Planning

I will be making a Dao and a Guandao for my props, both being Chinese swords.

Guandao

Dao

With Dao blades, regardless of whether they’re Guandao or a regular Dao, they always have very big blades. The handle for the Dao is usually big enough for both hands, though it’s usually held with one. On the end of them, there’s often a red piece of cloth or string which is a distinguishing trait for these blades. Some of them also have engravings, which I will also do.

Of the references I chose in Task one, there were:

- Dao Blade- Guandao - Hook Swords- Axe- Witcher Style Swords

The hardest ones of these are arguably the Witcher swords due to the topology and the particle effects, and the Axe due to the engravings. I’m not too familiar with engravings, so I honestly have no idea how to do them. The textures on the Witcher swords are very high resolution judging by the renders, which will be difficult for me to do as I’m not that familiar with substance painter.

Also, due to me seeing a lot of Dao blades in Chinese dramas as a kid, it’s a familiar weapon to me, so I decided to do them. They’re not too complex, but sometimes have engravings, which I’m going to figure out how to do at some point anyway.

I’m going to make both the Guandao and the regular Dao, both having their own unique designs. The Dao will have a “flame” pattern on it, while the Guandao will have a crane on it, and I’m going to

make the Guandao a lot more beat up with blood on it and such accomplished with Substance Painter.

To make the Dao blades, I’m going to use Maya and Zbrush to model, so it’s a mix of sculpting and hard surface modelling, while using Substance Painter to texture. Maya will be for the basic blockout for the blades and the handles since I’m hard surface modelling, while Zbrush will be used for the engravings. Substance will be used for texture maps, scratches, etc.

When it comes to tools, I know I’ll be using extrude and connect a lot in order to keep the shape of the Dao blades after smoothing. In order to keep the smoothing, I’ll add more edges near the parts that are supposed to be sharp so that they don’t get smoothed out too much. I will also use the smooth tool in order to make stuff look more realistic. Of course, as always, there’s a lot of extruding to be done, and I’ll be hard surface modelling / box modelling for the blades, while using cylinders for the handles. I often extruded from edge instead of faces as it was easier to get the shape of the Dao using that and tweaking vertices instead of a closed face. I also had to tweak vertices sometimes as they were uneven, but they can easily be straightened using vertex select and scale.

Some faces I extruded using scale as moving is locked to one direction, and if for example I wanted to extrude two edges at an angle going inwards, it’s better to use scale and tweak it afterwards, though it doesn’t make too much difference if you extrude using move tool first then tweak using scale.

Connecting and extruding is the main tools I used in the end, and I experimented with Ncloth a bit for the ribbons on the end, but I’ve yet to figure out how to make that static without Ncloth.

Main tools in Maya:

- Move tool

Moves objects, faces, vertices or edges. Can also be combined with other tools like extrude by holding shift. It’s also better to move by axis, because if you free move it, it often flies off somewhere without you having too much control.

- Extrude

Pulls out your selection in the axis of your choice. For example, you have a face on a cube selected and either click the extrude tool in the toolbar or hold Shift + move at an axis, it’ll make an edge and pull the face out. This can be dangerous sometimes however, especially when extruding inwards, as it can cause faces to be in the inside of the model which will break UVs. Also, watch out for Ngons.

- Selecting

When it comes to what you can select, you have a choice of:

- Objects- Faces- Vertices- Edges

Allowing you to tweak each and every part of your model. Selecting is an essential tool that enables you to do pretty much everything – if you can’t select anything, what can you do?

- UV

My weakest point by far, yet very necessary for textures. UVing determines where your textures will go, and it unwraps the object like you would unfold a cube. If done right, textures will not have as many seams (though this may be fixed using Trilinear rendering in substance, fixing seams sometimes) and won’t stretch around the object in unnecessary ways.

- Move and Sew Edges

This moves the selected edges in the UV editor and combines them into one. This may break things however so you should unfold it and then see if it’s good or not.

- Cut

In the UV editor you can cut edges to separate them into two sets of them.

- Camera Based

Creates a UV shell based off of where your camera is in your viewport. If you see any automatic

- Unfold

Flattens out the UV shell that you have selected. Used to make things flat and is an essential tool.

