Cocone's 3D Production Technique

The following is an article I translated originally posted on CGWorld on July 7 2022. It's a summary of a lecture given by Cocone 3d Modeler, Yukinori Fukatsu, on Cocone's 3d process. I found it interesting as someone learning about 3d as they use some special techniques to achieve the cute and round feeling in their smartphone app game Pokepia. I did not translate all of the image text in cases where it was just repeating the same text as the article.

Cocone's 3D Production Techniques for Giving Shape to "Kawaii" Behind the 3D Dress-up App "Pokepia" - CGWORLD JAM ONLINE 2022 (6)

CGWORLD JAM ONLINE 2022, an online event hosted by CGWORLD, was held over two days on May 27 (Fri.) and 28 (Sat.). The first day's event, "Kawaii to the World! How to create "kawaii 3D design" realized by Cocone with Pokepia Kokone Corporation, the creator of Pokecolo, a kawaii dress-up community application enjoyed by more than 130 million users, took the stage.
Using Pokepia, a 3D dress-up application released this year, as an example, Yukinori Fukatsu, a modeler in the 3D team of the Pokepia Division, gave a lecture on modeling used in actual production to realize a kawaii world, collaboration with 2D designers, and work with Unity.

『ポケピア』 is a world where you can be your true self.

Pokepia is a new 3D version of Pokecolo, a character dress-up application for smartphones released in 2011, on the occasion of its 10th anniversary. The catchphrase is "another world of your own, where you can wear what you want, talk with who you want, and talk about what you want." The emphasis is on enjoying communication, rather than on using parameters to gain an advantage in the game, as is the case with so-called game applications.
Based on a system called CCP (Character Coordinating Play), which allows users to coordinate and enjoy character costumes, another world where you can become your real self in the virtual world of the Metaverse is developed. You can invite up to five friends to your star, enjoy a party, take pictures within the application, and share them on the application's bulletin board and external SNS.

CG production techniques in pursuit of 'kawaii'

Next, he explained about "stars" in Pokepia. A "star" is a function that corresponds to a user's own so-called "room," and allows users to freely place furniture and other items to enjoy coordinating them.

The following is a list of the many techniques used in CG production to achieve these various types of 'kawaii.'

Increasing polygon density for a smooth effect

In the apps developed by Cocone, there are no attributes like stats which offer a gameplay advantage to an item, so the item's appearance is its entire value. Therefore, a certain amount of performance strain is factored in. Basically, furniture and items are modeled to have a smooth and soft finish by using increased polygon density. For some items, the details of the high model are transferred to the normal map and applied to the low-poly model.

Texture Rendering

The textures settings are PBR (physically based rendering) using 4 types of textures: albedo (base color), normal, RGBA mask, and shadow map (see below). In our version of Maya our developers have built original shaders in ShaderFX so the artists can work on models with the same look and feel as the app.
Image translation: Base map + normal map + mask (RGBA) map + shadow map -> how object appears in Maya with ShaderFX graph -> how final object appears in Unity.
This image displays 4 different textures used for mask map. RGBA map consists of R: metal, G: ambient occlusion, B: 2nd map for multichannel, A: roughness. (T/N: I'm not entirely sure what B is, I think it may be masking out the shadows.)
Furthermore, to prevent the screen from being too dark, a "shadow color map" is provided to specify colors for ambient occlusion, creating a three-dimensional effect while maintaining a bright impression.

Image translation: The shadow color map is a map for specifying the color of the AO. If you put AO as it is, the colors will be too black and grey, so to make a brighter image we overlay the shadow map in Linear Burn mode and control the brightness values so that the dark areas are not too dark.

Hair texturing

The appearance of fur/hair is currently handled in a legacy billboard like manner because using fur shaders on smartphones would make processing too heavy. The company is also conducting in-house R&D on fur shaders and hopes to support shader-based fur and hair appearance in the future.

Image translation: Using the old-fashioned billboard method so the front of the texture is always facing the camera. Depending on the item you can also prepare a high poly of the fur appearance and drop it onto the normal map of the item.

