   Evaluation of Zombie Killing Weapons
Here is an axe. Please look it over and make any suggestions. I personally don't feel it is ready yet but I'm not sure how to improve it since I'm not a modeler. Advice?   
  what is it for? a game? if so, its much too high-poly (it looks it anyway). normaly game-axes are pretty simple and use few polygons but have a nice texture. kind of exactly what you have not done. if its for something else... use some kind of texture, always looks better.   ;;  What's a wold? :)   ;  The amount of space on the texture should line up with the actual size of the part being textured. The smallest, most irrelevant part of the model is getting almost the most texture space.   ;  Well, if you want some realism/plausibility nitpicks, I have a start :)The blood spray pattern on the axe head doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Recall that when said axe head comes into contact with J. Random Zombie, the spray pattern is going to come *out* from the area of contact, usually the bladed end. As it stands, it's just kind of there. It doesn't feel very believable and I'd be willing to bet even a casual observer would notice that there's something that just feels off about it, even if they can't identify how. Also, the individual spat marks would generally be more elongated, spreading out from the point of contact, whereas the detailing you have now feels like the axe was just sitting on the ground and a zombie happened to bleed on it somehow. Similar deal with the stuff on the axe handle.On a similar note, the paint chipping is also rather haphazard and just feels subtly off for similar reasons. If you grab a real fire axe that's seen some use, you'll notice that most of the wear actually occurs at the edges, as these come into contact with other surfaces most frequently. Scuff marks/chips on the more central regions, while certainly still present, tend to take on a much thinner, more elongated character as they come about primarily from the edges of something else scraping against it, only taking off small bits of paint. Right now it looks like you have a brand-new axe that just happened to come into contact with some acid blood or something :)I don't think I can really nitpick anything about the geometry, everything looks more or less in order. If I did have to pick something, however, the piece of the axe head in between where the handle pokes out of the top of the head and the axe blade could probably be a bit straighter instead of curving a little bit like it does now. This is probably a stylistic choice, however, and as such is pretty minor.So, in summary, doing convincing weathering is hard, but you're off to a good start. This looks sharp, and I'd love to see it in-engine!   ;Quote:Original post by InvalidPointerWell, if you want some realism/plausibility nitpicks, I have a start :)The blood spray pattern on the axe head doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Recall that when said axe head comes into contact with J. Random Zombie, the spray pattern is going to come *out* from the area of contact, usually the bladed end. As it stands, it's just kind of there. It doesn't feel very believable and I'd be willing to bet even a casual observer would notice that there's something that just feels off about it, even if they can't identify how. Also, the individual spat marks would generally be more elongated, spreading out from the point of contact, whereas the detailing you have now feels like the axe was just sitting on the ground and a zombie happened to bleed on it somehow. Similar deal with the stuff on the axe handle.On a similar note, the paint chipping is also rather haphazard and just feels subtly off for similar reasons. If you grab a real fire axe that's seen some use, you'll notice that most of the wear actually occurs at the edges, as these come into contact with other surfaces most frequently. Scuff marks/chips on the more central regions, while certainly still present, tend to take on a much thinner, more elongated character as they come about primarily from the edges of something else scraping against it, only taking off small bits of paint. Right now it looks like you have a brand-new axe that just happened to come into contact with some acid blood or something :)I don't think I can really nitpick anything about the geometry, everything looks more or less in order. If I did have to pick something, however, the piece of the axe head in between where the handle pokes out of the top of the head and the axe blade could probably be a bit straighter instead of curving a little bit like it does now. This is probably a stylistic choice, however, and as such is pretty minor.So, in summary, doing convincing weathering is hard, but you're off to a good start. This looks sharp, and I'd love to see it in-engine!Thank you the care and detail of your answer! The artist hasn't had a chance to look at your advice yet but I will link him to it in the morning.Updated examples that came in today: