FMP Character 3

Here are some early concepts, they should help grasp the idea I'm trying to achieve. Some of the concepts were simply too difficult for me and my current 3D ability to do accuratly.

Lack of research made these concepts stray too far from voodoo and the character my project is based on.

These images are very quick sketches to quickly map out some poses, statues and the alter. The character has developed quite alot by this point, instead of uploading each individual concept design I've merely put up the important ones which sparked my final design.

These images are the final design for the male and female, they're well within my ability to model and their design fits the description of the vodou God Marassa. The major difference between my interpritation is the fact I've made Marassa an adult as opposed to a child. There many reasons why I did this, mostly because it'd be good practice to make an adult and it ment I could define more muscles in the high poly, theres other small reasons but thats the most important.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marassa_Jumeaux

I don't feel the 3D model does the concept justice, I altered the design slightly to make the character work as a 3D model. The skirt was changed and I've made the face more humanoid. The skull like nose on the concept wasn't right for a very humanoid character.

DS spec character.

FMP Character 2

Here's my character with most of it's accessories on. The head and skirt will be alphas and it's all unwrapped apart from body. The has sketc is poor quality because I used a digital camera, I don't plan to colour it in until I do use a scanner.

FMP Character

Here are some images of the same character modeled to Nintendo DS and Xbox 360 specifications.
Hopefully by tonight they should both have improved significantly.

A MUST SEE FOR ALL GAMERS!!

Here is a video insight on how the some of the general public view the latest gaming consoles. When I listen to those who, in the past have been very enthusiastic about video games, I tend to hear that the only new thing really is the quality has improved, in terms of graphics etc. but its the same old shit, for example; a new console with the same games, or the same type of games as the original. What are we on now, the third generation (PlayStation 3). Where is the promised virtuality we used to hear about from the days of megadrive. At least nintendo taking a risk to develope, evolve trying to be different in terms of gaming for the future, bringing more of the public back into gaming, and proves that we should take risks, even maybe look at hologram technology.
My Dad says, it maybe a bit tongue in cheek, but "many a true word said in jest".
http://i.gizmodo.com/5150189/so-mean-but-maybe-true-nsfw



To compliment what I mean it would easier to watch Johny Chung Lee's video, to give you an idea what gamers are craving for. Ironically Nintendo features again:




Check out www.johnnylee.net.

FMP

Here is an early concept of my character I'm doing for my FMP, I looked into Voodoo (Vodou) mythology and decided to create my interpretation of the God/Goddess Marassa. In short Marassa is pretty much like Gemini.

"Divine twins embodiment of elemental forces in the universe, ying/yang, sun/moon, hot/cold, complementary, inseparable polarized forces"

Quote from Wikipedia, lots of fancy words.

Pic

Here's some pictures of the last 3 projects I did. The pictures are few because I'm not too fond of any of the work I've produced, although this head of my Mum isn't too bad. Since the project was to create a character in the WW1 era I decided to do my Mum as a nurse, Florence Nightingale style.

Here are 3 LoDs far left 6000 tris, 4000 tris and 2000 tris.

I went for the inner city playground for my environment, the floor should probably be more than just a tiled texture though.


Normal and Damaged Van.

Handy Tutorial

Found this well useful tutorial to model hands, it's in a different program but the same principles still apply.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=J1mExXURsWk

I managed to mock up this hand using no reference and just that video, I'm not happy with the fingers so I gave up, still it's a pretty good tutorial but next time I really should take a picture of may hand instead of just looking at it.

Attempt 1

It's still not right, the verts are a mess oh and the fingers are not attached.

They're Running Out of Ideas But I Don't Mind?

Surprisingly I've only just found out Square-Enix is re-releasing Chrono Trigger for the DS.

http://na.square-enix.com/ctds/

http://www.infendo.com/ds/rumor-chrono-trigger-ds/

Before I go on I'm a sucker for this kind of thing, if a company re-releases a game with extra characters, cut scenes, battle features, etc I'll feel cheated that my version has none of those things. The Street Fighter games are prime examples, it's extortion but I still fall victim to the lush anime graphic. So why are games being re-releasing, Final Fantasy series, Tomb Raider, Resident Evil, Mario, Metal Gear Solid Subsistence, Rez and pretty much every other Nintendo game can be bought and downloaded on the Wii. Countless more classics from our child hood are following suit.

Resident Evil (Sony Playstion)

Resident Evil (Nintendo Game Cube)



Tomb Raider (Playstation)



Tomb Raider (Playstation 2)

One reason for doing this is the fact not everyone got a chance to play these classics when they were first released, plus it gives a chance for the kids of today to play some of the best games created. Ok so that's the positive reason, the second reason is chumps like me will buy the game again if they are re-released, heck it's much easier than trying to think of another original game that will be a huge success.

As far as Chrono Trigger goes, I'll just download it.

