Reflection of Zombie pickup truck, Week 30

When this project was first introduced to us, I was quite excited as we had a base model to start with, that was required to look a specific way. But the second half of the project allowed me to have freedom in my ideas and express my creativity. I also decided to take this as an opportunity to display all my skills developed throughout the year, as this was the last project.

Overall I am extremely happy with my concept designs and final work, I feel that I have developed greatly in my digital painting skills and am able to achieve a more professional standard. I have progressed and improved as a game artist where I feel confident, and will continue to develop my skills further. However if I could go back and improve on some elements, I would display my earlier concepts in more professional portfolio layout, also I could continue to push my design further with environment change, for example Zombie horde background, or an in game action final design. 

In reflection to my final model I am very happy with the end result, I feel I achieved the brief for a realistic zombie pickup truck using photos. I have developed my skills and knowledge of 3Ds Max and texturing in photoshop. As I have improved in all areas of modelling from previous projects. If I could go back to improve my work, I would add a light box around my model, so that the model is more visible when rendered, I would also render a video turn around of my model to show case it in a more professional way for portfolio. Also I would spend more time on the textures hand painting detail and a adding bump map to achieve a more realistic finish.

Reflection of game art, Week Twenty Five

This week was the deadline for the first half of the Toyota pickup truck project, so I continued with my Toyota model. I had already started on texturing the msps and finished the interior texture. I used the first hand reference images provided to texture the vehicle, I used a rusted metal texture forvthe base of the car, a leather material for the seats and then for the dash board a plastic material, with the images of the glove compsrtment, other parts of the dashboard over the top of the plastic material and applied a mask layer, then added clearer images of the dials to fit the dashboard.

After I finished the interior, I started texturing the car body using the first hand reference photos provided. First I started with the side of the car, I realised the photo reference provided only had ine door, so I had to replicate the side door and make it to fit the uvw map, including the window and handle. I continued to texture the whole exterior map with the reference photos, while also hand painting.

Once I had finished both texture maps, I saved them as targa files, the interior as 24 bit 1024x1024 and exterior as 32bit 1024x1024 pixels. I then applied them both to my model in 3ds max to test if the textured worked well, while doing this I noticed the textured along the seams did not match, also the lights at the front and back. I kept going back to paint over the texture map, while testing itbin 3ds max to check if the seams blend and the lights match. when this problem was solved I made an alpha map, so that the windows could be partly transparent. To do this I duplicated all the layers in photoshop for the exterior diffuse texture and merged, I then selected the windows areas with the pen tiol and filled in black, I then filled in the remianing areas with white and saved as a targa. Now that all the textures wre finished I could apply them to the model as a multi_sub texture.

Reflection of game art, Week Twenty Four

This week I continued with modelling the truck for the zombie pickup truck project. At this point, At the beginning of the week, I had already finished modelling the truck, however needed to fix some problems before I could move onto unwrapping. After modelling my truck and collapsing the symmetry modifier, I found hidden verts and engons that need to be removed. Once this had been fixed, my triangle count was at around 5,600 and the limit was 6,000, so I had a small amount of triangles to attempt modelling the interior. First I modelled the car seats with a box, then swift looped a line at the bottom so I could extrude the poly out to make an 'L' shape. I then chamfered the edges and moved around the verts to shape the seat until I was happy, then cloned the seat. I created a floor using  a plane so that the player can not see under the car, then created a dashboard using a cylinder which I deleted half the cylinder with the ends, I moved the verts until I was happy with the shape and then moved onto making a steering wheel. At this point I started going over the triangle limit, so I had to remove the wheel and leave the interior finished as it is.

Now all the modeling was complete, I could move onto unwrapping. I started with the interior and then the car body. As the vehicle had the symmetry modifier on it, I could use this to mirror most of the car while unwrapping, and place on top on each other to save space as they are the same shape. However I could not do this for the whole of the model, as it would be to obvious in some areas, creating a 'butterfly print affect' such as the bonnet and the 'Toyota' sign at the back if the truck. So I had to unwrap these parts fully. Once I had finished unwrapping one part of the car such as the interior or exterior body, I collapsed each unwrap uvw to a map channel number, so that I could assign the texture to the right map channel later in a multi sub material. I also render both interior and exterior body maps to a jpeg file, ready to be textured.

