutting out any nice to haves in the models.
| Hajo wrote: | | A question of curiousity: How long did you need to make this one model? I'm asking since I spend some 20+ hours on older models of mine and I'd like to know if that is a "normal" time to make a human model, or if there would be tricks to be faster. More precisely, 20 hours on the mesh, not skinned or rigged yet. |
It's difficult to tell how long it took as I've recycled a lot of the elements in the model from older ones. For example the head was actually used over a year ago as part of another model. In addition I used screen captures of 'borrowed' models as a guide for creating my models which saved so much time with getting the proportions right. However, the combination of the separate elements and the skinning has alone taken me the best part of 4 days (I am slow at this!). Animating normally takes about 3-5 days to get sorted, but once done for one model it can be exported to all the others (in fact they are the same model ... body parts are independent of each other and I create each unique NPC model by applying a couple of mask numbers - one to identify the model parts to use and the other the skins).
| Verious wrote: | | Looks good so far, but the knees could use a bit more definition. The feet also seem a little small in relation to the size of the body (but that could just be the perspective). |
The knees (and elbows) has actually lost a lot of definition! Up until recently I had modelled the upper and lower parts of the arms and legs separately which left the models with very odd joints. Since then I've been blending the two parts of each limb together into one mesh. Have to wait and see what it looks like when I start animating, but hopefully this won't need too much work. It has to be said that the two shots here do hide the knees a bit and as you also noted shrink the feet a lot (if anything the boots are a little big).
Thanks for the feedback,
Jon.
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RedSlash
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| Posted: Wed Apr 23, 2008 12:08 am Post subject: |
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Looks good! I think the level of detail is just about right. Not sure what the effects of halving it, though.
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RampantCoyote
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Joined: 16 May 2006
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Location: Salt Lake City, Utah
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| Posted: Wed Apr 23, 2008 12:26 am Post subject: |
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It really depends on the look and detail of the rest of the world, but for an indie RPG I'd be pretty happy with what you have.
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BadMrBox
Bringer of Apocalypse
Joined: 26 Jun 2002
Posts: 1022
Location: Dark Forest's of Sweden
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| Posted: Wed Apr 23, 2008 12:59 am Post subject: |
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Yeah, it looks good. Little thin thought.
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Jon Alma
Monkey-Butler
Joined: 09 May 2005
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Location: The Sunny South of France
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| Posted: Wed Apr 23, 2008 7:08 am Post subject: |
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| RedSlash wrote: | | Looks good! I think the level of detail is just about right. Not sure what the effects of halving it, though.. |
Sorry, wasn't very clear in my original mail. The model as shown is already at the reduced detail. The screenshots (while taken from a 3D package rather than the game) should be more or less identical to what the game will show.
| BadMrBox wrote: | | Yeah, it looks good. Little thin thought. |
This is the start model for the super fit warrior types. I'm going to try to blow the model out a bit to create an alternative mesh for the not so healthy merchants and so on. Also I've used an armour skin on the body that will be more used for a normal shirt / tunic. I am even considering creating a few child models as well (but then we get into the delicate area of having children in a completely open game ... how do you handle players who go postal!).
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BadMrBox
Bringer of Apocalypse
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| Posted: Thu Apr 24, 2008 5:55 am Post subject: |
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Do you have any new demo of your game that you could share with us? It was awhile since I checked it out and I'm interesting in the changes that must have happened since I saw it the last time.
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Jon Alma
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Joined: 09 May 2005
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Location: The Sunny South of France
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| Posted: Thu Apr 24, 2008 6:37 am Post subject: |
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| BadMrBox wrote: | | Do you have any new demo of your game that you could share with us? It was awhile since I checked it out and I'm interesting in the changes that must have happened since I saw it the last time. |
I'm getting closer! Up until now I've been using some models (both for NPCs and buildings, etc) taken from other games or from websites, etc. This allowed me to benchmark the performance of the game engine and make some pretty rapid progress. However, in preparing a new demo I need to replace these models. The buildings, trees, etc have all been replaced in the last few weeks and now its the turn of the NPC models. Once this is done the goal is to tidy up the first two chapters of the game and release a proper playable demo (rather than a walk around technical demo as in the past). It will take a bit longer, but should be worth the wait.
Jon.
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Jon Alma
Monkey-Butler
Joined: 09 May 2005
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Location: The Sunny South of France
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| Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2008 1:05 pm Post subject: |
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With the basic model almost done I'm about to start sorting out the animation. In terms of the different animations I plan to create I've got the following so far...
- Idle (still)
- Idle (look left)
- Idle (look right)
- Idle (scratch – no weapons!)
- Idle (still 2)
- Walk
- Run
- Talk
- Die
- Dead
- Battle idle 1
- Battle idle 2
- Block
- Dodge
- Shield block
- Stab
- Slash
- Attack 3
- Get hit
- Magic target
- Magic self
- Special - drink
- Special - hammer
- Special - read
A lot of these will be duplicated to ensure I have good animations for holding a weapon, holding a torch, having empty hands, etc.
Any others you would like or expect to see ... I'm racking my brain at the moment trying to get them all listed [i]before[\i] I start animating the models.
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Verious
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Joined: 06 Jan 2004
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| Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2008 6:50 pm Post subject: |
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You forgot the "Hot Coffee" animation...
Just kidding. :)
Will the player be able to duck/crouch? If so, I imagine you will need an animation for that.
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Jon Alma
Monkey-Butler
Joined: 09 May 2005
Posts: 50
Location: The Sunny South of France
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| Posted: Mon May 12, 2008 4:29 pm Post subject: |
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I've been busy on the NPC models (in fact on all kinds of things in the game) with the latest NPCs looking something like this ... 
The first two NPCs are complete, while the third NPC still needs a far amount of work.
All models shown are fully rigged up and animated ... they don't crouch (yet at least) but they do everything else including tucking into a pint of the local beer.
All feedback much appreciated (even if critical!)
Jon.
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Hajo
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| Posted: Tue May 13, 2008 9:56 am Post subject: |
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I'm not quite sure if I can really help a lot. The poses look a bit artificial to me, but I cannot really say what seems to be wrong.
Maybe it's because they appear off-balance to me, the body too much backwards, compared to the legs/feet.
Their knees seems not quite in the right place, I'd think they should have shorter upper legs and longer lower legs. But I assume you have used some anatomy book as reference, so that's unlikely?
I'm struggling myself since some months to give my avatars a more "natural" looking pose, and still fail ... so I guess I'm not a big help with feedback, but to share a few impressions.
Textures and the overall proportions look good to me.
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