Winter Quarter Week 2: Lighting and Cinematics

Rabil Thesis WIP 1 from Madeleine Rabil on Vimeo.

Time Tracking:
0h 30 min: Planning

1h 00 min: UDK Tutorials

2h 09 min: Cinematic Set Up

1h 00 min: Lighting Tutorial

1h 00 min: Planning

2h 00 min: Lighting/Importing in UDK

0h 48 min: Rendering

2h 12 min: Optimizing Light Maps

1h 00 min: Meeting with Thesis Assists

0h 49 min: Adjusting Lights

1h 11 min: Rendering Lights in UDK

1h 00 min: Adjustments in UDK

1h 00 min: Organization
1h 00 min: Fixing Issues
1h 30 min: Fixing z-fighting/exporting and reimporting meshes
0h 30 min: setting up cinematic in AE

Winter Week 1: Normal Baking Chaos

Fall break is over and after a week of relaxing I came back ready to rock this project. Because I managed to get all of my normal mapping done prior to the break, I was actually a week ahead of my previous schedule. As great as a taking another week off sounds, however, I learned a long time ago never to waste an opportunity to get ahead and stay ahead so I decided to spend the week on several things that I had been putting off instead. Due to various time constraints and tasks that were simply more important, I had put off looking into normal baking. While there where a few things I knew I would have to bake normals for, I wanted to see if baking down high poly smoothed meshes to my low poly geometry was something that would help my project aesthetically or not.
During my research I found that this was not something that everyone included in their workflow, so it wasn't entirely clear to me as to whether it was something I would absolutely need to do or not.
My first problem was that it was a process I knew about, but not one I had ever actually done so it meant I would being doing it for the first time. I watched several videos about transfer maps in maya, but because it is one of those processes that doesn't have a perfect answer (meaning the settings will change almost every time), I took me a long time to get it to work right. At first the transfer maps wouldn't even work. Then they would only pick up half the details. It got to the point where I had wasted about half the week trying to get it to work, and I was about ready to just give up, when I suddenly realized my problem. I was following all these tutorials online, but in all of them the user had their grid at the default Maya size. It occurred to me that because my scene is set up to UDK proportions, and therefore 16x larger than the default, and because I was transferring in world space, that i would need to adjust my max search distance to fit the size of the scene. I still didn't entirely understand the transfer map process, but after asking multiple people for help and still not having any solutions, I decided one last try wouldn't hurt. So I set my max search depth to 16% and crossed my fingers while I waited for the normals to bake. I opened the file, and finally found that it was successful.
Now for my second challenge, deciding if baking down the normals would be possible considering how much time I had left to get my project done. I had to consider how much time it took to set up each piece, bake down the normals, clean up any minor issues, and set them all up in my scene. I spent several hours setting up and baking out different pieces of my scene to get an idea how long it would take. Overall I was spending 1-3 hours on each object depending on it's complexity. With 162 objects in total, it was taking far too long. Had it gone like UVs where I was completing about 5 objects per hour it would've been more do-able, but my unfamiliarity with the process was making me slow, too slow.
Although it already seemed like I was not going to be attempting to bake out each object, I wanted to bring one of the objects into UDK and compare it's appearance to objects without their normals baked. I decided, that if it really made a difference aesthetically, than taking the time to do it could still be worthwhile.

The biggest thing baking high poly to low poly was going to do for me was effect the appearance of transitions between edges/surfaces. The objects that I had baked the high poly to the low poly had much softer and sometimes hardly even noticeable edge transitions. While this was not a back thing for smaller objects, I found that it didn't work well with most of the large objects in my scene and I actually preferred the much harder and sharper look of the non-baked objects. In the end I decided, that baking down the normals via transfer maps in maya was not going to be a worthwhile use of my time.
There were however, several smaller objects in my scene where I would need to bake down geometry. Several of the windows in my scene had details that I felt that could be baked down and done mostly through textures.

There were also several small objects that I just never got around to making last quarter that I wanted to make sure got done before I began texturing. The buildings are supposed to be worn down and even boarded up in some cases, so I wanted to several variations of scrap metal/scrap wood coverings to be placed on some of the windows.

Time Tracking:
1h 00m : Timeline and Planning
0h 33m : Background Building thumbs
2h 27m : Normal Baking
1h 55m : Normal Baking Workflow
3h 00m : Normal Baking
2h 00m : Modeling
0h 30m : Planning Organization
1h 36m : Modeling
2h 02m : Modeling/Normal Baking
2h 44m : Modeling
2h 15m : Modeling

21h 02m Total

Fall Week 9: UVs and Exporting

I don't have too many exciting things to show for this week. Most of the work I did involved UVs, which isn't the most exciting thing to look at.  I have also been exporting objects at the same time and slowly building things in UDK. Luckily, I'm very familiar with the UV process and things are actually going better than I was expecting. I have run into an issue with Lighting in UDK however, that I am currently investigating how to fix.