This week we also had a lecture on a blog assignment which is a 2000 word reflection on the first year, including the personal action based on our last review and how I want to develop forward to what career path ibwish to take. We are expected to used secondary reference materials, such as journals, books and articles. I thought I could use some reference as a comparison to my game art work, such as the character project in relation to low poly character model such as Lara croft and team fortress. I also decided to start from the beginning in September and use previous blog post and look through them to help me understand my development through the course and how my thoughts have changed, which I can talk about different aspects I liked and disliked.

Reflection of game art, Week Twenty Three

This week the new Zombie pickup truck project has been introduced to us. I am quite excited for this new project as it is a step in the other direction from what we have done so far. In previous project we were required to hand paint textures, however in this new project we have to create textures from photos. It will be more challenging and will be required to use skills more as this project requires accuracy and realism. I am also quite confident with this project, as I have learn so much from previous projects that I can apply to this. However one aspect I need to keep control of is my time management skills, I am close the end of the course now and shouldn't start relaxing a little because I am almost done, I am to work hard for this last project and always stay on target.

We have five weeks in total, for the first three weeks we must produce concepts for a zombie pick up truck. Also we are required to use first hand photo references to create a photo realistic toyota pickup truck with chassis and interiors. The second half of the project of the remaining two weeks, will be creating the zombie version of the toyota pickup truck, by adding the elements from our concept designs to the truck we already modelled and textured. So far this week I already began modelling the pickup truck and have finished the chassis, then began the truck body. I aim to finish modelling the vehicle by the end of this week, therefore I will have enough time to unwrap and texture the truck to a high standard for the deadline on 20th March.

This week I did not feel well enough to attend life drawing lessons, therefore I do not have work to show. This week I started my concepts for the zombie truck, I finished creating my mood board, however I was finding it difficult to come up with ideas and instead used this time to get a head with modelling the toyota truck.

Reflection of game art, Week Twenty two

This week I continued with my Character project and was also the deadline for the project at the end of this week. I had mostly finished rigging and had unwrapped my model, which I rendered into a 1024 x 1024 32 bit targa UVW map. At the beginning of the week I started texturing my UVW map in photoshop. I started by researching some materials for my character, such as furs, leather, cloth and how to hand paint them. At this point I realised that my UVW was  incorrect, as my head unwrap should take a third of the space of my texture map, I also forgot to model the belt and bag, therefore had to go back to 3DS max to fix these problems. Once I had fixed these problems, I continued with texturing the UVW map and changed the old map to fit the new one. Now I began texturing the clothing. First I copied the apron I used from my orthographic final, to the UVW map so that it fit where the apron is and painted over. I then started on the leather shirt, I wanted it to look very cracked and dry leather. So I first painted a base layer of the colours from the concepts, fading from dark to light, then found an image of leather with very prominent cracks to copy from. I layered the image under the painted layer and lowered the opacity so I could see the cracks. I then used this as a guide to paint in the dark cracked areas and the light reflective areas of the leather, once this was done I deleted the leather image and cleaned up the lines around the edge. This method worked well and I am happy with the results on my texture map, I continued with painting the rest of the map. Once I had finished, I applied the texture to my model and finishing rigging ready for the deadline. 

This was also Employability week, so there was no lessons to attend, however we had reviews of our character projects. Overall my feedback for my project review was excellent, I am happy with my learning progress and the level I am at. I was told that I am currently at an B grade, but with a little extra work I could be looking at getting an A grade by the end of the year and on to next year. To hear this makes me extremely happy that I have developed and learnt so much and that the changes of me passes the first year is high. 

