BA3: UDK Level Fly Over

And here it is, the fruits of my labour. I have created a model of a Moving Castle in Maya and exported that same model (fully textured) into the UDK games engine and created a small level to house my model. Below you can see a short video showing my final model in engine:

BA3: Castle Lighting Renders

In order to display the full potential of my model castle I have rendered it out using the Mental Ray plugin for Maya 2014. I have also used the various lighting tools to create light for 3 different times of day; Morning, Noon and Night.

BA3: 500 Word Creative Piece

To apply our new knowledge of Vladimir Propp's "Spheres of Action" we have been given the task of creating a short story for a character created during a parlour game seminar. The character I have is shown below:

I have decided that this particular character will be the Helper, which means that he will aid the main hero of the story in some way. We're not allowed to give our character a name though, so this will be a challenge. Here we go.

Have you ever wondered what happens in the wonderful world of the earth worm? No? Well, I'm going to tell you anyway. This is a grand tale of adventure, valour, and of course, worms. So you really should stay and listen. I shall begin my story, naturally, at the beginning.

Under the earth where humans cannot see their cherished kingdom, live the humble earth worms. But the worms we see on the surface are just that, the surface, the workers that build the kingdom and maintain the endless tunnels that twist and turn in your very own garden. This world of wonders is ruled by a Worman, a magnificent creature, the head of a worm, the slim body of a human, tentacles instead of arms and, in this particular Worman's case, two peg legs. All these elements come together to form a creature of truly epic, but still very small, proportions. Under the rule of this great creature, the kingdom prospered and all its citizens were happy. However, things were not as happy as they seemed, and the great Worman knew of this but kept it from his people for their own safety.

Instead, he called upon his only son; Wigwam, in secret to express his concern and ask him to do something about it. In truth, the king was a very wise man, but he had no power other than his knowledge. After losing his legs, the great king could hardly stand at all let alone complete the task he was about to entrust to his son. And so Wigwam came to his father as his father had asked, eager to hear of the request he had. The king told his son how, in just three days time, the kingdom will be subjected to a terrible flood that would fill all of the tunnels with water and drown all the citizens, not even the great king will be spared if the floods were allowed to continue. The great king watched as fear filled his sons face and twisted his expressions with horror, but didn't lose faith in his son. He instructed Wigwam to take 50 of the fastest builder worms in the kingdom to the very highest point in the kingdom and to dig a huge space to fit all of the citizens of the kingdom, and therefore save them from the floods. Wigwam accepted his task, and turned to leave the palace in search of these workers. His father watched with new found faith. "My son will succeed, I know he will" he thought to himself.

As the days turned to nights, the great king of the worms awaited his sons return. On the third day, the king had still not lost faith, and as if on cue, his son returned explaining his success and that he wanted his father to be the first saved from the floods. But the king refused. Instead, fighting back tears, the king then instructed his son to go to his mothers chambers. Upon arrival, Wigwam walked into his mothers room with a confused look on his face, until he heard the laugh of a new born child. The room was never meant to save the kingdom. Instead, it was to welcome a new Worman into the prosperous world that lives on your back garden.

After all, how could a being no larger than a worm know of a flood that will destroy the kingdom?

And there is my story.

BA3: Tileable Texture Research

Creating Tileable Textures for use on models created in Maya is a skill in itself, and something every 3D modeler will have to do to make their models effective in a Games Engine. There are a number of ways to create a tileable texture, but for the sake of this project I will be looking at only one method that I have found on tutsplus.com posted by Collis Ta'eed.

This particular method uses Photoshop and Collis says "So to turn that photo into a tiled background we need to first remove any irregularities, and the make the edges blend into each other". The first step involves getting rid of the darkened edges of an image using the Crop Tool, as shown below. This step can be skipped if the edges aren't as dark as they are in this one.

The next step is to lighten the darker areas of the image using the Dodge Tool. By gently brushing over the edges with a large soft brush you can weaken the shadows slightly, but don't do it too much or the image will appear too washed out.

Once that is complete the next step is to get rid of any obvious details that would show the texture has been tiled. In the image used for this tutorial, there is a leaf in the top right hand corner that will give away the tiled effect, and this can be removed by using the Patch Tool or Clone Stamp.