Basically it doesn't want to recognized my UVs for the Lightmaps, so when I bake the lights it looks pretty awful. I've never run into any problems with this before, so I'm not really sure what I am doing differently that is causing them to happen, but hopefully I'll figure it all out soon. There are several ways to fix it, and I'm already going over the options and trying to decided which course of action is the one I want to take. 

Anyways, here're a few of my UV maps that I did this week.

I have UVed 102 objects so far, and have roughly somewhere between 20-50 left. 

And here's a picture of what some of it looks like currently in UDK:

The lights haven't been baked, this is the preview version and so it doesn't look terrible here. 

Other than that, not much else is new. Just a lot of UVing and Exporting, and other than the issue with the light baking, things are going well.

Time Tracking:

4h 15m UV and Exporting

2h 36m UDK Importing and Layout

3h 06m UV and Exporting

7h 00m UV and Exporting

2h 00m UDK Importing and Layout

3h 00m UV and Exporting

1h 15m UDK Importing and Layout

0h 25m Blog Post

23h 37m Total

Fall Week 8- Last Week of Modeling

I got a lot done this week in terms of finishing up all the main models for the scene. Added in all the doors and different trims, and got the ground pieces separated out. Trying to decide how I wanted to do the ground took me more time than I would've liked and kind of felt like I was going around in circles for a lot of it. I'm still a little on the fence about it, but I'm hoping that putting it in UDK this week will help me figure out how to do it.
Once I got everything I absolutely needed modeled, I had a little bit of time left over to add in some small assets. I'm really hoping that I can get a Thesis assist next quarter to make some more for me while I work on the textures because the scene just feels really bare right now. Part of that is due to the fact that there aren't any textures, but I'd really like to get a lot of smaller simpler assets done for the scene to help it feel more finished.

I just did some quick AO passes.  I know some of the details I have now will need to be baked down to normals which hopefully wont be too difficult since I still have copies of models when they were lower res. But that is something that will have to wait until next quarter since I will be focusing on setting up the scene in UDK, UVs, and my presentation for finals week for the rest of fall. Hopefully the import and set up in UDK will go smoothly as I took a little long than I initially wanted on the modeling. I'm also hoping to have everything for my final done early so I can knock out as many UVs as possible before the end of the quarter.

Luckily I am very familiar with the UV process (both new and old methods) so I'm not worried about that, it's just getting them all done as efficiently and as quickly as possible. The nice thing about having modular pieces is that I only have to UV each part once and then get to duplicate it as many times as I need instead of having to do the whole building in one set.

Time Tracking:
2h 00m Modeling
4h 00m Modeling
5h 00m Modeling
7h 00m Modeling
2h 30m Modeling
0h 45m Rendering
0h 25m Blog Post

21h 40m Total

Fall Week 7- Intensive Modeling

Once again I spent the week modeling. I added in a lot more of the details in terms of what I need for the profiles of the various pieces, and overall the scene feels a lot more complete.
I went ahead and took a little bit of time to throw in a quick sun and sky for some nicer renders for this week instead of just using screen shots like I have been. The shadows could be improved, but since my goal is put this in UDK, spending time setting up nice renders in maya, especially this early on, isn't really a good use of my time.

I added trim as well as the details for the side doors and window vents. I'd say I'm about 80-90% done with the base for the train station. There's a lot more pipes I want to work on adding in, but I'm going to be making a small modular set for that. I still need to model the doors.

I added some more architectural detail to the Lux and made some changes to the windows. I'm not sure if all the detail is necessary, but because I still have the old versions of the model it will be easy to scale back a bit if I need to. Aside from the signs and extra decorations I'd like to add, and finishing the doors and store front windows the models for the Lux are pretty much done.

I didn't have too much to change for McQuinn, and other than the doors and any extra decorations it is also done. I played around with making some scrap metal and stuff as covering for closed shops, but I want to wait a little bit before I really delve into making that kind of stuff. Mostly because I need to make sure I plan it carefully enough that I can use it in various places through out the scene. One of the major points of modularity is to reduce the number of unique assets so I want to make sure the boards and other scraps I make can be used effectively.

Of all the buildings, Tepton went through the most changes. I didn't like the feeling I was getting from the design of the side doorways so I changed facade quite a bit. I also modeled the details in the actual gates. If you look below you'll see (aside from the bad shadows I mentioned earlier) that I added in the train tracks as well as a special transitional piece for when the train passes through the actual gate house.

I'm really hoping to push through the last phases of the silhouette pass modeling this week so that I can start putting the level together in UDK and then switch gears to UVing in prepartion for next quarter.

