Colour Id Process and work around process

To make the process of creating my materials inside of quixel easier, I knew that I would need to create a colour ID map. Where as what I would usally do to make my colour ID map is take my UV snapshot into photoshop and colour over the top of it, that was going to be a lot of work for me to have to do for all of these objects so instead I decided that I would do it inside of zbrush, by colouring in the parts of the model that would be a seperate material and exporting them as OBJ's with that colour attached. 

So what I firstly had to do, was take the high poly model that I had created before it had been taken into zbrush, and split apart the uv's of the object. This isn't something I would usually have to do with my high poly object as it is a lot more work unwrapping a high poly object than it is to unwrap a low poly object. But I had to do this process so that when I imported these objects into zbrush to be colourised I would be able to auto group the object from UV's and the color from polygroups.

Colour ID within zbrush

Unfortunately for me however, this process was going to have to take much longer. As for some reason, when i was auto colouring my objects from poly groups, parts of the colour would bleed into another colour meaning that there was no hard edges of colour though out my whole object which would be a huge problem later on when applying my materials to the colours.

To work around this I had to endure a lengthy process inside of zbrush. What I essentially had to do was split apart my objects into there poly groups. So that there would be an object for each poly group. The shoulder instead of being one object would now be made of four separate objects for instance, as there would be four different poly groups on that shoulder. With these parts of my objects now separated, I could fill that part of the object with the colour that I needed, and this would then mean that there would be no other object for the colour to bleed into. 

After I filled the seperate objects with colour, I could then merge them all together to create the whole orignal object like it would of been before, only this time all the colours where confined to their own poly group and not bleading into any of the others. This was a tedious work around to have to apply to each of my objects seperatley as it took up way more time than what it would of originally taken, which was annoying but it was definetly something I had to do in order to get the level of detail that I needed.

Layering Colour ID maps within photoshop

After exporting the objects as OBJ's with the colour data that they now had on them, I then baked these colour ID objects onto my low poly objects. I did however have to bake them all separately as, for an example, the colour from parts of the arm where baking onto the torso, essentially putting parts of colour on there that shouldn't be there at all. So I had to bake all the parts individually and then piece them all together within photoshop.

Fixing issues with colour maps

Despite baking them all individually however, there where still some slight mistakes that needed to be fixed where parts of the same object had baked onto wrong parts that later on down the line would mean that the textures would all be looking obscure. so with maya open on one screen and photoshop open on the other with a UV snapshot overlaying my colour maps, I was able to match up the uv's across the two pieces of software to ensure that I was putting colour in the right areas and removing it from where it shouldn't be. 

Final Completed colour ID map after layering process

Colour ID map rendered in quixel on torso. 

Below are some screenshots of my first test of applying materials to my torso object inside of quixel after applying my colour ID maps. 

Im glad that I did this test run rather than jump straight in and begin applying all the work that I wanted to put into it as I noticed that there where quite a lot of mistakes with my colour ID map for my torso that had to be fixed before I carried on.

No only that, but there where also some mistakes with my AO map and my Normal map that also created some obscurities on my object. As you can see in the screenshot above, the pipes on the back had baked onto the sides of the torso making it look really jagged, where as that part should be smooth instead, So i will need to go into photoshop and edit my maps a bit.

There was also a slight problem with the grill at the front. The colour ID had been baked onto the gril where it shouldnt of been, so i will have to remove this part inside of the colour ID map in photoshop.

Despite the mistakes, this test has shown that overall, all my maps work pretty well on this model. The mistakes that I will be fixing will only make the materials looks better and more realistic.

Finished tau head

After completing all the low poly pieces for my models body I decided that it was time to revisit the head model as it wasn't completed the last time I tested it in quixel.

As you can see below, I followed up on what I said I would do with my low poly model and used the high poly zbrush model of my head that I created as a live surface in maya and modeled my low poly model around that, so now the previously far more humanoid low poly face has a far more gaunt look, with a flat nose. This now means that when I bake my high poly model onto this there wont be any obscurities. 