Reflection of game art, Week Twenty one

This week we continued with the character project and working on the character model, the character needed to be finished modelling so that we could move onto rigging the model. I spent time working on creating the folds and creases in the fabrics of the dress and top, I also added extra topology to the joints and face, to add more detail and so it is able to move when the joints bend. I am quite happy with how my character model is progressing so far, it resembles my concepts well and fits the style guide.

In life drawing this week we continued with foreshortening, which I was happy about as I feel this is an area which benefits my drawing skills and style. The task of drawing a figure with a lot of foreshortening requires accuracy and measuring, which I am quite confident at. I also enjoy the challenges that foreshortening brings, which I find more interesting and enjoyable to draw than a regular standing pose, it adds more difficulty with measuring and obtaining accuracy of the figure. First we produced some warm up sketches, which included a two minute continuous line drawing, an opposite hand two minute drawing and a two minute straight line drawing.

In the first foreshortening drawing I had twenty minutes, first I measured the figure with the head size, I then lightly marked in the angle of the middle of the figure. Once I had done this I started lightly marking in more measurements, such as the hips and shoulders to get the gesture and weight distribution. After this I cold start drawing the figure, I did this by measuring each angle and marking them on the page. Once the figure was finished, I shaded in a negative space background at the top.

In the second foreshortening drawing I also had twenty minutes, I continued with my method of measuring and drawing with this drawing, however the second drawing had a slightly more difficult angle, making the foreshortening stronger. This proved more of a challenge, although I feel I captured the overall accuracy of the figure.

Reflection of game art, Week Twenty

This week we received the second part of our character project feedback, however I was one of the very few people that did not receive theirs, therefore I talked to tutors about my feedback during lessons. So far I am on track with my project, however my colour value iterations need to have a little more saturated colours as they look to dark and pale, which I will work on and develop further. This week I intend on finishing my character project concepts, so I can move on to starting the character model.

In life drawing this week we focused on proportions and foreshortening. We started off with four warm up drawings to get the brain fully working on both sides and loosen up my drawing. 

 

We then moved onto a first eight minute foreshortening drawing, I started my measuring out the proportions and then working in the rest of the angles and shapes of the figure. I ran out of time during the first drawing and did not manage to fit the whole figure in the time I had, next time I would plan my time better and work faster.

 Next we did a twelve minute foreshortening drawing, which gave me a bit of extra time to fit the figure in. I started the same where I measured the proportions, then worked in all the angles and shapes.

 In the last drawing we were given twenty minutes to produce a foreshortening drawing, I continued with the same method, where I measured the proportions, then worked in all the angles and shapes. However I had more difficulty with drawing, as It had a more complicated pose making the foreshortening stronger. 

In critical studies, we did a peer feedback group session, which we switched work with someone, to review each others work of each area related to our medieval character projects, including our blogs, 2D concepts and 3D work. Overall I agreed with all the comments my peer gave to me as feedback. I know that my blog work had improved, as I include more detail and reflection of my work, however my gramma and articulation of words needs to improve, as I keep making spelling mistakes and missing out words, to solve this I could start proof reading my blogs to prevent mistakes. I agree that my 2D work is good and aesthetically pleasing, which follows the style guide. I made a good variety of colour value iterations to keep developing my design. My 3D work at this point is hard to compare to the project brief and style guide, as I only have a body model and head. However it is a good start. Overall my peer feedback gave me 66% which is a 'B'. 

Personal action plan, Week Twenty Two

After having my review from my character project. As my review from my character project was excellent and I am on track to an potential A grade, I have to reflect on my work and review myself, as I am the only person who knows my strengths and weaknesses. So that I can make an action plan to develop my skills and decide what improvements need to be made. If I could have more time to improve on my stylized character project, I polish my final concepts to a more professional standard, with some extra environment finals and poses. I noticed that the contrast on my final orthographics was a bit strong in certain areas, which I would blend out. If I were to go back and improve my character model, I would change the posture of the spine, as my concept orthos have a 's' shaped spine, whereas my models spine looks too straight. I would also spend more time working on the texture map, especially the face, skin and top. I also noticed the smoothing groups were not correct, which I would edit the normals to solve this problem. Overall the area I need to improve on the most is rigging, although I managed to rig the top half of the body without a problem. I had a lot of difficulty rigging the skirt. However I learnt from research and tutorials, that in order to rig a skirt you need to add extra bones around the skirt, which I added four with five links. I gave this my best attempt of rigging the skirt, editing the envelopes, painting envelopes and editing the weight table, however there is still so much I need to learn about rigging.