- Unfold Along

Unfolds the UV shell in the specified direction.

- Textile Density

Gets the average dimensions from the selected UV shells and then applies them to the selected.

- Move and Scale

The same thing as in the viewport – allows you to move and scale UV shell, edge and face.

- Layout

Fits and resizes all of the UV shells into an appropriate size, fitting it inside the box.

- Merging / Target Welding

Merging edges or vertices are an option for us to use, and are good for cleanup. Before I UV or even when UVing, I often select all the verts in my object and click merge vertices in case there’s a stray edge somewhere which will cause errors. Target welding edges will allow me to cleanup or fill holes without causing Ngons. The difference between target welding and merging is that Target Welding is you hand doing it, dragging one vert/edge to another and glues it together and you can only do it one by one, while Merging is automatic and the computer does all of the selected for you.

- Scale tool

Scale allows you to change the size of an object, face or edge. Useful for resizing things and cleanup, making edges smaller so it’s easier to see and connect them, etc. Also useful for things like curves, etc.

- Rotate

Rotate an object/edge/face. Good for angling things.

- Soft Selection

Soft selection is good for organic objects, or smooth curves in an object. You activate it using B and then you can see a yellow to red circle from where your cursor is, which you can adjust by holding B and left click. Soft selection essentially moves everything slightly along with your selected edge/face/vert, making it easier to make smooth areas. I helped Ellis with this on his spear, and used it a bit for the handles.

- Connecting Edges

Connecting edges is often better than using Multi-Cut or things like bevelling an edge as bevelling is prone to creating Ngons, while using connect you can achieve the same result (though it takes a bit more effort) and usually prevents Ngons. To use Connect, you select a loop of edges, and then it makes an edge loop around an object which you can then edit.

- Ncloth

Ncloth is located under the FX bar at the top left, which changes the tools listed on the bar at the top. Ncloth, as the name suggests, allows you to simulate cloth physics on your chosen object (usually a plane). First, you make your object, then smooth it so that it has a good amount of subdivisions (more subdivisions = more deformations, as in smoother bends), and then go to Ncloth at the top and with your object selected and create Ncloth. If you click play at the bottom, your selected object will fall down gracefully, but it’ll clip though everything as you haven’t created a collider yet. To do so, select your colliding object(s) and click Ncloth and Create Passive Collider.

There’s also a tool I learned a bit later, which is to freeze the cloth animation in place and it’ll be the constant form of your object without having the Ncloth object, passive collider or nucleus. First, select your object, delete its history and go to Ncloth > convert Ncloth output space > local space -> world space. Then, with your object selected again, go to Ncloth > Rest Shape > Rest to start shape, then delete the history again and then the Ncloth objects.

- Multi-Cut

Multi-Cut tool allows you to draw an edge into something, like connect, but you do it by hand. Holding shift snaps the vertex and edge to the middle of the target edge, or holding CTRL + SHIFT allows you to snap it to certain points. Holding CTRL also allows it to try and draw an edge loop around an object. Careful for Ngons, though. Useful for precise connecting edge loops if your object is clean and if you’re doing miniscule details, which the linear nature of connect won’t be able to achieve.

- Texture sets

I’ll also be using Texture Sets, which as Joe has taught me, are Colour ID but for the low poly. The difference between colour ID and texture sets are that Colour ID is that Colour ID materials are applied to the high poly, and Texture Sets are coloured materials applied to the low poly. This allows higher resolutions for each separate coloured part, as each one will have its own UV space. For example, for the Dao, I’d probably have the Blade as one set, which will have a whole UV space for itself, while the handle and the guard will be two other sets for themselves, allowing for higher resolution, meaning more detail.

- Exporting

Exporting in Maya is used for packing up objects and readying them for other programs, like Zbrush or Substance for example. I usually exported objects to an FBX file type as it’s universally supported.

Meanwhile, on Zbrush, I’ll be mostly using alpha maps to make the high detail engravings, while using masking to do the flame design on the normal Dao, along with deformation tools. Engravings would take an unnecessarily long time to do each and every vertex, and it’d also make it Ngon city. Another thing to keep in mind, as the Crane engraving is so small, I’m going to have to add a hell of a lot of subdivisions so it’s not super pixelated.

