After last week’s meeting, I spoke to Jess about the division of labour between the two of us. I decided to focus on the main shell of the building and she took on the role of modelling the corridor, and the final room. In this way, we were able to work on the models separately and then combine them. I provided her with curated moodboards and sketches explaining the idea in more detail.
Throughout the week I created a new mesh. Looking back, I can say that the initial stage of the model was very chaotic, and since I wasn’t sure about the final design, I kept changing details. This caused many problems with the geometry, especially around the thickness and scale of the building. Duplicating the model inside and manually connecting it turned out to be much easier and less problematic than extruding the object. I also split the mesh into different parts to have better control over how the exterior and interior walls connect.
To fix general geometry issues, I had to separate the mesh by duplicating the object and removing parts of it (automatic separation didn’t work). This way I could spot overlapping faces, wrong geometry and much more. I then used non-manifold vertex cleanup on all separate parts to identify even more issues. I also connected all the vertices. I continued to retopologise on separate parts because it was easier than doing it on a complex mesh.
When modelling the building, I mainly used the Bridge, Booleans, Insert Edge Loops, Extrude, Target Weld, Multicut and Quad Draw tools. I’ve also taken lots of exact measurements to help with sizing/references. To solve some problems I used Mesh>Remesh and Merge Vertices to Centre. I utilised the Harden/Soften Edge tool from Mesh Display to create smooth edges. It helped me fix small details that looked out of place.
Furthermore, MA VFX had our first collaborative unit presentation.
General Meeting (24/02/23)
Later this week we had a meeting with lecturers and external studio partners. We discussed the possibility of purchasing assets within the budget offered by the university as we had many objects to model and very limited time. Ana asked us to make a list of resources and add those we had to model, which we could download for free, and which we had to buy. Trying to stay within a small budget, I found most of the rubble/debris models on the Quixel/Megascans website and used them to fill the space.
Meeting notes:
- Less futuristic, more urban, long corridors.
- Natural light in the pod (single point of natural light).
- Blocking other corridors with assets.
- Lower the floor in the corridors and connect them to the building with ramps to give the impression of underground/flooded floors.
- Stained, crumbling concrete walls, a larger hall, a wider waiting room.
- Fewer windows/glass, more walls.
- Paintings/murals on the walls.
- Get rid of stairs for VR, but include ramps.
- Create five identical corridors – the middle corridor to enter.
After the meeting, we had to work on adapting the entrances to the corridor and the shape of the corridor itself to better fit the whole. Models need to be connected in Maya to avoid problems with Unity. This will also make it easier to place textures in the building.
References:
3DWolf (2022) Maya Tutorial for Beginners | Bevel Tool in Maya 2022. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gknvC3lJyDI (Accessed: 26 February 2023).
CG Artist Academy (2020) Maya Holographic HUD Effect. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68fceb23T10 (Accessed: 26 February 2023).
Extrude > Thickness issue (2020) Available at: https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/maya-modeling/extrude-gt-thickness-issue/td-p/9777769 (Accessed: 26 February 2023)
JL Mussi (2019) Maya Hard Surface Modeling: How To Add Thickness. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXer5y9PRD0 (Accessed: 26 February 2023).
Maya Tool Thick Extrude (2020) Available at: https://create3dcharacters.com/maya-tool-thick-extrude/ (Accessed: 26 February 2023).
Separate polygon shells into separate meshes. (2020) Available at: https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/maya/learn-explore/caas/CloudHelp/cloudhelp/2020/ENU/Maya-Modeling/files/GUID-28F8A2CF-DC7B-4669-96C6-7A06C83EAFA3-htm.html (Accessed: 27 February 2023).
Uhr (2018) Maya: Detach and Separate [Polygon Modeling]. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sD7zqekHwHc (Accessed: 27 February 2023).