Post #14

I feel like the more I try and really move forward in this project, the more I just keep running into walls. Most of these walls are just decisions I need to make on how to proceed with the project, what techniques will fit my situation best and so forth.

To get some really high detail, I debated with importing sections of the building into ZBrush, which would mean retopologizing parts of the building to make it ZBrush friendly and then later retoping it once I import it back into Maya. Recently though, while doing research for my Zbrush class I found a thread created by a guy who is an environment artist for Gears. (link) I found his method of creating walls rather intriguing since he literally made it out of bricks. He textured (in zBrush) one brick and then instanced it to make an entire wall. I believe (though he doesn't really state it clearly in his walk through) that he then bakes these bricks into the actual wall or manages to cluster them somehow at least.

This got me interested in the idea of baking a high res wall (made out of a bunch of bricks) to create a highly detailed normal map. So this is where I currently am, doing research and watching tutorials and so forth trying to figure out what method works best. Hopefully I'll be able to test this stuff out sometime tonight so I at least am going in the right direction.

In other news, have been working primarily on the carriage house part of the manor (the little mini box part that helps to create the entry "gate". I'm really tempted to just plow away with this section of the house, and get it fully textured, so I at least know what work flow I'm really going to use for the rest of the building. I'd like to work out the kinks as soon as possible.