Why Maya?

I find Maya to be useful to block things out in and hard surface modelling. I think I’ve grasped the basics of Maya by now which is expected, so I don’t take as long as I used to, though I’m not as fast as I would like.

After hard surface modelling, it’s easier to take things into Zbrush for things like engravings and making things look more real and smooth.

The tools that I’m using/used are relatively simple and the only advanced thing is Ncloth. Most of the tools I’ve listed are standard procedure for Maya as they’re efficient, clean and familiar to me. Also it’s less random than Zbrush.

- Zbrush Tools

Starting off with:

- Init Zbrush

Basically resets Zbrush and your viewport, as when starting Zbrush sometimes the viewport is smaller than it should be.

- Importing

In the lightbox window, you can open a file, which in this case will be your export, then…

- Drawing in your object and edit

In Zbrush, you start with loading up your export and then dragging it in, which put the object in the editing part of the screen. Then, you press T to start editing the object, or else it

- - Subdividing

Subdivisions add more polys to the drawn object, allowing for more detail and less pixiley properties. For my crane, I had to have like 7 subdivisions because the detail was so fine and small, but put the high poly version up to an absurd 7.6 million polys. Unsurprisingly, it crashed Maya every time I even clicked on it in Maya.

- Masking

Since I was doing just the engravings in Zbrush, one method of going about it was using the masking brush (CTRL + Left click) and then drawing out the designs/engravings on the blade. Then, I used the invert tool (Shift + CTRL + I) to mask everything but the drawn part of it, which enables editing on only the part you masked before. Then, I used…

- Deformation Tools

Deformation tools affect the entire object, but in this case since I had masked everything but the area I wanted, It only affected that area. These tools are just sliders, making it incredibly easy to use. I mainly used inflate, but I dragged it into the negative sections, which made them go inwards instead, then smoothed it.

- Alpha Maps

For the crane, I couldn’t manage to do it using masking as it’s so fine and after about 5 tries I ended up learning about Alpha Maps. So I opened photoshop, had a black background, used white to draw in the crane, which then could be stamped onto the blade. Much easier than the masking method, but it’s situational.

- Move Brush

Technically the only brush I used if you don’t count the masking one, move tool allows you to move a certain area of the object. I used this on the handle.

Why Zbrush?

Doing engravings on Maya seemed like more effort than it was worth, so I thought drawing it in on Zbrush would be more successful, though that wasn’t successful drawing it by hand. After I learned of masking and alphas, however, I’d argue that it’s one of the better ways to handle things.

Making smooth handles and stuff in Zbrush is also easier using the Move Brush and such along with adding subdivisions as it makes things look less blocky and more realistic. In the end, the deformation tools, masking and alpha maps helped me immensely with achieving my goals. Also, it gives me more experience in Zbrush sculpting, which is essential.

- Substance Painter

Standard program for texturing.

- Importing and baking

As always, I start with importing the object from Zbrush/Maya, setting the resolution to 2k/4k. I then went to texture set settings and added an Ambient Occlusion map and proceeded to Bake Mesh Maps. In that window, I had to change a few things like in the ID window the drop down menu to colour material to use the texture sets I had made and set the resolution accordingly.

- Materials and Generators

Substance materials are simply drag and drop. Generators, however, are made under a layer but the effects are on top of it. Generators can be stacked and are good for making things like dirt, blood, dust, etc. You’re free to change the colours, amount of ___ (__ being what your generator is, like dirt for example), contract of __, etc.

- Fill Layers

I’ll use fill layers in order to change the material colour of something. First, I loaded up the normal of the material (in this case leather as I decided to add a last minute wrap), which loaded up the normal of the leather and then I was free to change the colour of it.

Why Substance Painter?

Substance Painter is an infinitely better method than texturing with Photoshop, which we used to do. Not only are the materials cleaner, but the resolution and stuff is higher. Our handmade textures weren’t pretty.

