stuff 2

Final (?!) color concept for a more unifying environment and flora/fungi.

And then now that's set, continue and finished texturing these:

Cadence of MA 3D Computer Animation lol is a damn hard course dam u bu

I used to animate flat 2D
Then came a man from MA3D
He said to me!
He said to me!
UV!
UV!
 Good for you
 And good for me

Up in the morning to the risin' sun
 Gonna rig all day, til' the riggin's done
 Harvard reference is a son of a bitch
 Got the missing links and the pdf glitch

One, two, three, four, double that and got my map
One, two, three, four, I love hand-paint every map
Spec Maps!
Bump Maps!
Gloss Maps!
Normal Maps!

I dont know but I've been told
Softimage ICE is actually gold
Looks good
Feels good
Is good
Real good
Tastes good
Mighty good
Good for you
Good for me

I don't want no fancy plug-in
I just want my coffee machine
If I lose all my auto-save
This machine's going to the grave
Ain't no use in mop and moan
Grab another and movin' on

Made from this song:

stuff

more stuff

Final shoot model

unit 1 painted texture

The bad seams scared me a while, then I realized UDK wasn't using the right mesh file. Put in the painted texture and mostly look okay. Still quite a few seams visible again, not sure why. Maybe a simplified painting will help reduce the visibility of seams? Also really need to redo the gills in the normal map - some are too visible, and some are barely visible. And this is ALL I've been doing everyday for the past month... figuring out how to do things, watching tutorials, and trying to do the things while wondering why things aren't working. It, again, makes me look like I'm not doing anything, when all I do other than work is shower and sleep, and occasionally buying instant food or laundry. Either I have ZERO time management skill, or I'm actually what Uncle says I am - a retard. I really would like to prove that man wrong.

A bamboo shoot

Single mesh bamboo shoot with no overlapping poly. Pretty simple little thing that took a whole day a a night to figure out... . So haven't gotten around to texture anything yet. My laptop is bleeping dead(unable to boot) so had to find alternative to easy(-er) UV-ing option than UV-ing straight in SoftImage/Maya, because I'm told it's a royal pain. So far it seems that Roadkill will be my answer for now. Or classmate's laptop with Headus UV, which I was using, and is better than Roadkill.

Modelling.

Having no more than a sample .45 colt and a couple of windows under my modelling belt, I set out to conquest organic modelling of a fungi forest. It turned out to be a long, slow trip through mud, monsoon, and mosquito of Vietnam, crawling face-down. Just when I thought I finally got the base mesh right, I had to face down ZBrush with no prior training. Just when I thought I finally finished the normal map sculpt, I found out my second UV set (for light map) vanished from all my .obj's. Just when I thought I knew what to do with the phantom lightmap (re-make, period), I found a GAPING HOLE has somehow, at some point, opened up in the mesh. And I didn't notice until I have OVER-SAVED every obj and ztool there were. *face-twitch*

A Mushroom, is in UDK! And glowing!

So the low res, one and only done, lantern mushroom is successfully imported into UDK with 100 emission value of yellow constant. And it's just a glowing mushroom without any color or texture. BUT, it's visible progress. Makes everybody happy...er. At least I feel better seeing something happen.

Model 01

Remade this one model 2 times, but forgot special merge option and lost all copied UV. Now reUV-ing the entire mesh as single mesh. Learning experience, learning experience. LEVEL UP!!! ... I've lost it.

Finally starting production stage

Finally not researching and Harvard referencing, or drawing concept art anymore.  Just started doing a couple of ground texture tile, and now just starting trying to model one of the fungi unit that will populate the environment.  Trying to do things modularly, but I don't really know what that means, so I'm going to pause modeling now and try to read up at polycount and watch some tutorial vids.  Don't have enough energy or time to type details here.  I've already gave up on recapping Personal inquiry.  And CAPT is just all the research and concept art designing for this project.

