Question about low poly graphics?

Unity Engine
1

Hello.I kinda started low poly modelling but I don’t know what to do to make my models look good in Unity.
Should I use UV map?Should I use lightmapping in Unity Lightning options?Is writing shader a must or can I use standart shaders?
Thanks in advance…

2

Depends on your style and look/feel you are going for, so the answer is yes/no. I’d suggest testing all the options that are available out. And keep in mind your target platform. If PC - unlimited options. If mobile - limited options depending on the game you are creating.

3

There are multiple approaches to low poly graphics so you should probably pick one first.
The easiest one is using flat shading on low-poly meshes with single color textures. Something like this:

3840×2160 376 KB

You don’t need fancy textures for that, just a single palette texture that all the objects will be unwrapped on.
Another one is achieved by applying hand-painted textures to smooth-shaded meshes, like this:
950×738 114 KB

This can look more or less decent even without any lighting, although painting textures by hand is hard work.

I don’t feel like including too many screenshots to this post, but there are many more approaches and styles. Like you can use pixelated unfiltered textures to look 8bit, or actually use realistic textures on low poly meshes to look like an old PS game (dunno why, but still, an option).

So yeah, you’re should probably focus on that first.
Should you use UV maps? of course, how else were you going to apply colors to you models?
Should you use light-mapping? It depends, light-mapping is more about optimising lighting than the actual look of it. If you want to develop a top-down game, or a game that doesn’t feature long view distance, then you can get by with just real-time lighting, but otherwise you will need light-mapping to maintain acceptable fps.
Writing shader is not a must. You can achieve very specific looks with custom shaders and some of them are not even too hard to implement(If you’re interested, research Gradient Mapping) but it’s definitely not mandatory, especially for someone who just started low poly modeling.

1 Like
4

Vertex shading/colors do not require UVs and are lighter (less overhead) than color pallette with UVs.