The reason i chose the revolver was because it was very visually and mechanically interesting. I wanted to make a hard surface piece of artwork that was not only dynamic but fresh. I originally picked an antique model dated back to the 1600-1700 during the American frontier.
It was until I stumbled upon image A. that gave me the idea to do a futuristic take on it. The new revolvers made by smith and Wesson are now able to have attachment mounts for scopes and lasers. Let’s just say some of the combinations border on the ridiculous.
Using high resolution pictures i was ab le to make decisions on the materials and how the object would be worn and torn. The way objects are used determines where they will show their wear and tear.
For example the revolver chamber is constantly getting removed for bullets. there is metal grind grime and grunge in the area where the revolver interlocks with the gun body.
BLOCKING
I can’t express enough of the importance of modeling to the reference and double checking the silhouette. A good way to do this is to turn your shader texture black in order to keep yourself true to the overall shape
LASER
SCOPE
I made the text using the text ARIAL in 3ds max. Max is usually really good about reading font files. I made the text floaters since I am going to bake it all onto a low poly mesh.
Utilize floaters to save time not as a modeling crutch.
UVW
When optimizing a low polygon mesh for baking and rendering it is important to keep a few things in mind.
I like to model the low polygon mesh without smoothing groups, this helps me see silhouette and shape variation better.
45 degree angles are better than 90 degree angles for your normal map calculations
I have tried, crazy bump, and ndo 2 and found the x-normal filter to be the best. It is free and it comes with a normal map filter for photoshop.
FATAI 