Time Tracking:
0h 30m Gnoman Disk
1h 30m Organization
2h 00m Modeling
6h 00m Modeling
2h 00m Modeling
5h 00m Modeling
2h 00m Modeling
1h 00m Rendering and Set-up
0h 30m Blog

20h 30m Total

Fall Week 6: Modeling

Not much to talk about this week, spent the whole time modeling and making adjustments. Got a start on Tepton Gate and continued working on the rest of the buildings.

Time Tracking:
4h 30m Silhouette pass
8h 00m Silhouette pass
8h 00m Silhouette pass

20h 30m Total

Fall Week 5: Proposals, Doubt, and Resilence

Proposals

This week I presented my project proposal. Of course, now that I had officially pitched my project and was actually building it, I was noticing things that I needed to change all over the place. The day before pitched my project I was going over my design document one last time, when I realized I was trying to do too much. I had already eliminated my initial list of "wants" from my project, but I hadn't gotten rid of any of my needs. I wasn't leaving any room for cutting- and while I wanted to tell myself I could do everything, I knew that not allowing for scaling down if I need to was going to be a huge mistake. 

Doubt

Anyone who has ever worked on a huge project that they have invested a large amount of time into knows that there are always moments of panic, doubt, and fear. This was one of those moments.

Suddenly I felt overwhelmed, it was the day before my proposal was due and I didn't know if I would be allowed to make changes. How would I even make changes? I had done so much planning and things felt as though they were already permanently set in stone. I had already scaled down my idea three times, and I here I was realizing it was still too big. 

I spent the next day in a slump. Proposing my project to my class felt like watching myself dig my own grave. This was my thesis, everything I had been working towards at school was all leading me to this moment, and there I was setting myself up for what was surely going to be failure. 

Resilience

I walked home from the computer lab the night after I proposed my thesis, and spent the entire walk trying to  find a reason to have hope. I kept telling myself, "I can do this," but being more of a realist I knew there was no way I could realistically get everything I had proposed to do done, while keeping both my jobs, passing my other classes, and have it not look like trash.

But I felt stuck, and no matter how many times I went over the situation in my head I couldn't figure a way out. We get in trouble if we don't finish our thesis and in the past I have seen dedicated and hard working students be told that they can't cut(these were small things that did not jeopardize the overall project-as I have seen other students try and change their thesis entire in the middle of it which should not be allowed for obvious reasons) from their thesis at all and that they just have to work harder. In my mind not being able to make cuts is bad project management- but as students who are graded for our projects we also have to adhere to the decisions of our professors.

In the end I decided to do what I have always done in these situations, I decided to go down fighting no matter what. Maybe it was hopeless, but if that's my only option then it is the one I am going to take. so I picked myself up and jumped into modeling. 

Whitebox

I don't know if it's possible to be a realist and an optimist, but even though I felt the opposite I told myself I was going to figure this out.

My fake optimism paid off, because while I was blocking out my white box I suddenly conceptualized a solution. I say conceptualized because it was the same as the first time I pictured the scene except I had a knew idea. 

I realized that if I made the train tracks part of a tunnel way below further below the shops, I could not only eliminate some of the more worrisome parts of my thesis, but that I could easily cut them out all together if push came to shove and things needed to be done. Rather than being a train station it would simply become a subway/metro which was something I was initially considering at the start of my project anyway. The train tracks would not be visible because they are underground. I will easily be able to make a floor model for a central courtyard should the track need to be removed.

 I got to keep the basic layout of my scene which I was already dedicated to as well as trim off several assets that were required simply because I was going to have the station on a higher level. In terms of project management it was a perfect solution because it did not damage the overall outcome I was trying to achieve and did not require any massive changes to my plans. 

UDK

Once I had that finished, I was ready to bring it into UDK to test out the proportions. I was a little nervous about opening up UDK for the first time in almost 2 years, and spent a little bit of time just playing around with the interface before I even attempted to bring my model in. I was surprised to find that even though I was missing a lot of the more specific details about using the editor, I was still familiar enough to pick them back up rather quickly. Although, I will admit I was able to ask one of my friends for help whenever I got stuck on something so that made things a lot easier.

Things do not go entirely smooth either, as I immediately ran into an issue with my white box model when I brought it into UDK. When testing out the door size I had chosen to see if it worked, I discovered that the character in UDK was two grid sizes taller than what I gotten from my research. 

I was at a complete loss. I had looked at multiple resources on the web when determining that the character was 6uu(UDK Units) tall during my research. All of them had given me the exact same data for character height and grid set up, but there I was in UDK with a character that was very clearly 8uu tall.

At first I didn't believe it and double checked my maya files to make sure I had the right dimensions there, which I did. I double checked to make sure my geometry was translating to being the same grid size in UDK, which it was.  I made sure that I had UDK set to its default settings, and still nothing had changed.  I even went back to the resources I had gotten my information from and none of them said anything about why this might be happening or even mentioned that it possible would. All the numbers they said to use were the exact same as what I had used.

