Tests

Running a few test's in the engine (these are screen shot's of the engine in real-time) seeing if it's worth pre-baking the lighting onto the static objects, giving superb lighting. Each lighting bake takes like 5 hours though so it's a timely thing to keep testing.


(ignore the line on his head, that's just a slight texture error, easy fix)

40th Post... Time to make pretty pictures

So onto a darker theme... started doing lighting test's on the model to see what I could come up with. Was inspired by the one light tests the programmer through together in the editor, with a black background, and I felt this really added to the character so I decided to play on this a bit.

Maybe he is a tad dark here (really depends on your monitor as it was put together on my very bright superb quality laptop... yes its nice) but you can see what I'm going for.

Also the editor designed in my concept art was a bit complex and wouldn't suit a black background in the first place. So decided to get to work on a new, more simple modern looking one, with inspiration from APB and Mass Effect. Still lots to go into it but it's getting there. The UI will have a level of transparency (lets see what the programmer thinks when he see's it anyway, surely must be more simple to program than the last one I pitched...) and you will be able to see areas of enviroment in the background, pipes, chains, patches of walls etc. Still trying to stick with the steampunk feel aswell to blend the character and editor together, have got to get the balance really right here, and not make it look like some future interface. If you can't tell here the key's are the bottom are like from a tyepwriter, with sciencey symbols on... ooo spooky.

This isn't a shot of the actually really time editor, if we could get the character to look like that in the editor we'd probably have jobs for Crytek. It will look a lot simpler (if thats a word) but still hopefully nice... Running some tests on Pre-Baked lighting, which would make it look high quality in the engine, but with the shadows baked in it would look funny if you say put a hat on the guy and the shadows didn't change, which would add another layer of complexity in the end... blah.

Colours...

Spent awhile modeling the guys trousers, as this was quite problematic at the bottom of the trousers. Had to use more alphas to curve the bottom, as they fold up etc. This made the normal maps a bit funky too so had to do a lot of painting of the normals which was a challenge.

Also not to sure what colour to actually make the clothes, I know i'm going to allow users to change the colours but I want a base to start with, tryed a dark brown but it didn't look to nice, so tryed a greeny colour which looked nice but didn't really fit in, so then I tryed a dull brown which looked nice, might saturate it a bit more still though.

Chapter Headings

At my supervisor meeting the other day it was suggested I really get my chapters sorted out to help me in writing my dissertation.

- Title Page
- Abstract
- Contents
- Introduction
- Player Agency (illusion of user control during game play)
Uses of player agency
Effects of player agency

- Characters for Games
Design Process (visual vs non-visual)
Emotional Bonds
Character Story Relationships
Why are characters important?

- Customization in Games
Case Study feedback
Questionnaire feedback
Effects on character user relationship
Effects on story character relationship

- Conclusion
The results of character customization
What we may see in the future

- Appendix A: The Sims 3 Case Study
- Appendix B: Spore Case Study
- Appendix C: Fallout 3 Case Study
- Appendix D: Maybe APB Case study??
- Appendix E: Questionnaire and results

- Bibliography & References

Side Project

Just on the side I thought I should probably start some portfolio pieces so here's my beautiful women so far, thought I should do something to contrast my skinny character a bit. Liking the form so far, need to do the head obviously, but in the end you will hopefully see here bulging out of a Halo armor style suit.

Tattoooo

So the character has been a bit neglected this last week as I work on the questionnaires etc. But I started creating the supports for his wings, his eye piece is almost done, and I started creating a tattoo layer for the player. I think I'm about a week behind at this point which isn't great but I planned for upsets like that in my schedule.Going for wing style tattoos to keep it in the same kind of theme...

Belt straps there to attach wings too.
More detailed eye piece added, difficult to texture though.

Been a little while

Not posted much up here for a little while. Been busy sorting out other things this last week such as the show reel for the fundraiser and the dare to be digital stuff. Also stumbled across a few problems on the programming side or the transfer side, we haven't worked out which yet, but in basic terms the textures and normals are back to front for some odd reason. Started modeling a few props etc for the background and I've been trying to get this eye-piece right because it just wasn't working how I wanted it.


Also I've been trying to sort out a questionnaire for my dissertation but it's been more difficult than I'd expected. Would of been a lot easier if I found one online which I could use, but now I have to make sure that it's up to high standards, which isn't easy. Currently in the progress of working out chapter headings so I can begin writing my dissertation one step at a time.

Eye Peice

Just started modeling the eye peice, not much done to it yet but it's already starting to look quite nice...

Shirt Render

Not really too happy with the shirt at the moment, will leave it how it is for now though, work on the other clothes, then come back to it later on if I get chance. It is very low poly though which is cool as a lot of the detail was added with transparency maps which was a first for me.