"Yes, but how many polygons?" An artist blog entry with interesting numbers

[Arwin]

there seems to be a bug with the PC version of the game. For lots of people, those effects only kick in when in window mode or exclusive window mode (sorry, can't remember correctly). It is just a bug. I think that it is best to wait till the PC version gets a patch resolving all those (many) issues. Especially for NVidia users...

I think this patch just came out?

 

[3dcgi]

I really can't see how that hair should be so expensive. Its about a dozen or so cloth strips with alpha textues of hair on them. We've been able to simulate dozens of choth strips for ages. And many games do so, just not for hair.
The real proble I think is making it look good. Real hair falls into peoples mouths, in front of their faces, and gets into weird positions constantly. More so if you were to perform the sort of fast motions game character do. Offline animation has a lot of artis trickery and correction going on to 'fix-up' their hair and cloth sims. You can't do that in real time. So the problem really is developing a bunch of artificial constraints and procedural systems to keep hair from doing weird things, while still alowing it to move perceptually realistic. That's not so trivial.

I don't know if the technique will be detailed at GDC, but it's obviously more than a dozen or so "cloth strips."

 

[Billy Idol]

I think this patch just came out?

Yep, the first patch was released and improved hair imo.

 

[COPS N RAPPERS]

the patch came out yesterday and it looks much better now and plays much better too.

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Polygon numbers for assorted games.

Valkyria Chronicles - Alicia 7,798 polygons
Brutal Legend - Ophelia 17,028 polygons
Ninety Nine Nights - Epharr 19,659 polygons

 

[Love_In_Rio]

the patch came out yesterday and it looks much better now and plays much better too.

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Polygon numbers for assorted games.

Valkyria Chronicles - Alicia 7,798 polygons
Brutal Legend - Ophelia 17,028 polygons
Ninety Nine Nights - Epharr 19,659 polygons

Yes, now we are talking. In an APU similar to the ones that will power next consoles how many resources ( CUs ) would this thing need?. Will GPGPU make it way faster?. I say this because IMHO going from 50fps to 30fps with Tressfx on is too much.

 

[eloic]

Yes, now we are talking. In an APU similar to the ones that will power next consoles how many resources ( CUs ) would this thing need?. Will GPGPU make it way faster?. I say this because IMHO going from 50fps to 30fps with Tressfx on is too much.

Much better now. Still, way too silky and "Pantene" to my taste. Motion could also improve a bit.

 

[lanek]

way better and more natural.. still need some tweaks here and there for polish it completely.

At this rythm it will be perfect when i will have finally buy the game .

 

[Davros]

Will GPGPU make it way faster?.

Its already using GPGPU

 

[Love_In_Rio]

Its already using GPGPU

HSA i meant

 

[joesiv]

Already in works
http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/19us99/tomb_raider_pc_woes_update/

Neat, figured as much! Seems that they tweaked the collision calculation on her shoulder too, there is some clipping, but I think I prefer that to the floating in mid-air that it was doing before. I also wonder if it was just a problem of doing the calculation on the default T-pose rather than her standard stance.

I really can't see how that hair should be so expensive. Its about a dozen or so cloth strips with alpha textues of hair on them. We've been able to simulate dozens of choth strips for ages. And many games do so, just not for hair.
The real proble I think is making it look good. Real hair falls into peoples mouths, in front of their faces, and gets into weird positions constantly. More so if you were to perform the sort of fast motions game character do. Offline animation has a lot of artis trickery and correction going on to 'fix-up' their hair and cloth sims. You can't do that in real time. So the problem really is developing a bunch of artificial constraints and procedural systems to keep hair from doing weird things, while still alowing it to move perceptually realistic. That's not so trivial.

Clothe strips flapping in the wind is a lot simpler (computationally) than having those same strips interacting (hitting/sliding along) with a dynamic soft body such as her shoulder. Not that they've nailed it yet, but the fact that it's actually being attempted is harder to do than ignoring collision that most clothe stips do.

 

[nightshade]

I kind of think it'd have been a better idea to have lesser number of strands, real hair isn't so fine,segregated and the hair is super straight when it's moving (it appears quite a bit wavy and natural in Alice), especially in conditions like you see in Tomb Raider. People called out the technique in Alice and mentioned how it uses lesser number of strands by I think by using a lesser number of strands and then making the ends appear coarse and they are practically making it look like it has more weight and hence more realistic while at the same time computationally less expensive.

 

[London Geezer]

Guys, imagine a movie. Real hair would be hard to style in a way that a 'real' Lara actress would look like she had some sort of style, but at the same time making it look like it moves naturally, messy, wavy etc etc... Imagine finding a 3D graphics animator who needs to understand how that works, is able to model it on a virtual Lara, and of course having a hair simulator that can actually handle all those computations in real time and not pre-calculated and fixed per frame, which is a luxury a Pixar movie would have...
It can't be easy.

 

[joesiv]

I kind of think it'd have been a better idea to have lesser number of strands, real hair isn't so fine,segregated and the hair is super straight when it's moving (it appears quite a bit wavy and natural in Alice), especially in conditions like you see in Tomb Raider. People called out the technique in Alice and mentioned how it uses lesser number of strands by I think by using a lesser number of strands and then making the ends appear coarse and they are practically making it look like it has more weight and hence more realistic while at the same time computationally less expensive.

Agreed, though to really nail it, I believe they'd need a bunch of densities, some thicker strands, some medium, and then some single strands. The thicker the strands, obviously the greater mass it would have, so the singles would be quite frantic in a strong wind.

 

[COPS N RAPPERS]

keeping the thread going with some numbers.

Poly number for two titles

Army of 2 : 40th Day - JonahWade 12,152 polygons
Onechanbara Z - Kagura 28,685 polygons

that's all for today.

 

[COPS N RAPPERS]

A few models turned up on the disc of Metal Gear Rising but for now only one is available.

Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance - Raiden (cutscene) 64,018 polygons

this particular model isn't the gameplay model given the chest plate and heals are rendered in polys. so it's most definitely the model found in pre-rendered vids.

made some extra captures of Raiden found bellow.
Picture 1
Picture 2

will post more later when the rest of the models are up for grabs, till next time.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

I believe the word you were looking for is "definitely".

Yeah I'm a grammar nazi. Even if English is not my first language. Which makes me all the more surprised when people mess these words up.

 

[COPS N RAPPERS]

yup, my mistake. anyways these key features i pointed out (chest and heels) during gameplay are simplified to textures.

Edit- i believe there could be a PC version in which the High LODs are playable. A nice bonus that would be for PC gamers.

 

[Viperzerofsx]

24583 if that is of any use to you guys

 

[nightshade]

Much less than Underworld where it could go up to 37k

 

[COPS N RAPPERS]

Much less than Underworld where it could go up to 37k

the model was weighed as a stand alone without equipment, and don't forget the environments have a lot to answer for; way bigger maps over underworld.