Although I have improved greatly in all areas, there is still a lot I need to improve to be at a more professional standard. In conclusion to reviewing myself, at this point after the character project. I know that I need to improve on my time management skill, I have already improved a lot, as I am able to complete all tasks within the deadline. However, If I gave myself more time, I could of improved all the areas I mentioned previously. I know that my knowledge and skills in 3ds max need to improve, which I can develop over time with my learning progress. Finally I think I need to continue to develop my digital painting skills, which I can do by practising.  

Reflection of Character Project, Week Twenty

To begin the character project I researched medieval bar maid and tavern themes, which I collected together the images I found and organised them into a mood board. I kept all my researched images organised in categories on one large mood board, so that I can easily view my  research and clearly access which part of my research I wish to use. 

From my mood board I developed my design and ideas into silhouettes, I produced a large quantity of silhouettes so that I had a lot of ideas to choose from, to make sure I chose them best ideas to develop and you can also clearly see where I developed my ideas from the mood board. I then moved onto developing value silhouettes from my first page, I did this to make each silhouette readable to the different elements of the character.

I used my silhouettes to develop my ideas further and narrow them down. In these character iterations I selected twelve silhouettes to develop, which I then began to use a technique called "photo bashing" where I take a mannequin and add elements from the mood board by "photo bashing" the images together. To do this I took a mannequin which I added a filter to blur out, then cut out elements from my mood board and applied them to each mannequin to recreate the silhouettes I chose, while creating my character iterations, I added a dry brush filter to blur out the images and paint over them. I had previously used this technique in the village building project to create a building block of ideas. 

I then chose three designs from my previous iterations and developed them further. To do this I copied elements I liked from each of the three designs, such as the apron, bags, fur, then added or removed them to create different iterations. I decided on iteration seventeen for my design to develop further, as it is the most aesthetically pleasing, as well as it being able to fit within the tri count, as the long layered skirt disguises the lower half of the body to reduce the tri count. the fur and layers are also accuate to the medieval theme and fits within the style guide. 

I then took this design and developed it further with value range, however first I decided to add back in the bad to the design, as I felt this improved the character design by adding more shapes to the silhouette. I developed my design further with value range to add readability to the character, by adding a gradient filter over to make the face more readable, also creating value patterns to make each element of the character readable from the rest.

 To develop my character design again I had to create iterations of face and hair designs based from myself. I chose to use iteration one as the simple hair style would fit well within the tri count, also as it is a personal favourite.

Next I moved onto developing my character further with colour iterations. First I needed to create a colour mood board to produce a collection of different colour palettes, which would be based on the images I had researched and used to colour pick from. While doing this I tried to pick different and bright colours to fit the style guide.

Once I had finished my colour mood board, I used then colour palette that I had created to produce colour iterations of my character design. On a layer over the top of my design, I used the colours from each colour palette to fill in areas of the clothing, then added a overlay filter.

Once I had lightened the colour iterations and painted over the top to add more detail and colour saturation, as the first page of iterations were too dark. I decided to develop my character with iteration ten, as the colours on the palette work well together as well as fitting with the style guide, I also chose this iteration as a personal favourite. however I still want to push the design further with colour values to develop the design more towards the style guide, as the colour are still a little desaturated therefore need to be made brighter and more vibrant. I also added and extra belt to the design as it looks more balanced and aesthetically pleasing, also adds to the silhouette.

 I then moved onto developing my design further with colour values, by increasing the brightness, adding more saturated colours and changing the colour balance in different iterations to push my design further towards the style guide. I also added a necklace and bucket. I decided to choose for my final design iteration two, as the colours fir the style guide, they are bright and aesthetically pleasing.