UV animating

UV animations are sent to Unity by assigning UV values to the locator's position information, creating a system that can be exported from Maya at the touch of a button. The system also automatically sets up materials, thumbnails, textures, and animations in Unity, and checks the data.

Image translation: Define animations in UVs in Maya -> Assign the moving value to the locator -> Export to Unity with animation already enabled.

Item-specific shadow models

In addition, since real-time shadows can cast shadows that are too dark, we eliminated real-time shadows and prepared a unique shadow model for each item. The shadow texture of the item is applied to the model, and the shadow model is then decaled to the floor in multiply mode in Unity to display the presence of the shadow without real time rendering.

Unlimited interior arrangement

In Pokepia the interiors are arranged freely, not on a grid system. In the early days, a grid arrangement was used, but it was too cramped and did not fit the appearance of the world. The free placement makes for a dizzying experience, but users are enjoying it as well.

Image translation: At first we made interior decorating follow a grid rather than free movement. We changed to have free movement so customers could enjoy maximum creative freedom. This will result in some graphical issues such as items overlapping eachother, but that can be fun too. We decided to implement this change as part of our policy of being customer-first and not being bound by specifications.

Useful functions and tools used in Pokepia

Modeling with physics

Next, we introduced useful functions and tools used for making models for Pokepia. As an example, physics were used to model a large number of gems and adjusting the shape of cushions. Jewelry was created by using MASH's Dynamics to make multiple copies of a single model and randomly changing its size, and cushions were made to look plump by controlling air pressure with nCloth and retopologizing after confirming the inflated state.
In a more unique approach, the 3D function of Photoshop is used to create models from 2D images: an alpha image is prepared based on a design drawn by a 2D artist, and then the image is sculpted in Photoshop and brought into Maya in OBJ format for retopologizing. Although other 3D software has this kind of functionality, Mr. Fukatsu says that Photoshop is by far the fastest and produces the most beautiful models.

Batch texturing with UDIM

Each furniture banner of 16 interior items per theme. Since it would be very costly to create each of these items individually, they are textured together by using one texture sheet per theme.
The UVs of the 16 models created in Maya were placed so that they fit into a 4 x 4 square, and then imported as UDIMs in Substance Painter. From here, three of the aforementioned four types of textures per item, albedo (base color), normal, and mask map, can be created for 16 items at once.
Furthermore, by applying a material color close to the finished model in Maya in advance, the ID map in Substance Painter can be used as the base color texture as it is, thus succeeding in reducing production time.

Aiming to build a Cocone universe where appearance itself is the value

At the end of his presentation, he talked about his future vision as "a story about the future that will take shape in the future."
Cocone has experience in the NFT Market, and will build its own metaverse world, the "Cocone Universe" in the future. For example, items gained from the gacha are now either kept or exchanged, but with the introduction of NFT, the value of items acquired in the past will increase, and it is expected that they will be able to be sold at higher prices in the future.

They envision a future in which royalties are generated by offering items created by users to other users within the service, and creative activities within the metaverse will flourish. They are aiming for an environment where users can be creative, not just given a service.
Because their worlds have no gameplay stats that give advantage to items, they want to create a metaverse where the designed products themselves have value and each brand can reach as many people as possible. The Cocone Universe is a designer's paradise. "The hurdles are high, but we want to achieve our goal," Fukatsu said.
It is not just a game app, but a world where users can freely enjoy themselves as creators. As a CG creator, I am excited to see the future that Cocone envisions, where creating and playing are integrated and seamlessly connected. As a CG creator, I have high expectations for this project.

Last but not least, Cocone is currently recruiting new team members to give shape to "kawaii". The male to female ratio is 3:7, but male applicants are also encouraged to apply. Originally a 2D-centered company, Cocone hopes to focus more on training 3D designers in the future.
Staff members come from a variety of backgrounds, including prototype designers of Nendoroids and people with experience selling assets on VRChat. The company is inviting those who are interested to apply through their website.