# 'Adventures in Low Poly Modeling' - Ep 1 - Swamp Horse **URL:** \ **Category:** Gallery\ **Tags:** render, mac, modeling, vray\ **Created:** [February 5, 2021, 11:37pm UTC](https://forums.sketchup.com/t/adventures-in-low-poly-modeling-ep-1-swamp-horse/152181 "2021-02-05T23:37:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 3\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![eric-s](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/sketchup/user_avatar/forums.sketchup.com/eric-s/32/55392_2.png) [@eric-s](https://forums.sketchup.com/u/eric-s)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2021, 11:37pm UTC](https://forums.sketchup.com/t/adventures-in-low-poly-modeling-ep-1-swamp-horse/152181/1 "2021-02-05T23:37:00Z")
Been awhile since I shared any non-SketchUp-Campus-related content here in the Forums so the following is what I hope to be the first of a series of low-poly models in order to beef up the old ‘concept/game art’ design skills. My usual starting point when self teaching/designing is to begin by researching and finding good sources to get inspired by…in this case: [Low Poly Molly’s work on Instagram.](https://www.instagram.com/low.poly.moly/?hl=en) (btw I’ve heard that imitation is the highest form of flattery). ![get_attachment_url](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/sketchup/original/3X/c/2/c216873fe49fd1906ea334391c32a44748a11ea4.jpeg) Now to recreate. Step one, since time was short here on my lunch break I started with a horse from 3DW and reduced polygons by 85% using Artisan. The original horse had about 13k polygons whereas the reduced version was down to just over 2k. ![Screen Shot 2021-02-05 at 2.50.31 PM](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/sketchup/original/3X/f/4/f405dc92b78061f8e2322ba4487d42000a07b1be.jpeg) Next up was the environment. This was pretty easy as it consisted of only 4 elements: swamp water and spiky stumps in middle-ground and swamp land and tall tree trunks in background. ![Screen Shot 2021-02-05 at 2.51.21 PM](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/sketchup/original/3X/5/d/5dac94b455b423bc7f1b4be06fe5e552078e70e7.jpeg) Here’s what it looked like when viewed from eye level at a similar composition as the original. The trees were made from extruding a hexagon shape from the polygon tool and the ground plane was just manually pulling a vertices. And trees and spiky stumps were placed randomly using Skatter and adjusted slightly to get the distribution right. ![Screen Shot 2021-02-05 at 2.51.52 PM](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/sketchup/original/3X/3/9/39435b7c492833993f09afa6add405932ed50e94.jpeg) Next I popped open V-Ray for some super quick materials and lighting adjustments. 3 spot lights added. One directly over the horse pointing down and the two others angled towards the trees in the back. The back spots were given a warm color tint while the spot above the water had a very light blueish-green added with the hope to pick up some ambient light bounce back onto the horse. ![Screen Shot 2021-02-05 at 2.52.15 PM](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/sketchup/original/3X/d/5/d54ec9dde806b1892a41e0b9a0ed116f261a6e95.jpeg) Here is the render as it came out of V-Ray with mostly default settings (meaning that I did turn on ambient occlusion and did some basic exposure corrections as well as added a vignette to the camera). I knew some more color corrections might still be needed so while I try to do everything in SU+V-Ray, it’s really more like 80/20 = 80 (SU+V-Ray)/20 (Photoshop). ![Screen Shot 2021-02-05 at 2.48.16 PM](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/sketchup/original/3X/e/f/ef3775199ec69ed249ff3b61300caf4b73822b45.jpeg) Finally, for comparison (original on left and mine on right), the first version is straight out of V-Ray and the second one below that is with the addition of some color corrections and because I’m lazy, I magic-wanded the ‘lady in red’ and just plopped her on top to finish things off. ![Horse_LowPoly_BeforeEdits](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/sketchup/original/3X/0/0/002bc992ffa9ee1763e9c6789c95ea12a1bc5462.jpeg) ![Horse_LowPoly_FINAL copy](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/sketchup/original/3X/d/4/d41db3d045d0d9221535f75232db5addbef14bd1.jpeg) In summary, not a perfect match as you can see but I learned a few things along the way and isn’t that the point after all? Looking forward to continuing this experiment and posting episode 2 in the near future. Happy Friday. ---
**Author:** ![Yulia2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Yulia2](https://forums.sketchup.com/u/Yulia2)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2023, 9:45am UTC](https://forums.sketchup.com/t/adventures-in-low-poly-modeling-ep-1-swamp-horse/152181/2 "2023-06-21T09:45:47Z")
The use of Artisan to reduce polygon count and Skatter for object placement shows good results. The addition of V-Ray for lighting and material adjustments further enhances the visual appeal of the scene. Great work! I think it’s awesome that the author is exploring and improving their skills in this [game styles](https://retrostylegames.com/blog/game-style/). The step-by-step breakdown, along with the accompanying screenshots, provides a clear understanding of your workflow. ---
**Author:** ![eric-s](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/sketchup/user_avatar/forums.sketchup.com/eric-s/32/55392_2.png) [@eric-s](https://forums.sketchup.com/u/eric-s)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2023, 1:43pm UTC](https://forums.sketchup.com/t/adventures-in-low-poly-modeling-ep-1-swamp-horse/152181/3 "2023-06-21T13:43:41Z")
Thanks for the feedback. That reminds me that I’m overdue for another episode in the series!