Aim - 1. Apply appropriate rendering techniques to a 3D scene
2. Understand the application of materials, textures, and lighting.
3. Create a ''Deathmatch'' type level in UDK, Designed for 12 simultaneous players, providing 2 battle arenas in addition to multiple access points to those arenas.
((( Click Images to Enlarge )))
Below I shall Blog Both Assignments.
Assignment 1 (Due = 19th Oct)
You are required to create a “deathmatch” type level blockout in the UDK. Your level should be designed
for 12 simultaneous players and provide 2 battle arenas in addition to multiple access points to those
arenas. The level should be created based on image reference either acquired directly by you or found
online. The level must also be lit.
You need to produce and submit a CD-ROM with the following directory structure and content:
/Root Directory
Microsoft Word document (maximum 1 page) describing:
1. Why you chose your particular design - whats so amazing /appealing
2. What problems you encountered during development and how you solved them / wants to assess productivity / forums / internet? UDK tutorials? Do I take a proactive apporach / list of problems/ how i solve them in paragraph/2 -
3. What would you improve in your work if you had more time -
/UDK Files (B2 lab compatible UDK level and package files go in here)
/Screenshots
Screenshots/images of minimum HD 720p resolution showing:
1. Top down map/s of level showing all spawn and pickup points
2. Bird's eye view of level
3. Your 2 arenas
4. A sample of connection points
5. Other gameplay features /sniping nest/ stuff
/Reference
All reference imagery and sources used to be placed in this director
table of image names / Ref links to them like in table.
Hourences.com /udk search fourm
Week 1 - 28/09/11 - (Research) 3 ideas
platoon?
get august Veer
All in UDK
Research of Envionments. Colour / Style / Feel/ Atmosphere / Shape / Feel/ Photos/
Multiple Angles. Plan - Show all details. Correct balance and game play in all areas.
ALL from reference - As long as they exsist from soemwhere else - NOTHING from my mind.
Not an exercise to conceptationlize 3D ideas.
Exercise in creating 3D enivon - Take what existits and replicate envinorments - Good refference. im creating a model of what exists in the real wolrd. FILMS probably.
Week 2 - 05/10/11 - Block out in UDK
Block out in UDK - Provide full screen shots below and make sure to do a 1 or 2 pages word Document showing all of this, but in a condensed format. Block out and take all view shots asked for. Show clearly game play routes and such. This is vital PREP for weeks - 4-12.
--per axis scaled - Non uniform -
--wolrd propertimes - ut - udk team death match - add lights - then build -light/then build all - mode LT - 6-7 or box - space bar scaling. - TAb - add bots 12 /
content browser - actor classes - Drag and drop
CB - Pick ups - Weapons - DD top opne for more fire power. - Double click on it - Green plus icon on weapons - Drop down, - seelct Rlauncher.
- Right click in Environment - add actor - Add path node -
Character - 96 units high. Udk base mesh. for scaling.
wireframe box - COntrol ALT drag to move brush verts
Light Col -
References for block out- environment found -
mix and match as long as it makes sense - need reference for everything i do
SCale - size - blance
put weapons / pick ups / balance level - 12 player Deathmatch
Provide gameplay Oppotunities for short/mid/long range play styles
Play test it all the time - Make it PERFECT for 12 players. Not too small/not too big. GOod pace. TEST.
Refs -
Week 2 04/10/11 (extra)
- Think faster -
- Don't waste time -
- Create 3 more B/O maps - Configure Differently
- Stick 12 spawns in Fast - TEST
- WE ARE AIMING for Belivability.
- Wont be texturing BSPS - Just place HOLDERS
- Custom Houses -
B/O For Size Scale / Game-play TESTS
- Test hardcore. All 3/4 Configurations.
- Not 1 Modular Asset a week / 15-25 a week. Pro ones. Build it up.
- Answer the questions he asked me.
week 2 05/10/2011
lecture - main way of designing principles i think.
Week 3 - 12/10/11 - Fully Finalize all Environmental Characteristics-
Week 4 - Hand in of B/O
Week 5 -
Maya model - texture - Transfter and replace block outs with maya assets.
30% Pre made UDK assets.
Week 4 - Hand in of first Deadline - Block out -
Updates below ---
Main reference below. -- Keep storng art style - aim for vibrant.
Arena 1 Below
Arena 2 Below
Birds Eye view below
Extra features / Jump Pads /
Extra Game play features - jump boots / connection points to roofing/
Map of - Spawn Points - Pick ups - Jump Pads - Weapons
Progress shot below
Early progress annotation
Below -- Silhouette 1
Below Silhouette 2
Below Is Silhouette 2's Wire Frame View.
Report So far - for A1
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When presented with this assignment I had a number of interesting ideas. Such as, an inhabited jungle or some sort of roman town with two main halls. In the end both of these ideas felt wrong. I did not feel comfortable taking them forward.
