2 Weeks and Counting...

It's been a while since I last blog posted as I haven't had time to render or screen record any of the work recently. I will begin rendering turnarounds of some of the finished props tomorrow so it won't be left until the last moment. I cannot render them out on my laptop as it doesn't have the memory (cant wait to go home and use the new computer) so I have to wait until I'm in uni before I can do that, it is a similar case with texturing.

I can screen record the unity particles and how I have them linked up to the animation but it will have quite a low frame rate so I will be rendering them off also when I can get on a decent computer.

As for now I have a few renders:

I'll update with turnarounds over the next few days.

Bows, Arrows, Staves and Dissertations

The characters have been handed over and the rigging and skinning has begun  so work has become less hectic. While it was great fun making them two characters for our game it would have been too stressful to keep going at that rate for much longer.

So I took a few days off over reading week, lazy? yes. Worth it? totally.

I feel much more refreshed and ready to crack on with the game now, and seeing the characters come to live as they are nearly rigged is making me very excited, I cant wait to see them animated and shoved into unity.

But there is a minor halt in the major project, as the dissertation deadline looms ever closer. My essay 'Aesthetics as Metaphor: A Study of Environmental Storytelling' had to be put on hold while I churned the characters out so I have less time to cram it in now, but it seems to have all worked out well as the models are completed and the dissertation is coming along reasonably well. So fingers crossed.

Anyway...art.

So I completed the low poly of the bow and arrow which I had blocked out in the last post:

Now I'm working on the Staff for the player character to use:

This is only a pretty early block out and has been through quite a few designs already, but I like the curling tendrils running up around a crystal. The shaft of the staff will be much more gnarled and branch like, quite similar to Gandalf the Grey's staff. This kind of staff has nature in mind as well as the new ability the player will have in the game which is the ability to cast magic, hence the crystal on the staff, but it can still be used as a melee weapon. The crystal also mimics the crystals present on the Bark Basher (the final boss character of the demo) so a theme is present throughout.

Once the staff is completed and the dissertation handed in I can begin working on some of the environment props and start playing around in unity with the particle effects and shaders. Oh, and start texturing the characters and weapons. The next few weeks will be when (hopefully) something resembling a game begins to form and that's when it really gets interesting.

Fae Handed Over

Last you saw of the Fae was the completely low poly model. Since then I have unwrapped it and created a high poly mesh in ZBrush.

As this is only the second time I have used ZBrush I was pretty pleased with the results, the high poly looks nice and I got across pretty much everything I wanted to in the model. I have yet to project the normal map on to my low poly model, but I cant foresee any problems as I have done pretty much everything the same as I did for the Centaur.

My current ZBrush technique is to stay with the standard red wax shader (which I know many pros don't like) and make the details more defined than I would intend for them to be on the final model. I then add the standard material to it as it will hopefully give me a better idea for how strong the final normal map will be.

So here is the ZBrush sculpt in red wax and standard materials:

Now that has been handed over to one of the riggers I can slow my work pace ever so slightly as the two characters which I needed to produce quickly have been made. Now I need to produce the weapons and any other props that are needed for animations quickly so the animators don't have to wait for me. After that I have a bit more freedom with what I can do, I will probably work on some more props, do any unity stuff that needs doing and then texture the characters while the designs are still fresh in my mind and the animators that want to work with textured characters can.

So now I have begun my longbow. It has only been blocked so far but here is a screenshot anyway:

The bow will be made mostly out of ice as the Centaur's that inhabit the ice areas of the game will be using them (hence the Centaur being used for a size guide). It's a longbow which means it is very big, and I was surprised during research as to just have large they are.

Turnarounds, turnarounds, turnarounds!

So pre-production is in full swing for next weeks deadline, I don't feel like I'm going to be able to get enough done for a great mark, but I can definitely produce enough to make production run smoothly. As well as this deadline I have a business studies deadline on Friday so I have to work on that too, so there's no shortage of work that's for sure. The business studies project doesn't have much to show yet, when my business card is finished I can put that up here, but I need to do some renders before then.

So for pre-production I have been working on the turnarounds for most of the characters and props as well as designing some of the props, it may seem late to be designing, but a lot of the props are very minor and don't require too much design, unlike the characters.

So I'm just going to post a load of turnarounds for you to look at, drawing is not my strong point but they seem accurate enough to be useful in production.

The Centaur's Ice Bow:

The 'Tholos Arch' building:

The Player Character's Staff

Ruin No 1:

Recorder Prop:

Violin Prop:

And the Centaur himself:

Quite a few things will be changed before the end, and some things will be changed when it gets to production as there won't be enough time to change them in pre-production now. But some things like making the instruments more unique and less like ordinary instruments, but for now I have something.

