[Weapon] M7 Grenade Launcher (+ M9A1 rifle grenade)

[lucky.BOY]

Looks much better, though I dont get why on the hemisphere you got on top, why the first set of quads is much smaller then the rest of the hemisphere? Making the all "equally" big would give you an overall nicer result for the same amount of tris.

Please collapse the polygon you got on the end of the hollow tube, the resulting cone will give you a more "endless" feel, while costing less tris and significantly less UV space (you can just do a planar UV on it then).

Time to talk about optimization of the cylinders. The smaller cylinder shouldnt have the same amount of sides as the larger one, it doesnt need so many sides to appear "smooth" So either collapse every other edge on the smaller cylinder, or double the amount of sides on the larger one. I dont know which of the options is the right one, because I cant tell wether or not the model needs more smoothing without seeing it with smooth shading. Maybe try posting some screenshots?

Anyway here is a quick tut i put together on how to optimize cylinders/spheres:
optimizing cylinders, spheres - Imgur

[KaB]

Looks much better, though I dont get why on the hemisphere you got on top, why the first set of quads is much smaller then the rest of the hemisphere? Making the all "equally" big would give you an overall nicer result for the same amount of tris.

Well I just tried to reproduce its real shape :

http://i.imgur.com/iOwDSL0.jpg

If I do what you ask it might look like a perfect half-sphere, which is not how it is.

Time to talk about optimization of the cylinders. The smaller cylinder shouldnt have the same amount of sides as the larger one, it doesnt need so many sides to appear "smooth" So either collapse every other edge on the smaller cylinder, or double the amount of sides on the larger one. I dont know which of the options is the right one, because I cant tell wether or not the model needs more smoothing without seeing it with smooth shading. Maybe try posting some screenshots?

Screenshots :
http://i.imgur.com/7HTQ8k3.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/sUbtsxJ.jpg

I tried to optimze the small cylinder, and I'm afraid it makes the rear looking pretty awful at the end : http://i.imgur.com/iN1CKhW.jpg
So I'm not sure that's a good thing for this part. I'll optimize the hemisphere for sure though.

[lucky.BOY]

Yep, looking at the screenshots your bigger cylinder could use more side, try to smooth it up using chamfer tool:

https://www.realitymod.com/forum/f189-m ... nders.html

But make sure to keep the old one as a backup somewhere, you will need to create esome lowpoly models for the projectile model and for 3p (geom1) mesh of the weapon.

[KaB]

Out of topic : I just noticed I'm actually using 3ds max 2009, and not 3ds Max 9, which seems to be two different softwares ... The fact is that I couldn't find any 3ds max 9 when you told me to move to it, however I could find a lot of 3ds max 2009, so I suggested they were the same. And they're actually not (according to what Rhino says in this tutorial).

Will it cause trouble if I keep using the 2009 ?

[lucky.BOY]

Well, there is really no difference if you use 2009 or 2013 or any of the new versions. We cant export from those versions, so the model will have to be backported to 9 for export, which will make the job fro the exportr harder, may couse some bugs, which he may overlook etc. All in all its better if you can switch to 3ds max 9 yourself.

[KaB]

Should I totally scrap the model from 2009 then and start it over with the v9 ?

[Mineral]

Just port it over.

[Psyrus]

Should I totally scrap the model from 2009 then and start it over with the v9 ?

If you haven't done any smoothing groups or anything complex then it should be fine. A basic model should transfer to v9 just fine as far as I know.

[KaB]

3ds max 9 won't open my 2009 files. I guess I have to export them from 2009 and then import them into a new file in max 9 right ? Should I export them with a specific type of file or will .obj be fine ?

Edit : just did with .3DS and it worked perfectly

[KaB]

How does it look ?









https://p3d.in/NK8nj/wireonsmooth

Bonus : should I also chamfer this thing ? http://i.imgur.com/Xmc5EuI.jpg

[lucky.BOY]

Getting ever better

Collapse this face:


I think you may have over-optimized this area on the tip of the grenade, try to give it more tris:


Yes, the stabalizer on the back should have the same number of sides as the head of the grenade, as it has the same diameter, so yes, chamfer it.