After some research I decided on an old/Medieval French Town. These types of towns have a roughly unison building height and structure. I chose this design for a number of reasons. The most important being its ability to present to the player two Main different surface areas to fully engage on. These being, the ground and the roofs. The ground being broken up by multiple buildings and town assets and connected by tunnels, doorways and paths. The roofing being connected by the initial close design of buildings next to each other, as well as wooden planks.
This enables for a very diverse level of game play. Not only can you find cover on the ground, grab weapons and kill people, but all of this and more can be executed on the roofs of the buildings as well. The advantages being, height advantage and a fast route of escape from horizontal or vertical directions. A vital point in this structure of game environment is the inclusion of jump pads. These connect both of the fighting tiers in a very helpful way. So I knew from the start that I had picked an idea where I would not have that much trouble in creating interesting, diverse game play from the beginning. It was a challenge deciding on what the two arenas would be, I decided on a nice fountain garden and also a tight market place both with many access points.
I had the most trouble when it came to balancing game play and creating interesting methods of play. This I presumed would be the hardest area to start with anyway. From getting multiple people to play test my level I discovered the following:
- I needed more interesting objects to interact with. For example, more wooden planks, not just used to connect roofs, but some on the ground, some leading too certain floors of buildings, therefore helping populate all the different height tiers of the map.
- I also discovered I didn’t have enough objects of cover scattered around the map. I created more barrels. Quickly adding red, orange and green lights around certain pickups really helped bring the map together.
- From play testing I found out I had created too many scaffolding points and these were also annoying too climb to reach the roofs. So I therefore deleted two of these, left one and included multiple jump pads instead.
If I had more time, I would be more adventurous with my reference gathering. More importantly I would probably include terrain changes within UDK and put half the town of a slight slope in certain areas. This I will do in Maya later, but it would have been nice to have done it beforehand. Having the town on one flat surface makes things easier to start with though. I would create more BSP assets with a bit more detail like a boat or add a few simple textures or turn the map white or grey. I would also cut down the lights and make sure they are all doing their jobs properly. I would also add more roof details to break up the silhouette and give it more identity. Adding some cobble stone textures and normal maps would have been nice too, boat mast and water.
It covers all different paces of game play, all the pickups are not placed directly in front of the player, some are, some are on the opposite side of buildings or roofs, the player has too discover them, if they see a faraway lit pickup, they have to execute different hypothesises to see how they can acquire such bonuses. Some strong weapons are hard to reach, some are just hidden.
I tried my best to balance this map in all aspects and I’ve learnt a great deal so far and look forward to taking this further in the near future.
Week 5 - Planning / Asset creation / Texture work - Planning of next 5 weeks / Package creation
-
fail below. i mean... if its not standstone... i guess just grey stone kind of.... >.> and the mesh didnt import smoothed which Ive got it to do before... boooo. time to rest.
long way to go.... haha
Must be a quicker way to clean up imported BSP from UDK to Maya. Either a setting somewhere or maybe I just fast Re-Model the mesh in maya and use the other as a guide (Time unknown) because deleting triangle by triangle and re-Extruding faces and merdging to get the below result took me hours.... :p
I have made the decision that executing the method above is a waste of time, and what took me 3-4 hours could of taken me 40mins.....
Therefore next time. I shall use the BSPS in maya as guides, and totally re model new meshes from them. I will also use flat planes lots and instead of connecting lots - just intersect window ledges and so on into the wall. I will extrude once on the wall plane for example to use that new face as the window texture. - This method should work a lot better... I will probably finish off the mesh above... actually probably use the new method using it.
Below - Right mesh - Is 2nd attempt - Took four times less time when using my brain a bit more.
24/10/2011 - Week 5 - Monday - Notes - Fountain 'Mid' Re Size 1/4 UV layout of the mesh and resize to fill the 0 to 1 UV space. Overlay 3 other UV sides. Extra pixel detail then.
Fountain Head - Make - Bronze foundation. --- Take Mid Section into Zbursh Highpoly it - sculpt whatever High detail I want. Take high poly back into maya and bake it onto the low poly side of Mid Fountain. Center Fountain poly in middle of High poly. Bake 1024 - Transition maps I think. Just Normal Map.
((Base Texture then Pattern Ontop))
25/10/2011
25 10 2011
Need to watch this vertex painting tutorial below - This will greatly speed up all walls and whatever else.
Plus notes to do still ---
Next tasks - (keep some sort of basic reference of all texture sources?)
UV'ed house nearly done - max it out everywhere - text textures on it next and such -
And Zbrush - baking (soften edges for nice transition?) change to tangent normals wherever
- UV Texture first main house fully - details and such. -
-- Then focus on How to do amazing Roofs fast for it
--- Barrels --
--- Fully re model the tower - uv - Amazing stone texture it.
--- Maybe make generic walls, vertex paint lots at a time then. whatever.
