why not improve ogre's art content ?

[jacmoe]

I have witnessed talk and talk and talk, and seen a lot of concepts, but so far the Jerky Ogre is the only one approaching reality.
I like it a lot.

I like the OGRE head, I love it - that is OGRE to me.
But it is not a complete Ogre character - characters have bodies, which you can animate through a skeleton.

The Jerky Ogre has the potential to become, ever so slowly, a part of official OGRE art.

[Falagard]

Sure, but the Ogre does have a body:

http://www.powerrender.com/2006/powerre ... y/pic1.jpg

I'm saying if (a big IF) we can use the full Ogre character with the Ogre head that is already the logo and the body then that'd be the best bet.

[jacmoe]

Yes, but that requires the full body, doesn't it?
IIRC, that body is on one of the early 3d studio CDs. Maybe the first version of MAX?
What makes me sceptical about digging out that body is how Digimation is able to sell it. Maybe they are the original owners?
They better be.

[Jerky]

Im with you on that Falagard. I could detail that thing like crazy in ZBrush, to make it stand up against that Unreal3 engine character. Either solution gets us to what we want, and yours is easier (and lets me continue pouring my time into PW) . Either way, I'm game if you are.

[jacmoe]

Besides, the dear OGRE head would like a friend.

Agree that the head is for OGRE like Suzanne is for Blender.

[jacmoe]

Jerky, you posted in between: Sure, if it is legal. We should check how they are able to sell that Ogre. If it is copyrighted, it would be bad business - if the license is open: we can do whatever we want. (Including selling it!)

[Falagard]

Jacmoe, perhaps you missed my post on the previous page:

Ya, I remember reading that, and tracked down the thread. It links to a Digimation product, and I further tracked it down to belonging to Viewpoint Digital. I've sent them an email (without referring to Ogre in case just using the rendered head could get us in trouble) asking whether it's okay to use the Ogre model in renders and computer games since it came with an old version of Character Studio.

I figured I'd ask, the worst they can say is "no", or "yes but only if you have a Character Studio license" and maybe they'll even say "sure no problem".

Digimation is a reseller of Viewpoint Digital's meshes. If you look at the Digitmation page for that Troll you'll see it's name is VPXXX (some number) standing for Viewpoint.

[jacmoe]

I missed that, sorry.

If they are being reluctant, maybe they would be interested in the publicity OGRE provides?

[Lee04]

The last rendering is just a print screen from ZBrush that’s why the edges are jaggy. The Head is not on the model just "printed"on top of the body’s within Zbrush to.

The extra "outer organ" does make a good effect if you look at the Ogre from front/side angles. It makes the belly stand out because it's so far in….
And it produces a sense of heavyness and care-less-nees of self.

And personally I like Heavy Metal …the magazine and I couldn't imagine that magazines characters with out there organs

I am working on a version of the Ogre that will go with a real skin shader not a plastic looking or cartoon looking skin…

Where you would be able to see individual pours and wrinkles.
And the light gets shattered in the skin.
Like the NVidias mermaid demo that uses 17 passes....


One idea is that it will have the cartoonist Ogre head as a relief on it’s shield or flag so there will be a link to the Ogre logo somewhere.

The rigging and animation should not be rigged like a plastic doll but rather the fat should wobble and stretch naturally and the animation should show of it's weight and strength correctly, not just move.

I do use a high-resolution model and a low-resolution model I built.
Infact I first start in 3DSMax with the low-resolution model modeling in the details in ZBrush exports it's low polygon model to max afterwards,
UV map that in Max using Pelf tool as one large UV chunk.
Then return the low polygon model to Z Brush and get the new UVs there.

Then I run the ZMapper to produce the normal map, I vertically flip the texture and normal map texture so I cn try it in Max with a normal map shader in Ofusion on the low polygon model.

But sure I can take in the old existing models and do the same things on it if you want me to.

I just think all the other ogres are too cartoonish for a realistic rendered and animated demo.

And yes my model looks a bit like melted plastic, I am just learning ZBrush as I go along. And I haven’t yet detailed the hands and feet due to the fact I haven’t learned how to move the central rotation point on partly isolated parts of the body I want to work with, so when I work on a hand and rotate the view it rotates around the body which makes it hard. I just downloaded a ZBrush plug-in that lets me project edited and shaped photos from different angles this I will use to project hand/feet displacement details from real persons and maybe use it to add realistic details to the head and body.

And I am using the TOO detailed Ogre body version see my message above for this rendering, the original is cleaner, not so detailed / melted. I can always use the smooth brush to take a way detail in some areas.

The question should be: Should we make a DX7 demo or a DX9 demo art for Ogre?

And how do we make a cartoonish / unreal3 demo art version of an Ogre?

Where realism meets Ogre loggo character.

Then again my vesion has never been a contender for the loggo part it's inteended for a realistic demo that would look nice and display what Ogre can do in terms of animation, rendering and effects.

[jacmoe]

Maybe that cartoonish look is what we want.

Besides: we can't really argue, because the OGRE head is quite established as a symbol now.

Take a look at Shrek and the dancing Ogre demo from the nVidia site - they are cartoonish(ish).

If you want to showcase your art: monsters are in great demand!

[Jerky]

To defend the cartoonish look, I agree, but it was just a quick render with Blender's internal renderer. If finished, I doubt mine would look much like those renders at all. Detail is yet to come.

[Lee04]

What art should have is

WEIGHT, form. balance. contrast, depth.
And tt should use the medium fully to it's advantage.

[jacmoe]

Lee04: I am not arguing that OGRE doesn't need next generation art, I agree with you there.

[Lee04]

On the first topic, that Unreal Engine 3 character... It's something we've been talking about a lot here in my game design class circles. (Sorry if someone's already explained this but I've missed it).