It looked as though I would have to adjust all of my scene's measurements, which I was prepared for since that was the whole point of checking in the first place but I had hoped that my research had been solid enough to prevent the need. But before I could do that I had to figure out just how tall the character was.

With the help of my friend, Ben, we made a mock character out of barrel assets and attached it to character in the game(the character it self would not show up even though Ben was  sure he had the right settings for it) and set up a camera to record it during game play so we could figure out exactly how tall the character was. From this we were able to determine that the character was set to exactly 8uu tall.

I was slightly distraught over the situation and the fact that I had apparently messed something up, and decided that there had to be something else I could do. So I did the only thing some one in my situation could, I turned to the internet. And as luck would have it I very quickly found my answer.

It turns out that the character is not set to the UDK default character setting of 6uu by default. Something which none of the websites I had gone to for research had bothered to mention. Luckily I found a blog that not only explained it, but told me how to fix it.

 All I had to do was go into the world properties and set the game type to UT game. Which was of course the obvious thing to do once I read it. 

I am so glad I decided to look into it further, because it saved me hours of work in terms of refiguring out the scale of my level.

And now that my character and world was set to the scale I had planned for, I was relieved to find that many of the dimensions I had chosen worked. However, I also found that there were a number of things I had also gotten wrong. 

The walkways I had made were far too narrow and completely unrealistic for the city scene I was planning. The height of the bridge as well as the depth of the train tracks was not deep enough. I also found that because the train station was now on the same level as the Lux and the Mc Quinn Outlets that it did not stand out as much as I wanted it to. So I decided to make it's structure larger overall. 

The image on the right is the whitebox model after I adjusted the different proportions. I brough the new model into UDK and found that it was a vast improvement. 

Silhouette Pass

I had actually planned for the majority of my time this week to be spent of trying to figure things out in UDK, but I got the hang of it so quickly that I was done after several hours. I don't like to waste time, so I got a head start on my silhouette models for the scene. Things are going really well now that I

Things are going really well now that I've managed to get back on my feet and I'm looking forward to keeping up the work!

Time Tracking:
1hr 00m: Whitebox modeling
2hr 00m: Whitebox modeling
2hr 00m: Whitebox modeling
0hr 30m: UDK Refresher
1hr 30m: UDK-Whitebox testing
2hr 00m: Whitebox adjustments
0hr 20m: Whitebox adjustments
0hr 13m: Checking adjusted whitebox in UDK
4hr 05m: Silhouette Modeling
2hr 035m: Silhouette Modeling

4hr 32m: Silhouette Modeling

1hr 49m: Blog Post

21hr 14m Total

Fall Weeks 3 and 4

Due to illness I'm going to be combining the work I did for week 3 and the work I did for week 4 in this post. I was so busy trying to keep things together overall that I just wasn't able to post during week 3.

Most of what I have been doing has involved fleshing out my design doc and finalizing my project plans.  A big part of which involved putting together an organizational chart of everything.

It's pretty intense as far as everything I need to get done and the order of it all. These kind of visuals really help me though when it comes to project planning so even though figuring it all out took me quite a while I'm really glad I took the time do it. 

In terms of the actual document I spent a lot of time touching things up and going into more depth with the details.

-->

Depicting the Scene: Time Period and Background

The environment takes place in a fictional dystopian future, where countries have reverted back to nation-state statuses centered around their gargantuan cities. This is a time where the very notion of the countryside does not exist, as life beyond a city’s limit is unsustainable due to mankind’s dependence on technology to survive.  Those who travel to a city’s edge will be confronted with nothing but the sprawling waste of land that was once lushly vegetative. Depending on their city’s location they may be able to spot the edge of a neighboring city-state just above the horizon in the distance. There is only one way to travel between each city state and that is to take one of the massive cable trains that spans the wastes connecting each massive city as traveling via plane is no longer desirable due to the destructive about of pollution that fills the sky.

Travel vie train, subway, tram, and so on is common and the main form of transportation not only between cities but within them as well. Each city is broken down into a series of districts or what are essentially even smaller cities that provide their own special functions and goods to the main city. All of which are connected by a web of various rail-lines allowing for people to move about the various districts as a part of their daily routines.

Depicting the Scene: Rasheem Commerce District and Valhiem Station

The Rasheem Commerce District is one of the many hundreds of districts that make up Durkheim City. Originally one of the wealthiest commercial districts in the entire city, Rasheem, like most, has decayed into one of the city’s largest slum districts.  Although it housed many local hotspots, most have gone or diminished over time, and the very economic survival of the district depends solely on the famous but barely functioning Valhiem Station.  And it is here outside Valhiem Station where the environment actually takes place. 