Bellow Is my first attempt at creating the head again within quixel. This time I got it much closer to how I wanted the final piece to look. A noticeable error at this stage though was that I had forgotten to smooth the eye on my low poly object, so when I baked my models together in Xnormal it put some detail onto the eyes that shouldn't be there. Other than that Im pretty happy with how the head looks at this point, but as you will see below after I smoothed out the eyes and brought my head back into quixel I decided to make some aesthetic changes to the textures.

Bellow are some screen shots of my final materials that where created from my finished iteration of the tau's head that I created in quixel. The final outcome can be seen right at the bottom of this post.

Albedo

During the process of creating my materials in quixel, I decided to add a few details to my albedo within photoshop. I layered over some pupils on top of the eyes, added some decals to the communication device and also added the red spot on the forehead of the tau, as from looking at some reference of the tau, some of there race have this marking and I thought it would add more character to my model.

AO

Colour ID

Gloss

Specular

Normal maps

Unwrapped UV's

Complete rendered head within quixel

Im really happy with the final out come of my models head. The materials I have chosen on this final model are for more accurate in my opinion. The second test that I did made the face look far too shiny so this time I found a material that had a more matt finish too it which i Thought looked really good as it brings out the battle scars on him a bit more. These materials are now ready to be put on to my low poly head when im posing my model.

Finalized low poly model high poly model comparison (Pre Zbrush touch up)

Here awesome screen shots of my final model all pieced together within maya. Since my last post I have completed the torso and went on to creating the jet pack that the broadside has on his back. This model is not my final high poly model, as this model is made up of the parts that i will be exporting all separately into zbrush in order to add some details like battle scars, dents and burns.

Fortunately, I wont have to do to much extra work in zbrush as I have made my life a little easier by adding all the bevels and grooves in this model during my modeling process in maya rather than in zbrush. As this model is quite mechanical and hard surface I figured I would have a far easier time doing something like that in maya than in zbrush, and because of this it looks a lot more realistic. 

The final poly count for this stage of the model was high but it needed to be at this in order for me to gain all the detail that I have created already before even putting my objects into zbrush. 

Somewhat jumping the gun a bit, bellow are some screenshots of my final low poly model.

I realize that I have skipped the whole process of screen shooting and evaluating my process of creating my low poly model. But at this stage of the project, I really just wanted to see my model come together. Quad drawing over the top of all my individual objects was a long and tedious process enough, without having to screen shot it along the way, but never the less here it is.

As I stated before, the process for creating this model was quite long winded and tedious. Before going into creating my low poly, I debated whether I should quad draw a lot of pieces into one object rather than separate ones like I had done before with my high poly piece. But in the end I decided that taking the long way around would be the better option again, as when baking my objects later on in xnormal, I will have an easier time picking out 'LowpolyLeftGunArm' and 'HighPolyLeftGunArm' for instance instead of 'LowPolyLeftArm' as a whole object, it also means that later on I wont have too much trouble with objects baking on to each other. 

As i've not had access to Zbrush at home, and can only access it in university, I decided to use the high poly model that I already created to quad draw over the top of, as the shapes are going to be exactly the same after exporting them from zbrush later on anyway, they will just have a few scratches and wear and tear on them. So using my high poly model I created in maya as a live surface worked well enough. 

I'm happy with the final out come of my low poly model at this stage. I have brought down the poly count a significant amount compared to the original high poly that I created. It is still quite a high poly count for a low poly model granted, but I'm taking into consideration that this model is made of a lot of pieces and because of this it is really difficult to get the poly count below anything lower that 20k 

Model preview& chest modeling

In the image above, I have decided to make sort of a test pose. I duplicated the arms and the legs inside my scene and mirrored them across. I also added in my low poly head and the gauss cannons that I created after making the legs. You can also see in the model the beginning of the torso coming along.
I wanted to create this image as i had been modeling all these separate pieces for a long time and it was a satisfying feeling to see them all coming together like this. I wanted to make sure they all worked together and nothing looked out of place. 

