It’s been a while since my last post. I mean to update more often, but I don’t end up doing it enough.

Since my last one, I revised my shader a few times. I’ve finally got one that I’m finding to be a decent mix of stability and functionality. I haven’t changed too much from before; I’ve swapped out the procedurals for baked textures from them, though it doesn’t seem to make much difference. I also was annoyed with the way I was applying texture in the previous version all as one at the end. It makes more sense to texture the main and shadow colours before they’re ever seen. Other than that, it’s mostly the same.

I recently worked on a model of the Kaibacorp building for Millie. I decided I’d practice with it.

I applied the shader to it, and I’m quite satisfied with the results. It’s…..Not perfect, but better. It seems to work better on static objects than organic things like character models. It’s less tricky….Characters have a lot more than can trip you up, I find.

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I rendered two versions. One in standard perspective. The second is using a fake perspective on top of the usual one, made with the Lattice modifier. Faking perspective is very important to give it a 2d touch, so I wanted to experiment with it a bit. I should use a Mesh Deform in future, I think, for greater control, but the Lattice is quite useful. It’s quick and easy, whereas a Mesh Deform takes time to calculate. For this kind of perspective, I think it’s quite helpful. I could probably have exaggerated it more.

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I also tried applying it for an experiment to a character mesh I’ve been sculpting. I’m still struggling, unfortunately, with getting satisfactory, crisp character models. It’s the same problems….The eyes, the mouths, nails….Those small details. I could model them onto the retopo mesh and just not use a normal map, but it seems…..Reductive. I want to be able to capture those details, without having to have a huge polycount. There are some times when I might want to throw out the normal mapped detail, but I’d rather have it conveniently saved to a texture map the rest of the time. Lower poly meshes are easier to work with and perform better.

In this case, that’s a work in progress mesh of one of my D&D characters, Nagi, a half-orc wizard. I’ve had difficulty with the paper texture on grey colours; with my current settings, I found it was too dark, so I’ve recalibrated it. The way my shader applies paper texture and edge soak according to what colour is used couldn’t be called physically correct, I think. It’s certainly no simulation of real watercolour. I’m just going by what appears right, what looks and feels right based on what I’ve seen. I think that’s probably a better way to go about it, as far as art goes.

I want to work on the edge soak, though. It’s not very prominent there, and I’ve found at greater sizes it seems to just….Dissolve.

At any rate, I feel like I’m making progress. I want to be able to update more soon.