83 was proposed as a realistic tactical shooter and because of this it was decided very early on that the use of photogrammetry should indeed be used; not only for speeding up art production but more importantly for the high fidelity that can be achieved through such a process.
Workflow
There are many processes involved in photogrammetry but we begin by capturing surfaces. In order to generate accurate PBR textures we need to collect as much data as possible. Basically meaning we need to grab a camera and take a ton of shots from various angles. All images need to be consistent, with some overlap, and the same lighting conditions from the beginning to the end of capture.
We then proceed to importing our photographs into a relevant photogrammetry software such as Agisoft or Reality Capture. This software compiles all the relevant capture data, calculates where they are in 3d space and finally recreates a 3d model.
When we are happy with our 3d model we then usually export to a sculpting package and optimize any topology. The capture tools can often produce artifacts depending on how complex they are, so it’s important we clean these models up and smooth them out. The end result is our high poly asset.
The final step of our workflow is to create a low poly version of the asset for optimsation purposes. We bake the necessary maps such as albedo/ normal / height from the high scanned version to the low-poly version and then proceed to importing the assets to game for testing.
