Planning & Creating Trim Sheets For Games - Trim Texture Tutorial Part 1 

This is such bad ass knowledge thanks so much for putting this out into the world. Btw, if anyone is watching this series, I bought the trim sheet and geometry from Gumroad to really understanding what is going on, and I'd highly highly recommend it - at like $5 it's an absolute steal for the amount of knowledge jammed into it! it's one thing to watch someone else doing it, but to have it in front of you opened in your own software and being able to study its usage in detail is absolutely invaluable and puts everything Tim is saying in perspective and helps to really accelerate and solidify the learning. To not only take a concept I'd only heard of recently and to make me understand just how crucial it is as a technique in a couple of hours is a huge accomplishment. Tim, do you think you'll ever do a series on how you've blended trim sheet use with tiling texture use and vertex painting for maximum impact in large enviros? The last time I'd touched that stuff hands-on (as I'm a concept artist making forays into production now) was probably 15 years ago, a lot has probably changes since then :D

I am just achieved my gradutation and my professors never explained that. my mind exploded when i have seen this tutorial... Absolutely fantastic and helpful. Like and subscribed.

Right here... Is some Pure Gold Content. It's rare to see this much knowledge not hidden behind a paywall. Thank you, sir! You are awesome.

This is exactly what I was looking for, a lot of people skip over the theory of planning and etc. Thank you so much :)

I come back here every now and then and rewatch the construction part. It still excites me and blows my mind how practical it is to standardize your trim layout. Thats so golden. It also makes this technqiue more approachable. I was always intimidated by all those complex and extravagant layouts, it's so nice to kow now that it is about simplicity and reusablity at this point, just to have the tehnicalities layed out in the most practical way, instead of getting creative at this point for no reason and thinking of inserting variations that only will make your life harder. Those come later when using the trim sheet, not during the layout. So great to still learn from this video. I always freak out now when I exchange a texture in my game project and it simply just swaps wihtout any hassle. And with this typ of sectioning, it somehow always falls into place and just fits as long as you are working with a power of two also with your geometry. But even when you diverge a bit. It's really powerful.

The part I always feared with trim sheets is knowing how exactly do you split that thing up. Some leave a blank trim space beneath, others blend it with decals in one corner.. Having it standardized really allows you to dive into the thing right in. Less thinking more working ! Thanks for the gold knowledge !

Hello Tim, Im a Junior 3D Artist and this was the first time I ever used Trim Sheets. That Video is really helpfull I made a Modular Castle with this Texture and Im quite happy with the results of this Trimsheet keep up the great work with these Tutorials 👍

i watched all your videos for trim sheets. I appreciate these videos because i am in art school and my professor didnt show me in depth how to create a trim sheet for UV mapping. I didnt use the program that you used for modeling but it was easy to understand and just worked in Maya

I only just found out about this channel recently and while I'm late to the party, I found it has been tremendously helpful and I'm super grateful for it! Actually one of the easiest videos to follow and understand that I've seen in awhile.

Other tutorials: Just simply prep your mesh for sculpting and keep the geometry nice and clean. This tutorial: Actually shows how it's done and doesn't assume you have been making trim sheets since when other kids were playing with Legos.

Texel density could be a great subject for one of your next tutorial! Man everything you say is so interesting, you're like the real teacher we never got. Keep it up and thank you so much for doing these videos!

you are one of the best 3d tutorials creator on this platform, thanks a lot!

This is obscenly useful, just starting my 3rd Year Game Art course and all the help i can get is worth so much, thanks!

Really nice video, exactly what I was looking for. There are not that many tutorials about trim sheets on RU-vid. Cheers

Argh, thank you!! This could not have come at a better time for my 3rd year uni project aha! You are great at what you do and thank you giving us great insight into industry practice :)

I cannot thank you enough for the tutorials you put out!

Omg I was struggling with a trim sheet this week and how to plan it out ! You are the best🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻

Somehow missed the notification for that one. I think I've said that before, but whatever : most professional channel out there... which the content is entirely free. Please, set up a Patreon account, so we can show you how much we appreciate your help! Thanks for continuing this series!!

Bro, this is exactly what I was struggling with! Yesss

Tim, my man. I have been looking for something like this for a while. I figured out more or less the same workflow based on your previous videos (trim sheets were a new concept for me back then). It is really cool to get reasurance, plus optimisation of my makeshift workflow. Your content is really amazing and platform independant. I could adapt everything you showcase in max into blender as a poly modelling tool. All I'm trying to say is your contet is really helpful and really outstandingly awesome. It helped me grow a lot! Thank you brother.