The ruins will also be split up into smaller parts, such as separate pieces of broken wall, rubble and floors, so they can be adjusted if gameplay requires it and also so they can be mixed and matched into different designs. This gives us some more freedom and also works as a safety net.

Back to Pre-production

So it's been a while since I posted any work up here, mostly because I've been working on pre-production which is always a weak spot for me, I generally find myself unmotivated and struggle to get any work done. I am glad that pre-production for major project is it's own project however as it stops me from getting to this stage and then just jumping into production before I am ready.

That said, it hasn't been going too badly so far, the pressure to do well this year as well as getting the animators and directors everything they need is keeping me going for the time being. I find that I enjoy the end of pre-production anyway as I have trouble coming up with initial ideas and designs but enjoy tweaking solid work.

So far I have basically what I put up here for the Centaur a few weeks back, even though some tweaks have been made to him, and I now have the player character design down, at least in terms of his size and shape so the animators can start thumbnailing and planning the animations and rigs.


So here is the Fae player character design so far:

The one on the left was the original design, then we had the idea of using the vines running along his body to roughly plot out the veins or follow the nervous system. I then came up with the one on the right. I really liked the idea but I'm not sure it comes across to well. I like how it grows up onto his face and down his arms, but I think I'll need to play around with it some more before I enjoy it.

I also have a list of props I'm making for the summer court environment as well as weapons, these include:

Books
A bookcase made out of a tree

Musical Instruments

Tholos Arch (Similar to the Oracle of Delphi)

General Ruins

Tree Stumps
Staff
Bow and Arrow 

So far so good, just got to keep this up and keep knocking these designs out in preparation  this should be an amazing project, lets hope my blog posts stay this optimistic over the next few months.

On to Specialist Animation Week 3

Week 3...the final week...for the first part of this project anyway.

I've mostly textured the two props now, which was expected to be complete by the end of the second week, so not too bad timing there. The 3rd week we need to light and render them as well as modelling a character, this is where it gets interesting.

First off though, here is Mjolnir:

And Loki's Sceptre:

Things are turning out quite well if I do say so myself. Although this is where things begin to get difficult. I've never been great at characters, and I have to make it in Maya by Wednesday, so less than a week. Not to mention the rendering coming out with some very weird results. I also have a presentation which is due either this Wednesday or the week after. Here I will be presenting my study of how visual themes effect the narrative of a game and pitch the idea for my dissertation.

Loki's Poki Stick

I've had the last few days off in terms off university work as my Mum and Sister came up to visit which was nice, and we went out on Sunday night to see my comedian Ross Noble for the first time and that was a pretty awesome night.

But as for work, I've mostly been texturing my props for the current project, got to have these completed by Thursday so I have the last week free to model and unwrap the character. I've spent a fair amount of time these past few days trying to render out an ambient occlusion map which I have had partial success with. It is working but I have seems around the edges of the model, even though i have turned up the 'fill seams' option in the baked map setting.

So here is Loki's Sceptre, with the not quite working AO map:

So far it has a diffuse and a specular map on it, so I still need to start my normal map for this as well as finish these maps, but I'm pretty pleased with how this has turned out so far.

I have done some work on Mjolnir as well, but I have spent the majority of my time on the sceptre as the work seemed to be flowing quite well on that prop.

The hand strap is going to be changed, as having it all the same texture makes it look very boring, but the normal maps are working to a certain degree without spending too much time on them, and the tweaks that need to be done should be pretty simple. The spec map is only basic at the moment too so that will require some changes, but overall I think I can have both of these to a pretty good level of quality by Thursday, which would be great considering I've been learning a new program throughout.

I've also been posting bits and pieces to Polycount which is an awesome website based around game artists. Some of the work on there is incredible and it's a great community. Eventually I'll start a thread of my own work...but I think I'll build up my portfolio a bit more before then.

By Thor's Hammer!

Just a quick update, unwrapped both weapons and started texturing the hammer now. All seems to be going well so far, and I'm enjoying the texturing a lot more now that I have my new Intuos 5!

So here is the hammer so far:

The black pattern is going to be normal mapped on it, it's just there as a place holder. There still isn't a spec map on it either, plenty more to do before this is finished.

I'm going to be moving on to Loki's sceptre soon, so I have a good basic texture for them before working on the details and I will have plenty to get feedback off during the tutorials on Monday.

Beginning of the last year...

So, this is it... The last year, after this the big scary world.

Anyway, we've begun a few projects at uni so far, the first of which is the pre-production from the final major project. For this project everyone has 4 projects to complete, which we can split between any amount of collaborative or personal projects, as long as 2 of the projects are part of a collaboration. During this time I will be putting all 4 of my projects into the same collaborative project, which is the Fae game I briefly mentioned in the past. For this project we have 11 people, all of which are artists or animators, who are putting various amounts of their time into the project.

In short it will be a game demo created in the Unity game engine about a faerie player character who has to defend a you girl who has found herself trapped in the Fae realm. She will face many dangers while in this unknown environment and you will have to use your abilities to defend her. The player starts off in a forest environment where they will be attacked by tree like creatures and small wyverns and will eventually end up in an icy environment plagued by centaurs.

For the project I have been tasked with creating the player character and the centaur enemy as well as various props mostly centred around the forest environment. The final part of my project will be using the unity game engine, as I did with the UDK game last year. This year however we have a much larger group with more people working within the game engine, so we will hopefully be able to achieve much more and get it looking closer to a stand alone game rather than the mod of last year.

So enough talking, lets have a look at the designs I have so far...

First up, here are some early designs of the player character, it has a forest theme to it so I was thinking of the bulk of the body being made of rocks, with vines and branches reaching between them holding together:

This is also the most finalized idea I have for the Ice Centaur so far:

The designs are still in early stages as we have only been working on the pre-prod for about a week. In this time I also managed to get camera to follow a moving player in unity by recycling code that people are sharing on the internet.

And that's project 1...

The pre production is done over a large period of time during which we have other projects to do. The first one of which we are half a week through. We have to model a character and 2 props in Maya, which is a new program for me to use and one that I really need to get a good grip on when looking for work. We are allowed to use existing characters and props but preferably ones that have not already been rendered in 3D. I chose to do Thor from the avengers movie as well as his hammer Mjolnir and Loki's Sceptre.

During the first week we need to have designed turnarounds and modelled the 2 props as a warm up for using Maya. I have already finished the majority of the modelling, with just a few tweaks needed here and there.

Here is Mjolnir, weighing in a 312 Polys:

And here is Loki's Sceptre at 494 Polys:

I'm pretty pleased with how these have turned out and how quickly I have managed to make them as I have had quite a bit of trouble adjusting from my 3Ds Max workflow, but it is starting to come together now and I should be ready for moving on to modelling Thor himself once I finish off his turnarounds.

Year 3

Well it's back to Uni next week, really looking forward to it although I am quite nervous, what with this year's grade is basically my final Uni grade...so yeah...no pressure...

Honestly though I can't wait to get back into it, summer has been a nice break but I really should get back to work now

In the past few days I completed a tutorial from Digital Tutors which came free on the CD that came with my 3D World mag. It was quite an interesting tutorial which focuses on the basics on unwrapping and texturing, but it has made me rethink may workflow and I was pleased with what I got...so it can't have been bad

This is the final image, the model was not done by me and was supplied with the tutorial, as were the photographic textures, the unwrapping and texturing (Diffuse and Ambient Occlusion) was done by me:

I think this turned out well for saying I consider myself to be a weak texture artist and I always rush through the unwrapping stage which makes texturing harder. So hopefully this will help me with my projects that start in under a week

Let the free time commence!

so yeah...I'm posting a lot less now that university is done for the year, I've been out enjoying myself with friends a lot and generally having a great time

In between the fun I've been trying to get a bit of work done, I've mostly been working with Mudbox as it is an amazing program that can produce some amazing pieces of work...but I'm not very good at it. It may be my lack of traditional art skills or maybe I just need to get used to all of the tools and tricks of Mudbox... but at the end of the day a bit of practice will help.

So first I took the basic human male mesh that comes with Mudbox and then tried sculpting onto that adding muscle definition using the Classic Human Anatomy by Valerie Winslow. I had some problems with getting the general form right, starting with the base mesh I found it more difficult to move the mesh around to get the shape right, for example I struggled with the shoulders and arms as I wanted to add a bit more muscle to them areas.

Never the less this took about an evening to do, I was quite pleased with some bits, others not so much, but it was still fun to make...

Another thing I decided to work on was a gun, something common in games which I still haven't gotten round to making since I moved over to art this year. I started making it in 3DS Max using a side on view of a M4 Commando and then took it into Mudbox to sculpt on to. The modelling took about an evening and the sculpting took around 3 hours. I set myself a poly limit of 1000 and it ended up being 1044 polys, so close enough...

I'm quite pleased with how it turned out in the end and proved to be very useful for improving my hard surface sculpting which I didn't really know how to do. After playing around with different techniques for about an hour I managed to find a way which worked for me so I stuck with that for the remainder of the project.

I intend to keep working on fast projects like this so that I can improve my work speed as well as practice lots of different techniques while I have the free time. Very soon I'll be beginning work on the 3rd year major project to get a good head start on that, so I will have some more complete works then.