HOWEVER, there is one major thing i forgot about untli now. The hollow end of the grenade should have exactly the same amount of sides as the tip of the launcher it will be slided onto. If the have different amount of sides, it will look wierd, and it will point out that one of them is badly optimized since they both have the same radius.

so make sure that they can slide into each other nicely, please.

[KaB]

More tris to the front :

Collapse this face:
http://i.imgur.com/wHESPUp.png

Like this ?



Should I move the bottom further to the left ?

[lucky.BOY]

Bumpy, any news on this?

Last images look great!

Could you model the blank round as well, so it can be used in the animation?

[KaB]

Im working on the high poly version of the M7 right now. It takes more time than expected

I have questions about turbosmooth :
- What is 'Explicit normals' ? Should I enable it ?
- How much iterations should a high poly model have in order to be ready for the next ?

What blank round ?

[KaB]

Here it is (the locking thing isn't done yet) : https://p3d.in/XOYqr

What happens if I have two high poly separated objects owned by one same low poly object ? For example the granular thing at the edge of the big cylinder isn't weld with the rest. Should it be welded with the cylinder ?
The thing is that this object might not need to look like it's welded though, as it is IRL. But actually I dunno how works the normal map baking yet so maybe I'm missing something and I'm wrong.

[lucky.BOY]

Model looks good, though your edges are too tight, you need to make them more round, and I mean more than looks reasonable:



Explicit Normals im not sure what is, but it looks like it is conserving the normals from the base mesh. Anyway I always had it off, so you might as well go with that.

Number of iterations depends on how smooth the base mesh is, and how powerful your pc is. I usually find 2-3 iteration steps sufficient, but you can always turn Turbosmooth on parts of your highpoly off to take the load off your pc, and you can up the number of iterations just before baking, so its not really something to worry about right now. But as long as it looks good, it should be alright

I meant the blank round that was used to launch the greanade, it could be shown in the deploy/reload animation. We could just use normal round instead, but players could tell the difference. Looks like this (the round on the right part of the image):



And yes you can bake from multiple highpoly objects onto one lowpoly object (or even multiple lowpoly objects at the same time, for that matter, but that can lead to poorer results). You can as well just attach the base meshes to one another (using the "Attach" button in Edit Poly), and them turbosmooth them together. Keeping your highpoly parts separated has its merits and can help you with keeping things more organized, but be careful not to overdo it. I once tried to bake from like a hundert deparate highpoly objects and it brought 3ds max to its knees.
You can infact do very little welding on the highpoly mesh, nobody is concerned how it looks under the surface so you can get away with a lot. Again, as long as it looks good it should be alright

[KaB]

Edges more round : https://p3d.in/BJz0k

Is it good ?

Should all the edges be as round despite the fact some are tighter than others IRL ? Or can I decide some becomes more round than others ?

I'll try to make the blank round. Do you think it's the same size than the common rounds ? So could I use the ones inside the M1 Garand you sent me ?

[lucky.BOY]

Yeah of course some edges can be more round than others. Now it looks better, but its hard to tell for sure because p3d doesnt smooth it properly. Could you post a couple of screenshots please?

As for the blank, yeah m im guessing it should be the same cartridge, just instead of a bullet it has that distinctly shaped tip.

[KaB]

Screenshots :

http://i.imgur.com/pW3uOM6.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/Qqt36fJ.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/pExI0xf.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/SWx3PCv.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/w4mj8Xf.jpg

[KaB]

There was no way I could make a high poly model from the current locking thing low poly model as it was full of bugs (poorly made and the export from max 2009 surely didn't help), so I just decided to do it back from scratch (used the old one for the dimensions tho). And as I remembered you said it was too much detailed I simplified it and now has less tris.

High poly :

http://i.imgur.com/KGX1c1n.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/kIXd8of.jpg

High poly of the M9A1 :

http://i.imgur.com/dMHdFGm.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/L1ChfwS.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/LAcWnFb.jpg