Week 11

 As previously posted, this week I worked solely on my first year Dwarven Axe. 

At the time, I was happy with the outcome I had, as it was my first ever attempt at 3D modelling. However, as my skillset has now developed along with my workflow and ability to conform to said workflow, I know I am capable of doing a lot better. 

The first thing I did was to go and find the original concept art we were given as our brief. As it turns out, it is actually a Dwarven Axe from Warhammer Age of Sigmar, a franchise I'm quite a big fan of.

The next thing I did was go back to my model on Sketchfab and re-download it, to see if I could simply fix the geometry and textures before moving to Unreal Engine. However, as this was probably my first ever 'real' attempt at building something in Maya, it's relatively safe to say that the asset was (for lack of a better word) janky at best. 

So, like the artist I am, I just remade it, and I truly enjoyed every second. Even when it came to baking the asset out (the only part of this that tested my patience), figuring out the correct parameters to use and the best course of action was like a puzzle that I had to really dig into to work out -- which is my favorite part of any project. 

The main thing I knew I needed to do, though, was to clean up the unneeded geometry. It was a simple fix -- one that I wasn't even aware of back when I made the asset for the first time -- in that I used Alphas and Textures to get the desired effect.

It's a simple process; creating a white image on a black background, but as the reference image wasn't very clear I had to physically trace over each one. This was the most time-consuming part of the entire build.

 

Then, after I used these (and as such finished my texturing process) I decided to add something else to the scene in Unreal -- to give a little bit more environmental development / world building. I eventually settled on sculpting a rock out in Zbrush. 

Because I'm a bit of a scatterbrain and have been under stress from other modules, it kind of slipped my mind to take screenshots of the process (which I am sad about as it was my first try at bringing an asset from Maya into Zbrush to sculpt on). 

However, following the pipeline that we learned last semester (Model, Sculpt, Decimate, Remesh, Retopo) I got a base mesh that, again, isn't optimal for game use whatsoever but is ideal for a presentation piece. 

 Once again, I was too caught up in enjoying the process to remember to take screenshots. However, I did utilize masks, generators, and anchor points among the other techniques to get the desired effect. I baked in most of the base normal detail so anything else would only add an extra layer of detail to the final model.

One part that I am particularly proud of is the moss textures on the rock, which I used a metal edge wear generator to create, layering and layering with varying shades of green until I got a satisfactory outcome. I'm aware I could have used a Moss generator, instead, but I wasn't particularly happy with how it looked on my model. I wanted a more sparse look, as opposed to it flooding from the top of the model. 

After that, I brought it into Unreal Engine. Here, I used a Starter Content Material to add a grassy effect to my base shape, of which I added a multiply node to make it darker to not take away the focus from my model. Then, I added in dust particles, giving them a very slight glow. I added lens flares, along with a small amount of Depth of Field, before taking a few High Resolution Screenshots.

Those screenshots were taken into Photoshop, and I edited them to include my watermark, and the Unreal Engine logo. Overall, I am extremely happy with the outcome of this recreation, and am truly glad I decided to test how far my skills had come since First Year.  

This was the final week before spring break. As is the theme of the rest of this semester, I will be mostly focusing on Journeyman work over the next three weeks, but I will also be looking into what I can do to further boost my portfolio in that time.

Link to Artstation post:

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/5BZy8A