UE3's taking a new approach when it comes to normal/displacement mapping characters, and that is the result there. With UE3 what you'll do is create two models: 1) a high-poly model with a half to one million (maybe more) polys and 2) a low-poly model of ~10k... something reasonable for an engine. You'll then feed those two models into a program that will spit out a normal/displacement map (I'm hazy on if it's an actual displacement map or a normal map with parallax mapping) that will fit on the low-poly model and make it look like the high-poly model when in game.

That screenshot there is a tech demo rendering, so it could likely be a pre-rendered thing and it might be the high-poly version, but I'm willing to give Epic the benefit of the doubt that it'll be realtime and low-poly by the time the engine starts coming out (mid-late this year).

The other big thing about that image is the lighting, and that's basically just a shader thing. I have no doubt that you could make something in Ogre look like that if your models, textures, maps, lighting, shaders and necessary c++ coding is good enough. That's just a hell of a lot of effort, though, and most likely more than us amateur developers are able/willing to give.

You can see my point if you download and install RenderMonkey, ATI's free shader development environment: a few of their example projects use a model similar to that Athena one, and there's one in particular in which it looks stunning (Ambient Occlusion for DX9 and OpenGL). And all it is a good normal-mapped object with real good shaders.

Yes this is exactly what I do for this character. Although I don't use so highly poly counts on the low polygon version as Unreal3 version. But I can bump it up easily, but I have another plan.

I have the ability to move vertices inside 3DSMax and I think even add new ones without destroying the UV mapping which means I can add detail where I need them rather than just have a heavier mesh. I will use this to get the shapes where I need them.

I also have a version of the old Shader tool that no longer is availble on the market that allows me to define shaders using a schematic system, a highlevel and low level schemas and it produces CG, HLSL and FX code.

Although I would like to get Rendermonkey to import these fx files so I can use Rendermonkey to export to Ogre materials...

But rather I want Ofusion to directlly update and import FX shaders as fast as they are changed/resaved.





Here is the UV mapping of the Ogre body in one chunk which optimizes the tri stripping so the vertex cash in the GPU works more effecientlly.
The emty areas around it I will use for props to the Ogre later.



3DSMax pelf tool is a charm to work with. What used to take days is done in minutes.

Here is the seams I draw in max.



Here is the normal map:



All in all I think it willl look great ones it's ready.

I have animated some stuff before see so I think I can animate this one as well.

[Jerky]

And personally I like Heavy Metal …the magazine and I couldn't imagine that magazines characters with out there organs

Someone just explained to me what you were really talking about. I thought you were talking about the music. To each his own, I guess. I don't really envision porn when designing characters, nor would I think it would be very good for any of the Ogre tech demos to include a character like that. Kind of contradicting if you ask me, since you state your purpose is to provide exactly that (better demo art).

[jacmoe]

Looking forward to seeing what both of you can come up with!

[Lee04]

I think leaving out Dolnads Ducks intimate body parts are ok sense he is a bird and that part on birds aren’t visible anyway.

I from Sweden and I do not practice your religion
If you ever seen old paintings and classical Greek statues that was used in public places where there is a lot of nudeness.
The Muslims smashed the statues faces because they didn't allow people to portray faces of people or people. That's why they have art that are just patterns....

If I should take care about what’s acceptable then my Ogre demo art should be patterns?

[Jerky]

@Lee04: I disappoint myself in continuing to try when it is futile. Forget any advice I have ever given you, it is useless anyways.

[Lee04]

@Jerky: No don't give up on me rather please tell me what parts of the Ogre makes it looks more like an Ogre and less melted.So I can make the correct changes. Critticsism should allways be constructive.

We just have different approches, I like a fat natural looking Ogre with a lot of curved surfaces that scatters light in an intersting way and you like a fit cartoonish Ogre. It's just two different things.

I tend to think of th fit looking meshes as very suitable for lowpoly characters. While I am trying to make a character that really can use a lot of polygons and shatter light in manny different directions with it's curved surfaces.

And yes I can be hopeless to agrue with, but please never mind that.

[Jerky]

[Lee04]

OK detailing and now trying colors for the head.



The body has yet to get more details as skin pors etc.



Still WIP.

[Phantom]

that head looks like fun in RT with shaders
good job.

[Lee04]

that head looks like fun in RT with shaders

Yes it will be fun in RT with shaders... but right now it's "only" a screen dump from Righthemispheres Deep paint 3D tool.

[Jerky]

@Falagard: Any word from them on whether we can use the head and body?

[Lee04]

I just finished this game ready model of the head in 3DSMax.
I had to do it for several reasons.

* Face animation
* Eye lids and rigging
* Nicer mesh
* Correct UV mapping with hidden seams, Z Brush didn't collaborate with Max for the UV mapping this time. Like it did with the body mesh.

It's a pain if you start out modeling something in Z Brush without importing a game ready mesh. Here is mine, but I had to create it now "after the fact" since I didn't know the exact shape when I started out.

But hey, here it is.

I had no luck exporting the obj forth and back between ZBrush and 3DSMax to make a nice pelf mapping for the head, Max twisted the order of vertices in the file so Z Brush couldn't go back to the higher LODS.

And even if that worked the Z Brush version of the low polygon head had jaggy lips edges and the polygons didn't line up around mouth and eyes for face animation.

So I decided to use ZBrush uv mapping for the normal map creation using ZMapper. So know I have one normal mapped model with no good polygons for face animation and bad UV seams. And I have the new "low polygon" head for face animation with a good RT pelf mapping and good seams.

How do I get the textures and normal maps and other maps from one to the other??

Well I have this idea I testing 3DSMax render cage can be used to many things. Projecting over textures for one? But does the normal map survive this treatment? Stay tuned....