[WIP] FM FAP - LMG (PR:F)

[Dosedmonkey]

So here is some screenshots of the FM FAP from FAL conversion I have been doing. Would like to know if it looks good, before I go ahead and figure out how to UVMap properly in 3ds.

(Man blender is so much easier, I am remembering why I left 3ds max years ago for other projects)

I think I have everything in scale and kept the poly count down enough.




I realise there is a transparent section, where a poly needs UVMapping on the back of the old sights section... I did a cap hole modifier on it, now got to figure out the uvmapping.




Some research photos...








I hope it looks fine.

[Rhino]

Nice work Monkey, looking good so far but a few tweaks needed before you can begin UVing.

With these bigger renders I can see now that you have gone a little too low poly on most of the parts. This is the 1st person model, ie, what the player who is holding the weapon will see so the model can have quite a few tris but the basic FN FAL model was pretty low poly to start with so you don't need to worry about polys much, but you still want to keep the quality more or less in line with the rest of the weapon too.

When talking cylinders or rounded surfaces, the basic rule is the bigger the cylinder or rounded surface, the more tris it should have in comparison to the smaller cylinders so they have the same amount of smoothness.

Quick example with 8, 16 and 32 sided cylinders, with a radius's of 0.1m, 0.2m and 0.4m and note in the edged framed pic how each face is basically the same size.



Now if we have the same radius's, but have them all at 16 sides, you will see the problem with the small cylinder being a lot smoother than it needs to be with just wasting tris like that and the big one being to blocky.



There are some exceptions like if there is a problem with the silhouette being obviously low tri and for 1st person models, the closer the mesh is to the player's camera the higher tri it should be etc but generally speaking this basic rule still applies in most instances.

Looking at your bipod top cylinder, especially from the 1st person view where you can easily see its silhouette, you can see its much lower poly than the muzzle flash its attached to when it should have a few more sides than it since its bigger and also in this case, has a very distinctive silhouette from the players main perspective ingame.


You can also see this from the side wire view you posted where it looks like the muzzle has about 12 sides and your bipod's top cylinder has about 10, where it would be better with something like 16, possibly a few more than that even.



The same goes for most of your other cylinders too, mainly the fore grip which being the biggest rounded object on this weapon and it also being a 1p weapon, not that far away from the players camera should have about double the sides it has currently.

I also see a few small smoothing/modelling errors on the fore grip so seeing as it ideally needs about twice the many sides it has now it might be worth remodelling it from scratch using the current one as a reference. Best way to do the basic indents btw would be to simply use the bevel tool like so which will keep them even then you can do more tweaking from here, possibly using the bevel tool a few times over the top of each other to create a much smoother indent down but tbh probably better off using the chamfer tool to do that once you've done the basic cavity and shaping


Also its a good idea to weld up the model where you can to not only save on UV space etc but to also cut down on any zfighting which the Falklands being 8kms is also much more prone to than normal maps when you get further from the centre of the map due to the way BF2 was coded but also zfighting is a big issue on normal map sizes too so if you can weld the hand guard up to the cylinder above it etc that would be really good


Next the thing in the middle of the bipod legs looking from the ref I'm assuming its a telescopic spring (probably not the right term) kinda like this which keeps the legs apart when in the folded out position:


although based off this ref:

It looks to be a slightly diffrent type from that pic above with having a big centre and then the ends being small with both sides folding into the centre when compressed rather than just end to end like the above one.

As such what would be best model wise would be just to have a (possibly slightly bent downwards?) cylinder between the legs with a big centre and smaller ends and then on the texture can be painted on the spring bits


Finally I was going to suggest looking at adding that carrying handle you see on most of the refs but then looking at refs from the Falklands war and I can't seem to see any carrying handles on the FM FAPs used during the war so probably best to leave it off




Other than that looking awesome so far but would be good to get a few edged framed perspective pics of the model (press F4 to turn on and off edge frames)

Hope that helps!

[Dosedmonkey]

Thanks for the feedback.

Noted on cylinder sizes, I didn't realise the model was low poly to begin with, I was being super careful poly wise, that's not a problem on the improvement fronts.

I will try the bevel tool, I originally used the extrude tool, that's what I would use on blender you see, and I had narrowed the ends off, this is possibly why the smoothing is odd.

The carry handle is actually on the original model you sent me, I might move it to a up right position, if I can with out blocking the sights.

Here is the picture I was using for the bipod spring;

I can model in the screws as well if we got extra polys going. Going to rehash the bipod to barrel attachment now I have better photo + polys spare.

Another nice frontal photo. This one droops, is that the bent downwards you mean?


