3D ART OUTSOURCING CHECKLIST FOR PROJECT ESTIMATION

The key information needed to provide a quote for a 3D art outsourcing project can save a lot of time on your pre-production process:

General 3d modeling questions:

• Is concept art required or it's already done at your side? If there's existing concept art, we will appreciate it if you can share it with us - this is especially important when we talk about creating stylized 3D characters
• What software is preferred for the models to be created/exported to?
• Is the model done from scratch or based on an existing model?
• If there's an existing model, please share it with us for the review and analysis. If there's no existing model, please share the closest visual references so we can have an understanding of how it looks for each type of the unit/item/character.
• What is the number of polygons required per model?
• Is UV required?
• Is retopology required?
• Are there any requirements for the hierarchy of the objects, pivots?
• Are LODs required? If yes, then how many and what are the requirements or limitations?
• Which game engine is used in this project?
  

PBR and textures:

• What is the number of maps per material? Add the list of the maps if possible.
• Do you require seamless textures?
• Do you require a standard of procedural material?
• What is the size of each texture in pixels?
• Explain the level of detail and quality of a texture. Please, attach visual references for each type of the texture.
• If there's an existing (completed) scene implemented in the engine, we appreciate it if you send it over together with the textures for the review and analysis.

3D rigging:

• Which is the overall number of bones required for the rig?
• Is IK (inverse kinematics) required?

3D animation and VFX:

• Which software/game engine the animations to be done within?
• Please, make a list with the descriptions of all the animations needed (e.g. idle, attack, jump, etc) and add visual references for them;
• Please, mention what should be the length of each animation in seconds;
• Should the animation be looped?
• Are there any additional requirements for the animation?
• Do you require skinning? If yes, elaborate, please.
• Do you require blend-shapes? If yes, elaborate, please.
• Are VFX required? If yes, then please make a list of VFXs with the visual references for them;
• Is there a limit to the overall number of particles

That is a lot of information to consider indeed. We wish we could make it easier, but it is highly recommended to get this figured out before approaching the estimation, let alone the actual production of 3D art.

‍
As you may know from our previous posts, careful attention to the details during the research & development stage is what helps us to achieve the targeted result creating custom 3D assets for video games.