a discussion on the state of HL2 modeling

[HiroProtaganist]

What we know At this moment

1. We have a general idea of poly count for weapons and chareture models. 2000, and 5000-7000 respectively

2. Weapon models will be both 3rd and 1st person meshes so we must assume that 2000 will be 1st person and 3rd will be lower.

3. Source will utilize dynamic lighting, bump/normal mapping, and a host of really state of the art techniques to create life like images. however these will only be seen on higher end machines so mod makers who are hoping to make just bump map all of their models to give them detail remeber that only 30-40% of people playing will see it.

4. We will be able to use 2000x2000 images for mapping though i'm not sure if this applies to weapons also?

So the qeustion arise that we as a community should discuss and come to a consensus on

1. Is it neccesary to go balls out and strive for 2000 polygons on all models or rather should we hold back and if we only use 1300 polys but get th major shapes and detail should we leave it up to the skinner to finish.

2. ATM we don't know whether the 2000 polygons includes the arms or not. For those who modeled for bf1942 you remeber that the arms were not included in the gun mesh but we had a 1000 poly limit for models.

3. whithin a few weeks of game relese this section of the forum is going to explode with people whom never model but are looking to see what mods are doing what. we should brace ourselves for an onslaught of uniformed, l337 speeking, know it all to invade this forum and criticize us and our models for not being 100% accurate. so prepare thyself.

4. "Though shall not claim others work for thy own" this was on the third tablet but moses tripped on a bush and dropped it. We need to determine a method for dealing with claims of plagarism and be on the lookout for it.

thats all i got for now. please feel free to add any thoughts you have regarding modeling and skinning in hl2 and discuss or raise any ideas you have or correct me if i am wrong.

 

[dawdler]

Good points, except this:

"2. ATM we don't know whether the 2000 polygons includes the arms or not. For those who modeled for bf1942 you remeber that the arms were not included in the gun mesh but we had a 1000 poly limit for models."

BF1942 doesnt have any limit. Or at least not one within your reach. I did high polygon tests, a weapon of 21k polys, a dropship on 45k polys, a carrier on about 20k polys... All could easily be displayed on a single screen (no LODS) at relativly high fps. Not to mention a full poly grass test for EoD, I think it was around 100k polygons per screen on average.
The limit was when the map had to many vertices (they didnt fit in the buffer, BF1942 actually crashed on me after a few copies of the models )

Source will probably be the same. There are no real limits! The engine will probably crash sooner or later, but those limits are far away from what you need to display.

So the point is what?
Model with as many polys you need. No more. No less. Keep in mind the LODding of stuff.

 

[spin]

The polycount and high end feature issues really depend on the type of mod and the audience the mod-maker is aiming for. It also depends on each particular object, as certain objects will work better with normal mapping, while others will look better by just using those extra polygons. Personally, I'm not to hot on using normal mapping on weapons for areas such as the slide grips. It comes back to the per object basis again since a weapon like a Beretta, with thin and tiny grip ridges would work fine, while others, such as a USP for instance, wouldn't work as well since the ridges are larger, deeper, and wider.

Again, planning ahead and thinking about the audience the mod is aiming for (low end, medium, high end) is important when creating the artwork since it depends on the user's hardware. However, one must also think about the rate at which the users will upgrade. If the mod is being released within a few months, you'll probably want to target the medium audience. If a year or two of development is planned, keep in mind that many users will have upgraded their PC's and will be able to take advantage of the new features. Gamespy usually has hardware surveys floating around, so it's a good idea to take a look at them and compare the numbers of people from year to year.

I'll comment on the other points as time allows.

 

[dawdler]

Originally posted by spin
The polycount and high end feature issues really depend on the type of mod and the audience the mod-maker is aiming for. It also depends on each particular object, as certain objects will work better with normal mapping, while others will look better by just using those extra polygons. Personally, I'm not to hot on using normal mapping on weapons for areas such as the slide grips. It comes back to the per object basis again since a weapon like a Beretta, with thin and tiny grip ridges would work fine, while others, such as a USP for instance, wouldn't work as well since the ridges are larger, deeper, and wider.