Valhiem Station

Because of its importance, Valhiem is to be the main focus of the scene. Located in the center with a line of rundown or abandoned shops and apartments leading up to it on either side. Just below and in the front of the station is it’s iconic iron bridge, which arches over the train tracks that lead to and from the station’s interior boarding zone. The strong vertical lines of the buildings lining the train tracks serve to lead the viewer’s eyes toward the station which features arching windows and roof tops that dominate the scene but also bring it together visually under the station’s central location. Valhiem Station was Rasheem District’s pride and glory and remained to be for decades after it’s original establishment. At the time it was built, it was on the cutting edge of Durkheim’s engineering technologies. The station’s disrepair, like so much else in Rasheem, stands as a reminder of better days that have long since past.

Mc Quinn Shopping Outlet and Lou’s Bar and Billiards

The Mc Quinn Shopping Outlet Houses several run-down boutiques with overhead apartments. Most of the shops left are either on the brink of having to shut down or already have due to the decline in business. The third level of the outlet houses Lou’s Bar and Billiards, one of the few places to have had an increase in business since the district began its decline.

Rasheem Luxury Apartments

Rasheem Luxury Apartment, better known as the Rasheem Lux, was the premiere place to live back when Rasheem was still a bustling city district. The Close proximity to the train station as well as to the Mc Quinn Shopping outlet made it the ideal for anyone who wanted to be on the up and up. Although it’s popularity as high demand housing helped it to stay in good condition far longer than any of the other buildings in the District, it has recently fallen into disrepair.  Several of the room’s floors have caved in, causing a good portion of the apartments to be closed off. Only half of the building is still occupied, only causing to its further economic downfall.

Tepton Gate House

Tepton Gate House sits directly across from Rasheem Station. It is an older building than the majority of the other’s in the district and relies on somewhat older technology to lift and lower it’s massive gate. Gatehouses were originally set up in many of the districts as a precautionary measure for pedestrians and the public in general. The gate is left in in the down position and raised whenever a train is approaching. Each gate was built with an automatic shut off mechanism for trains about to pass through in the event that a person had some how wound up on the tracks while the train was approaching. However, the constant need to raise and lower the gates lead to the need for frequent repairs and in the end most gate houses were either torn down or modified by having the gate removed all together.  The Tepton Gatehouse is one of the last true functioning gatehouses in the entire City of Durkheim.

I also got my final timeline together. Of course, from what I have learned a timeline is never final, and requires constant reworking and checking. But having something to adjust from the get go is a must.

-->

Production Timeline

Fall Quarter, Week 5:

Blog

Re-assess timeline, make adjustments if needed

White Box Scene in Maya

Bring White Box into UDK

                  Check Proportions to models and make adjustments where needed

Watch Videos on Lighting in UDK

(If time) Start blocking out lighting in UDK

Fall Quarter, Week 6:

Blog

Re-assess timeline, make adjustments if needed

Block Out lighting in UDK

Begin Silhouette Pass

                  Block out Major Models: Train Station, Mc Quinn’s & Lou’s, Rasheem Lux

(If time) Begin blocking out as many of the other major models as possible: Valheim Bridge Tepton Gate, Elevators, Building 5, and Stone Wall 1

Fall Quarter, Week 7:

Blog

Re-assess timeline, make adjustments if needed

Continue working on Silhouette Pass

                  Block out Major Models: Valheim Bridge Tepton Gate, Elevators, Building 5, and Stone Wall 1

                  Block out small Assets: Train Tracks, Lampposts, fences, signs

Fall Quarter, Week 8:

Blog

Re-assess timeline, make adjustments if needed

Talk to Marla about getting Thesis Assist

Finish up Silhouette Pass

Update UDK scene with Models

(If ahead of schedule): Begin laying out UVs

Fall Quarter, Week 9:

Blog

Re-assess timeline, make adjustments if needed

 ALL NECESSARY MODELING MUST BE COMPLETE! (Wants are not included in this)

Final Tweaks to models

Adjust lighting in UDK if needed

(If ahead of schedule): Begin laying out UVs

Fall Quarter, Week 10:

Blog

Re-assess timeline, make adjustments if needed

ENTIRE LEVEL MUST BE SET UP IN UDK WITH SILHOUETTE MODELS AND LIGHTING AND READY TO BE PRESENTED

Begin laying out UVs

Prepare for finals week presentation

Fall Quarter, Week 11:

Blog

Re-assess timeline, make adjustments if needed

Fall Quarter Final’s presentation

(If time)  Begin Working on UVs

Fall Break:

Re-assess timeline, make adjustments if needed

Figure out Timeline for Thesis Assist

Try and get a head start on UVs but remember to relax!