I demand more videos on specific topics like this!

Only just getting into this now and you present it in such a clear and easy to understand way. Thanks so much!

Really like your approach to teaching, almost every sentence you say has a new nugget of information that has a high and smart impact on the workflow. You also motivate me to learn the environment design properly. Thanks so much!

Dear Polygon Academy, Thank you very much for sharing your knowledge and experience via this incredible Trim masterclass series. This is by far the best quality content I've ever seen on Trim setups, be proud of yourself and thank you very much for giving a such a great learning content to the community. You are awesome!

Thanks so much Tim for the trim tutorials. You are great.

Tim is teaching me how to Trim

Wow looks like you dropped a bomb with this series, Gametextures had done an amazing but rather long ass stream on the subject but this looks more focused and streamlined, plus it's just an added bonus coming from you and this channel. Can't wait to get cracking on this :)

Awesome! You are back :D I was looking for a good trim sheet tutorial so long. Thank you, Tim.

You are back!!! Thanks for the video.

Thank you so much for this, this playlist is exactly what I needed! :)

Thanks for all the tuts man, i'm learning so much from you!

Excellent explanation, I found it very useful. Thanks a lot!

Yes! This is just what I was looking for!!:)

This is amazing! I love all of your videos! It's awesome to get some tutorials from an industry professional!

absolutely SMASHED the sub button. You're a legend!!!!!

Why am I smiling? Fantastic

Thanks so much for this your tutorials are the best on youtube dude

I've actually been looking for a good reason to start using ZBrush again so I decided to follow this tutorial all the way through. I'm using Blender though but recently came over from 3DS Max after almost 2 decades of loyalty lol.

This is nice concentrated piece of tutorial! Too much valuable info. Thanks.

i have watched this video like a hundred times lol

Dude... exactly what I asked for and MORE, this is amazing!

This is exactly what i was looking for for my scene :) cant wait to go through it proper :)

Sharing this with all my classmates! Thanks dude

oh, hell yes this is what i was waiting for

You're awesome man, learned a lot from you so far, thank you

Love your vids Tim and glad to see you back here on YT in full force. I just recently started a course on Game Art and Design and so far been let down by the quality (or depth) of the curriculum. So again thanks a lot for your time and efforts here on YT and keep at it! Addendum: oh and do please make a dedicated tut on texel density and making texture res correspond with scale! That has been bugging me for a long time now and can't get a straight answer anywhere ;)

Wow, Thank you for this tutorial, I will watch the entire series carefully. Thanks a lot :D

Thank you so much for this series Tim! Caught up on all of your videos yesterday and learnt a whole bunch!

He's back! Keep it up

took one look at this and was like, yep, that's exactly how I plan my trim sheets. :) But a little in I realized we're pretty different. My pipeline is to sculpt all my normals in Quixel's Ndo, then apply Material IDs, then go to Ddo and create the textures with hand painting and screening where necessary, and finally export to TGAs. I then quickly combine the normals and AO to the albedo and merge them into one shaded map (so I can see shadow details when there is no shading information), which I take to 3dsMax. From there I apply my trim sheets. So to plan that, I slap together lowpoly blockouts of my environment (the whole thing) and I'll open photoshop and create a 4098x4098 black and white texture, which I import as a UV plane to 3DsMax. Then as i do my blockout and realize what trims I need, i just "sketch" onto that photoshop UV and slap it onto my greybox. That tells me as I go, what do I need, and lets me quickly iterate and plan how to minimize textures to just a minimum number of sheets, reusing what I'm making as I make it. The upside -- planning and asset creation are done simultaneously. Very fast. If I had concept art to begin with then I can rapidly produce results for a producer or art lead to look at and they tend to appreciate having "done looking" greyboxes the same day as they issued the ticket. I do too, it it helps me think more of the finishing details of the scene day one rather than crash face first into them day 30. The downside -- I have ADD, so the act of closing one program to open another sometimes jogs me out of my flow, and results in focusing on one task rather than the other and getting carried away. To prevent that I had to buy another monitor and place it next to my 3ds main window to jump back and forth. I also tend to get complacent with my existing trim textures and materials, because UVing is such an old and tiresome process I associate it with things being nearing completion, and that turns me off to iterating models and trying new things as I go. (ADD, again, robbing me of speed gains using this workflow, if I allow it to do so.) Maybe that helps! Off to work. :D

I figured out where that one dislike came from, it's because you didn't teach the whole alphabet. Thanks a lot for the tutorial it's really helpful to understand trim sheets.

