Final Project: A Photo-Realistic Room

Due 3/14

-Concept Approval by instructor

-Photo Reference

-Primitive Layout

-All textures from photos

-Clean Geometry (a wireframe you can be proud of)

-Good UVs

-UVs on everything

-At least 1 NURBS object

-1 object with a destruct state (so this would be two models-example, a wine glass and a shattered wine glass, a marble pillar and a crumbled pillar, etc.)

-At least 10 unique objects within the room

-At least one repeating texture

-At least one decal (a 32 bit targa with the alpha in the alpha channel of the texture)

-At least three different lights (example: a low ambient, a directional through a window that represents the sun, a point or spot light from a table lamp, etc.)

-Textures are all targas

-Textures must be valid texture sizes (32x32, 64x64, 128x128, 256x256, 512x512, 1024x1024 or a rectangular combo of those numbers like 512x1024)

-Boards that showcase the room and close-ups of the best elements of the room, and some wireframes and textures. For an example see my tiki lounge page1, page2, and page3, and my girl's bedroom.

-The goal of this assignment is to have a portfolio-worthy environment.

What I want to see in your Final Projects

No "doll house furniture"-every object modeled from photo reference. Why? Doll house furniture impresses no one, and when you get a job people will expect you to know how to model from photo reference. So start now.

When surfaces meet other surfaces something happens. When walls end and floor begins there's maybe grime or dust. Or base shoe. When ceiling hits walls there's sometimes grime, molding, cobwebs. When pillars meet floors there's some sort of base, simple or ornamental When pipes go into walls there's some sort of fitting. When surfaces meet, indicate this in the texture and/or geometry in some way-it will always make your scene look better!

Lighting should never "overshadow" your models. If you're trying to get a job as a modeler, lighting should help your work, not be a distraction. Subtle is often good.

Keep your wireframes clean. Environment models DO NOT NEED ROWS OF QUADS EVERYWHERE. Even if your models are high-res, try and keep your polycount no more than it has to be. In general, only have polys that define your model! An exception to this is architecture which can be subdivided every five feet or so, for lighting purposes. Your model can look great but if your wireframe is heavy it can cost you a job offer! No one wants to clean up after you!

Your textures should be at a similar resolution throughout your environment. Meaning no small paintings on the wall that are a 1024 by 1024 texture and then having your whole floor be a 128 by 128 with pixels the size of my head! Companies will notice this!

Wear/age/dirt are all good. They make your stuff look more like game art. Companies look for this! Create a room without this and it looks more like an architectural rendering. Which is fine if you want a job doing that.

The real world has few straight edges and hard lines. Houses settle, dirt collects, edges are often beveled, damaged, crooked, bowed, whatever. Reducing or breaking up hard edges in a scene increases realism.

No solid colored shaders! No procedural bump maps! Use a color texture map image and if you need a bump map, use a greyscale image for that. A colored shader is almost never good enough and you usually can't use them in games anyway, get used to making textures for everything now!

FINAL ASSIGNMENT SCHEDULE

WEEK6
Monday 2/12 Concept Approval (have some photo reference)
Wed 2/14 Primitive Layout Due

WEEK 7
Wed 2/21 Room Architecture Due (modeled, UVs, and Texture) Repeating Texture Due, Decal Due

WEEK 8
Wed 2/28 NURBS object due, Object with destruct state due

WEEK 9
Wed 3/7 All geometry must exist (with UVs and Textures) This means room architecture, at least 10 unique models including 1 NURBS model and one model with a destruct state.)

WEEK 10
Work on final lighting and rendering and boards
Wed 3/14 PROJECT DUE INCLUDING BOARDS

WEEK11
Critique