Making a negev skin is a bit like decorating a brick. It’s just a huge nondescript rectangle with bits sticking out of it. I had a look in the workshop and didn’t see any depth in variation of submissions so thought I’d have a crack with the Daimyo execution, specifically for two reasons: Daimyo’s were feudal lords and only the very best would be acceptable for them, (they’d probably have a Negev honor guard) - which fits in with the Negev being expensive and fearsome. And secondly because the Daimyo execution is really fun! It’s like laying out all your lego bricks into colours and then choosing which bits to go where - which in this case I’m really grateful for as the Negev had a horrible UV mesh with random areas duplicated elsewhere and a flexible approach was essential.

Symbol placement proved a problem as the most visible real estate is over the rear side panels closest to the player, which you may notice have a deep taper on their edges distorting anything you print over them, with the added problem of non-editable text applied over the top causing legibility issues I opted to apply the hexagonal pattern here instead. I ruled out the forestock box as the horizontal ridges obscured anything applied over them when viewed in workbench. Next best place was the rear block which had the additional problem of being obscured with 4 bolt heads. Even so, out of the possible options I decided this was the best place.

The ammo block had huge potential for displaying graphics, and as I compromised with other areas of the model I capitalised heavily on the large area here - which is fine as it's out of shot for the most part. On the model itself, the two smaller extruded panels near the ammo belt were perfect for the crossed swords symbol - which I applied to both so that one is always visible (the bottom one when loaded, the top one when reloading). I like to hide the symbols on the magazine if I can, but the Negev has no magazine - it does have a flip lid (I don’t know gun component names so bear with me) which was the perfect alternative location for it.

I’ve made more of the starburst graphic which I normally introduce over small areas like a front sight or scope, it just seemed in this particular circumstance to resemble an array of sprayed of bullets - and as the top face of the weapon had no detail apart from a rail on the right I thought it would look far more interesting with that texture applied over the top rather than blocking it out with a flat grey.

I could have made the reds bolder but as the M4A4 is already in the game I used that as my reference point and attempted to match the overall saturation level for consistency.

Let me know what you think!

edit: note whilst rendering the cover images I lightened the ammobag slightly so the it wasn't so dark - I've applied that change to the uploaded UV as well (v1S).

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