Eye of the Abyss - WIP#1

[ArcanisLupus]

hehehe

I feel silly.

"All the characters modelled and base textured" actually means "I'm a stupid git who forgot the actual antagonist"

So yeah, quickly rushed this guy out, pretty pleased with him. He's gonna switch between biped and quadruped, so will be fun to mocap. Think a gorilla.

I'm gonna make him sort of half insubstantial, like this.

http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...ekka-front.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...rekka-back.png

[President]

looks great...might I also Suggest a look at this shader for that half insubstantial look....there's some great wavy edges to the Pawn here... you just have to ignore all the fire particle effects coming off of the figure...the methods in both videos combined should really push that effect you're looking for...

[ArcanisLupus]

President that is awesome, thanks for sharing.

[zibipod]

Woah.. where can i get a tutorial for that?
@president

[ArcanisLupus]

More weekly updaty-ness.

Thanks again to President for that link, it opens a few worlds of possibility to me.

This week was a little slower than past weeks, but I still managed to sculpt and texture the trees, update the maps with the updated models, and then spend a fair swath of time digging through CGTextures and such for textures to apply to the castle, forest floor and character details, which means by next week I should have some extra pretty maps near to completion. After that its the characters again, followed by rigs, then sound design before uni returns, which will see me utilising the MoCap studio to capture the game's animation. Can't wait to dress myself in a tight black suit covered in dots.

Here is some pretty shots of the updated maps.

http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co.../01/forest.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...1/forest-2.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...4/01/menu-.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co.../01/menu_2.png

[ArcanisLupus]

Update 31/01

Updatiness.

So with another week gone by, I have gathered textures, given them normal maps (through a delightfully repetitive process) and applied them to the world! Behold, maps with textures on their BSPs and terrain, at long last.

http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...k_Forest_1.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...k_Forest_2.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...k_Forest_3.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...k_Forest_4.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...u_Forest_1.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...u_Forest_2.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...1/castle_1.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...1/castle_2.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...1/castle_3.png

With this done, I will spend the coming month texturing the remaining static meshes, finish dressing the castle interior, and making the characters prettier...much prettier. This will be followed by some sound design and then rigging and Mo-Cap.

Wish me luck.

[President]

Good luck...
Lovely environments...I really can see the potential in this project....
Looking forward to the next update.....

[ArcanisLupus]

alrighty, new week.

I actually think I lost a day this week, I would swear it is Thursday right now.

Anyway, much work has been done…around the house. With moving out coming up, things like packing and cleaning are fast becoming more important. But this does not mean that I haven’t done any work. I have done some detailing work on the characters textures, and finished the textures for the castle and forest. Behold:

http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...ster-front.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...ther-front.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...evil-front.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...pure-front.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...-forest_01.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...-forest_02.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...nterior_02.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...nterior_01.png

The character details are hard to see in these shots, they're things like actual material textures and skin colourations for the most part. some clothing tweaks also. This week also saw me learn some new tricks in Mudbox, which has been most helpful, along with some methods to deal with tricky normals.

Away...........................

[ArcanisLupus]

Forget what I showed of the castle interior, I've completely rebuilt it to looks less ****.

http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...stle-int-1.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...stle-int-2.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...stle-int-3.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...stle-int-4.png

An early and minimal update this week due to moving house shenanigans and a weekend trip away from my computer

As you can see I've completely rebuilt the castle interior as the previous one was literally a box with some **** thrown in. I feel like this one is much more an actual Castle. And it also is a helluva lot cleaner in regards to its BSP, which has made for much smoother everything ever.

That broken mirror is also real time reflections, which is smexy. Now I just need to get the same effect on a shield carried by the player...which I think might have to settle for a reflection map instead

Anywho, weekend trip activate.

[ArcanisLupus]

Not much done this week because of packing and cleaning and moving. I'm currently sleeping on an inflatable mattress.

I did however manage to crash UDK at the most inconvenient times, while implementing a new, Portal-esq, menu set up, have a lookie at the mechanics demo:

[Umberto]

Good progress! I can relate about the moving....
This door of Narnia effect is cool - Could you share how you did it?

[Max Power]

It would be worthwhile at this point to go back and edit your previous post changing the image post to links to the images. This thread is so cluttered by the content it takes quite some time to load. Possibly updating the first post with a "best of" the new stuff.

[ArcanisLupus]

Day late update, such shame.

Umberto: Moving is done now, so just unpacking to go. For that portal effect I used actors call UTPortal. Check out these two tutorials: One and Two.

Max, I think you're right, especially since I just spent a few minutes scrolling down :/ Ill get on it after this post.

Speaking of which, this week saw very little done, as I finally had to pack away my computer, but before I packed it away I managed to pretty up the menu map, so now it looks as follows:

http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...u-Forest-3.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...u-Forest-2.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...u-Forest-1.png
http://www.nicholas-ferrar.net/wp-co...u-Forest-4.png

Now that Uni is back on I will have access to some serious resources (Mo-Cap studio is a thing) and should give way to awesome progress.

Tally ho.

[ArcanisLupus]

Uni is back, I’m back, everything is back, we’re all back here. How are you?


In terms of work I have done much messing about in MotionBuilder, to the effect of this:


I have taken my character, given it a full FK/IK Rig, and driven it with some motion capture data supplied with the software, which I have then taken into the UDK successfully!

Huzzah, I have a working Pipeline. I tested this on multiple characters too, but since they all would be doing the same thing I decided not to include the video.



See you next week.

[ArcanisLupus]

Certain….things happened that caused me to forget to post my update on friday (it totally wasn’t the Elder Scrolls Online Beta or anything like that…)

That said, this update comes with great cheer and joy in my heart ^_^



This week, I have not only solidified my MoCap to UDK pipeline, I have also added my own animation on top, introduced secondary assets to the characters (eyes and facial rigs) and got them working in the UDK. At this moment, the two main characters (Brother and Sister) are ready for Mocap: rigged and weightpainted.

Additionally, I have got through my version incompatibilities and have managed to get APEX cloth simulation working in the UDK on top of MoCap data. This means that all characters are ready to go with a working pipeline.

Here is a video of a properly weightpainted Brother model running MoCap animation with my own additions on top (the hands and some arm movements)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsYRPuIjXfI


And here is the Evil Snow White with a very basic rig showing off her dynamic skirt (I realise the deformations are terrible but it is only a proof of ability, now final product ^_^)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsynGGiTVlM

With all that done, progress can now be made on a much smoother track. In theory at least.