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I don't know where I should put this thread so I' posting it here

I've decided to model one of the low-priority model task, which is the R.550 Magic missile. I just want to ask how much tris should the model have ? I'm sure it's not a high amount since it's only a missile, but I want to be sure

Also, I've passed over some details because I'm keeping in mind that it has to be super low-poly, but I'll add them if you tell me so

Here are the details that I skipped :

Basically, the attach ports of the missile.


I didn't add the little "bumps" on the missile.


Here are the images of the model (it's nearly finished, just need the info stated above )





Hope nobody is working on this right now lol

Cool

Well first of all, ye isn't worth making those mounting bits, best not to make them.

The small "bumps" yes, you shouldn't model, they should be done as part of the missiles normal map, possibly a little bit of fake lighting in the diffuse map too to make the bump, although texture will probably be to low rez ingame to be able to pick them out, but ye, shouldn't be modelled.

Modelling in blender might be a problem but we will see how it goes

First of all, missile has waay too many tris, my R.530 which is a much bigger missile than this, had 12 sides on its largest part for lod0:


vBF2 AIM-9 has 10sides on its widest part although you might be able to get away with only 8, but if 8 doesn't work, 10 should really be as high as you go.

For the thins, front thins I would make 2D planes, in the refs they look very thin so no point wasting tris there, rear thins however do look to have some width so would make them in pretty much the same way I did the rear thins on the R550 here, although looking at it that edge on the right hand side should be going from the central part, down to the bottom right vert instead of the way it is..:


For the rear of the missile, you really should just have a cone going in rather than a cylinder, with a black texture in the middle gives a much more realistic feeling of depth with also using far fewer tris, as well as saving quite a bit of UV space since you should just do it as a planar UV and this also helps the LODs since then you can just easily remove the central vert and it looks pretty much the same:



Can leave the border around your end cone on lod0 but would collapse that down on lod1.

As for a tri count, anything under 200 tris is acceptable but as low as you can get it for this missile while keeping all the core details
Although the important thing is good lods, can have a detailed lod0 of 300 tris (but can't see why you need that many tris for this missile) with all the small details removed from lod1 making it ~100 tris.

Keep up the good work!

- Moved to community modding.

Ok thanks for the reply, Rhino !

I'm also wondering how should I make the LODs ? Should I make 2 separate saves named lod0 and lod1 ? I really don't know

As for Blender, I can export it in .3ds and .nearlyeverything so it's not a problem ^^

And I'm not going to texture this, because I basically don't know how to texture lol My friend might do it if I ask her, but she is studying hard and I don't want to bother her too much

Someone will have to texture the missile.

I'll lower the number of sides of the missile and make the front thins with a plane

For making the lods, first you want to 100% finish lod0 with its UVs and ideally textured first too (although not so important for a missile as you can see its UVs pretty well with a checker map UV tester texture) and then you just clone lod0, rename it to lod1, optimize it by removing details, collapsing edges etc and doing what you can to reduce its tri count, keeping in mind that low1 is seen up close by low gfx users and a few meters away for high gfx users, then repeat the process for all the other lods until you've come down to the lowest possible tri count (for a missile, final lod should be 4 tris, ie, a 3 sided spike with a face on the back) which is what is seen at long distances, before the object is culled.

And ye, problem with exporting to .3ds and other formats is it can create a few errors that need to be fixed up on the other side, such as face errors, smoothing group errors, UV errors etc but that very much depends on the program, format you export/import it with and the settings used, as well as the object itself and since this is quite a simple object, shouldn't be too bad.

Do you know how to do UVs? Can pretty easily find someone else to texture this I'm sure

Sounds good, but you can make the thins you've got into planes with just removing the inner verts that make it 3D, although might not work in blender.

Well when the model is done, you should make UVs, and then get somebody to texture it. Then you can make LODs, which you just copy the object in the scene, rename the copy to LOD1 and simplify it, and then again for other lods. It should all be in one scene. Then again, i dont know how blender works in these things, but i reckon it will be similar to max.

EDIT: Ninja..

EDIT: Then again, who can respond to a question as its being typed?

I know what UV mapping is, but I just plainly don't know how texture You'll have to find someone else to texture this ^^

I'm basically remaking the missile itself with 8 sides, and remaking the front thins as planes. Thanks for the info on how to do LODs, but one last question : are the all the different LODs on the same save or on different ones ? I can do different LODs on the same save and just put each LOD on a different layer if it's how it works

EDIT : Well... Thanks lucky.BOY I might learn how to do UVs then lol

EDIT : Nobody xD except god

Texturing and UVing are different things but think your referring to UVing as texturing?

UVing is the process of plotting out what parts of what faces are on a 2D sheet so when a texture is applied to those areas on the sheet, they are applied to those faces on the model.

Texturing is the actual process of painting the "texture" onto the sheet to match the UVs, which when applied will give it colour, lighting etc.

And ye, as lucky said, all the LODs should be in the same scene, as separate objects as that's how they will need to be when exported.

Ok, thanks ! I knew that about UV mapping, and I know where to this in Blender, I just don't know how. So, I think I'll just give you the models. But, if you want me to do the UV, I'll try it anyway

Its a nice simple thing to learn on, main reason I'm not doing this myself since I could knock this out in a few hrs, everything other than textures (since I'm rubbish at them but could make a basic texture for it) but not doing it because its a nice simple task for other people to learn on, and I have bigger fish to fry too

[R-DEV]Rhino wrote:and I have bigger fish to fry too

Well, I'm sure about that

Well, here it is ! I've finished modelling it Only LOD 0 though ^^ 296 tris

Here are some images:









And how many LODs should I make for it ? Three or four ?

think it could do with some optimizing before going onto the other lods, as well as needing UVs too if you haven't done them since they need to be done before lods.

But ye, rear thins have way to many tris right now, they should just be a simle "<|>" and not "<|||> like you have it now. Also the nose has too many sides right now, only need a few of them and can collapse in the end of the nose too.

Other than that and its missing smoothing, looks good.

There I've reduced the number of faces on the nose and removed useless faces on the tail thins like you said it's down to 172 tris.



I've also added the smooth shading.

looks good, although rear thins look like they have are 100% smoothed rather than one SG on each side, got a wire?

Here's the wire.

Ye quite a few optimizations you can do there, anyone else wish to point them out? I'm off to bed

You can target weld those verts on the rear of the missile like so:
http://i.imgur.com/fLYESVl.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/ltoErDD.jpg

You can collapse every other edge near the tip of the missile like this:
http://i.imgur.com/pxeddOB.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/pooAzUI.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/og6FQVD.jpg

here is how it looks in smooth mode
before http://i.imgur.com/uLlQ0Qs.jpg
after http://i.imgur.com/F0WB8pT.jpg

You get some redundant verts on your front wings, you can target weld them like this:
http://i.imgur.com/dioKYPh.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/GKMVAeU.jpg

Maybe you can also collapse that small edge on the tip of this wing, should save you some 8 tris.

Cheers lucky, although the optimizing of the rear of the missile I would leave for lod1, although can do it for lod0 not a big deal either way, and tip of the rear wings also can be left for lod1

I've finished fixing the little details for lod0, and I'm just wondering: by "doing the UVs" do you mean just unwrapping the missile ? Or it's something else ?

Unwrap it and then pack it into the UV square, if you understand me.