Renault UE 2 french carrier

[CptdeS35]

Hi mates !

This is the french (small tracked vehicle) Renault UE 2 I've made in 3 days. This is my first 3D model for FH2 so please be gentle ^^' The model is 33600 triangles, and the tracks, cupolas and wheels have been made separatly. I don't know if FH2 can use it as a static or as a vehicle.

I don't know how to code that, I can't manage to do tracks correctly, and I can't skin for the moment. I didn't tryed to import it in FH2.

A brief description first :

"The Renault UE Chenillette was a light tracked armoured carrier and prime mover produced by France between 1932 and 1940.

In 1930 the French Infantry decided to develop a light armoured vehicle able to tow and supply small cannon and mortars. In 1931 the Renault company was given the contract for production of its Renault UE, combined with the Renault UK trailer. In 1937, from a number of competitors, the Renault UE2 was chosen as an improved type for large-scale production. Of both types combined over five thousand were built, including licence production in Romania, and they were part of the standard equipment of all French infantry divisions. Most Renault UE vehicles in French service were unarmed; those in 1940 captured by Germany were used for a variety of purposes, including being armed with machine-guns, antitank-guns and rocket artillery.

The Chenillette ("small tracked vehicle") or tracteur blindé ("armoured tractor") as Renault preferred to call it, is indeed a very small vehicle: just 280 centimetres long, 174 cm wide and having its highest point at 125 cm; the roof is only 103 cm high. Its cargo carrying capacity is rather limited. There is a rectangular armoured bin at the back, 145 cm long (its length corresponds to the width of the vehicle as a whole), 60 cm wide and 36 cm high, able to hold a load of about 350 kg (lower than the original specification of 500 kg); unloading is made easier by the possibility to tilt the bin; the back plate then hinges downwards, forming a slope on which cargo can slide to the ground. The main cargo is carried by the tracked trailer, a close copy of the British type, with a length of its bin of again 145 cm, a width of 110 cm and a height of 35 cm; weighing itself 775 kg, it can hold a load of about 600 kg — whereas the specification had asked for only 400 kg. The tracks can be removed for road transport; there are two road wheels per side."

3D VIEWS




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[Paasky]

Ooh, excellent! Now just have fun learning how to export a tracked vehicle

[Stubbfan]

Ooh, excellent! Now just have fun learning how to export a tracked vehicle

That's really a piece of cake

It looks nice, especially for a first model. 33.600 tris is too much though. You should take a look at the fh2 tanks and how they made the wheels etc, and you should be able to save lots of tris! Around 8000 polis is normally the standard for tanks.

[mopskind]

One thing- smooth modifier. You can save about a gazillion polygons by smoothin the round surfaces

[CptdeS35]

33.600 tris is too much though. You should take a look at the fh2 tanks and how they made the wheels etc, and you should be able to save lots of tris! Around 8000 polis is normally the standard for tanks.

Yeah i know...if i delete all the wheels, the tracks, i got around 18600 tris ^^' / 6300 faces.
Now it's 33600 tris / 10 650 faces

[Stubbfan]

Pretty much all the rounded parts are too rounded. With smoothing groups you can make them look round with far less tris!

[CptdeS35]

I get down to 8633 Polys ! without modifying anything ^^'

[Stubbfan]

With wheels and all?

[CptdeS35]

YAA !

[Stubbfan]

Nice. Unwrap the sucker and start texturing!

[CptdeS35]

Nice. Unwrap the sucker and start texturing!

Gonna die 3 times in 1 week ^^' !

[pizzzaman]

First Panhard, now this! 
Good luck texturing it!

[Wakain]

Hey, I'm not good at this myself but posting a wiremesh would enable people (with the right amount of expertise) to give proper feedback so you could save some more tri's and/or spend these on other places.

[CptdeS35]

True ! so here it is !

If someone can unwrap it correctly (mine is wierd, strangely scaled), i will be very glad ^^'

http://www.sendspace.com/file/lhdmgf

[Gurdy]

Woah there, slow down--not quite yet! The mesh needs quite a bit of work! It's all simple stuff, however.

I took a part of it that contains most of the issues found on the entirety of the model:



Here are some of the main issues that immediately come to mind when seeing this mesh:

1None of the verts are welded—I am not sure if this was an export/import issue from another program, but it’s just a collection of faces instead of solid objects.

2.Everything is made out of Ngons! Again, I am not sure if this was made in a program other than max, but everything needs to be cut down and welded into a good mesh. This also leads to a skewed polycount and a broken object!

3.   Nearly all of the curved/rounded surfaces have WAY too many polygons, as already mentioned in the thread.

Let’s clean ‘er up!

Issues 1-3 are quickly solved. I remade the geometry here—I ended up with a 138-poly result as opposed to one running at 818+ polies. Have a look at the model here (Max 2011 and .obj).



On a real asset I would probably spare the polies to make the exhausts look better, but this serves it’s purpose.

If you combine a great high-poly bake with this, you can really get a good looking vehicle! I see a couple of things that belong best in a normal map. Details like the insets in the return rollers and the roadwheels could very easily be in a normal. As far as more specific changes, I’d suggest remodeling the cable on the front—try using actual geometry to make that cable look more defined as opposed to just having a flat piece of geo. Look at Rad’s KT for something similar.

All in all, I think it came out looking right, but the actual construction of the geometry was a bit sloppy; this unfortunately renders it useless. However, if you spend some time optimizing it and cleaning it up, you will have a nice little tractor that is FH2 ready!