I then created a final development of my design with an orthographic. overall I am very pleased with my final design and how it has developed, you can clearly see my ideas from my mood board and how I have pushed it further. Now I need to move onto my modelling my character.

Reflection of game art, Week Nineteen

This week we received the first feedback from the village character project, for my initial concepts, which I produced a mood board, silhouettes, idea generations (with photo bashing) and refinement of ideas. The feedback I received denied approval for further concept development, as I did not annotate my work displaying my thoughts and ideas, therefore I was to deduce where I was going with my final design. I discussed with my tutor about how to develop my design and concluded a final design which I would progress with. I decided to use the with the long layered fur skirt and belt bags, I chose this design as the silhouette is interesting and recognizable, I also like the design for the fur lined layered skirt as people from this medieval time would have worn lots of layers and fur clothing for the cold. The low off the shoulder top and corset is recognizable for a medieval bar maid, you can also see how the character has developed from the mood board and where the ideas have come from. Now that I have a final design I can develop it further with values and colour. To do this I started with turning my design into Black and white, then duplicating my design and adding a gradient over the top of each layer, starting very light and gradually darkening the gradient over each one. I then added a overlay filter to each layer to blend the gradient with the design, I added a gradient iterations to my design, so that I make the character more readable by adding a focus on the face, also to decide the level of darkness and contrast on my design. After I created various iterations of pattern values, which I changed different elements of my character such as the skirt, apron, belts, so that they contrast with each other and are easier to read. Once I had finished the values, I collected together images of paintings with different colour palettes I like to create a mood board. I then used the images I had collected to colour pick from them and create a colour palette of five colours. I then used these colour palettes to create iterations of colour values for my design, by adding a colour filter over a certain area.

In life drawing this week we continued the theme of fabrics. We started with some warm up sketches then moved onto mid-tone paper and soft drawing materials to create tonal values, to capture the folds of the fabrics. 

In this drawing we had thirty five minutes to create a tonal value sketch of the figure and fabric, I used my time to sketch down a proportional drawing of the figure with lines, then used the rest of my time to focus on the fabric and rendering the values. Overall I think I achieved a proportional drawing, and good tonal values. However as I decided to used soft pencil to render, it did not blend enough to create tone and the fabric resulted it looking flat and too dark. To improve on this drawing, next time I would use softer materials such as charcoal, even though I still use white chalk in this drawing to highlight the drawing, it did not blend well with the pencil, leaving it looking very contrasted and not enough value range.  

 

Reflection of game art, week Eighteen

We began the start of the character project and the first stages of development. As I already had my mood board I could work on silhouettes, to quickly create character ideas. Then moved to developing these ideas using my mood boards, I copied some elements of the images I had collected, then arranged them onto a mannequin to recreate my Silhouette ideas. This technique of creating concepts is called 'photo bashing', I have used this technique previously in the village building project to create building block ideas. While using the photos collected from my mood board I added a dry brush filter to blur out the images and painted over the top. I also moved onto developing these ideas further and then created face iterations of my character from photos I had taken of myself, which I painted over the top to change the facial features and shape. The work I have produced so far will be handed in and assessed to find out if I am going in the right direction.

Life drawing this week, we did not have a life model, therefore we were split into groups and took turns to model for each other. We continued to focus on fabrics and folds, as everyone was wearing clothes this was a good chance to draw different clothing and how they fit different body shapes.

Reflection of game art, week Seventeen

This week we received the feedback from our village building project. Overall my feedback was excellent and I am very with this. Compared to how much I struggled with game production and trying to keep up with visual design last year, I feel I have improved so much and my feed back shows this. My work in both the design process and the final product showed excellent feedback , however I lacked enough research and good mood boards for the project. Which showed to be a problem with everyone else, as we had a lesson on how to properly create mood boards. We learnt how to create mood boards and now I know that I need to organize my research into section and keep all my research together in one large mood board. For example from my character mood board I have divided up my research into clothing, faces and hair, accessories and body types.

Mood board used for concepting.

