3d Object Design Doc

Fingernail · September 30, 2004

Essentially, in Doom 3, models are a complex thing. Or rather, half complex.

You will need to make, for each individual object:

a lowpoly version (aim for < 7500 for characters, < 2500 for most objects, architectural details more. Use your discretion)
a highpoly model. Anything from 50000 to 2 million polygons. This has lots of detail.

The detailed version is used, by Doom 3 or another tool such as ORB to generate a normalmap with all the detail, so when lit, the lowpoly looks much higher detail.

Texture sizes go in powers of two: 2, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, 1024, 2048, much like monitor resolutions. Doom 3 characters have a 512x512 texture mostly, but there are unsightly seams. We can test out 1024x512 textures.

So, aside from the normalmap, what do you need for the skin? You need a diffusemap (this is like a standard texture, just colour and value information). Don't paint any shadows on this; that's done more or less in realtime. Then you need a specular map. This defines the shiny areas, and is greyscale. White = very shiny, black = matte. Skin should be greyish for normal, slightly greasy skin. Eyes = shiny. Clothes = not so shiny. Metal = very shiny, quite white in places.

Characters need to be in the MD5 format, with bones. Tutorials at www.doom3world.org

Objects can be in ASE or LWO formats.

MRYS · April 4, 2006

For Max users (I dont know Lightwave) - ASE format.

If model using more then one texture should be composed of independent parts named as the path to their textures. It is not possible to made one piece model with Multi submaterials (as it is possible in T3ED).