Hand-painted game texture tile

I'm going to ignore the vaccum of record regarding Personal Inquiry and hope to fill them in later. Time is scarce now. This entry is just to note that I just realized I should paint the texture FIRST, then offset and make it tile-able LATER. Not the other way around. *sweatdrop* Also, painting stylized game texture that looks nice is hard.

My first ever texture tile! And it's rather crappy! Woo!

TT_TT

I've had enough researching stuff, documenting my researched stuff, watching tutorials, documenting the tutorials I watched. Any further requirement of any kind of research is going to get a flat NO from me. I'm starting modeling and texturing. I don't care.

Masters Project

<p>Technically the Masters Project started with CAPT as its pre-production, and PI as its supplement, as we have been "strongly recommended" to do by our tutors once upon a time (March). <br><br>
Anyway this is just a quick log of what I need to add to the Production Diary hand-in:<ul>
<li>continued concept art for fungi units
<li>read article and tutorial on modular modeling
<li>bought udk modular modeling dvd, damn expensive
<li>laptop's C:\ died, rendering it un-bootable, fucking sad-face.  Lost all programs and games along with hard drive, spend £149 for repair, new hard drive, and some data recovery.
</ul></p>

CAPT individual production journal 4

After deciding that Earth went to waste due to warming and water pollution. I followed up on tutors' suggestions from presentation 1 & 2.

Spent half a day looking up environment artists from various PC game developers whose game I either have played or at least seen being played. Not all of them have individual contact information available. In the end I emailed to 12 artists whose emails worked. So far 4 replied with helpful suggestions and further resources to investigate.

Following up on their suggestions, Dev and I quickly established sets of color themes for the landscape, sky, and structures. Types of plants most likely to be there.

Spent a few days looking through books and online resources on soil types. What general types are there, what are their nutrient attributes, etc. But they all relate to gardening pretty flowers in a healthy world. They don't provide basis for the kind of land and flora design I have in mind for this environment.

Meanwhile also looked at many documentaries on plants and films that had themes of garden or environmentalism. While their ideas and styles are not directly contributing to my design direction, they sort of showed me what I don't want this project to look like.

During this search I came across a book on plant conservation. One of the articles talked about how experimental garden should be designed, and, more importantly, gave a case study on the recovery of alkaline soil through plants. However I did not pursuit that lead further for another day or two.

Also briefly looked at suggestions such as Laputa, BioShock Infinite, etc, but those floating cities are Utopian, pretty, and civilized. At least in appearance and construction. Mine is just a DIY lab of plant conservation and engineering.

Classmates I spoke to about the stuck research suggested looking into desert reclamation, and reclamation of polluted lands. Now I can't remember who suggested them, but Jack suggested one of them. It seemed so obvious and straightforward now, but at the time, for some reason, I did not think of looking straight to pollution and recovery. I blame panic.

Meanwhile I've been gathering reference images for soil types as well as rock formations. Still they don't look to fit together well.

From desert reclamation and pollution restore I came across the phrase "environmental remediation", "soil remediation", and "bioremediation". It turned out there's a whole science field, and a whole bookshelf at the library, on that topic. If only I knew.

I looked up remediation of soil contaminated with heavy metal and oil. Took down species names to look up and base concept art designs off of. Meanwhile, I revisited what kind of pollution the soil might have. Since heavy metal contamination is not visible on surface, I decided to push the oil leak part, and try to incorporate tar. I also looked up documentary photographs of Hiroshima and Nagasaki after they were nuked for landscape design of a polluted, war-torn land that came to be abandoned.

Meanwhile, I compiled a color board for a polluted atmosphere, as well as some island shapes that incorporate more of the tar and destroyed building. Further research into bioremediation revealed that many types of plants are used, and not just microscopic fungi, bacteria, and algae. Unfortunately, all those savior plants' appearance are modest with similar looking blossoms. Design-wise that isn't good news, even with mutation and distortion from environmental radiation. I will have to return to the microscopic ones to find better basis for design.

CAPT individual production journal 3

Continuing doing research on soil type, and land restoration. First concept.

