Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
Tips and Tricks
Be sure that when getting rid of the edges that are no longer needed that
those edges as they continue down the size and bottom of the shape are
deleted as well. Additionally, watch for left-over vertices that should be
selected and deleted as well.
Step 17:
Repeat and optimize throughout right corners (
Figure 2.19
).
Figure 2.19
Optimized corners.
Why?
Looking at
Figure 2.19
, you can count four four-sided polygons that
were involved in the three right angle turns the shape made. This
makes for eight tris. Compare that with the seven four-sided polys
that were there before (14 tris), and you can see how this sort of
optimization can whittle down a polycount in a hurry. Ultimately
there are some tradeoffs you have to make. It takes a bit of time
to optimize, and if you're taking too much time out to optimize
you're eating into your creation time. However, I find that if I do a
bit of obvious optimizing as I go, it saves me from hours of painful
optimization later.
Step 18:
Delete the polygons along the bottom. We don't see them, we
don't need them, get rid of them.
There is certainly some other optimization that can be done here, but we have
looked at the basic techniques that are used to make a lean, mean mesh. Feel
free to further optimize, but for now we'll move on.
Step 19:
Add the lip to inside of the channel. Select the faces as shown
in
Figure 2.20
(the faces that are along the inside of the channel into the
mountain), and use the Extrude tool to extrude them out just a small bit.
This will create a new collection of faces along the dock top. Select these
and extrude up to create the lip.
Step 20:
Duplicate and place the column roughly as shown in
Figure 2.21
.
Yes, I realize it would be better to UV map the column first before
duplicating it. And in fact, these columns we are placing now will
undoubtedly be deleted and replaced by duplicates that are UV mapped.
However, placing these here allow for some important placement of items
in the upcoming steps.
