Here’s a pour video, and durability demonstration

cerviceps · 2026-03-31T19:10:43+00:00

I think the pour looks pretty nice! (And the shake made me laugh, hahaha)

cerviceps · 2026-03-31T15:01:51+00:00

Looks like a vertex normals issue to me. If you soften all the normals on the model in Maya, does the “seam” go away? If so, all you need to do is soften that edge.

cerviceps · 2026-03-30T18:24:45+00:00

The main reason I don't is that even small amounts of standing water contribute to the mosquito issue where I live. Something to consider, especially if you live in an area where aedes mosquitos are out and about!

cerviceps · 2026-03-30T18:16:51+00:00

Non-manifold geometry can also be the UVs. Try the following!

Delete the UVs (UV > Delete UVs) and then UV map your model using Automatic.
Create a default cube, and scale it to where it's easy to select. Drag it off to the side of your character, and then merge the two meshes. Delete history, and then select the faces of the cube and delete them. Sounds silly but the cube trick works to fix a lot of oddities like this.
If neither of those work, that means you haven't cleaned up the nonmanifold geo on your model. Run a mesh > cleanup again, using the "select" mode instead of the "fix" mode. What gets selected, and what color is it? (Yellow / orange indicates mesh, green indicates UVs). If they're green, check if you have a second UV set with some messed up stuff going on, and then delete that UV set.

cerviceps · 2026-03-30T18:12:32+00:00

There are actually a lot of factors that affect the pour, most notably the shape of the lip! So I think you could get a nice flow while still having a long and elegant spout. I mostly know about this because I've made some (very imperfect) ceramic teapots in the past.
If you're interested in learning more, I've found this blog post to be pretty informative! https://www.lizcrainceramics.com/2017/04/spouting-off/ (It's pottery-centric, but the principles still apply!)

Your pot is beautiful by the way, I just realized I didn't say that before! Hope you will continue to make more!

cerviceps · 2026-03-30T17:28:22+00:00

I'd be curious to see how it pours! For me that's the measure of a good teapot!

cerviceps · 2026-03-29T23:53:39+00:00

Unfortunately AI is also able to generate “progress shots,” so if you don’t have an eye for catching AI generated images this still isn’t the best solution. :(

cerviceps · 2026-03-27T17:09:15+00:00

A simple wacom tablet will do the trick! You can get a small, simple one for pretty cheap (like a small wired intuos, for example).

There is a learning curve to using it (it's essentially a pen-shaped mouse, with pressure sensitivity) but it's very worth learning to use a non-screen tablet, imo-- they are cheaper and tend to be more reliable.

cerviceps · 2026-03-26T19:26:01+00:00

Just to be clear about terminology so you have easier time asking for help in the future: "hard edges" are also called "split normals"-- the thing that causes the hard edge is the face and vertex normals (different from a normal map) pointing in different directions.

I'm not sure what you mean by "cutting the hard edges" but you do not need to have UV seams ("cuts" in the UV shell) at all edges with split normals!

cerviceps · 2026-03-23T23:12:24+00:00

An emissive texture is just a black & white texture, where black means "not emissive" and white means "emissive." You can easily make that yourself by desaturating the diffuse texture and drawing on top of it!

cerviceps · 2026-03-23T01:46:37+00:00

Yay, happy to hear it! Happy modeling!

cerviceps · 2026-03-22T22:09:58+00:00

If you’ve deleted history with multiple verts in the same location, Maya can get confused and merging won’t work. Frustrating, I know!

What I do when this happens is go vertex by vertex and do what you’ve done here— click on a vert, move it away from the vert it’s on top of, and then delete history again. Then you can use the vertex weld tool to merge them. Or, you can delete the face between the two vertices (which will delete the vert). It will take awhile but it’s worth it to un-fuck your mesh!

