Short Skills
Revisiting software and skills
Revisiting software and skills
On the first day back, Joe needed us to test to make sure all of the previous software we were using was working properly and as intended. After we had confirmed everything was good and the new Unity version was installed (6000.0.57f1), we loaded it up and were tasked to create a game around a dice roller.
Now, before you go looking at the work, you should know that my Unity took around 30 minutes longer to start than everyone else, so I had nowhere near as much time, or basically none in Unity. However, while I was waiting for Unity to load my new project, I decided I would create the dice object inside of 3DS Max.
Inside of 3DS, I thought about what kind of dice I wanted to do for a bit before eventually deciding to go for a regular D6 die. I did want to do something like a D8 or similar, but couldn't find an easy polygon tool, and I didn't know where to start modelling one. Therefore, I just made a simple cube primitive and rounded the edges with the chamfer tool. Now, I don't quite understand why so many vertices were added, but I couldn't really adjust anything that well, so these very smooth edges were good enough.
After making the cube base, I made a new primitive, this time a cylinder. I sized it so it would look alright on the cube, and started copying them around until it was completely covered with the correct dots.
Although I don't think this looks too bad, obviously, in real life, the collisions would be an issue; however, I could simply exclude that aspect from this. Additionally, I don't think it was the best design choice anyway, since in real life, they are usually coloured indents. Although that would've looked better, and I already have an idea of how to do it, I'm not sure how to colour it, so this way was definitely better for a quick project.
The day after, Joe challenged us to create a plane model in 3DS Max. Now, obviously, the first thing to do was to go and find some reference images that I could use to base my design off of. I just searched "small plane" on Google, and this was one of the Google Images search results that came up.
After a little while, I was told that this wasn't ideal since I didn't have a proper blueprint picture of this, so I was recommended a website that includes these designs, and after asking ChatGPT for the model of a plane, I could find a similar blueprint. As you can see, the second image below is the blueprint designs that I would be able to base my plane model off of. This makes modelling quite a bit easier, since I no longer have to guess/make up the size of certain parts, since the diagrams give me three different views which should cover every part. I think it's still useful to keep the original image, though, since if we get around to texturing, I need something to reference then.
The first thing that I did when I got into 3DS was create a basic cube primitive again and size it out to give me a rough base to work off of. I also roughly added some segments to map out the areas that I would be altering the shape of.
Looking back after starting, I regret what I did here slightly, since I didn't add a segment going through the middle, which made things difficult later on, and I think I added too many segments for what I actually needed them for. Overall, I think this was a decent start, but things like this just get better as you learn, and I'll find out later that the length is a bit off, too.
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One of the last productive things that we were going to start before the pinball project was unwrapping and texturing a milk carton. Joe started out by giving us a 3DS Max file that has this free carton asset that he got from Sketchfab. He had removed the UV unwrap, since it already had one, which we didn't want, since we were using this as an example to relearn this all again.
We started out by doing the basic sides, which were the flat sides all around the outside of the carton. After that, I tried to do the inner parts of the carton, and then the cap was all that was left. For that, we learnt how to add a seam, which is the best way to unwrap a cylindrical shape. After finishing the unwrap, we were reminded about how to export the .fbx model file. First, though, we detached the cap from the carton model, which separated the models, giving us more room on the UV map when texturing and giving us higher-quality textures.
After making sure the unwraps were complete, I opened the material editor and made sure to create two physical materials for each of the models. I named them, gave them a specific colour to make sure it was all working fine, and I was ready to export. To do this, I just had to go to File > Export > Export and boom, I have the model file ready for texturing.
Since I now had the FBX file, I opened Substance Painter and began texturing. To begin, I applied a paper-cardboard texture which I customised to my liking. I then started painting the milk carton by adding a new fill layer and selecting my designated paintbrush. I made some rough patterns with it before going online and downloading some images to make it look a bit better. I also added some text layers to make it a bit better, and the milk carton was all finished.
After finishing the carton's textures, I opened the rendering part of Substance Painter and got this image of the final result. Overall, it went relatively well, and I'm pleased with how quickly I remembered and picked it all up again. Joe taught us some quick and useful skills for the unwrapping that will definitely help in the future, and with regards to the texturing, I think I'll try and find other textures online, since the default ones in Substance Painter are a bit limited, and I could've found something a bit better.
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