Photogrammetry Test 5 - Apple Void Shooting Part 3

    Today I moved on to the final steps of getting this model into a render ready state, or a game ready state if I had simplified the mesh even further.

    I first took the model into Maya in order to reorient and resize the model properly.

    Also at this point I decided to fix the issue with the underside of the mesh which can be seen in previous posts. Unfortunately I forgot to screenshot this process, however I used the sculpting tools in Maya to smooth the surface down as the geometry in that area was little bumpy, for lack of a better term. I then used the Remesh feature in Maya to redistribute the triangles of the mesh as the area was lacking poly definition compared to the rest of the mesh. This brought the model's final count down to around 170,000 triangles. Which again I could have potentially reduced further but since I wanted to test the model I didn't want to ruin the geometry.

I then exported out the model and imported it into Substance painter. This last process was fairly quick as it was just a case of adding in the already made colour map and normal map that RealityCapture exported out with the model.

    I forgot to mention that when creating the textures within RealityCapture, the software actually unwraps the UV's of the model for you. While not the perfect unwrap it definitely cuts down a lot of time spent having to unwrap UV's yourself. And since the texture aligns perfectly with the unwrap you don't have any seams on the model. The only issue I did find when testing this out is dependant on the material you would then notice the seams of the model very clearly, so if this asset was to be reused or retextured to fit a certain theme or aesthetic then perhaps it would be best to manually unwrap the model in Maya.

  The base lighting in Substance really starts to do the model and textures a lot of justice. As you can see to what I described earlier, there are no visible seams because of how the texture is split up. Also the base colour layer is very flatly lit which is perfect, I think this was more just luck as I know there were some specular highlights cast from the ring flash but I didn't manually remove these in any step of the process. I know it will be by chance if I recreate this result on other objects with different material types. 

    I also fixed the last bit of the black underside texture in Substance simply by clone stamping the surrounding texture into the black to cover it up and honestly it did a really good job and the area just looks like a natural deformity of the apple itself.

    The final step was to do some fully rendered images of the apple in Iray, setting up better lighting, background, etc... In order to really show off the model and the end result.

    Again I am so relieved and over joyed at the result I have ended up with after only a few weeks of failing and trying different methods to achieve a model of this quality, it has really furthered my understanding of the process of photogrammetry and the role it can play within the industry and game art.

    Since I have achieved this result, the next steps are to attempt other objects to see if I can recreate the results and improve on the timescale of getting it game ready. I will say however if I were to attempt to manually model this it would probably take me weeks to achieve a realistic quality of this nature so to have it done in the course of 3 or so days is pretty mind blowing.