Furniture modelling

I'm really getting into modelling at the moment and am continuing to develop ideas for my gothic / horror themed art. I've started modelling some furniture props. These are intended for a haunted castle. I've aimed for around 200-500 polys per model at the highest LoD (unintentionally the mirror is up to 610 which I intend to optimise at some point).

WIP grabs from ShowTool Pro


I've had some success using a nodal texture workflow to render dummy UV textures in Lightwave before working on them in Photoshop. This workflow gives me a very strong starting point for a texture by enabling me to work directly in Lightwave to apply highlights and feeling.

This following setup gives two outputs from the one scene and one object. Rendering gets me a high poly UV map render with lights and textures. When I export to DTS I get a low poly image-mapped dts. All from the one model and with having to model hi and low rez iterations. Nice!

The workflow I'm using goes something like this (requires Lightwave 9 and above):
1. Model and set up the UV maps to use a basic dummy UV image (I'm using a flat 50% grey);
2. Enable the nodal textures for each surface. I'm connecting nodes to bump and colour channels. Connecting nodes to channels will override the basic texture for that channel when rendered in Lightwave but keep the basic texture for the DTS export. Lightwave will save attributes of both the basic texture as well as the nodes with the model.
3. Texture using nodal procedural textures - wood, metal etc;
4. Import into Layout and set the display subpatch to 1, render subpatch higher (3). A subpatch of 1 will "triple" a sub-patched quad model without increasing polys for DTS export, while the render subpatch level adds additional geometry for your smooth texture renders.
5. Set up a Texture baking camera using the UV map at 512x512 render dimensions (or whatever you need);
6. Light the scene (I'm using background radiosity for nice soft shadows and a few spots for mood);
7. Render your new UV image which now has a lot of form information and basic textures and save over the basic UV you made in step 1.
8. In Photoshop mix in your other resources. I'm using symbol typefaces for relief ornaments and photographic references.

I'll add a staircase, chest, table and chair next week time permitting.