Page 42 - 3D Artist 110 - 2017 UK

REBUILDING HISTORY: WORLD OF WARSHIPS

While one artist usually builds
a ship, in some instances more
artists will assist if production
needs a fast turnaround

it might look once the artist feels conident that the ship is truth be told, the process sounds gruelling.
ready to move on to the next stage of modelling, Why, then, do the artists at Wargaming saint
impressive, but it’s the time-consuming texturing process begins. it is Petersburg commit so many months of their lives
actually quite simple. it split into two parts: technical and artistic. in the to these single-ship projects? “Passion. it’s all
technical stage, artists will work to ill in any gaps
about passion,” nepochatov beams. “i really love
all starts with a cube that they were not able to implement in Maya working with ships, i love vessels from my youth.
due to polygon limitations. “it’s approximately i saw Titanic when i was seven years old, and it
Anatoliy Nepochatov, 300,000 polygons. it sounds like a lot, but if you wasn’t that boring romantic story that i fell in love
Senior 3D artist talk about a huge battleship, it is nothing,” says with, but just the ship.”
nepochatov, explaining that the way the artists that passion can be seen and felt across the
will work around modelling restrictions is by entire studio. it’s a team with a passion for history,
a german destroyer, for example, it might look “texturing some of the elements that are either eager to please the millions of players. there’s
impressive, but it’s actually quite simple. it all too small to model or too small to see. Pieces such a certain level of technical skill required to handle
starts with a cube.” as rivets, air grates, welds and langes. if a ship is these digital restorations, and Wargaming has
the hull itself is a compound object, crafted in riveted, for example, there will be thousands of turned it into an artform. And that, we’re told, is
Maya to align with the schematics – although this, them that need to be put in place… thankfully, something the studio is intent on maintaining as it
we’re told, can take a signiicant amount of time. we can just paint them on using Photoshop.” continues to build, improve and expand World Of
“the schematics are never perfect,” nepochatov the second part of this process sees the Warships in the future.
continues. “it can take a lot of time to adjust these near-inal ship move through a texture pipeline, “to an extent, our dedication to historical
features.” thankfully, the studio has found a few with Quixel studio used to paint in lourishes such accuracy it comes down to personal pride,” says
shortcuts to help speed up production once the as rust, scratches and leak stains to give the ship Vladimir gremitskiy. “but on the other hand, we
initial craft work has been completed, taking some the inal touch of authenticity, resembling their know that [our players] are naval nerds and they
of the strain off of artists looking to re-create real-life counterpart as closely as possible. expect for things to be speciic – they whine on
these ships with 100-per-cent accuracy. With Wargaming intent on having the most forums if it isn’t… the last thing we would want
Wargaming’s object manager is essentially a accurate 3d models in the world, a strict is to go to war with them over it.”
huge library of different assets and elements from quality-control process has evolved. When the
other ship classes that an artist can reuse. it’s the model is inished up, the team circumvents
elements many ships have in common, such as rendering it out straight away: instead, it exports 300,000 polygons
“the main and secondary weapons, ire-control the model and its texture maps from Maya and
systems, and anchoring equipment,” says into Wargaming’s proprietary big World MMo sounds like a lot, but if
nepochatov. “We can load these various game engine. it’s here where all the pieces are
elements into the ship scene as reference welded together, giving the artists the opportunity you talk about a huge
objects, signiicantly shortening production time.” to see their model in the proper environments battleship, it is nothing
nepochatov notes that re-creating each of the and illumination before the QA teams, nautical
2,000-plus objects that make up one ship every engineers and military veterans pass over it Anatoliy Nepochatov,
time would be, as he puts it, “ridiculous”. for inspection. Senior 3D artist
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