Leave the Hedgehogs Alone FFS!!

Remember this guy, I'm talking about Sonic the Hedgehog, please don't get me confused with this other blue hedgehog that's getting raped by nintendo.

Sonic must be spinning INTENSIVELY fast in his grave if he saw what was going on today. Ok so Sonic got to pair of with Mario in Smash Bros Brawl, that was fun but it's too freaking late Mario has already won. Sonic vs Mario should of existed on the N64 and Sega Saturn, it would of sold like wild fire. I don't mean prance around in the Olympics or smashing each over off a tiny level, I mean a proper head to head with Sega's and Nintendo's best.

But hey it's too late for that Brawl is as close as I'm gonna get. On to point two.

I've continued to play Sonic game due to my love for Sega, but now Nintendo have raped and destroyed Sonic to the best of their ability. for example, first we get Werehog Sonic and now Sonic with a freaking sword. I give up I don't even know what to say. Sonic died along time ago I should just come to terms with it instead of kidding myself :(

Stepping on the Little Guy

Take a good hard look at these two video game covers. Words cannot describe how incredibly shit these two games are. These are but two examples of the terrible games being produced for next gen consoles. Granted the Wii is the worst for this but I digress. I can see the popularity of the exercise games from a marketing point of view. My Dad's friends all have Wii fit, and he claims his jab was too fast for the boxing on Wii Sports which obviously pleased him (don't tell him its not real boxing though).

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/how-big-is-big-enough_4

This article explains how in a few years we won’t see games like ‘Ninja Bread Men’ anymore.

For starters the budgets for next-gen development is pretty high and for a game like ‘Chicken Shoot’ cutting corners in graphics sound effects and EVERYTHING is going to really hurt how much this game sells. Ok so these two examples are indescribably bad, so let’s take the latest ‘Atari’s Alone in the Dark’ (example the article uses). With a bigger budget and a better team to refine the game as a whole it could have been a huge success.

The cost of “effective” marketing is tough for smaller firms, just take another look at ‘Ninja Bread Men’!! I can’t stress how much I hate this game! This is why were seeing double barrelled companies like Square-Enix and Bandai-Namco.

Tale of Dale -part 3-

I had a few idea for the character project, I was tempted to create two characters in the Team Fortress 2 style but I think I will wait until I get into industry before I'm forced to model and draw in someone else style. Still I reckon I'd be able to do myself pretty well in the TF 2 style bigger afro shades and a few other cliches. For the WW I character project so many people have done a soilder and I wanted to stray away from that as much as possible, my first choice was a typical paperboy with a beret shorts that sort of thing but I could find anyone for reference, it's an unusual thing asking a kid if you can take pictures of them...

From fear of appearing like a pedofile i decided to change that idea. I figured who could I take reference off for the WW I character, theres no chance I could do my brothers or sister there weren't many mixed raced kids around, I guess there would of been a few but thats besides the point. The next best choice was my mum, I then looked into 1930's african nurse and Florence Nightingale and thought that be a really cool idea.










This is the project I'm working on at the moment since it won't take me that long to finish the other two. I'm pleased with how it's going so far this is my second attempt, my first one is a little embarrassing to post.

Tale of Dale -part 2-

For the vehicle project I decided to go with the easiest one I could find, vehicles are defiantly not my strong point so If I could I’d like to avoid them if I get into the industry, unless I get a into a situation like Rick Nath did with the Colin McRae Rally series then I wouldn’t mind so much. I chose to do the Citroen Van, pretty simple and easy to find blueprints for it. I don't have any real life reference yet but I know where one is in Leicester thanks to Caz.

When I came to model the door I seperated it from the body of the Van, this turned out to be a bad idea, while I was editing the body of the Van the door remained unchanged so I had to go back to it to refit to the shape of the body. The door had some crazy turn problems but I managed to narror it down this faint shadow. If anyone has any advice on poly distribution and edge loops I'd really appreciate it.

I pretty much rushed this unwrap to see how faced I could do it, it was late I was tired and felt bad I was behind, still I think it turned out ok. The only bit's that are overlapped are areas where the lighting infomation will remain the same.

Tale of Dale -part 1-

Since it's been awhile I guess I should start with a heavy load. I wanted to show some work I've been up to recently.

Here some images of a park I live near, it just looked so bizarre, check out this bench look at how it’s made by crappy bent metal bars.

With modelling this park I really wanted to capture the bent metal and not make it look like bad modelling, using loft and its many features made this really easy to do however I did manually edit a few verts here and there. It's almost finished; it's all unwrapped I just need to get better texture reference and sort out some scaling problems but other than that it’s done.

Here's a few texture pages, texturing and unwrapping is quite possibly my favourite bit about modelling, people usually prefer modelling which is understandable, working in 2D is just so much easier for me, plus texturing is what brings the model to life.