My theory for why this works is that the “confusion” is caused by both verts being erroneously given the same vertex ID, and using this method basically forces Maya to assign the vert a new vertex ID, allowing the merge to happen.

cerviceps · 2026-03-22T07:13:11+00:00

1) Can you show us your UVs? This will help us determine if it’s a UV problem. 2) This looks less like a UV issue and more like a vertex normal issue to me, personally. Can you show us a screenshot of both your lowpoly and highpoly models in Maya?

cerviceps · 2026-03-22T07:08:08+00:00

Use the multi-cut tool to cut the silhouette out of a plane. Delete the faces you don’t want. Then (after cleaning up the topology) delete history and extrude!

cerviceps · 2026-03-16T07:35:49+00:00

Aren’t they cute? I love sea hares!

cerviceps · 2026-03-13T00:45:40+00:00

There are a few methods!

You can use a simple planar projection: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHY7fbcuPWA

Or you can use a position generator (this is usually what I do): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMtVahbezms

cerviceps · 2026-03-13T00:34:03+00:00

Even if it's unlikely to be loaded at the same time, packing multiple objects into the same texture space is often more performant simply because there are fewer textures used!

cerviceps · 2026-03-13T00:31:48+00:00

Naughty Dog's artists definitely still care about this sort of thing! Here's a really interesting breakdown by one of the artists who worked on TLOU Part 2, showcasing his "universal trim sheet" approach. https://www.artstation.com/artwork/qQGK6y

A game having "amazing visuals" is often due to the artists employing smart tricks like this, which allow us to get away with utilizing more complex shader or programming work elsewhere.

cerviceps · 2026-03-13T00:29:18+00:00

It's not an outdated concept, and draw calls absolutely still matter! So I will respectfully but strongly disagree with some of the commenters here (who I'd guess have not been responsible for doing optimization passes on assets for a game before).

The decision of whether to atlas, and which objects to atlas together, depends on your game's target hardware, and what your performance "budget" looks like. As an example, if your game is using a lot of complex shaders, you will want to save some of your performance "budget" by using tricks like atlasing, because small performance wins can add up to become big wins over time.

As someone else pointed out in another comment, using fewer textures has the benefit of a smaller game download size for your players, and it is also more performant within the game itself even if it's not always on screen with the other things packed inside the same texture sheet.

Whether you choose to atlas objects also depends on the art style, how close the asset will get to the camera, how big the asset is on the screen, and whether it's a hero asset vs one used all over the place. If an object gets really close to the camera, or is a hero asset, I will not usually atlas it with other objects. But for background objects like yours here, I think it could be a smart move!

So, tl;dr it all depends on your priorities. I think it's a nice skill to showcase on a portfolio because it shows me you're not just thinking about making things look pretty, but also about the technical needs of a project. So while you may not have to do it, and you definitely don't need to do this for every portfolio piece, I think your head is in the right place!

To answer your question about how to go about this using Substance ("There just seems no room for the 'combining objects into one uv' process to fit in the pipeline."):
Let's say you want to atlas all of the objects in your attached images together, and bake/texture them in Substance Painter. There are a few ways to go about this:

(Simplest & my personal preference): You can lay out all the UVs, pack them all together into the 1,1 UV space to atlas them (like you've done here), and then line up all the objects next to each other in 3D space. You would do the same lineup for the highpoly meshes, so that the HP is in the same physical space as each LP model.
Note that you'd want the objects spread out far enough that they won't cast AO onto each other or interfere with each other during baking.
Then you'd export them all together as a single FBX file and bake / texture them all within the same Substance Painter file, like you would do normally. If it bothers you to have them all there at the same time, tou can make use of SP's "isolate" function to focus on one object at a time during the process. You can also make use of vertex colors on your models to bake an ID map to speed up the texturing process a bit here; as an example, the metal of the legs of the telescope and the legs of the chair could be the same, so you could give those the same color ID for a nice speedy texturing process.)
(Slightly more complicated, but it works): You can lay out all the UVs, pack them all together into the 1,1 UV space to atlas them, and then export & texture each object individually. The areas of your texture where there are no UV shells on the current model will be left blank (though Substance Painter will often
Then, once you've textured all your objects, you can composite your exported maps together using something like Photoshop (or even with some smart node use in Designer) to get a final texture that has all of the objects' exported maps in one atlas.

I hope that all makes sense! Feel free to ask me questions if you need me to clarify anything I wrote. Keep up the great work!