Here is a big more of the progress I had with the torso. At this point in my modeling process I was wondering what I would use for a pivot for the arm, as similar to the leg, the original reference simply has a plain sphere that connects the arm to the torso and I don't want to carry this onto my model for the same reasons as with the leg, so think that what i will do create a similar joint as I did on the leg but re size it a bit so that it fits right in the torso.  

Leg Modeling

You can see in the above screen shot my process of creating the leg. In the window to the side, it shows how I have created the leg out of three separate objects, much similar to how I created the arm model. This process will continue on through my project, and the final outcome will end up being quite a lot of parts in the end, but it will be advantages for me as it means later on down the line posing this model will be a lot easier.

Above you can see, much like my process again with the arm that I am placing in the pivot points on my leg model. I wanted to place one and the top of the foot so that it could rotate on all axis as the legs are designed so that they wouldn't look right if I was to rotate them along any other axis, so the foot and the top of the leg need to be able to do this. 

This is another area of my model that I decided to be a bit more original with to increase its realistic values. On the broadside figurine the models leg simply has a ball attached to the top of the leg, which is able to move around with in its socket. However, I didn't think a plain sphere would look that good on my model, as I wanted to make it appear like it would actually be able to move my models leg.
I instead created a sort of hinge, that is able to swivel at the top to enable the legs to spread out, but it also attaches the rest of the leg by a hinge so that the top part and the bottom part of the leg can only move along one axis and cannot go side ways.  

Above is an image of the final part of detail that I added to the foot, being the heel. The heel is a separate part to the foot which can also move, making the final model piece count for the leg up to

five. I wanted the heel of the foot to be separate so that if i was posing the model to be stood with its foot on a ramp or something the heel would be able to appear as if it was supporting the rest of the foot by rotating itself. 

Arm Modelling

Bellow are some screenshots of my process of modeling the broadsides missile arms. 

You can see above from the original broadside model that I have made some alterations to add a bit more detail to the arm. I instead wanted too have some exhausts that would extrude out of either side of the arm to give the idea that when the rockets fire off they can let out head from the side of the arms. I wanted to do this to add the extra detail of realism to my model, as I don't want my final outcome to look as if it was a 3d render of a warhammer figurine and is instead an actually asset for a game.

You can see above how I began adding in the pivots into my model pieces so that I could pose it later on. I ensured that the arm had two pivots, one which could move the entire arm if it wanted too, and one that was placed within the elbow, so that I could bring the arm up and down as you can see in the second screen shot of the three.

Head modeling

As my model is only going to have one part of it that is going to be organic, I decided to begin creating my head model early on into the project. 

As I already had a basic head model that I had created to practice the topology of a face, I took that into maya and expanded on it, I extruded out around the bottom of the head to make the shape of the leather armor the tau has wrapped around his head and I then created the shape of the communication device that he has on his ear.
With this basic shape ready it was time to take it into zbrush and begin making the detail that it needed. 

Im fairly happy with the final outcome of the head that I created in zbrush. At this point, I had not created anything organic within zbrush, so this was  new area for me, and as it was only loosely based to resemble a human face I had the ability to be a bit more free with my design. I think I got the resemblance to a Tau's head pretty good though, I wanted to give him a bit of character too so I added a few scars going down his eye.

Heres is a screen shot of a quick test I did within quixel. I had baked my high poly zbrush model onto my low poly model to see how it would turn out so that I could edit it somewhere down the line if I needed too. From this outcome, I can see that I will indeed have to make some alterations, only to the low poly model though. As what I mistakenly did was not edit the high poly model after the zbrush process, hence why the face is quite flat. What I will need to do is bring the zbrush model into maya with my lowpoly model and make the high poly model a live surface, so that I can shape my lowpoly face around it a lot more to get a better sense of the shape.