EDIT: More bipod photos for me for tomorrow.

[Insanitypays]

fapfapfapfapfapfapfapfap

[Raphavenger]

Good luck!!!

[Rhino]

this is possibly why the smoothing is odd.

Smoothing is mainly odd due to no real flow in the poly shape and possibly a few other small errors, this vid might help:

The carry handle is actually on the original model you sent me, I might move it to a up right position, if I can with out blocking the sights.

Cool ye in that case just leave it where it is as being upright in the carrying position all the time will look odd and it will inflict on the main FM FALs shadows on the texture with a big shadow being where it was before on the normal FM FAL.

Here is the picture I was using for the bipod spring;
http://i818.photobucket.com/albums/zz10 ... CN1754.jpg
I can model in the screws as well if we got extra polys going. Going to rehash the bipod to barrel attachment now I have better photo + polys spare.

Another nice frontal photo. This one droops, is that the bent downwards you mean?
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-YXLw5z2cRhk/U ... 2697_n.jpg

EDIT: More bipod photos for me for tomorrow.

http://i818.photobucket.com/albums/zz10 ... CN0237.jpg

Cool ye in that case just leave it how it is pretty much, maybe slightly bent but wouldn't worry about that too much unless lots of refs support it

fapfapfapfapfapfapfapfap

Spiderman also likes the FM FAP

[X-Alt]

*FAP FAP*
*Patient Bear Wakes Up*

[Dosedmonkey]

Remodeled the grip, removed unnecessary polys and welded them together.
Got to remodel the bipod yet.

[Rhino]

Better but still got quite a few modelling errors which most concerns me as well as smoothing ones.

This Fore Grip is pretty tricky to model and TBH I've spent the last 20mins trying to look for a decent low poly modelling solution that would get the shape and smoothing you would want on this without spending too many tris etc and I can't really find one that's right tbh.

As such I've concluded that really the best solution to this problem is really a high poly model bake for just this fore grip, with possibly the support of a really basic low poly indent for each indent in the grip, to give it a little 3D depth but all the main smoothing and detail would come from the normal off the HP model, one a bit like so which I've just made up quickly but with possibly a bit more detail, mainly on the ends of the grip:


Have you done any HP modelling and normal baking before Monkey?


There are also some cylinder problems with the big and small being either too high poly (mainly the bit after the fore grip that's welded on having the same amount of sides as the fore grip where it should just have only a few) and some bits that don't have enough like on the big bits on the cylinder above the grip.

Will talk to you more about them later.

[Dosedmonkey]

The Normal/Bump map texture you make post UVMapping, to help smooth out the sections, and using the AO to shade the Diffuse also helps I thought.

Don't know about HP modeling. Whats HP stand for.

The ones on the top barrel are the same amounts of the sides as the other components on the top sight to match as the FM FAL original model.

The lower one is the same cylinder, not a welded on one, this is why it's higher poly, can easily change that if we are short on poly, it would need to be seperate from the grip though to match up polys.

[CTRifle]

stands for high poly

[Rhino]

Basically HP Modelling stands for High Poly Modelling, aka Sub Division Modelling which is a special type of modelling method where you create a basic structure of a model, then add a turbo-smoothing (or similar) modifier to the object and it can make a high poly model from that basic structure like I did for the basic fore grip one I showed on the last page:

Basic structure:


With 4 iterations of Turbo Smoothing:



This model however is far too high poly (hence the name) to be used as an ingame model, and is only used to bake normals onto a LP (Low Poly) Model, like this wheel here where the left is the high poly model, middle is the low poly model with the normal map applied from the high poly to low poly bake (+ AO and diffuse and spec etc, although diff and spec would have been made by hand in this case) and then left is the low poly model with textures in edged framed mode:


Taking another example from Lucky's Tigercat Missile: https://www.realitymod.com/forum/f388-p ... f-wip.html

Here is the HP model of the missile, and second pic of the HP launcher with missiles:



LP Model of the missile which is around 260 tris:




The Normal map baked from the HP model to the LP model:


LP Model with Normals baked on and just the normals and low poly model showing:


And the LP Missile with normals and textures on in the Editor which is pretty much how it will also look ingame:



As you can see it would have only been able to get the proper shape of the missile, + all the details the normals give too with either spending a lot of tris on the low poly model, or with a normal map.



Going back to your FM FAP, I would only really suggest doing this on your fore grip as its not really worth it for the rest of it since it doesn't have any details that would be that much improved by HP modelling and any other normal details other than the ones on the fore grip can be quite easily done by hand.