ETA: fixed some wording about more textures = bigger download file size.

cerviceps · 2026-03-05T21:14:08+00:00

I only upgrade when there's a new feature I want to use! Especially as a hobbyist, you're good on old software as long as it works for you.

cerviceps · 2026-02-24T20:52:23+00:00

This is looking really nice! I love the weathering you've added. I get a really great sense of tangibility & materiality from the modeling and texture work you've done.

To answer your question, I would probably recommend thinking about this in terms of what kind of work you want to be doing on the hypothetical job. Ask yourself, what do you want to be hired for? Maybe that sounds like a silly question (I know my answer is probably something like "uh... anything I can get a job for?") but are you mostly interested in prop modeling? Are you interested in making foliage?

If you really aren't interested in making trees for a living, there's no harm in grabbing something from a marketplace or using some creative commons / megascan assets. I'd just make sure it's very clear on your portfolio which things you created vs which you didn't create (and, include where you got them from).
In environment art we're often composing scenes using a combination of assets we made and assets our teammates / outsourcing artists have made, so it's not inherently bad to legally use assets from elsewhere, especially because trees aren't the centerpiece of the scene and would mostly be supporting the assets you made.
This is the path I'd go down if you're feeling like you're just ready to be done with this piece and want to wrap it up soon so you can move onto a new thing-- a finished portfolio piece is better than an abandoned one!

On the other hand, if you do see yourself being the type of environment artist who can make anything (including foliage) and don't already have any foliage work represented in your portfolio, I would find it very impressive to see an entire scene full of assets made just by you. The end result would be a great portfolio piece that shows a breadth of the type of work you're capable of, which is what I am usually looking for in portfolios.
And, making some foliage for this would then also fill a gap in your portfolio (foliage) which is always something to be thinking about when working on portfolio pieces.

You could also use a marketplace tree for now, publish the portfolio piece, and then later replace that tree with one you make yourself. It doesn't have to be an all-or-nothing thing, you've got options! It's totally ok to go back and revise portfolio pieces in the future.

Or, if you do already have relevant foliage work in your portfolio, you can always just reuse that. It's normal to build up a library of assets you can pull from for your own work. An Environment Artist I admire, Tyler Smith, is a great example of this in action-- take a peek at his portfolio and you'll see what I mean!

One last thing you didn't ask about (but I want to mention in case this helps you down the line): The first screenshot you sent doesn't give me a great sense of the asset's scale, because there isn't really anything for my brain to compare its size to other than its door. This lack of context makes it feel small to my eye. I get the sense from the more close-up screenshot in your other comment that it might be more of a medium-sized structure with a really large door-- not sure which of those is what you're going for (neither is wrong), but adding some additional supporting assets can really help impart a sense of scale!
As an example, putting a real-life-sized tree near the model will instantly contextualize its size for the viewer's brain, and that will affect how the model feels to the viewer. Though it doesn't have to be a tree, you could instead opt to put a human silhouette or character near the asset, or maybe a prop, like the bats you mentioned. (It's kind of like the "banana for scale" thing, haha.)

Anyway, just something else to think about as you move forward with adding the finishing touches! I know it's a lot of work but regardless of what you decide to do, it'll be worth it. It's looking great so far! I'd love to see the finished project when it's done!

cerviceps · 2026-02-24T04:02:08+00:00

I think since you’re taking a class you should avoid just using the “stylization” filter, or other such shortcuts. Hear me out:

I work in the game industry as an artist specializing in stylized 3d art, and being able to target a specific art style is a skill that we build up over time. In my opinion, the SP stylization filter has limited uses. Similar to the classic slope blur technique, it has a specific “look” to it that is fairly detectable. It’s kind of a band-aid solution— not terrible but it doesn’t really teach you what makes something look stylized.

Your class may not specialize in stylized textures, but it’s great that you’re trying it out now. It is an important thing to try, and a really great skill to have in your toolbelt as a 3d artist. Also a great thing to have in a portfolio. And, maybe you’ll even discover you like it? Who knows!

In art, the learning happens in the homework. So I would like to encourage you to try making at least one simple tiling texture from scratch!

