Can you release all the cubemaps you've made in png or tiff format, since JPG format for stuff like this is you know...

most (plus some) cubemaps that I kept on my harddrive. in 1024x768 .png format~
http://filebeam.com/5aeb86a27ec0962832bffe495cd5019b

Edited by master noob on Jan 10, 2013 at 07:56 PM

halo 3 sky in my With_Whiteness map









With_Whiteness finish for Halo Full !
http://forum.halomaps.org/index.cfm%3Fpage=topic&topicID=40419&start=211

Dude that's pretty bawss.

Why is the Ark possessed?...

99% of the Ark's ecosystem is based on mages and wizards.

I'm guess that you got your inspiration from the Library.

I'd say 6. Must...refrain...from se7en Definitely seeing the b40 inspiration; first thing that popped in my mind.

Things I think you did well:

The central pillar in between the two sentinel tubes.

The two pillars flanking what appears to be the entrance.

The inclusion of sentinel tubes.

The central, quintessential mysterious shaft.

The floor detail (the two strips of detail flanking the shaft).

The overall shape of the room.

The wall-to-floor chamfering.

Things I think you could improve:

More "regular" patterns and insets. By regular I mean along the lines of 45 or 90 degree cuts and angles.

More detail around the two short pillars on either side of the shaft.

Those two struts connecting the short pillars; why? They stand out too much.

Needs some ceiling detail. Simple or complex.

Toss in a few areas that appear suitable for holographic controls or create some inaccessible geometry (for example, a simple extrusion behind a wall, shielded by alpha grate. Common materials for this inaccessible detail are tech dense circuits, metal panels generator, and even basic materials like metal strips narrow. See b30 for great examples, or, if you have Halo 2, play Sacred Icon.

Most of this feedback is a bit guesswork, as I am assuming this is not nearly the final build of your design. But hopefully my feedback, and the feedback of others, will find a use in your work. Overall, though, I like it. It definitely has the potential for displaying some vastly imaginative and new ideas while still drawing inspiration from classic Forerunner examples and staying true to the standard design themes. CE needs more sexy Forerunner views and structures.

Halo CE needs more attention.

Try and stay away from beveling/extruding. Extruding is okay sometimes but this needs some attention.
Take some serious attention to the already made Halo bsp's. Since most of the Halo game's tend to have different kinds of forerunner tech, make sure you take examples from whatever game that inspired you to design. Halo 1 is easier because you can just observe the ripped bsps.

Another thing is something I like to call is attention to detail. You wanna set yourself up to have 3 levels of detail in a bsp. The first is the geometry the player will be playing on and whatnot, this would be the most detailed parts of your level(usually), areas that are for decoration that can't be reached I try to make the player "think" it's just as detailed as the rest, when it's actually more optimized then the other geometry. The third is normally the very far decorations and whatnot it the level (think of a30 with the 2d trees). Sometimes you can actually getting away with modeling some very complex geometry, rendering it out, and putting it on a plane for a far-distant object.

This picture is just all over the place. You have a very low-poly environment with some small complexity in some pieces. Make it all equal out as I said above, this is just plain bad flow right here.

Trust me, if you Rip b40, a30, c20, or even c10, you will learn alot just by looking at how they modeled their objects, and how you can implement those techniques into your own:)
Hope this helped.

Ah, that does look a lot better than the other pic you showed.

Reminds me of Cryo B. I haven't seen much in the way of human modeling (and as far as Halo is concerned, I suck at human modeling; Forerunner is my domain). Easily the best custom human BSP portion I've seen, though it isn't busy enough. Needs more pipes. Grime. Tech. Maintenance access points. The hallways and main rooms look kind of bare; from what I've seen, human interiors are busy, exposed (but easily accessible for repairs) and filthy, a stark contrast to the smooth, carpeted interiors of the Enterprise with which I am more familiar.

I think you should make more use of the cut tool to create more interesting shapes. Most of your shapes are simple insets that are extruded inwards. Cut out a more interesting shape, use a simple extrude and bevel the edges a bit. Now, getting interesting shapes is the hard part :-)

balls of steel. and by that, I mean a cubemap for steel materials maybe.

still trying to figure out a model to use as a cubemap previewer; one that isn't too complicated like a biped or a helmet, and isn't too simple like a sphere or a box.
Edited by master noob on Jan 13, 2013 at 11:48 PM

What about the magnum?

not bad, but that ain't forerunner.

Using bevel extrude and such isn't a bad thing, it's just things shouldn't solely be made with bevel and extrude. My recomendation is to look at all the concept art from h1 on up and see what is similar through all of them about forerunner architecture.
I will probably have a tutorial out sometime in the near future on how I do it.
But anyway, look at the concept art, and ingame too, but the best stuff is the concepts. After looking at that, try and think how something like that could be replicated using the tools you know how to use.
Extruding and beveling are tools I actually use a LOT in my modeling, it's just you need to know what to do with an extrude and a bevel to make them fit with the style you are going for.

Might I recommend try and find a good plane modeling tutorial. I pretty much only ever use plane modeling as the basis for all my modeling.

Going to make a complete video tutorial on making cubemaps later.


Edited by Maniac1000 on Jan 15, 2013 at 12:16 AM

Those look good for skin,

There are tons of programs and plugins and techniques for this but i am trying to get as much variance and ease of use as possible, using the basic 3ds max and other free programs.

is this a good cubemap preview setup, or should I just go pure magnum?

Edited by master noob on Jan 15, 2013 at 11:21 PM

I think you can take out the Wraith.

pure magnum!
Edited by OrangeJuice on Jan 16, 2013 at 01:45 PM

Where is your 4k limit now? Muahahahahha 4k is limit per cell, whole map seems to have no limit


Edited by altis94 on Jan 16, 2013 at 05:04 PM

what is a good resolution for an app? trying to make a cubemap previewer app for practice.

100px X 100px
Edited by SilentJacket on Jan 17, 2013 at 12:02 AM

it's in 3d; loading custom models, textures, and cubemaps are a priority. I doubt all that info can be stored in 10,000 pixels.

1920x1080

oh, I thought you meant a preview icon

in that case, can we have retina support? (2880x1800)
Edited by SilentJacket on Jan 17, 2013 at 12:34 AM

on a completely unrelated note, can models be used as muzzle flashes?

What's the point unless you going to freeze time and fly around.

muzzle flashes are too short an animation to be worth polies probably. Looks cool granted, but it may be a little overkill. :P

It could be really cool for machinima, though?

If it's possible, I would go ahead and make it usable. Anything we make now could be useful in the future, right?

Yes but it's useless, halo's effects changes by the angle to look better

Exactly. If you go into an SP map and fire the AR and hit the dev key, type in "game_speed 0" "debug_camera_save" and "debug_camera_load". Now hit the key again and you can fly around and see all the pretty particles from the AR's firing effect.