LarryG on 13/10/2012 at 14:22
Excellent!~
Re. kwgrain2, part of the problem with the original texture is the seeming lack of symetry, that is, the left border seems wider than the right border, as though the panel were not centered in the texture. Similarly the top and bottom are asymmetric in the original. The bottom is border is thicker than the top. The question is what to do about those asymmetries. I think that you need to try two alternatives. 1) You should try to take a middle ground and make the borders a little wider on all sides so that the panel remains centered, and all four borders are a little off, too wide on the right and too narrow on the left, too wide on top and too narrow on the bottom. 2) you should duplicate the asymmetries exactly. Then show us both alternatives to fuss over.
Asymmetry aside, I think the depth of color still needs improvement. The blues should be darker and the orange richer. I thnk there is too much bare wood showing on the central panel, and that changes the colors.
Nameless Voice on 13/10/2012 at 15:03
Xorax, can you supply some lossless versions of your textures?
The same applies to everyone: once you're happy with a texture, make sure to upload a lossless version (e.g. PNG or PSD format), so that I can add it to the archive!
ZylonBane on 13/10/2012 at 15:18
Quote Posted by LarryG
Well if ZB wants, who am I to argue?
I can't see much difference. The highlights on the tiles are still pretty obviously in the shape of large blurred squares.
Yandros on 13/10/2012 at 15:37
The page looks fine to me, NV. Simple but should serve us well. I've already made a 256x256 version of catacomb>hammer1.gif for the HMDK (well the iconography, not the background) so I may try making a much larger version.
ZylonBane on 13/10/2012 at 16:33
Quote Posted by Renzatic
edit 2: Whew. Besides critiques and tiling, I think I'm done. What do you all think?
Since the perception of light and dark are so important in Thief, I let the histogram be my guide once the basic details of a replacement texture are matched. The current texture is noticeably brighter than the original. Also, it's clearly top-lit, while the original seems to be front-lit. This could cause it to look weird in some lighting configurations.
LarryG on 13/10/2012 at 18:01
Quote Posted by ZylonBane
I can't see much difference. The highlights on the tiles are still pretty obviously in the shape of large blurred squares.
I don't see that at all. I did use halo softening of the original for color distribution, but no blurring, and to me there are no blurred squares at all to be seen. The highlights are from various other texture layers for luminescence and surface texture. I think it will look great as a drop-in replacement.
Renzatic on 13/10/2012 at 18:56
Alright. Changes noted, and working on it now.
There is one aside I want to bring up about the colors. At one point, I had it more closely matching the original, and thought it was kinda ugly looking. Like the original has an almost painterly look to it. Dark purple paint on orange-red wood look alright there. You're more accepting of weird color combinations in paintings and cartoons. Throw those colors on a more photorealistic texture though, and it ends up looking almost surreal.
Devils advocate, it might be possible the colors are fine, and surface details I've got in there don't lend themselves well to those particular shades. But it's also very possible that colors that look fine on more vague textures won't necessarily look good on higher res ones.
I'll see what I can do. I'll have a proportion redo and a color remix coming up in an hourish.
Renzatic on 13/10/2012 at 20:48
Panel adjusted (still got to fix that middlemost piece, as it's not perfectly square in the original), color tweaked, and gave it a generic lightsource. It's kinda sloppy at the moment, but a few tweaks, cuts, and dabs should fix that.
Inline Image:
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3018396/Panel_Example_O.jpgInline Image:
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3018396/Panel_Example_3.jpgRemoving the lightsource makes it look sorta plain to me, but it is a closer match now.
edit: gonna add in some dark stains along the edges and center piece.
edit 2: I think it's kinda ugly and undetailed looking now, but it's pretty close to be proportionally correct, and the colors match as close as I can get them without looking too garish.
Nameless Voice on 13/10/2012 at 22:11
Quote Posted by LarryG
I don't see that at all. I did use halo softening of the original for color distribution, but no blurring, and to me there are no blurred squares at all to be seen. The highlights are from various other texture layers for luminescence and surface texture. I think it will look great as a drop-in replacement.
This is what ZB means:
Inline Image:
http://i49.tinypic.com/33mpe9u.jpgYou can see the square pattern from the original tile on the new tile.
LarryG on 14/10/2012 at 00:15
I don't see the highlights as square at all. They
are the same general shape in outline as the original, but that's the point. That's what I was going for. It is supposed to be a drop in replacement. But there are no straight edges like in the original. If you decrease the resolution to the same as the original the new texture should look almost identical to the original. That's what a drop in replacement should do. But no, there are no straight lines like you have drawn. Use it or not. I like it.
Quote Posted by Renzatic
Panel adjusted (still got to fix that middlemost piece, as it's not perfectly square in the original), color tweaked, and gave it a generic lightsource. It's kinda sloppy at the moment, but a few tweaks, cuts, and dabs should fix that.
Inline Image:
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3018396/Panel_Example_O.jpgInline Image:
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3018396/Panel_Example_3.jpgRemoving the lightsource makes it look sorta plain to me, but it is a closer match now.
edit: gonna add in some dark stains along the edges and center piece.
edit 2: I think it's kinda ugly and undetailed looking now, but it's pretty close to be proportionally correct, and the colors match as close as I can get them without looking too garish.
I think it's much better, but still not enough blue paint in the center, especially on the center panel. The thing is, the texture doesn't need to be either to your taste or to my taste, it needs to be a drop in replacement. Try this test: scale your replacement down to the same scale as the original. Do they look like twins? Do they even look like brothers? If not, back to work on the hi-res version. Then scale it down and test again. The colors are what they are. The proportions are what they are. We are trying to figure out what the lost details are, not reinterpret what the original should have looked like.
Edit: I took your texture and mucked about with it, and this is more what I meant:
[ATTACH=CONFIG]1308[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]1306[/ATTACH]
or maybe this (slightly better match for the original's panel proportions, maybe)
[ATTACH=CONFIG]1308[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]1307[/ATTACH]
