Assignment Frenzy #4: Voting

[Ravidge]

Voting time!

7 productive people decided to tackle the material creation assignment. I'm sure everyone else is waiting for a new, more hammer friendly assignment to start, so let's get the voting over with asap.

Above is a MULTI-CHOICE poll, select all the entries you think deserve to win this time. Once you've made your vote you can NOT edit or update you choice, so make sure you've made up your mind before you hit that button!
Please do not vote for you own entry.

I strongly recommend checking out the materials in-game.

Voting closes: Friday 12th (August) 21:00 UTC [Link to show corresponding local times]

[Click here to download the AF#3 & #4 Showcase map!] 12mb
[Click here to view all screenshots]
[Click here to download all material files] 12mb

Author|Screenshot #1|Download
aly| Screenshot | Download
evang7| Screenshot | Download
fubar| Screenshot | Download
grazr| Screenshot | Download
ravidge| Screenshot | Download
sergis| Screenshot | Download
void| Screenshot | Download

==========================================

Point scoring:

• All the entries that managed to place in the top 33%* will get 1 point. The #1 entry gets 2 points.
  
  If first place is tied between 3 or less entries, each of these gets 2 points. If first place is tied to 4 or more entries, no one gets 2 points.​
  If the cutoff point at 33%* is unclear due to tied scores; All entries tied will receive 1 point, as long as the point receiving subset is <50% of the number of entries. If larger than 50%, none of the tied entries receive any points.​
  *it's not always possible to divide the number of entries into thirds (33%), the closest approximation that yields a integer will be used in these cases.​
• Participating in voting threads earns you points.
  
  Voted in 3 separate assignment frenzy voting threads = +1 point​
  Voted in 6 separate assignment frenzy voting threads = +1 point​
  Voted in 9 separate assignment frenzy voting threads = +1 point​

 

[tyler]

I see what you did there, Ravidge.

 

[Da_Man]

Nice Watchmen reference in your materials Void. Made me chuckle.

 

[Prestige]

some good stuff here

aly: 3 shades of grey, tree thing is neat, but weird to me.
void: dubuk metalworks, clever
ravidge: get shit on by facts, lmao
grazr: road & stuff would go good with ravidge's props, i like em
fubar: i like da shimmer


don't know what to vote for

 

[grazr]

Aw man, considering the amount of time some of our regular members have been creating custom materials i expected loads of awesome textures, that people would go mental with creativity; especially considering how much time we had to do these in. But yet again in another texture contest a majority of people submitted a bunch of generic posters to add to an already substantial poster repitoire.

I like the fact that fubar experimented with material proxies, it shows he was willing to learn new things and now we have a unique texture at hand, rather than more posters to add to the already substantial poster pile.

 

[Pocket]

Well, part of it is that resource development generally happens because they or someone else had a map in development that needed it. Textures even moreso than models, I'd imagine, since with models there's always the "hey you know what would be cool?" factor.

 

[grazr]

I suppose TF2 generally only needed additional nature-ground and wood textures which are probably the most awkward to produce, so we havn't seen much of it. Still, i was hoping people wouldn't cop out and do a bunch of posters and actually produce some interesting wall/ground textures nobodies seen before.

 

[Freyja]

Aly: Sux

Evang: First one is too empty, but the others are nice!

fubar: Always love seeing waterfalls.

Grazr: A texture tf2 needed. Good work!

Rav: I like it! Good use of existing tf2 IP's

Sergis: Unfortunately, it's just mostly recolours

Void: Cool, as always. I don't really get the references though

 

[Moose]

I'm looking through them now, but fubar gets major points for creating water textures. Will probably get my vote.

EDIT: Fubar, how do you intend for people to use your caustic texture? I was playing around with it earlier and got something that looked okay, but I want to know how you're applying it.

 

[Ida]

Here's some feedback from me too, since others are doing it.


Aly: Kind of underwhelming, sorry. Almost redundant considering the existing texture is very similar.

Evang: Pretty good, but you lose marks for lack of subtlety and use of the TF2 font (which is never used outside the menu, other than the flags in Degroot Keep and possibly a couple of other things).

Fubar: Potentially very useful! I'd love to see this in a map. <- voted

Grazr: The gradient from dark to light looks a bit cheap, but these textures could be very useful! < - voted

Ravidge: Very nice, theme-appropriate signs. Props for humor. < - voted

Sergis: Not distinctive enough to be useful in my opinion, sorry. Feels a bit cheap.

Void: Best of the bunch, if you don't mind me saying. The signs fit right into the existing style and look as if they could've been shipped with TF2 in 2007. Good for variety in maps. < - voted

 

[Freyja]

What existing texture

 

[Leminnes]

Void, you crack me up. Especially Fargo Wood Chippers.

