Mesh Creation and Land Impact Zbrush, Blender, Photoshop

[NealCrz]

I appreciate any help.  New to 3D modeling.  I made this flower in Zbrush and it was 65K Active points and 26 prims. I wanted to refine it some so sculpted it a little in Zbrush,  ZRemehed it down to 24K active points in Zbrush, textured in in Photoshop , exported as a  DAE from Zbrush, Imported and exported in Blender.  It's now 117 Prims and it rezes out like 15 feet tall 

I've put the relavent pictures in for any help please?   :)

 

 

[NealCrz]

Ok I dont get it. I redid it reducing active points to 6500 and blender reporting 13K faces and its still 51 prims when reduced in size?

[Sassy Romano]

A picture of the upload dialog would help most.

 

Your lowest LOD and physics are important.

[NealCrz]

Thanks, Here are the  screens.  Been so happy something finally uploads have not mssed with these yet. lol

[Drongle McMahon]

When you rez it inworld, edit it and click the "More Info" link. That will tell you the download, physics and server weights. The highest of these becomes the LI. From what you have shown us, you have not specified any physics shape. In that case, you don't get the "Prim" physics shape type option in the edit dialog and are stuck with "Convex hull". That uses the default convex hull which is made for all meshes whether you specify a physics shape or not. If you do not, then the uploader uses the convex hull of the Low (3rd) LOD mesh. In this case, that will still have many vertices, resulting in a high physics weight. So that could be the problem. You can change that by either supplying a much simpler physics shape (a box with eight vertices would probably do - then click "Analyze"), or by setting a much lower triangle count on the low LOD.

Ignoring all that, and assuming it is the download weight, you still have far too many tiangles for a mesh like this. Cutting it down drastically will reduce the count at all LODs and reduce the download weight. Make sure you use smooth shading and not excessive subdivision for gettig a smooth appearance. If you need to keep the high detail, then just reduce the triangle counts at the lowest two LODs (say, 40 and 4). Unless your object is going to be very big (>10m), these will have the greatest effect on the download weight.

Note that the physics weight of the convex hull based physics shape does not vary with size, while the download weight does increase alarmingly rapidly with increasing size. So make sure you adjust the object to the intended size before looking at the weights.

[BarcodeBrian]

It is easy to see that you are relying on the uploader's automatic generating of lower LODs and not choosing or uploading a physics model, which almost guarantees the highest LI results. But in fairness, that is only secondary to this case.

The main problem is that you are expecting to get high detail with a phenominally high polygon count for a flower that should only be maybe half a meter tall in SL. That's the opposite of what makes quality mesh for a game engine to render. Even if you were to optimize by uploading lower LOD and physics models, you still have the initial model for people to rez when up close - over 13k triangles for a small flower.

Someone who has created flowers might offer you better insight, but if I were to try making some myself, I would think that trying to stay within a couple hundred triangles for the high poly model is not an unreasonable goal for something that will be that small. Get more detail with textures and materials and less with geometry.

[NealCrz]

Thank you working through those and learning .

How do you set "a box with eight verticies"  I cant find an option to set.  

I did try setting the item type under "Model Represents"  to small item (hopefull that fixes the convex hull assumption)

Set LOD low and analyzed

Reducing LODs to lowest 40 and 4.  Is  that just typing in the number in the LOD box?

 

Picture of the adjusted size weighting.

 

Thanks again

[NealCrz]

Thanks do you get to that very low trinagle count by having low active points?  I retopologized it down to 1300 and it looks very blocky.  Working on the texturing to mask it.

 

Thanks!

[Drongle McMahon]

It's not the physocs weight, so far. The download weight is higher, so you need to work on that first. Where you say it looks blocky, is that because you are using flat shading? You need to use mostly smooth shading.This has 1052 triangles. It is just rendered in Blender with colours bu no textures. The sack is maybe a bit too angular as you can see its silhouette. It should be possible to get something reasonable with about 2000 triangles. Then set the lower two LOD triangle counts to much smaller than they are by default. The uploader tries to do 1/4 steps. So it will be 2000, 500, 124, 65. Instead, use 2000, 500, 40, 8, and see how that works out.

Then is the download weight is less than the physics weight. you can try making a simpler physics mesh. Just make a box that fits the rough shape of the object, but is convex, no indentations. Upload it on the physocs tab alongh with the main model, and click "Analyze".  It is probably a good idea to do this anyway, because the low LOD with the low triangle count may not be appropriate.

 

[NealCrz]

Thanks a ton off to try those ideas.  Getting closer now. This is a 1 prim and 10 prim version using lower LOD numbers like 400/40/4.   Really appreciate the suggestions.  

 

[Jenni Darkwatch]

Set the edges to be soft edged, not hard edged. Or let the uploader generate the normals - check the box and set the second value to "180".

For a small model like this you can skimp on things like the stem, likely also the leaves. Instead, use normalmaps if you are familiar with them and want to create the illusion of much more detail than is really there.

[NealCrz]

Thank you trying the normals you mentioned.

Soft edges I'm assuming is a Blender setting? 

[Jenni Darkwatch]

I'm guessing most clients have them... not all export them properly though. Blender certainly does, but for simple models like that one it's also possible to just have the uploader fix it.

[NealCrz]

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Jenni Darkwatch wrote:

I'm guessing most clients have them... not all export them properly though. Blender certainly does, but for simple models like that one it's also possible to just have the uploader fix it.

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Do you know which panel it's in in Blender?  thanks

[Jenni Darkwatch]

Unfortunately I do not, sorry. Blender isn't my usual poison of choice - can't stand the UI.

[Drongle McMahon]

Tool panel->Object tools->Shading->[smooth][Flat]

{affects whole object in Object mode, selected faces in Edit mode}

Edit mode->Menu->Mesh->Faces->Shade smooth/Shade flat {selected faces}

CtrlFA CtrlFH {selected faces}

Note that you can use the Edge split modifier to make some edges sharp while rest is smooth shaded. This can either use the edge angle or edges explicitly marked sharp, or both. The angle option is a bit like generate normals in the uploader, but superior because it ignores uv seams.

 

[NealCrz]

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Drongle McMahon wrote:

Tool panel->Object tools->Shading->[smooth][Flat]

{affects whole object in Object mode, selected faces in Edit mode}

Edit mode->Menu->Mesh->Faces->Shade smooth/Shade flat {selected faces}

CtrlFA CtrlFH {selected faces}

Note that you can use the Edge split modifier to make some edges sharp while rest is smooth shaded. This can either use the edge angle or edges explicitly marked sharp, or both. The angle option is a bit like generate normals in the uploader, but superior because it ignores uv seams.

 

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thank you