I also learnt about clothing for my character, when modeling a character with clothing there is going to be folds in the clothing, which I learnt about the different folds needed to create a more interesting silhouette and realistic character.

In life drawing this week we continued the theme of clothing, fabrics and instead of concentrating on the figure, we focused on fabrics and the folds created when draped over the figure. To do this I used rendering to capture the creases and folds in the fabrics. Overall I feel I lacked in the final rendering of the fabrics, which I think I did not use enough contrast, therefore the folds were lost in the shading.

This week I also found out that we will be starting the character project properly next week, so I made a start of my character model. As the character model will be based on myself, I took orthographic photos of my head so that I could start modeling. As this will not affect the design process, if the character is based from myself, no matter what my head will be the same.

Reflection of game art, week sixteen

This week I learnt more about anatomy, but focused on gesture and posture. I will apply this knowledge to my character project, which I will produce some sketch studies. Also I learnt about face topology, the planes which make up the surface of the face. Which I had to plan out the polys that make up a face, on a photo of myself. I also worked on modeling a female head using the box method, I already had an idea of what I was doing, therefore I took the tutorial provided and completed the work on my own.

Life drawing this week continued with looking at anatomy and proportion, also our work produced during the lesson was to be handed in for reviews. Therefore I did not have photos of my work and will upload my work from this week with my thoughts of reflection, as soon as I get it back.

Reflection on Stylized tree, week Twelve

After I had finished my final concepts, I began modelling the trees. I used my orthographic concepts as a guide to model by adding it as a material to a plane. Once the models were complete, I had to unwrap them. Most of the model was made from cylinders and cones, therefore most of the unwrapping was done using the cylindrical unwrap and the pelt unwrap for the bark on the woodland tree. However some of the model I had to unwrap by hand instead of using tools, I did this mostly because some of the tools did not look right on the uvw map and I wanted to make sure it was all unwrapped correctly. 

This is the bark texture and the uvw unwrap render map for the pink blossom tree.

These are the texture maps for the pink blossom leaves, including the alpha map, diffuse map and uvw unwrap render.

These are the texture maps for the blue leaves on the woodland tree, including the alpha map, diffuse map and uvw unwrap render.

This is the bark tiling texture for the woodland tree and the bark uvw unwrap render.

I then rendered the uvw maps ready for texturing. Now I needed to work on creating hand painted textures, First I looked on the internet for bark textures for reference and ideas, I then found one which I based my bark texture from. I gathered together a colour palette and started painting, the textures also had to be tillable which took a long time to achieve. I also created alpha maps for the leaf textures, by silhouetting the areas which needed to be visible with white and the invisible with black. After I had finished the texturing, I went back to the uvw editor to create map channels for the material ids, I did this by setting a map channel in the uvw editor with the map I want, then collapsing the modifier save the map channel. I also set the material ids for the muti sub object, I did this by selecting the polys in a area then setting the material id number to match the map channel id. I then selected the correct materials in the muti sub material for the same id as the map channel.  Once this was done I could apply the multi sub material and the models were finished.

These are the renders of the final textured floating blossom tree from front, back and side view.

These are the renders of the final wire frame renders of the floating blossom tree.

These are renders of the final textured floating blossom tree from different perspectives.

These are the final renders for the woodland tree from front, back and side view.

These are the wire frame renders for the woodland tree.

These are the final perspective renders for the woodland tree.

Overall I am quite happy with the stylized tree project, I have managed to work within the deadline, which time management has been a problem before, I have learnt new skills throughout the project, such as more hand painting skills. I feel now that I am fairly confident with painting textures and would say it is one of my strengths, however I could still improve on making the end result of my textures sharper and neater, especially by using normal maps and specular maps. My final model against the brief proves to be a good asset and fits the style guide, as it has a stylized fantasy look, has chunky stylized textures and fits the bright colour palette with purple shadows. However, if I were to improve the model I would add some more details, such as bump maps to make the model look less flat, especially in the bark. I would add more detail to the bark, such as in the concepts for the floating tree it has a hole in the middle.