Substance offers an incredible amount of tools with most of the options in demand on sliders, and is incredibly user-friendly. You can also use royalty free materials from Substance Share, which come with Normals, AO maps, etc. instead of having to do them yourself.

The Purpose of a Project Plan

A Project plan allows you to schedule when should be done by what. I’ve noticed while on this course people tend to think “I have a month or two I have time to just relax and work for now”, but realistically, this is never a good mindset to have as this always ends up in us rushing at the end and due to mismanagement of their time. A project plan can nullify these effects to some degree as you always have a goal in mind for each week, giving you something to aim for and therefore giving you some sort of motivation. I honestly think these should be reinforced but I understand if it isn’t.

In group projects, a project plan could make or break a project for the same reasons as above, and if even one person falls behind, the entire project is in risk of falling under. Each and every person needs to do their part, and the project plan enforces that.

Level of Detail

I’ll go for photorealism in this case, as it’s our task and is what Joe suggested. Now of course 4K textures aren’t NEEDED, but since we don’t have a poly/resolution limit and it’s only for renders and not a game, so I’m going to on deep with it. However, since my high-poly is so excessive, this might end up crashing my programs.

Do I have enough time to achieve likeness? How?

Yes. I just have to manage my experimental time and actual achieving times. Theoretically, the Dao low poly should take maybe half an hour at most to produce as the shapes are pretty simple. I will be

experimenting with both Substance Rendering and in-game engine (Unreal) to see which turns out better.

Where might this asset(s) be used in game?

Stored away in an armoury, used by characters, scattered around a battlefield from fallen soldiers. More than likely be used by a character, which will then be used to decorate environments.

Tri-Counts

I will be baking a high poly onto a low poly and using texture sets. The high poly one will be very high due to the fine detail of the engravings (ended up being 7.6 million tris on the high poly… whoops) though it’s not going to be rendered in game or real time, and it’s just supposed to look good. Joe said no tri limits!

However, with my high-poly, I ended up going way too far and it was excessively high-poly to the point where it crashed Maya and made Substance lag hard, meaning I went too far. Next time I’ll try not to do such fine detail leading to such excessive subdivisions in Zbrush.

How am I going to achieve a render which simulates photorealism?

I will be using multiple different renderers to see which one is the most optimal to achieve my result. I will be trying both Substance Painter and Unreal Engine’s renderers to see what the results look like, and I will save some renders from both programs to compare. I will also adjust the backgrounds and lighting in the environment that the renders will go in, hopefully showing the shine on the fresh and dried up blood on the Guandao.

Texture Resolution

Because my high poly will be so high poly, I will be using 2K resolution as it’ll likely crash the programs that I will be using (Spoilers: It did, Maya specifically when I tried to even click the high poly). I originally wanted to do it in 4K, but even if it’s not real-time rendering, it will destroy the programs (Spoilers: It did, specifically Substance Painter lagged). So basically, 4K optimal for looking pretty but will break computers, 2K if I don’t want the computers to explode.

For real-time rendering, it would likely be 2K also but it would also have a lower tri limit in comparison. If it was 4K, it would make things lag, but if it is 2K it should be able to handle it. My high poly ended up crashing Maya, as well, which is not a good sign. Definitely need to lower the tri count by a ton.

For weapons, if they’re a focal point, they’d likely be 2K. 512 would be used for background props or miniscule objects that you won’t see much of, 1024 is used for environments and small things that won’t have much detail to it, 2K would be for things that you would see often or up close and finally 4K is for characters mostly and enemies.

Lighting

I will likely have my rendering environments set in daytime and have nice bright lighting as Oriental Asia usually has a lot of sun. I want to keep it as appropriate for the setting as possible. I might also try it at night time as it sounds fun to do and experiment with it. Lighting will be strong and sunny so that I can show off the nicks and damage in the blades (in both textures using normal and height and the model itself) and the leather textures.

Posing

Since this is a weapon, there’s limited posing that I can do with it in Substance. However, In Unreal, I can put the weapons into the Avatar’s hand (maybe) and see if I can do anything with that. I could also prop (pun intended) it up against a weapon racket, have the Avatar hold it, put it up against some different stock backgrounds, etc.