[Weapon] Flak 18 (8.8 cm) [WIP](WW2)

[Ratface]

Ok, take a look-see, I think I got rid of all the z-fighting I saw when in p3d minus a tiny bit on the back leg underneath, but nobody will see

Both updated.

[Pvt.LHeureux]

Z-Fighting seems clear, looking forward to that 88

[rodrigoma]

that looks great, I just love p3d XD

maybe if you got the time you should do a wreck static of it?

[lucky.BOY]

Just a quick post, will post with pictures later:

collapse the face inside the barrel, you only need a cone there.

Very many unneeded verts on the shield. Also you might want to chamfer some of its edges, to make it look more neat-ish?

On cylinders in general, you have quite a few small cylinders or spheres with too many edges, and you have quite a few big cylinders that have too few edges. Also try to use the tri count on areas players will see most frequently (sides of the gun), while sparing some when you work on top a nd bottom, that wont be seen too much.

[Ratface]

Sounds good! I'll start working on these ideas today and tomorrow, I'll post again when I've updated the p3ds.

[Ratface]

Updated!

Worked on the shield and other areas to optimize (as well as inside barrel: cone rather than face).

Added more faces to area where gunner would sit so we have more detail, as lucky had said.

Let me know if you guys see anything else I should do on this, then I'll need to know if the next step would be unwrapping, or if I need to find a way to port this to an older version of max so it is compatible with the bf2 engine.

p3d.in - Flak W/ Shield

p3d.in - Flak W/Out Shield

[lucky.BOY]

Nice work!

First of all I think you should read what Rhino posted again:

Rhino;1805770']Think this might help you quite a lot with your optimization.

https://www.realitymod.com/forum/f189-m ... heavy.html



http://www.realitymod.com/forum/f189-mo ... nders.html

Now, picture time


Purple: Somewhat what i quoted above, no need to have so many edges on the innner part of the cylinder, and especially on the top of it.
Red: Something weird going on there, check if there aint multiple verts in one spot, or if those polys just have wrong smoothing groups?


Yellow: this thing is way too detailed, while the Green cylinder is quite low on polys. No need to weld the yellow part too, i think.


Blue: Those other cylinders are rather boxy, especially when compared to the barrel. Try to give them some love and smooth them a little
Purple: Same thing as two images above, the little cylinder can have half as much edges as the bigger on has.


Green: a smoothing error there, caused by a group of thin triangles. You need to weld the thing as marked by the Red line


Bad smoothing here, putting all of those polys into one smoothing group should fix it


Green: somthing wrong in there, check it out maybe?
Blue: I thing these polys are not needed really, as they most probably wont be ever seen. Get rid of them, maybe?


Yellow: Unless this cylinder is going to rotate in some kind of animation, you dont need to leave that vert in the middle.


Red: unneeded verts
Yellow: Probably some hidden polygons, get rid of them.

http://i.imgur.com/bfbrz.jpg
Red and Yellow: Unneeded verts

http://i.imgur.com/5d43s.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/nXgqI.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/4JVRs.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/0AQcg.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/ZMzpj.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/IMNnO.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/0k8md.jpg

Unneeded verts in all of the above. Also look on the other side of the shield.


Also here i found interesting sites about the Flak 18, the second has also a diagram of its opical sights:

Operation Barbarossa: The 88-Flak
II. Sighting Equipment | 4. Sighting and Fire Control Equipment | TM E9-369A: German 88-mm Antiaircraft Gun Materiel - Technical Manual, U.S. War Department, June 29, 1943 (Lone Sentry)

cheers

[Ratface]

Amazing lucky! School is starting up tomorrow but I'll work on these and reupdate it as soon as I can, I appreciate the help!

[Ratface]

Ok, just spent an hour or 2 tweaking things and going through working on things, with lucky's help above I got rid of around 300 tris! Amazing how quick those disappear XD

Anyways the model has been updated, to make things easier I made the feet separate objects, so total I have 28 objects (+1 for the shielded version).

I also watched some smoothing group tuts and smoothed the barrel and many other areas to give a cleaner feeling, I will still go back and make sure I can smooth out anything I can.

Shield:
p3d.in - Flak W/ Shield

No Shield:
p3d.in - Flak W/Out Shield

Also let me know like lucky did if you see and smoothing errors or ripping like in the legs, for me it doesnt show up very well in max if it is there, and I have an ati graphics card that doesnt let me see the smooth version in p3d, thanks

[AfterDune]

Yeah, good job on the feedback, Lucky .

[Ratface]

So I'm having an issue seeing exactly where the sight would go on this, can anyone tell me what each seat is designated for?

As far as I can tell from pictures the man adjusting the height and traversing the cannon is on the right hand side, but I am unsure who is sitting on the left hand side.

In FH2 it is a 1 person asset (as I would expect when it is implemented in PRN) and they are on the right hand side with the telescopic sight as well. I am just trying to figure out where to place a sight if I model one, thanks!

[Ratface]

Also this, because I'm excited as hell to get this in game and blow up some c-47's ^^

[Spush]

Looks good to me, have fun uvw mapping it.

[Rhino]

Render looks good mate, much better with the smoothing

[lucky.BOY]

Good work!

I think the FH2 approach is reasonable, as you probably want the guy to sit on the side with traverse and elevation controls, while also giving this guy sights. Also the gap in the shield is located on the right side.
Dont know where to put the sight, though..

This might help?
http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5146/5873 ... 76be_n.jpg

By the way, i think it might be good idea to code this a bit like SPG, i mean that by pressing C you would get a "naked eye" view, not using the sight, to get an overall picture of the field of fire. If you want it to be coded like this, you should keep that in mind when doing the 1p model.

Anywho, to the model. Both the fornt and back of the shield seem unsmoothed, like what one of the legs looked like before. Also some of the cylinders are not smoothed yet, dont know if you didnt get to it, forgot, or it is intentional



Also i found some more unnecessary verts here:
http://i.imgur.com/ycYBh.jpg

And marked with yellow here:
http://i.imgur.com/bVWfs.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/FY0LQ.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/2UL6m.jpg

Other then that, i like it alot

[rodrigoma]

Haha lucky, I saw your link and thought, "oooh, walkaround showing off the gun sight and view port, that interesting" and then I saw the image XD

[AfterDune]

Very nice job, Ratface!

Yeah, UV-ing will be tough for sure... but I'm confident you can do it .

[Ratface]

Ok, just fixed up things on the shield for a good hour to make sure (to the best I can see XD) that there is no tearing, and I took out as many verts as I could without causing any damage to the shield's look.

So, here is the big question! WTH nao! XD

I am a novice at photoshop if it is needed, but I am willing to learn basics from my friend if I am the one who is going to texture this. Is it best to UV map it with the modifier, or unwrap it using max and do it that way?

Edit: Also, Lucky, that made me laugh so much because I've been looking for good pics of flak 88's on google, and over half are lego version, so annyoing! XD

[Ratface]

Also, because I feel the shielded version needed a nice aa/arty render, here it is too, unshielded version was feeling lonely