Kilan Larsen
Ancient Knives
*High poly models scanned and provided in class
For this project I was provided two 3D scanned knives with extremely high polygon counts (over 1 million triangles on the first knife!). To actually use these models in a game, a low poly version of each knife needed to be modeled and textured. To do this, I brought the high poly models into Maya and set them as a live surface, and then used the quad-draw tool to create a low-poly version of each knife based on the geometry of the high-poly model. I added more edge loops and relaxed the vertices using the brush tool until I had an even distribution of around 1000 faces (or 2000 tris) per knife. Once the models were complete I UV mapped them by slicing them down lengthwise with the 3D cut and sew tool, and then unfolded the UV shells to fit on a 1k tile. Finally, I duplicated the low poly models and triangulated them before exporting as fbx files.
Next, I brought my low-poly models into Substance Painter and baked the high-poly mesh maps to generate a normal map, which added quite a bit of depth to the models (as seen in the photo to the right). After that I began adding my materials and masks, layering bone, steel, and a smooth black obsidian to the knives.
Then, the detail work. On the first knife I used an orange paint and a 'scratches' stencil to add lines of coloration in the obsidian, and added a light layer of dirt to the handle. On the second knife I modified the grunge on the steel blade to make it look more worn, and added a heavier layer of dirt using a generator to fill in the curves and cracks in the handle. This made it look like it had been buried and dug up. Finally I exported the albedo, metalic/smoothness, and normal maps for use in Unity.
With the knives modeled and textured, I imported the triangulated models and texture maps into Unity which was as simple as drag and drop. I then added the knives into the scene and created a material for them by applying their respective texture maps. After that, I imported the Post Processing Stack from the Asset Store in order to add some extra effects such as anti-aliasing, ambient occlusion, and bloom. The final result of this process is shown below:
