Collab2021 – WIP – createtaiwan

[Dave Hudson]

Sorry… Just saw this. I guess it’s a moot point now!

[Dave Hudson]

@luthier @duerer – So, after last night’s Livestream I am making a few changes to my file before jumping into the sculpting and I just wanted to get some feedback on whether I am going in the right direction.

1.  I separated my original wood pieces (there are 9) and put all the linked duplicates that I arranged in the space to form the actual fence into a separate collection to keep things clear.
2. I moved the original “lego” pieces to the middle of the world space (by clearing the location and rotation info).
3. I am simplifying the mesh (I had originally done it all in quads because, well, quads rock) and using more triangles to reduce unnecessary vertices.
4. I will then duplicate the 9 pieces into a new collection called Fence_High and add the MultiRes Modifier and start the sculpting process.

I assume that next week when we bake the MultiRes mesh onto the texture of the low poly pieces, that will automatically propagate to all the linked duplicates that make up the actual fence?

[Dave Hudson]

One more thing… should I be creating holding edges around the major cracks in the wood?

[Vincent]

@createtaiwan Good question. @theluthier 👆

[ladymito]

I followed the treasure chest tutorial, they use Mark sharp, without reinforcement. I imagine that in order to put multires on it you will need to reinforce the cracks unless you don’t use it and opt for dynotopo.

[Dave Hudson]

I’m planning to use the Multires as it was demonstrated in the livestream.

[Matthew Ullrey]

One more thing… should I be creating holding edges around the major cracks in the wood?

I “wood” say yes….

When Kent added the holding edges with the bevel tool he described it as a “dirty subsurf modeling” method for only the edges that understandably would need to be harder and reinforced. [CRTL+B] with a little bit of offset (EX.0.0006) and a segment of (3.)

He tested it with the Subsurf modifier just to see how it will smooth, then removed the subsurface modifier in order to add the multires. He then added the Multires and set the level to (5.) You can also sharpen edges in Sculpt Mode with the Crease Brush [SHIFT+C], but it is easier to create those sharp edges with the bevel tool.

[Kent Trammell]

I concur with @ullreym that the “dirty subsurf” method of beveling everything is a decent way to get to sculpt mode faster.

One thing to keep in mind once you’re done adding sculpt accents: All the little nicks and cuts you modeled in the base mesh (as I did in the treasure chest course) – those could possible be removed in the final model for each fence piece. This would optimize the geometry where such details would only live in the normal map. Food for thought!

[Matthew Ullrey]

I see…. so keep a Lo rez model for the baked maps to attach to. Then make a medium rez model based on the Lo rez to prepare for a high rez sculpt to produce said maps. Then at some point lose the medium and high rez models when you don’t need them anymore. 

[Dave Hudson]

Would that apply only to cuts and nicks that do not show up in the silhouette?

[Dave Hudson]

First attempt at sculpting wood!

[Vincent]

👆👆 @createtaiwan Yes, I believe that that would only apply to anything that doesn’t affect the objects silhouette.

The sculpted wood looks good, although I don’t think that there would necessarily be that much wood grain on the shorter sides of a fence post. 🤔 👍

[Ingmar Franz]

@createtaiwan Cracks that help defining the silhouette or are casting significant shadows should be modeled, the rest is baken into normal maps. Listen @jlampel talking about this here. Your first sculpting attempts on the fence are already very promising 😀👍!

[Dave Hudson]

I have already cleared the sculpting and will start again after watching Kent’s upcoming livestream. It looks too much like melted cheese and not wood. I think the cracks need to have harder, finer edges and I’m not sure what tool/brush would work best to achieve that look.

[Ingmar Franz]

I’m not sure what tool/brush would work best to achieve that look. 

@createtaiwan I think, it’s the “Scrape Brush” used by Kent @theluthier here (already in minute 1; Kent renamed the brush to “Carve”) with the “View Plane” set as “Sculpt Plane” which has to be locked.

In Blender 2.9x check “Use Original      Normal” for the locking:

What these settings do, as far as I understand it, is that the brush projects the mesh along the “Face Normal” that the brush detects directly when the stroke is started to a plane parallel to your screen surface in the 3D scene running through the surface point currently under your brush.  You should also check “Use Original      Plane” if you don’t want to reduce your mesh to nothing 😉😁! With the last mentioned option checked, the distance from your viewpoint to the surface point where your stroke starts is measured and only mesh parts up to a plane parallel to your screen and running through that “stroke start point” (my naming 😉)  are affected. You need that option in your use case.

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