Soyuz addon and model

[zhar2]

Well i noticed in celestiamotherlode a Soyuz addon is missing so yesterday night i decided to model one, this is what i have so far:

Its the older soyuz, untextured atm but id love some feed back on the models accuracy and any tips on improving it.

felipe.

[ElChristou]

During the modeling of my TMA model (see here) I went over some docs of the first soyuz model and so far your work seems to be cool. How many poly so far?

[zhar2]

Well currently it has: 338003 faces according to blender.

[ElChristou]

Well currently it has: 338003 faces according to blender.

Yep, it's what I was thinking... (and still I suppose it is not triangulated, no? So if it's the case it's already a 600k+ model)
Do you realize that Celestia is a real time software?
Modeling for such soft is not the same as modeling to render a still. I don't recall well but despite having a quite nice rendering (no?) within Celestia, my model over (triangulated) was around 100/150k ...
Now, you must also think that not only the 3D part will be computed, but also the textures of the model and the ones of the planet down there. See what I mean?

Now of course you do what you want, but if you wish to model in the future for Celestia, you should perhaps think in how to optimize your model for real time 3D...

[zhar2]

oh i see, well i wasnt aware of that but id love if you could tell me how to drastically reduce that mumber without destroying the quality, or would i have to star over again?

i know i can reduce it by using normal maps on the model but im not sure if celestia supports normal maps on models.

well atleast i know now that ill have some trouble with the models im making for my andoria addon (some with are ove 1000k in faces).

[ElChristou]

Normal maps have not much to do with the geometry.
You could have a look at this tut that could give you some ideas.
Now in general think about how many poly will have each of your meshes during all the modeling process...

[zhar2]

right thanks, il be a while (and tedious) to sort and optimise the models.

[ElChristou]

Yep, it's why it's important to realize quickly the problems specific to real time rendering; then it become natural, you switch from real time modeling mode to still rendering mode depending on what you have to do...

[bh]

Looking great zhar2! keep going.