what I normally do is model an entire area and then breathe life into it using materials and textures but I’m wondering if this is the best course of action . Do other people model individual objects and model them right afterwards or wait like I do? I curious about when people add their lighting as well. my scene usually goes like this,
Model everything in the scene.
Get to working on those nodes for materials and textures.
Lighting
I know I should put armature stuff next but i’m not brave enough to attempt that yet. I’m only just getting used to the switch between render and cycles.
I personally like to jump right into materials and textures right after modeling an object. It is simple to viewport render a single object and get a feel for how it looks on its own. Of course, that can be a problem if I need to alter the mesh after I’ve made my UV unwrap. I prefer to give each object or group its own blend file anyway. I then link to the files in another master blend file where I place my lighting and camera. Going back and forth between blend files can be a bit of extra work, but it helps a lot when organizing a complex scene, especially when there are actions and animations associated with different objects.