It's almost 9pm and haven't gone far in reading. Tried to watch documentary with one eye and read with another. Big mistake. Got a whole of 10 usable lines of data from both. Tears. Have 2 more hours then go home. Must do most concept by this weekend. PI. Rivers of tears.

CAPT individual production journal 2

Concept art stage. Not only just what the plants, lab, land looks like in detail and color, but also how the actual game are we're making will be laid out. How the path of the audience's eye will be guided by what is in the layout. What exactly will this area look like.

Dev and I both agreed warm-color, barren landscape provides a very nice contrast against vegetation. That is, if the vegetation will be mostly green. The thing is neither of us developed and researched a back story before presenting. Now the more I think and read about what this future Earth might be like, the less I'm certain the "plants" we'll be planting will all be green.

I hope Dev won't be upset if I propose too much of a change to the concept art. I'm currently trying to compact-research what this new, barren Earth could look like while still being grounded (pun intended) in some kind of current science knowledge. I definitely want the environmentalism mood to be felt, even if only as an under current.

Just now I've been reminded of possible reference material from the Fukushima nuclear disaster. Gods be with Japan and all the folks affected by those disaster. I don't know how I could've forgotten about the nuclear plant's demise while remaining aware of the earthquake and flood. But now I definitely should look more into what has happened to local flora and fauna other than mutated butterflies that were first reported. This can be done later tonight on computer, however. Right now I need to continue make use of Talbot campus library whilst it's open.

I should probably also say hi to new flat mate when they all hang out in the kitchen again, but... ... damn this social phobia to Hell and back. And to some other places too.

Oh and I have to do PI research at the same time somehow. ... Man this gonna hurt just as bad as Term 2

Current quest: Determine dead Earth climate. Confirmed traits = radiation, worn ozone layer, lack of oxygen, polluted water,

CAPT individual production journal 1

Viewed documentaries on plants, space colonization, and possible ways Earth goes to waste for concept. Did not have concept art prepared for presentation. Presentation was told need to clarify goal, and give tutors sometime definite (and visual) to look at in order for them to give feedback.

Tired of catching up because time spent on this assignment cuts off time for that assignment. Determined to stop situation from repeating. Need to make short term plans. To do that need to understand game pipeline better, as well as game engine Unity (which is needed for PI anyway).

Current "quest": install Unity, run one tutorial on Unity. Create rough concept art and color boards to pitch.

http://www.thiagoklafke.com/modularenvironments.html

search udk and modular modeling keyword.

project pitched

Made and pitched my technical and master project all together (we all did) on time afterall. Figured this is a real chance to do something that I honestly want to see happen, or at least pitch it, instead of just working for other people as I've done constantly for the 6 years since graduating college, I did just that. I thought it was a silly idea, a silly dream of a naive soul that can't sober up. So I was so nervous on that stage, putting a piece of what I truly cared about out there, I couldn't speak fluidly, remember what was on the slide, or which slide I was on. It was a disaster.

Fortunately, tutors gave me practical feedback of what to research more on, what to take a look at, how much of this silly idea would possibly be doable by me. There is a LOT more research to be done, as soon as possible. But at least I wasn't shred to pieces and told go make a new idea.

More surprisingly, I got more suggestion of resources to look at, and voicing of encouragement from fellow classmates. I guess it's not as horrible an idea as I thought it is. Most surprising of all, someone else joined up to do my idea. It is a frightening concept to realize your idea is to be put into action, and you're the one making decisions on how it'll happen. Having never led before, I'm real nervous about screwing up and dragging someone else down with any mistake. Can't have any slacks now.

This program will soon come to an end, and I will face life full on once again. Before that happens I will take buffer provided by the protective school environment, and endure what may come with pursuing an ideal I truly care for.

......

Museum visualization, so far, seems like a lot of craft, and data representation - sometimes not even in detail - and no or scarce art or story. Game trailer and assets have stories, but the looks all feel similar to each other, like nobody wants to try and do something new (other than thatgamecompany). Heritage preservation is definitely government sponsored and not often. ...... Why can't I be content just doing simply game stuff? Stupid. Have to make a decision what I want to be doing 7 years from now.