As such for the basic LP (Low Poly), 1st person model for your fore grip is to have something along the lines of this for the slits:


Which then just using low poly smoothing looks nothing like it should:


But when we bake the normal from the HP model onto it quickly with a basic UV you can see with just the normal map texture showing on the surface where the details are baked:


And in a render it looks like pretty much the same as the high poly model, but only costing 204 tris:


And even when looking down the slit you can still see a bit of mesh depth from the low poly slit in the model, although a bit of a funny bit on the end in this render but should be fine ingame:



So ye to summarise, for now, just make the slits on your Fore Grip on this model like the ones on my Low Poly model above and then we can look into making a high poly model later



Moving on to the cylinder after your fore grip, you can have one welded on (ie, part of the same mesh) while also having fewer sides. This is a really important part of optimization a lot of people miss and especially in this case since you won't be able to see this clyinder much behind the fore grip in 1st person being quite a few needless tris they have to render.

This is pretty pretty much what you have now:


But you can easily 1/2 the tris, or more by just selecting every other side's edge like so:


And then hitting the "Collapse" Button will then collapse each of the selected edges down, resulting in 1/2 the sides it had before:


You can also repeat this process over and over again until you get to the level your looking for:



And you can even select every one in three sides to result in a 1/3 loss of sides/tris as well as other methods of reducing the amount of sides these cylinders have, while keeping them part of the same mesh:





Moving onto the cylinder above the fore grip, looking at the new refs I don't think its a good idea to weld it onto the fore grip, since the fore grip slightly wraps around it with quite a big gap between the fore grip sides and the cylinder, and I think this would actually be worth modelling in and with the gap, you won't get any significant zfighting in first person at least and can possibly look at welding it up in 3p.


Other than those points, and the points I've made before its looking good so far!


BTW to improve the textures in your viewports go to Customize > Preferences and go to the Viewports tab and hit Config Driver:


Then match these settings in the popup window and the texture on the main part of the weapon will look much better



Hope that helps and keep up the good work!

[Murphy]

Gorgeous work! Keep it up, I can't wait to see this weapon ingame.

I have to admit I came here for the fap memes though....I was not disappointed.

[Dosedmonkey]

Really good advice, thanks Rhino!

I understand about high poly meshes, being used for bump/normal mapping, I just didn't quite make the link, and helps having it explained again as 3ds is quite different to blender too. And making a HP model just using a modifier, that makes send now.

Will see how I get on and post the results.

[Dosedmonkey]

Redone the grip section, with the gap and optomisation. Not bump/normal mapped it yet, but its ready for HP modifying now.



Time to redo the bipod.

EDIT:

Redone the bipod a bit, so it is looking better and closer to the real thing.
I don't quite understand this zfighting, but I believe I might get it where I have put the cylinders on the gun attachment. Any suggestions on that, Make it out of cubes, then move the polys to makle circular parts?





Oh and just so people arent disapointed....

[Rhino]

Sorry if I didn't make it clear enough above but this is what you need to be aiming for, for the slits on your low poly model:



Don't worry about a high poly model for now since its not worth over complicating it at this point and I can easily do one later, I was just showing you a few examples to help you understand how the process works.

Looking at the refs I also don't think you've got the end bits of the hand guard quite right, since looking at the refs they seem to be quite event indents, where yours seem to be offset and not quite right? Also on the back of it nearest the player it has a little cut in the side although probably best to do that small detail in the high poly but might be worth doing it a bit in the low poly too.




Your bipod legs and feet have a lot of nu-necessary edges/tris I can see too. By all means use extra tris on adding extra detail but you should try and optimize all the bits you can to the fullest as otherwise you find your tri count exploding and players computers struggling to render what should be a pretty simple object.

As for zfighting, ye you will probably get a bit from them but no real way you can easily get around it and it can be somewhat cut down with them having pretty much the same texture.


Other than that its looking pretty good so far

[Dosedmonkey]

I did make a hi-poly model quickly using turbo smoothing, but didn't go further with it as I thought it was a bit early to do it. I also watched a tutorial about baking the normals from high polys (it looked like it used that wheel/tyre you posted actually).

I can easily modify and weld up that grip to close your example, but with the slightly higher sided cylinder I am using.

Its slightly offset, as to get the grip to the same size and position to the photos, it is all a bit off set from the barrel of the original model, I wonder if the grip has a slight taper. I can fix this up too.

I have thought of a way to reduce zfighting slightly, and I will try to remove some of the polys on the flat backs of the bipod, see how it goes.

[IOSIF_M]

Any update on the model, still working on it?

[GeneralBishop]

Now show us what it looks like ingame!