 

[fubarFX]

I'm looking through them now, but fubar gets major points for creating water textures. Will probably get my vote.

EDIT: Fubar, how do you intend for people to use your caustic texture? I was playing around with it earlier and got something that looked okay, but I want to know how you're applying it.

yeah I think I'm going to rerelease these textures with a proper readme or something

the caustic is meant to be used at a scale of 1 (or whatever looks good with the scale of your water texture). place it on a displacement, 1 unit above the wall you want the effect on. and since it blends with a completely transparent texture, you can fade the effect in and out with paint alpha.

for the wave texture, use it has an overlay on your water brush

 

[Void]

Aly - I feel like you would've shined a little brighter if you used a normal map here. Or more obvious brushstrokes. Just stuff to make it stand out more. It's alright, but not great.

Evang - Good to see I'm not the only one making references here. And between you and me? I've used TF2 fonts in signs before - some of them in the swamp theme, even. But I changed them a bit, warped them, made them... not recognizable too much as a TF2 font. Sadly, yours is obvious. Nice work, anyways.

Fubar - Nicely done. You surely have put the most technological effort into this contest. Voted.

Grazr - It looks nice, however, that manhole throws me off. I just don't like it. Instead of a modified drain overlay, I'd suggest making a manhole cover from scratch. Still nice, however. Voted.

Ravidge - Hurm. The first two overlays are a bit... off. The scratches in the posters just feel like they were done in a hurry to get these completed. And when it comes down to it... they are what they present... generic. However. Bonus points for the nicely done referential humor. Voted.

Sergis - Though the grass would be useful for a lot, as they would eliminate the necessity to use inverted alpha displacements, the dullness of the rest of your textures looms over the usefulness. This is going to be a little hard to hear, but that sign of yours feels like a spray you'd find on FPS Banana. Or Gamebanana. Whatever it is. You get the idea. Sorry.

Void - Stop trying.

 

[purequaternion]

Aly: I liked them.

Evang: I liked them.

Sergis: something about the way the engineer's head looked didn't click with me. I liked the premise but it just didn't feel right. Maybe if the face was more like how the engineer actually looks, instead of being a silhouette? Dunno exactly how to put it. But the grasses were fantastic. I'm not sure about the rocks, though...I think by itself, that texture looks strange. Perhaps with other stonework, wood scaffolding, etc. it might look more natural (I mean in game, not the texture file itself).

Fubar: I think there might be an issue with one of the textures (the wave looking one). It looked to me like a diagram from high school geometry (I'll take a picture) rather than something else. I was also curious how the ripples were intended to be used. Not your fault of course but their placement in the demo map just doesn't do them justice.

EDIT: here's the picture.

Grazr: I really liked these. Is the intent for them to be flat (as in game) or with the sidewalks elevated?

Ravidge: the Red v. Blue design is perfect. You captured them well!

Void: loved them.

 

[grazr]

Grazr: I really liked these. Is the intent for them to be flat (as in game) or with the sidewalks elevated?

I designed it so that you could create an actual curb and elevated sidewalk, I took a screenshot showing people 2 ways how it could be used to create curbs+elevated pavement but Ravidge took screenshots of them flat for the contest.

P.S. The only thing the same about the manhole as the drain is the alpha circle. Everything else is new, the hue, the dents, the production tag. I guess the indents do look a lot like the drain holes though, prehaps i should have used circles so it was less similar. I had 3 copies of the manhole (note it's name "manhole3"), blue tinted, black tinted and brown tinted and the brown one looked best with the tarmac so i chose that one even though it's real similar to the drain.

 

[fubarFX]

Fubar: I think there might be an issue with one of the textures (the wave looking one). It looked to me like a diagram from high school geometry (I'll take a picture) rather than something else.

I will look into that

 

[purequaternion]

I will look into that

If it's any help it occurred with my office computer: OS X with a Radeon 6750. I don't recall what the rendering settings were.

 

[evanonline]

thanks for the comment/critiques etc guys

i am waytoo tired to say anything useful right now so i'm not going until bother to later voting

using the tf2 font was a conscious decision, i figured that a message from the administrator (and thus tf industries) felt like it'd be most natural in the tf2 font. i wanted to switch it a few times because i really wasn't liking how it was looking, the letters felt too small--i probably should've, haha

 

[Pocket]

the caustic is meant to be used at a scale of 1 (or whatever looks good with the scale of your water texture). place it on a displacement, 1 unit above the wall you want the effect on. and since it blends with a completely transparent texture, you can fade the effect in and out with paint alpha.

Two questions: One, how did you make this? I mean, did you have to paint every frame by hand or was there some kind of shortcut involved? And two, would it be possible to get a version that can be used as an overlay, or is there something about the way it works that would prevent that?