Winter Quarter, Week 1:

Blog

UV All major models

Winter Quarter, Week 2:

Blog

Finish UVing all major models

Begin Uving smaller assets

(If time) begin modeling to texture

Winter Quarter, Week 3:

Blog

Final Week for UVs

Model to texture: Train Station, Mc Quinn’s & Lou’s, Rasheem Lux, Side walks, Valheim Bridge, Tepton Gate,

Fix UVs

Winter Quarter, Week 4:

Blog

Model to texture: Elevators, Building 5, Stone Wall 1, Train Tracks, Lampposts, fences, signs

Fix UVs

(If ahead of schedule) start sculpting normals

Winter Quarter, Week 5:

Blog

Wrap Up Modeling To Texture

Fix UVs

Update Models in UDK

Start Sculpting Normals/Crazy Bump

Winter Quarter, Week 6:

Blog

Finish sculpting and Editing Textures

Begin Finalizing Lighting

Winter Quarter, Week 7:

Blog

Set Up Kismet for Elevator

Import Materials to UDK

Finalize lighting

ALL PHOTOSHOPING AND TEXTURE EDITING MUST BE DONE

Winter Quarter, Week 8:

Blog

Finish Setting up Materials in UDK

Capture Footage of Level Walk through

Start Rendering

Winter Quarter, Week 9:

Blog

Edit Level Walkthrough footage

Continue to Render

Start putting together Asset Sheets

Winter Quarter, Week 10:

Blog

ALL RENDERING MUST BE DONE

Make Final Tweaks to Assets Sheets and renders

Prepare for Thesis Final Presentation

Winter Quarter, Week 11:

Thesis Final Presentation

And the last thing I did was get one last concept drawing done for the fourth building in the scene.

Time Tracking
Week 3:

7h 00m Research

1h 45m Gnoman Disk

1h 30m Research UDK specific

4h 00m Planning Timeline

2h 00m Design Doc Organization

4h 00m Design Doc Organization

19h 45m Total

Week 4:

2h 35m Design Doc Description

5h 25m Design Doc Research Documentation

8h 00m Design Doc

 4h 00m Ord Chart

1h 00m Design Doc

2h 30m Final Timeline

1h 30m Presentation

25h 00m Total

Fall Week 2: Conceptualizing, Planning and Research

Concepts:

The majority of my time this week was spent on continuing to conceptualize the different buildings in the scene. Trying to draw and map them out was taking too long since I just don't have enough experience drawing architecture in general, so I decided to just do quick block out models of them instead. It ended up going way faster than trying to draw and gave me a really good sense of the form and space for the different buildings. 

Conceptual block out of the train station.

Conceptual block out of building 3.

Documentation:

I organized my files into a nice little folder set-up so that I can hopefully keep everything neat. Didn't take too much time, but I have had to deal with disorganized project folders before, and the time and frustration is just not worth it so I wanted to make sure I got this done and soon.

I also spent a good bit of time working on the documentation and actual production to-do list. I won't post the whole list, but here's a snippet of what I did:

Production:

UDK:

Test out different Heights for Doors and Windows in UDK

Import Base Meshes to UDK

Block out scene in UDK with Base Meshes

Import Collision Meshes

Test Collision Meshes

Replace Base Meshes with Final Meshes in UDK

Regularly test Proportions and models in UDK

Set up Lighting

Import Textures to UDK

Set up Materials in UDK

Test Materials in UDK

                Set Up Animations in UDK

                                -Train Matinee

                Beta Comments

Assets:

                Train Station

                                Base Meshes

                                Uv’s

                                Textures:

                                                Diffuse

                                                Specular

                                                Normal

                                                AO

                                                Transparency (if needed)

                                Collision Mesh

                                Retopologized meshes (if needed)

                                Final Mesh

                                Rendering:

Asset Break down Sheet

                                                Wireframes

                                                Still Render in UDK

Final Products:

                Capture Footage of UDK Walkthrough of Level

                Still Renders in UDK

                Asset Break down Sheets

                Wireframe Renders

                Process Break-Down Video

                Design Doc

It's still very far from being perfect, but a lot of what I have left to determine will be based on the results of my research so I can't plan it out until that is done.  I don't want to do too much planning before my research is done because a lot of the workflows and over processes I will use are going to be based on what I learn from it. In fact, I began researching today and it is already obvious that I will have to make some major adjustments to the to-do list I put together earlier this week. 

I also managed to write-up a preliminary version of the abstract for the time being. 

Abstract

The purpose of this thesis project is to create a Stand-Alone Game Environment  using modular building techniques that meet and or exceed current industry standard. As a Stand-Alone Game Environment, the final product does not need to include any playable mechanics or require participation from the player. Rather, it is created with the purpose of being an explorable environment that showcases the overall art and assets that make up the environment itself.