The fourth step is to make the edges bleed together. Duplicate the layer to both the right and the left to get an idea of where the make the edges bleed. In the image you can see below a 1px gape between the layers so you can see where the layer has been copied.

After that it is important to bleed these two layers together, again using the Patch Tool or Clone Stamp it doesn't make too much difference what tool you use as long as you use it effectively. Below you can see the result of this.

And there it is! By repeating this process for all 4 edges you can create a fully tileable texture. Below you can see the final image.

This is the method that I have used to create the tileable textures I have used for my model, such as the Gold Metal and the ground texture.

BA3: Research into Bump Mapping

Bump Mapping in Maya (and many other 3D packages for that matter) is a great way to add new levels of depth to your 3D assets and is therefore very important in the modelling process. Bump maps are similar to Diffuse Maps, but instead of adding colour they add the illusion of 3D details to flat poly-planes, saving on your poly count and making your assets much easier to render in a games engine. I have found a great tutorial online that helped me when I was adding bump maps to my terrain in Maya, which you can see below:



With this tutorial I was able to understand the process of Bump Mapping and also apply it using Crazy Bump. The results of my bump mapping can be seen below in this screenshot of my model (in progress).

BA3 - Concepting in Photoshop

After my attempt at creating a concept in ZBrush for my final model, I have been working on a concept in Photoshop to help me plan my idea. Below you can see the development of this concept.

This is the first concept that I created from my ideas that I have developed throughout my research. The castle is based on the Steampunk Style shown in Bioshock Infinite and Howl's Moving Castle, and the courtyard follows this style. The castle and courtyard is built on top of a huge Pirate Ship hull, similar to the pirate ship in Peter Pan and decorated in a similar style once again to Howl's Moving Castle, which has also been decorated with a face to add to the overall style that has been established by Disney throughout the years. By personifying the robot carrying the castle it gives it a much greater presence to the audience. The robot is powered by an steam engine to the rear of the ship with a number of chimneys similar to the engine room seen in Mortal Engines, which is also where I adapted the idea of the Tank Tracks from. The courtyard is also based on the Steampunk style, to create an oasis that separates the castle from the rest of the world, just as is seen in Agrabah from Aladdin. However, looking at this as a concept there were a number of issues that I addressed in my second concept below.

Above you can see how I developed this concept. The castle has been changed and developed into a much more circular design with more towers and details. There are less chimneys and more details on the hull of the ship. The path leading up to the castle has also been made longer to give more of a build up towards the structure.

I then added colour to the concept to help for my texturing phase of the project. I have asked for feedback based on this concept, and one of the main issues with it is the size of the castle. People have agreed that since the castle is the main focus of the piece it should be much, much bigger than it appears in this concept. Something else people said was that the design for the boat was very different to the castle, and so there should be more continuity between them. Finally, a few people thought that the tank tracks used for transport didn't fit with the disney style that I am trying to replicate. These changes have been made and you can see them below.

This is my final concept in 2D, and the one that I will be continuing on to the modelling stage of this project. I have taken on board the comments of my peers and made changes to the design, increasing the size of the castle, unifying the colours and exhanging the tank tracks for legs. I have also given the face on the front of the ship a comical nose, trying to follow in the stylised footsteps of Disney.

BA3 - Concepting in ZBrush

I've began to concept my idea for a Castle that moves from place to place across the world. I started using ZBrush since Mark has always said that it can be used to concept in 3D, so I thought I would give it a go. I've quickly created two ideas using ZSpheres which you can see below.

The first of these concepts was created based around the base of a Pirate Ship. I've adapted the legs from Howls Moving Castle onto the side of the ship to allow the structure to move, and the castle has been created out of a number of towers similar to that of Maleficent's castle that I looked at earlier. As you can see from the 3/4 view of the sculpt, the castle is connected to the rest of the deck similar to a Motte and Bailey castle.

This is the second of these concepts that I have created in ZBrush. The castle has been placed much more centrally with more symmetrical towers, and instead of being mounted on a Pirate Ship the castle sits on a kind of creature with four legs, similar to the Starwhale idea that I explored from Doctor Who.

Looking at both of these concepts, I personally don't feel either of them have much promise and I won't be continuing on with them into the next stage of development. I will next work on concepting my idea in 2D rather than 3D, however it was worth experimenting in ZBrush.