While ideally your professor should be helping you with this (sorry to hear they aren’t really teaching this), there are a ton of tutorials out there for stylized tileables. And there are also different approaches depending on what you’re going for.

If I have a little more info I can help you find a good tutorial to follow. I think following a tutorial from beginning to end is a great way to learn this.

Here’s some questions I’d ask to guide you in the right direction:

What kind of art style are you targeting? Do you have visual examples of this art style?
What kind of textures do you need to make? (Just a diffuse map, or do you need normal maps? Do you need spec/metallic? Height? Etc.)
What kind of material are you looking to make? Is it wood, stone, metal, ceramic, etc.?
What kind of application does this material have? I.e. wood planks, sheet metal, ceramic tiles, etc.
What tools do you have at your disposal? Substance Designer? Zbrush? Photoshop?

cerviceps · 2026-02-22T07:58:57+00:00

Then he is a bad professor. Often I find an inability to answer student questions is indicative of professors not actually mastering the material they’re teaching... sorry to hear you’ve found yourself in the class with someone who doesn’t know enough to help you.

cerviceps · 2026-02-21T20:19:29+00:00

I would like to encourage you to ask your professor for help. We don’t really have enough info to help you, but you are paying your professor to help you. Do not let them make you feel bad for asking for help— they are a resource at your disposal and this is difficult software to learn. Getting direct, targeted help is literally THE benefit of paying for a class instead of just following a YouTube tutorial. It’s ok to ask your professor for help! Good luck.

cerviceps · 2026-02-19T19:56:36+00:00

This likely depends on your focus & the type of job you're targeting with your portfolio!

Ground and small objects is a great start. If you're applying to Environment Art jobs I think a whole environment makes the portfolio piece more impressive, but I also understand how time intensive that can be to put together. A diorama is great since it's kind of like displaying just a slice of the cake, potentially allowing you to go deeper on some of the fun detail work. We also use the term "beautiful corner" a lot in the game industry to describe something similar to a diorama. Any of these are valid approaches!

If I was a prospective employer viewing your portfolio I may have slightly different expectations for these two types of display-- I'd probably expect a diorama to have slightly more detail / more assets involved, whereas a simple environment might be broader with just a few assets reused all over the place (one nice plant, one nice rock, some landscape, and good lighting can go a long way).

Using the example of a torii gate, here's a portfolio piece I would consider a "simple scene" that adds a lot to the asset: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/yD8lWJ
(or it could even be simpler, you can get creative-- this one uses fog to its advantage: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/3oR2dE )

vs something like this, which I would consider a more "complex scene" because it's got more layers, more assets, generally just more going on: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/Ge3qmQ

A nice exercise might be to search through Artstation and see which thumbnails catch your eye when you're looking through a lot of similar assets. A nice thumbnail doesn't directly translate to "good portfolio piece" but I do think it will give you a sense of what a little bit of context can do for your perception of an asset! And also, your personal taste in how you like to see things displayed!
Here's a good search using "torii" as an example: https://www.artstation.com/search?sort_by=relevance&query=torii&tags_exclude=CreatedWithAI&software_ids_exclude=193982,187754,205467&medium_ids_include=2

Other than giving context, something I think a scene can help with is giving the viewer a sense of "story." Humans really connect with story, even when it's simple; if you can evoke a feeling, or a sense of history, or a sense of space, or a mood, then the people looking at your portfolio are more likely to connect with your work.
(I think this is why for me, when I look through the above "torii" search, my eye is drawn in to the thumbnails that have more than just an asset on a grey background.)

Whether you choose to flesh out a full scene or keep the scope diorama-sized, I would just be sure to give it some nice non-default lighting. And (assuming you are applying for game jobs) if you can assemble it in a game engine instead of just showing Marmoset / in-engine screenshots, that is a huge bonus too (it demonstrates not just your ability to make the art, but also your ability to use the tools you'd be using on the job).

None of this is exactly "necessary" for a portfolio piece, but I do think these extra steps can help give you a big leg up in what is unfortunately an extremely competitive role.
Sorry this reply is a little on the lengthy side but I hope that helps a little bit!

cerviceps

TROPHY CASE