--- Future ones -
---- Water --- ROcks --- Crane -- interoirs
----
window parallaxing below
Change fountain moss - to make more sense - in only corners - where it would grow. soften edges - no sharp streching
Painting in proper detail like here - http://www.3dmotive.com/training/photoshop/hand-painted-weapon-texturing/?follow=true
higher res the garden ground - 2048 maybe then
--- Tile roof textures- if i want - tile normal baked something? roof tile? repeated one section?
tilable refs for tiles - or walls
in simple terms. maybe not bake? - just create a tilable Tile roof texture... spec and normal map it awesome... then poly tile the horizontal peak of the roofs... and create guttering maybe?
Above - copy the door and stop stretching -
texturing below -
Just normal map the large sections of roof tiles and close off with guttering and poly tiles for the top. attempt that
USE BELOW -
Use below -
below is pathetic. I am now changing my method to tackle this. The roofs and houses are a key feature. So I need to spend more time. I will add more polys. you run on these roofs so i'll be streching one tile to appear like below. then i ll texture and normal map edges into it , to make it appear like there are many of them.... I am deleting guttering and add iconic odl french stone edges instead. All of these will be textured with an old worn stlye, but still depicting old vibrance. Today has been fail but i have a better plan now. im not bothereed about creating pieces i can re use at the moment i just want to knock out a good piece.
UDK can handle tons of polys... I am barely using polys here I feel. I could probably cut a few more off but at the moment, its stupid to. I can hit very nice realistic roofing this way. and the polys is lowish. I cant hit a good looking 1-2 poly roof. as attempted above, i dislike it greatly. and feel i can hand texture(partly) the below we a much great result.
all roof is triangluar. I can Adapt this 1 roof and duplicate it everywhere. Same UV skin for every strech of tiles. Hopfully this will work better.
28/10/2011 - need a break from developing the house at the moment.
so did this today.
Softening edges helps i think. learnt a few uv extras with this one too. i'll work on good normal maps for it now, few seams. then -re ajust for UDK all voer again.
29 10 2011 -
- its reached the point where i need to work on other projects... you know this to be true when you start to write about your other projects here lol. I believe though, this takes a lot more time, hard work and skill to make look correct - compared to 3D modelling a game character / Female head, I feel that is just a grind, since I use such strong informative reference for it :D I intend to rtr today. Try and finish off the character base mesh tomorrow and go to the gym. Although I have quite a bit of art to do, I will print off most of the important things for that on monday.
Below is my first attempt at creating roofs tiles. I was thinking to much, trying to achieve to much to fast, and i didnt use enough common sense and needed to think more simple.
In game - Wireframe. Low amount of tris, very good. :D
unlit applied texture.
Detailed lighting - normal map
texture plus uvs below.
Final :D
Many things good and bad about today. Going to have to simplify my aims , and just aim for a french town lol. Probably will leave roofs - as the last thing to do when starting a - New building asset. or even till the end. Ground still seems a challenge. Overall lighting seems to effect the look of the assets greatly. Most assets have Dif and norm maps only atm.
01/11/2011
To big info updates -
When doing collision... cossion it with combined cubes , name it in relation as - UCX_Tower1 - Select it with the other mesh and export like that or grouped. should be fine then.
AS well. Take OCC map from maya of my Static mesh UVS - put it in PHS with the meshes DIFF and turn the OCC to multiply then layer ontop of the DIFF. Then it'll have full shadows. Maybe impliment this in UDK shading network as well - yea... Add OCC in Material editor - using a multiply and run it into the DIFF. with the DIff.
GO to for anything i want to know - http://udn.epicgames.com/Three/DevelopmentKitGems.html
02
tiling iinfo and uvs -
---
Export Roof as - Half or Full Roofs - Probably - Half.
-- take tile 1024 down to 512 or 256 i think , reinport
soft light or multiply normal maps
Tile the ground. easy.
Soft light the exported OCC map from transfermaps in maya and the noverlay with soft lgiht in phs on the textured uvs, test that.
04/11/2011
below looks like noob on a good day. but any closer and it sucks. hmmmm
only Norm and Diff maps atm.
05/11 - 2011-- RE fixed the roofing and working on the house walls.
Not aiming for super accurate texture atm. Just aiming for something lol.
Very happy with the roof method. So technically the engine only draws the 1 conbined tile mesh and draws/repeats the 1 256 texture map. It was a 1024 map on every single individual tile before hand LOL. 256 /512 looks practically the same for the tiling, happy with that. Atleast I now know that all the roofing can quickly be done now, of course to break up the simularity I'll place some decals or vertex paint later.
06 11 2011
09/11/2011
--- Image - Adjustments - Match Colour - Fade - Lum -
window --- History - ---
Layers - transitions - overlay - ---
Select Similar Colour -- Delete -- overlay --- History.
double click bsp UV 3.0 -- 2/3.
--- so colour match- then - make a Nutrailized one, lighter colour one and the main one. overlay, and also then select Similar for groves then delete that area of the overlays. then fill some back in inall the layers, creating nice transitions where needed. hard edges sometimes will be needed tho.
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