My sword was inspired by several objects in the art museum. I combined the body of a sword I found with the battered look of some of the daggers, and embellishments inspired by armor. I also added a gem stone to the hilt for decoration. I changed the basic shape of the cross guard of my sword to be simpler in Maya. I had previously used a corkscrew, but decided to use an extruded rectangular prism instead. I later added spiral texture through a normal map created through Zbrush. Here are some screen shots of my work:
The sword overall is definitely impressive. Even though you can’t see them very much, there’s a lot of high detail in the etchings, and I think that you got the texture of the sword itself down really nice–it looks like I would expect a sword to look. Plus, I think that the gem on the hilt looks like a gem and adds a nice splash of color to the hilt. The only things I would suggest are making the designs on the hilt more pronounced and the texture a higher resolution on the protruding metal parts of the hilt. Overall, though, I would say it definitely is believable as a battle-worn sword, which can be pretty hard to achieve, so nice job.
Your sword model is awesome! The longer you look the more details you begin to spot. The jewel really stands out and is definitely an impressive addition to the sword. Keep up the great work!
The sword looks great, and I love all the little details that you put into its design. The jewel looks great and the pommel looks like the one in the museum. The engravings are also well designed, they are just really hard to see, so i think making them stand out a bit more would make your sword look even better.