Alamo VR/AR project
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great stuff
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Some more front detailing. The statues were quite the challenge as they started off as huge Zbrush files. I dropped them into 3D Coat, voxelized them and began to close all gaps I could find. I then converted them to surfaces, and 3D Coat has this cool tool called Object-ify (separate) which separates a mesh into only contiguous pieces. There's always junk lying around, and this lets me clean it up and then save out a very high (1M+ polys) mesh for baking.
I then use 3DC smart decimation to create a very small mesh (all 4 statues are under 900 vertexes each!) and export into SketchUp. I'll bake the original mesh on in Substance later and you can see the result.
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Pretty advanced stuff (and a lot of work). So you turn the image of the detailed mesh into a texture to apply to the simplified model?
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@pbacot said:
Pretty advanced stuff (and a lot of work). So you turn the image of the detailed mesh into a texture to apply to the simplified model?
I actually turn it into a single normal map, which when applied, adds a lot of detail to the model. It also creates texture targets in the low poly model allowing me to quickly add diffuse maps for parts and pieces of the single OBJ. There's a video on the process:
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Working on the texturing. All are Unity renders.
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Finally got the 3D color print back and it looks wonderful.
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Have you thought about making this a card/paper project? Much cheaper and sales could be greater.
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@mike amos said:
Have you thought about making this a card/paper project? Much cheaper and sales could be greater.
That's a great idea! Are there SketchUp plugins/tools that can do this?
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There is an unfold plugin somewhere.
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@mike amos said:
There is an unfold plugin somewhere.
Flattery?
https://sketchucation.com/pluginstore?pauthor=Pumpkin%20Pirate
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I so love the 3d print.. how the texture came out is amazng ..Are the colors there right of the 3d print or is it repainted manually.. What kind of printer will give me this detailed output? Very well done...
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@cuttingedge said:
I so love the 3d print.. how the texture came out is amazng ..Are the colors there right of the 3d print or is it repainted manually.. What kind of printer will give me this detailed output? Very well done...
Yes the colors are correct. I added a dirt layer and ambient occlusion layer in Substance Painter. I used Shapeways.com to print it. Cost about $150. You can find out more about the Z-Corp printers half way down this page. They're fairly expensive. I think they start at around $60K.
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Good luck! My VR experiments are still ongoing, on hold a little while I expand my coding skills!
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Some more stuff...
This tambour was located on the South side of the Alamo and used 4lb cannons to defend the South and East.
Gary Zaboly's map of the entire Alamo compound as it existed in 1836
The SketchUp model of the tambour
A quick SU SketchFX video of same:
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@chippwalters said:
Currently, I'm working with my new SketchFX Ex extension to figure out a custom render theme and video workflow for these in progress pictures. Here are a few tests..
I've looked at this extension and considered adding it to my list of plugins-to-buy. (along with Ambient Occlusion). I really like some of the effects and your examples look great.
How have you found it? Are you happy with the output? Is there any performance hit? Does using it without AO severly handicap the avaialble effects? (I use Twilight Render currently)
Oh, and the project overall is very impressive... but having seen some of your previous work (e.g. your Hyperloop presentation) I'm not at all surprised. Great work.
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I actually really do like the SketchFX extension. If I had to get only one, I'd get the AO one as it helps you design by accurately showing you what the object looks like. Both give you the ability to create some really nice and quick renders and animations. I don't see this as a presentation tool to show finished work, I'd prefer something like Thea or Unity or KeyShot for that.
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Thanks for the reply. I imagine I'll probably end up getting both, but I'll likely take your advice and start with AO.
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Some more updates. These are Unity screenshots from the Palisades scene, which is the place David Crockett and his men defended the Alamo from. It was supposed to be one of the most vulnerable, but due to Crockett and his sharp shooters, became virtually impenetrable.
Ultra low geometry except for the Alamo, which will be optimized next...
Also, we'll be adding a better ground texture as well.Of interest, the shader I'm using was created in Amplify Shader for Unity and it's a pretty interesting shader. The goal is to NOT have too many texture maps for mobile AR. So, I've compiled 2 different shaders and the only custom maps per object are a normal and ambient occlusion map. The rest of the texturing is done with only a couple of diffuse and normal maps, plus a noise map for the dirt coming up from the ground. This way I can keep both the polys low AND the number of textures low.
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Coming along VERY nicely.
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