E-11 Blaster Rifle

[Corto]

I heard they really used the Chinese replica for Han Solo's gun. Even back then, I doubt they could get a hold on an original Mauser gun to play around with. At any rate, the E-11 is coming along just the way I want. I've modified, added and polished more details. I'm currently modeling some arms and hands for the first person view model. I'll cut down the polygonal detail for the world view.

[AshuraDX]

@@Corto The original Hero Prop used in many of Hans closeups was based on a original Mauser C96. The exact same pistol was used in a few other movie before it hit the screen in Star Wars. Each time with new, different Accesories and Attachments. But there were many cheap Stunt and Action Props that looked castly different from the glorious main Prop.

 

Theres quite an interesting Article about this on the Tested Website. Most of the reference pictures I used for my DL-44 came from that article.

 

Anway, maybe we should get back on topic now

[Corto]

Alright, back on topic. I'm not convinced with the gloves design, but here's and update anyway. Again, the textures are rudimentary and for testing purposes only.

 

[IrocJeff]

Alright, back on topic. I'm not convinced with the gloves design, but here's and update anyway. Again, the textures are rudimentary and for testing purposes only.

 

 

 

The gloves look fine they just need to be a bit on the more leathery, tan, brownish looking side since the arm is a bit pasty looking.

[Corto]

What you see is not even going to be the base for the real textures. The hands have to be bigger so the blaster doesn't appear to be so big. Also, the design of the gloves is what I don't like right now.

[Archangel35757]

I heard they really used the Chinese replica for Han Solo's gun. Even back then, I doubt they could get a hold on an original Mauser gun to play around with. At any rate, the E-11 is coming along just the way I want. I've modified, added and polished more details. I'm currently modeling some arms and hands for the first person view model. I'll cut down the polygonal detail for the world view.

You should make an animation for 3rd-person where the buttstock is unfolded for a more accurate, single-shot shoulder-fire position.

[Tempust85]

You can't animate world (player bolted) weapon models, not for how the code is set up currently anyhow.

[Archangel35757]

You can't animate world (player bolted) weapon models, not for how the code is set up currently anyhow.

Seems like it would be no different than a reload animation.

[Corto]

Guys, you're high-jacking the thread again, lol. After I release my version of the model, anybody's free to do with it whatever they want. Just like my Boba Fett model, which has been re-skinned, ripped apart and put back together many times. I'll make public the scene in as many formats as I can.

[Corto]

Quick update. I'm fine with the hands now (had to model four of them until I got it right), I've optimized the gun mesh a little more and everything is UV unwrapped and ready to paint the textures.

 

Here's a screenshot with plain textures as placeholders:

[Corto]

Almost there...

 

[Corto]

This one is out. I'll update the file in the download section from now on.

[AshuraDX]

I hope you're up for some serious crits @@Corto

 

1. The modeling work is fairly solid! But I do have a points you might want to tackle before your next release. You seem to be using the exact same mesh for the view and World models. The world model does not need to have all the small circular idnentations modeled and you could delete the front and most of the right-hand-side of the view mesh to optimize the model for the game. You should also consider adding LODs to the model. As it stands right now, someone who were to use this in base JASP with a rather detailed Character model will definitely run into the Ghoul2 Transformspace error.
    
2. The textures could be improved a lot, while I love the base you have for your scope atm the whole gun could use some proper highlights and shadows, in a game as old as JKA having pre-lit textures is usually the best way to go. I'd also recommend to reduce that edgewear by a LOT. Right now it looks like someone disassembled the gun and purposefully evenly scratched all edges. Place your scratches strategically. The more Occluded an area is, the less scratched it should be. Take a look at this small hole, how did that get scratched around the entire perimeter? And that is just one small example, here's another. Who took a rather hard piece of metal, put it in that nook and scrubbed it over that things bottom edge? Place your wear in places where it makes sense. From looking at your textures I'd assume that you did infact bake an an Ambient Occlusion map, you could use that to help you find the occluded spots that'd see less wear. You can also use the same AO map as a guide for where to Paint dirt, because dirt is more likely to gather in the deeper crevices and occluded areas that are rarely scrubbed over by accident and difficult to clean due to limited accessibility. You also don't need a 4k map for this gun. Especially not for the world mesh. The World mesh can do fine with a 1*1k Map while the Viewmesh can get away with 2*1k map, seeing that you only need about half the UV space for half of the gun model.
    
3. you got some nasty UV distortion on the left side of the grip
    

This is all I got for the moment, if I dig further I can probably find some stuff to nitpick about but for now I'll let you focus on these bigger Issues.

