WEAPON MODELLING: LOW POLY MODEL

          I overcome the hurdle I had yesterday. As it turns out, all I had to do was save the model as a 3Ds Max 2012 format. Unfortunately  that meant I needed the 2013 version only available in University for some strange reason.   

    Anyhow, after finishing the development of the high polygon model and tidying up its topology. I needed to take the high poly model, and remove the majority of its supporting topology to create the low polygon model. The reason for this is because the next stage of development is the UV Mapping and baking.

    Eventually I'll do this by projecting the maps of the high polygon model onto the low polygon model, to give the illusion that the low polygon model is in fact the highly detailed high polygon model. This is why I need both versions - to help with mapping, texturing and rendering.

    Now the cleaning of the topology was done, I deleted the supporting topology, ensuring that no vertices or edges crucial to the weapons base shape were removed. What was left (as shown below) is a weapon model with less tris and less detail, but a weapon that would run faster in an engine, saving processing space for more details in-game. The final Low Poly model is below.

ORIGINAL DESIGN - REFERENCE
by Christian Whelan

WEAPON MODELLING - LOW POLY
by Christian Whelan

All I need to do now is bake the high poly model to the low poly model. Then I can paint the texture and add the diffuse and specular maps.

NEXT POST: WEAPON MODELLING - TEXTOOL UV MAPPING ISSUES