The environment itself will be of a worn down train station and boarding zone set in the heart of a once buzzing commerce district of a now aging city. The barely functioning train station is surrounded by decaying apartments and barely-in-business shops.  The shops and apartments are separated by the train tracks which lead from a tunnel into the train station itself.  Above the tracks just outside of the train station is a bridge that civilians may use to cross over the tracks safely from one side to another. The lower level by the tracks and the upper level bridge are connected by special elevators that civilians may use to traverse the scene.

Other visual elements that the environment will feature are detailed textures with normal, diffuse, specular, glow/ambient, and reflection maps. Models will be low poly to allow for optimization in engine, and in some cases sculpted and retopologized. Some interactive elements may include an elevator taking the player to different sections of the map and possibly a matinee Sequence involving a train coming into or leaving the station.

Overall players can expect to experience a well thought out and stylized custom Game Environment that takes place in a unique urban setting.

I expect it to change over time as I flesh out more and more of the design doc and well as continue my research.

Research:

I spent a little bit of time playing around with Trello.com's project planning tools, but in the end I found that it lacked a lot of features that I just felt like without them it wouldn't really be an effective tool for me. I didn't like how you couldn't have a main board showing all your other boards. You could lable them all to be under the same project, but not being able to seem them all at once was a major problem if you wanted to break down the areas of your project into seperate boards. I tried to do something similar in a board where I just broken down the project into notes, but you are extremely limited in how much you can do with a note. I wanted to be able to take a note and break it down into different sections, but again there really just wasn't a way to do it. I spent about an hour trying to figure out how I could organize it so that it would work, before I decided it just wasn't going to be something I could use effectively.

I watched an incredibly helpful video that my professor showed me on the Autodesk Area website by Sandra Tournmille called, "Insider Tips and Tricks for Creating Game Environment Assets." I highly recommend it to anyone who is interested in creating game environments and assets. I'm going to be replanning my overall workflow for this project now because of it.

What was nice about the video was that it was all concepts I had heard of before, but she really goes through and explains what they mean, why they are, and where they play into the production process. Although it was more of a walkthrough to the concepts than an actual tutorial, I found it was really helpful because when watching actual tutorials about the same stuff they don't usually take the time to break things down and explain what they are doing things that way when in relation to everything else that would be going on in a studio. A lot of times in a tutorial, you'll hear "this is important, so do it this way," while the way Sandra does it is, "this is important because the person you pass it onto needs to be able to figure out this from it- which is why it is done this way."

I took about 6 pages of notes from the video, but even so I expect I will be re-watching a lot of it because it really just is that helpful.

I also went over some of my notes from my research on modular building and scale for UDK and updated my standard scale guide for my level.  I'm not always reliable when it comes to math and calculating numbers, so to help me save time and move a little quicker, I realized having a chart of general sizes would really be beneficial.

Of course, because I have yet to actually test things out in the engine this is going to be another one of those things that may very well be subject to change. 

Time Tracking: 
5h 00m: Conceptual Modeling
5h 00m: Conceptual Modeling
1h 00m: Conceptual Modeling

1h 15m: Conceptual Modeling
0h 15m: Rendering
1h 00m: Trello
0h 45m: Production To-Do List
3h 00m: Conceptual Modeling
1h 00m: File Organization
1h 00m: Abstract Write-up
0h 23m: Scale Guide Up-date
1h 00m: Blog Write-up

Total: 20h 38m

Fall Week 1: Conceptualizing and Organizing

I've been working relatively non-stop on my thesis all week. And I've managed to get quite a lot done. I'm going to try and break it down into general sections in terms of what part of the preproduction everything falls under. I'm a big believer in the time saving power of good documentation so I'm doing everything I can to make sure I do a thorough job.

Preproduction To-Do List:

This is my general to-do list in terms of everything I need to get done for my preproduction.

-->

-->

Design Doc:

                  Abstract

                  Full/Precise Project Description

    Start Bibliography

                  Gather Links for sites already used for research over the summer

     Organize Images into Style Sheet

                  Organize Images into Inspiration Sheet

                  Wants and Needs Lists

                  Production Timeline/Gantt Chart

File Organization

Come up with Naming Convention

Concepts:

Train Station/ Building 2 Concept Art

Building 3 Concept Art

Building 4 Concept Art

Asset List

Texture List

Everything List

To-Scale-Top-Down-Map

To-Scale Asset Break Down Sheets:

                  Train Station

                  Building 2

                  Building 3

                  Building 4

                  Bridge

                  Train Tracks

                  Train Tunnel

                  Elevators

Research:

Research Modular Building

Research Mudbox and Normal Mapping Environment assets                 

Test out Mudbox and Normal Mapping on a small asset

Research Texturing workflows and techniques for Games

Test out Texturing workflows on a small asset

Find notes on UDK

Practice Workflow from Maya to UDK

Research Materials in UDK

Practice making a Material in UDK

Block out Scene in Maya

Design Doc:
Here's what I have so far in terms of the design doc and just general project guidelines. Nothing is written in stone obviously, but it's a start.

