Sorry for the delay. Despite repeated promises I just haven’t been in a posting mood of late.
Everyday for the last 2 weeks it’s been on my to-do list, but somehow I never get round to it. But tonight I’m making a concerted effort. That’s commitment, folks, only 2 weeks later than my word.
It’s been a busy few weeks. I’ve gotten a lot done but as usual it’s a little short of my intended target.
I’ve spent almost all of my time in the 3D editor and photoshop - modelling, painting, unwrapping and texturing the static environment.
I’ve described in previous blogs how enjoyable and relaxing this I find this, but after so many weeks of performing the same dull repetitive tasks, I’ll be glad to move onto something else to put it mildly.
I’m a little apprehensive to show pictures as it’s not quite there yet.
The models have to exported into the game editor before I can finesse the look of materials and textures, however it makes sense for me to finish modelling before I bother with that.
So currently it’s only viewable within the 3D editor with a very basic shader which doesn’t take into account lighting or shading, no real depth of surface, so it all looks a bit old-school. That’s sort of appropriate I guess.
Currently I’ve got the entire environment in a single scene. It’s laid out in pieces but essentially it looks like one seamless structure, so with a basic fly-camera I can explore all of it from a first-person perspective.
It feels a bit like that fantasy/movie-trope of being shrunk down to 1/100th your size and exploring a doll’s house.
It’s hard to explain, but it often feels strangely trippy walking about with the first person perspective. I’d be curious to know if this is a common experience among 3D artists who design environments.
A first person view was never an intention of mine, but I think for certain scenarios it could work really well. You'd have the established, overhead camera for most of the time, but a first-person view toggle while standing still would be a great mechanic for inspecting/finding things. A hidden piggymon card for example, or a note pinned to a notice board containing clues. I'm not totally sold on the idea though; as I mentioned in a previous blog, it would allow the player to see too much, or would require that I added significantly more detail. Who knows, it's just a thought.
While a number of rooms have been furnished, these objects are in a different workspace.
By next week I should have it all plugged into the same workspace and looking more like a complete picture.
Also it should be noted that the green area outside of the school grounds will be left blank for now, but at some point I’m planning on making it into a lush and wild bit of English woodland, trees, plants, rocks, perhaps a stream, all explorable within limits of course.
Once I'm done with the environment, I’ll finally be ready to define environmental collisions, setup the new camera rig and start working on a system for NPCs.
There’s still so much more before I can start developing missions though (*sigh*).
In all these blogs I don't think I've mentioned GUIs and the hassle that brings.
I’ve also been looking further into shaders and effects recently. This was always an area I struggled with before I got a grip on the tenets of 3D rendering (incidentally I came across an excellent video series on YouTube if you’re curious about how it works, click here)
Run, white boy, run.
What proved to be most helpful was looking at a load of examples, particularly by one Keijiro Takahashi (if you ever see this Keijiro, thanks!)
Just browsing some of his code repositories taught me a great deal, but also provided some excellent unlicensed shaders that I hope to develop upon, like this simple yet powerful grass shader
A basic grass texture on it’s own looks all too much like astroturf, with a dedicated shader you can make it look and feel a lot ... grassier.
I'll leave it there, short and sweet. More blog happenings in a couple weeks.
I promise.
No really.
(probably 3 weeks)
Some pics then.
Along with previous disclaimers about the lack of detail, also note that these are taken from first person perspectives (ahem, stating the bleedin' obvious), which includes the ceiling, but most of the ceilings are mostly white and boring looking as they will rarely (if ever) be shown.
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Welcome |
School time! |
Boys' restroom |
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Assembly hall |
Cafeteria kitchen |
Mr Ross's room |
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IT room |
Hooch's room (no windows, bad design - oops!) |
The dormitory |
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Got drainage and everything |
Runoff drain for flat roof (I thought of everything) |
Dorm kitchen |
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Dorm dining area |
THE SHINING |
Just a corridor in the dorm |
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Girl's bedroom |
Secret room? |
Fire escape |
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Changing rooms |
MacDougal's shed |
A massive pile of leaves |
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Assembly hall from above |
Main building front |
Staff building front |
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And |
That's |
All |
Folks.
See you soon.