The Real Dirt on Modeling - An Editorial by Pluginz.com Art Director, Zak Akin

March 3 2006

As we all progress as artists we tread dangerously close to the void of unbelievability that is perfection. The better one gets at modeling, the more imperfection you realize must be interjected into your creations. Anyone who has ever been to zoo knows that monkeys are far from clean and fluffy; they're dirty and have all sorts of unmentionable substances matted into their fur. The 2005 King Kong had cuts, bald spots and mucky matted fur…sometimes. Gibson Guitar charged an extra 15% for their "vintage" looking re-issue guitar, complete with scuff marks, nicks, dints, dings, scratches, and a shiny new "Made in USA" sticker. Why? Because looking old and worn lends an air of credibility and realness to an otherwise unproved object.

I was in college when the first Toy Story came out. After watching it, the focus of our discussion in 3D Modeling class the next day wasn't the intricate modeling of the characters or the advanced reflections from the ray tracing and image mapping. It was the bedroom door. The door had scuff marks, nicks, dints, dings, scratches and so on. The door itself told a long and illustrious tale of a child at play with his toys. It added to the realism and believability of the room but moreover it showed to us that a good modeler and texture artist could tell his or her own story on top of the one that was written.

Having a dirty gritty look to your work may sometimes defy basic logic. When filming Titanic they went through great lengths to make it as look real and true to the era as possible. However, "true to the era" is not always the most swaying to the modern eye. A good example of this is the luggage brought on board by the passengers. It would have no doubt been clean and new due to the great wealth of the passengers but the modern eye has become so accustomed to seeing items from the early 1900's looking old and worn, that a brand new travel truck is simply not within our natural realm of perception. After battering and antiquing the luggage the test audience found the scene much more believable even though it was slightly less accurate.

Let's take a look another example: There are few out there that are going to contend that the new set of Star Wars movies are superior in any way to the original save those readers that are under eight years old. Why is this? Well, we could go on and on about story, direction, acting, editing, the mysterious disappearance of George Lucas' neck, but we'll let the myriads of subterranean troglodytes discuss that on their blogs. We're just talking about look here… the stark, clear, sparkly, everything resembles a brand new toy look. For whatever reason the used pinball parts and the off the shelf airplane models had a remarkably more real and believable appearance. Again, they were dirty, gritty, and told their own story.

There are plenty of plugins out there that can help your model look dirty and worn but the best results are going to come from your own imagination. Each scratch and dent you add tells a small story of toil and the ravages of time. It's those last little details that are going to separate you from the masses out there. It will also make your creation much more believable to the audience. It's one of the great ironies and classic truths of filmmaking: The very best work that one can achieve is the work that appears as if nothing was done at all.

by Zak Akin, Art Director
Pluginz.com