Modeling...

[oakchas]

I'm trying to model a '50's style fedora similar to the one shown. The hat itself is little problem, but my challenge especially concerns the portion of the band circled in yellow. Would it be better to model this in geometry or as a (bump, normal, or displacement) map...

 

I'm concerned that a map would make it less 3D than it is, though the actual "bow" on a fedora is pretty form-fitting in real life, it does have dimension and this photo shows it fairly well at the rear of the bow where it is obviously not "decaled" to the hat, but a seperate piece.

[attachmentid=12783]

 

Of course, since it would be part of complex scenes (with a person under it) patch count will be important in the long run.

 

Thanks for your input,

[heyvern]

A bump map would not have "3D"... around the edges anyway... but it would look convincing "enough"... unless the hat is a focal point... an important part of the "story".

 

A bump wouldn't be very effective on that "bow" area.

 

A displacement map requires higher patch density to "look good"... thus... defeating the purpose.

 

I would go with geometry. Something that simple is not going to be a high patch count if you do it right. The overall patch count of the whole hat shouldn't be very high either if you are careful about construction... if the hat doesn't have to animate too much you could use a lot of bias manipulation and really keep the count low.

 

Vernon "!" Zehr

[oakchas]

Thanks Vern,

 

Kinda confirmed what I was thinking. Now, on to finishing it up!