Again, planning ahead and thinking about the audience the mod is aiming for (low end, medium, high end) is important when creating the artwork since it depends on the user's hardware. However, one must also think about the rate at which the users will upgrade. If the mod is being released within a few months, you'll probably want to target the medium audience. If a year or two of development is planned, keep in mind that many users will have upgraded their PC's and will be able to take advantage of the new features. Gamespy usually has hardware surveys floating around, so it's a good idea to take a look at them and compare the numbers of people from year to year.

I'll comment on the other points as time allows.

Hm, well I think those points are invalid for HL2. Even the low end computer can display the high poly 1st person weapon, the 3rd person are LODded. If you cant handle it, you just lower the LOD. LODding in 3DSMAX takes like 1 minute with multires, its no problem to do on models. The same goes with characters. You could model a 10,000 poly character, then the next LOD is 5,000, the next 2,500 etc... There you have your three systems. One never displays above 2,500, one never displays above 5,000, and the last (and sweetest) displays the full 10k LOD.

That is, if you can set the LODding in HL2. But since they have said the game can do it on auto, I assume that.

 

[spin]

Issue #3 is a good one. Soon enough loads of new people will be asking the same questions over and over, many of them not being as friendly as the people now. Instead of preparing for the worst with them, perhaps we should write up a FAQ as a community for their benefit, and ours. There will, of course, be those who come just to start trouble, but a good moderating team will be able to handle that just fine. We just need to be pleasant, helpful, and keep in mind that they're human beings too.

Edit:
Perhaps not to the same extent, but it's still important to keep it in mind. LOD is great, but to plan solely on that can lead to problems down the road. There will always be times when the player will come across many close up models at once, and will be too much for his or her PC to handle. You want to balance everything so no matter what happens during normal gameplay the player will experience minimal slowdowns.

 

[HiroProtaganist]

if i remeber correctly Weapon modles ar enot LOD'd. I'll hav eto look into it.

 

[dawdler]

Originally posted by spin
There will always be times when the player will come across many close up models at once, and will be too much for his or her PC to handle. You want to balance everything so no matter what happens during normal gameplay the player will experience minimal slowdowns.

But that was the point with the HL2 automatic LOD system. If it aint fast enough, it automaticly falls back on a lower LOD...

 

[!-fgdf-!]

1st person models are 'unLODable'

 

[random.hero]

i like this 1

"3. whithin a few weeks of game relese this section of the forum is going to explode with people whom never model but are looking to see what mods are doing what. we should brace ourselves for an onslaught of uniformed, l337 speeking, know it all to invade this forum and criticize us and our models for not being 100% accurate. so prepare thyself."

PREPARE THYSELF !

 

[OatmealMu]

IMO, first-person weapon models that lack a LOD system is a good thing. Watching as your weapon rapidly shifts from 2,000 to 1,000 polygons, for example, could be rather jarring to the game's sense of believability. I'd rather have objects that consistently remain close to the screen maintain their LOD.

-Scott

 

[dawdler]

I have never talked about 1st person LODding. Any halfassed engine on a low end card can display a 5000 poly gunmodel once. What I was talking about was 3rd person. That is where the LODding matters, you could do 1/10th of the load with LODding. And the players computer will automaticly walk the 1-10 scale. If it gets 30 fps at 10, it goes to 9. If it gets 40 fps at 9, it goes to 8. If it get 60 fps at 8, it stays there. Thus, you skip the two highest detail LODs. You could skip 10,000 polies in a scene easily if they are close enough.

That was what I meant when I said that saying something as there is "limits" for models is obsolete. There are no limits. The game will display whatever it can display, from its array of detail levels. Sure its harder to mod (alot more models), but its doable.

 

[spin]

You have to think about how it's going to look to the player after seeing the 10,000 polygon model up close, and then going into a group of 6 of them up close and having them LOD to 3,000. You are correct about obsolete limits. However, the above problem still remains. If the player walks into one room and sees an incredible 10,000 polygon marine in his face, and in the next room he's ambushed by 6 of them, they no longer have the same effect. It really comes back to the type of game and situation. If at no point in the game the player will come across large groups of the same characters, then by all means go all out on LOD. Just remember that if he will, however, it's going to look silly seeing them low poly up close after seeing them in their highest LOD beforehand.

 

[HiroProtaganist]

of course when you get ambushed by 6 marines at 3k polys youre not going to be thinking mand that doesn't look as good as 10k. you'll be screaming WTF! WTF! damnit. how often while playing CS or any game do you really notice how bad the grahics are? usually it's just in screenshots do you really notice the difference.