GOLD!

Your content is amazing! Thank you very much!

dude, make a course, full course on building an env from start to finish, i'll pay good money for it. You r amazing

1 thumbs down? wth!! this is good tutorial!!!

He's back!

I was just thinking abt this.. Right in time thankx!!

Thank you very much Tim! Great tutorials! I'm learning a lot!

so pumped up for more videos

Thank you bro, you save my arts.

Ty for more videos! i need moar!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! also thank you for all your help!

THANK YOU VERY MUCH !!!

Amazing !! Thanks

Such an amazin content! Hofeully there wil be more soon. Thanks

This is very helpful. Thank you

Great work!!!

THANK YOU!

Really great video - super useful, good job :)

Awesome video

this is amazing !! thank you !

Thanks a lot for the tutorial :).

Awesome content, you are awesome!

I think that this is super great that your showing the workflow that is actually used and needed for ones tool kit! I was wondering if you would feel comfortable enough to use ZModeler to make you initial base mesh instead of Max or Maya?

ah I wish u was my 3d lecturer 4 years ago.. My 3d tutor in uni was doing his own thing and wasn't explaining anything, i don't remember he mentioned about trim sheet at all. 🙄

Hey, are you still planning a potential series on Udemy or Skillshare or something? This advice is invaluable and surprisingly hard to find good info for online, would love so much to have a full in-depth course covering a whole scene or whatever you are able to do :)

thanks for this,

Yeahhhh this is good! So stoked about checking out the other videos. Had a question about lightmaps for the models that use the trim sheets. Do you auto generate them in UE4 or lay it out yourself? Thank you for the videos btw! All of them dropping at once is just pure joy.

Is it me only or this dude is Johnny sins of the trim sheets 😛

2:52 Tim is Canadian 🍁

Many thanks

MMA guy is def the kind of user I picture using 3d studio max.

Jesuus finally

Was wondering if you are still planning on doing a video on texel density? I haven't found a video that actually discusses it in depth.

Bro, this is awesome! And i exactly look like you tho :D

Great videos and great channel! sub!

Epic

Heads up, all the example files are 50% off for the next 48 hours : gumroad.com/l/Trims/trims50

Hey great tutorial! I just have one question about the crease. You creased the edges to export to Zbrush, but as I remember crease works just in the software you are. So why did you do it if you didn't use the Turbo Smooth? Thank you!

Man thank you so much for these videos, I can't tell you how big of a help they are to reference when I'm feeling stressed out with an environment project! I have a question about your 3DS Max keyboard shortcuts though. I haven't set any up myself and can tell it's slowing down my workflow but haven't the slightest idea which functions are worth setting up shortcuts for and am concerned I'll overwrite something important or get swamped setting up shortcuts for every little thing. Do you have any advice or resources on how to approach keyboard shortcuts?

please upload few tutorials on UV editing the workflow btw I have a doubt here that shouldn't we UV unwrap here? I mean honestly, it's my 4th in college and after hearing about this trim sheets I feel like I'm today years old i swear

Hey Polygon Academy, your work is great but I was wondering if you could answer me a quick curious question please. The methods here, as for most things in asset design for games is quite labour intensive and if you have a street to make with 12 unique buildings, different textures and designs altogether, and you're designing trim sheets for just one of the buildings, how long does your client usually give you to do this job? I'm just trying to gauge the average expected time for such a project when high-end results are also the expectation. Also, no prefabs allowed :p

Love all your tips! I’m new to 3d but am using Maya what tool would I use to make creases in Maya or is this something I can only do in Max. Keep up the great tutorials it’s really inspiring me and helping me understand video game production.

Thanks for video.How about Ultime Trimsheet technique?

There is more advanced techniques for Trimsheet ? Pixel Stretching Techniques, color gradient, vertex paint, decals, details maps, Mega Textures , etc.

Great videos Tim! Are you using References for these trim sheets?

Greetings Tim.., a doubt when generating hard edges ..., you recommend using this process "Crease" ...., why not use Bevel or parallel edges to harden the edges ....,? Crease offers better behavior to create hard edges ....? Thank you, un Saludo

You are a Fuckingg God!!

Hey Tim! Thanks for doing this series it's super helpful! Is there a reason for using Max or can this step be done in Maya as well?

First i wanna thanks for such great tutorial series on Trim sheet but I have a question. Right now i am creating sci-fi environment, should i create modular kit with unique texture or should use trim sheet with with medium polygon geometry ?

it would be cool to know which of these parts are separate models, just to understand cause I work in an other Software