[Corto]

You read my mind. Although I was comfortable enough to release the model, there are a lot of aspects than I don't like yet. All the points you mention are spot on. I generated the texture using Substance Painter with all the fancy stuff to find and wear down the edges. Now it needs manual work to look more realistic. I have a lot of small details in mind that need to be included in the texture. As for the rest of it, you are right and I have it in mind for my next update. Thanks for comments. One loses perspective when working several days in a row on the same thing.

[AshuraDX]

You read my mind. Although I was comfortable enough to release the model, there are a lot of aspects than I don't like yet. All the points you mention are spot on. I generated the texture using Substance Painter with all the fancy stuff to find and wear down the edges. Now it needs manual work to look more realistic. I have a lot of small details in mind that need to be included in the texture. As for the rest of it, you are right and I have it in mind for my next update. Thanks for comments. One loses perspective when working several days in a row on the same thing.

Which version of Substance painter do you use?

I have created this Smart Material that helps you bring your Substance Painter Work into JKA.

[Corto]

I downloaded the latest trial to be honest. It saves you a lot of work. I still need to try the hand painting tools, but I think it has potential.

[AshuraDX]

I downloaded the latest trial to be honest. It saves you a lot of work. I still need to try the hand painting tools, but I think it has potential.

okay, check your pm's

[Corto]

I hope you're up for some serious crits @@Corto

 

1. The modeling work is fairly solid! But I do have a points you might want to tackle before your next release. You seem to be using the exact same mesh for the view and World models. The world model does not need to have all the small circular idnentations modeled and you could delete the front and most of the right-hand-side of the view mesh to optimize the model for the game. You should also consider adding LODs to the model. As it stands right now, someone who were to use this in base JASP with a rather detailed Character model will definitely run into the Ghoul2 Transformspace error.

    

2. The textures could be improved a lot, while I love the base you have for your scope atm the whole gun could use some proper highlights and shadows, in a game as old as JKA having pre-lit textures is usually the best way to go. I'd also recommend to reduce that edgewear by a LOT. Right now it looks like someone disassembled the gun and purposefully evenly scratched all edges. Place your scratches strategically. The more Occluded an area is, the less scratched it should be. Take a look at this small hole, how did that get scratched around the entire perimeter? And that is just one small example, here's another. Who took a rather hard piece of metal, put it in that nook and scrubbed it over that things bottom edge? Place your wear in places where it makes sense. From looking at your textures I'd assume that you did infact bake an an Ambient Occlusion map, you could use that to help you find the occluded spots that'd see less wear. You can also use the same AO map as a guide for where to Paint dirt, because dirt is more likely to gather in the deeper crevices and occluded areas that are rarely scrubbed over by accident and difficult to clean due to limited accessibility. You also don't need a 4k map for this gun. Especially not for the world mesh. The World mesh can do fine with a 1*1k Map while the Viewmesh can get away with 2*1k map, seeing that you only need about half the UV space for half of the gun model.

    

3. you got some nasty UV distortion on the left side of the grip

    

This is all I got for the moment, if I dig further I can probably find some stuff to nitpick about but for now I'll let you focus on these bigger Issues.

 

Ok, I couldn't help myself and started working on the fixes right away. Here's some progress, I hope it shows. I'm going to add a lot of object detail to the textures and then work on the highlights and shadows by hand.

 

 

 

 

[AshuraDX]

Or you could try my smart material which handles highlights and shadows too

 

I'll really have to record a set up guide for it.

[Corto]

I will use your smart material, but I need to get back to speed, so I would rather manually paint some stuff for now.

[Corto]

Another update: Added a lot of small details (nuts, bolts, screws, washers, indentations, etc.). Also tuned some geometry and UVs.

 

 

 

 

 

Now onto the shadows and highlights, then a lower polycount world model and I'll be submitting and updated file.

[minilogoguy18]

[AshuraDX]

@@Corto I saw your update and took a closer look at the textures:
You replaced your base texture and got rid of that incredibly speckly and patchy galvanized metal texture and went with something a lot smoother - which I think is a step in the right direction. This makes the whole texture so much nicer to look at.

You also added quite a few more details to the texture which suffer from one problem - while you have a consistent light direction in your 2d texture, the light direction for the "venting holes" in the barrel as an example changes from being lit from the top to being lit from the bottom depending which side of the gun you are looking at. The edgewear is also still quite heavy and should be decreased further. Your textures are also still lacking in general lighting information and specularity

[Corto]

Hahaha, you noticed the venting holes, damn. By the time I finished duplicating and positioning, I didn't feel like fixing the lighting right there. But I will. I'll decrease the wear further, but I still want the gun to look battered and overused. I plan to use it on a mod and the battle weary gun tells a story. The specular light is still missing from the texture because I didn't do it yet. I'll probably delay the next update until I have everything sorted out.

[JAWSFreelao]

May I just possibly suggest that you make 2 versions? One clean and one dirty? I know it's a lot of effott but