Stand-Alone Game Environment

A Stand-Alone Game Environment may not include any playable mechanics and may not require player participation. Stand-alone game environments may created for a portfolio piece, a beauty scene or simply an environment to explore and showcase.

Game Engine

Unreal Engine and Unreal Development Kit

Idea Description

A worn down train station and boarding zone set in the heart of a once buzzing commerce district of a now aging city. The barely functioning train station is surrounded by decaying apartments and barely-in-business shops.  The shops and appartments are separated by the train tracks which lead from a tunnel into the train station itself.  Above the tracks just outside of the train station is a bridge that civialians may use to cross over the tracks safely from one side to another. The lower level by the tracks and the upper level bridge are connected by special stairwell buildings on either side. Building materials should be metals, bricks, and concrete.

Environment Setting

A general location where the environment takes place.

City/Urban

Metropolitan

Location

Subway/Metro/Train boarding point in the heart of the busy city district, a main point for transportation.

Train Tracks

Apartments

Storefronts

Themes

Metropolitan

Traffic

Federal Style turned Technological

Worn-Down

Mobility

Commerce

Project Purpose

What is the Reason I am Creating this Environment?
Develop an industry standard stand-alone game environment using UDK, Maya, Photoshop, and Z-Brush that is set in an Urban and grungy train station with a metropolitan city setting for my senior thesis.

What I want to learn/Improve

Modular Building techniques for creating game environments

Modeling workflow for game asset and environment creation

Texturing and surfacing techniques for games using Photoshop and Z-brush

Development process for game environments and props

Hard surface Modeling

What I want the player to Experience

Custom Game Environment

Unique Urban Setting

Stylized setting

Inspiration:

I spent a lot of time searching through images over the summer looking for something that would inspire me interms of the type of style I wanted to use for my thesis and just in general for creating ideas. The problem is I am so used to conceptualizing on my own that I had already formed an idea of the style I wanted in my head, but I was having difficulty putting it down onto paper. Mostly because I knew how I wanted to stylize it, but I didn't know what I wanted my scene to be. 

After running around in circles for what seemed like weeks, I stumbled apon the work of Oscar Cafaro and in particular his environment work that he posted here (the 6th image down is the one that particularly struck me).  Not only did it have the exact feel I want to go for, but it immediately caused me to visualize a scene for my thesis. This was the first big break through I had in terms of figuring out the visual development for my scene and I consider it the biggest source of inspiration so far.

I also spent quite a bit of time looking up various train stations to fit the concept that was forming in my head. In the end I found Hauptbanhof, which was almost a perfect fit.

Style:

Obviously, I don't want to copy off of Oscar Cafaro, so I began doing some sketches of my own to help me develop my own visual style. I even blocked an entire environment to help me get the feeling of the types of forms I want to include. 

(Note: The bridge in the render on the left is an old version, I decided that visually it was too big and ended up changing it quite a bit)

I eventually determined that my original scene was far too over scoped in terms of the amount of time  have for this project, but I believe that keeping it as a reference is still a good use for it.

I ended up changing the style towards something a little more industrial(in my mind at least), but combined with some of the same futuristic looking features. 

It took me a while to put my finger on a good example exactly what I was looking for, when I realized I was drawng from my favorite video game with out even knowing it. My favorite game is Final Fantasy VII, I've been in love with it ever since my brother's brought it home back in 1997. I did a quick search around the web and found a fantastic site with tons of pictures of the in game environment.

Color Palette: 

This is just my rough color palette. I've been adding to and adjusting the colors when needed.

Concepts:

And now for my favorite part of the preproduction process, concepts!

I've been building ideas for small assets over time.  I went ahead and quickly sketched a few of them out.

 I did a quick concept to put at the top of the blog, but also to help me sketch out some ideas for the buildings.

Then I began working on a more detailed concept drawing of the train station, bridge, and building 2 to help me in terms of figuring out my assets. Here's what I have so far:

Unfortunately I'm hoping to finish blocking out the remaining details tomorrow so that I can start coloring it.

Time Tracking: That's about the majority of the work I've gotten done so far this week. I'm require for class to keep track of the time I am spending on my thesis so I'll end each blog with the hours.

3h 00m:   Image Search

2h 00m:   Concept Art

1h 00m:   Class

0h 30m:   Image Search

1h 00m:   Concept Art

0h 00m:   FFVII Image collection

1h 30m:   Blog Banner/ Concept Art

1h 00m:   Blog Set up

2h 00m:   Documentation and write-up

4h 30m:   Concept Art

0h 16m:   Scanning Sketches

1h 00m:   Small Asset Sketches

1h 00m:   To-do list type up

1h 45m:   Blog write up

Total: 21h 01m