Production Week 1
Week Ending 15th March
During the first weeks of March we began production of our final 3rd year project for The Art of Video Games at Escape Studios. As a group we really wanted to focus on something outdoors and bright and sunny. Through a few pitches and a lot of research we settled on the idea of a Spanish Courtyard! Along our journey we will also be mentored by Creative Assembly!
Viktor - Art Director & Environment Artist
This week we've started production and I'm very impressed by everyone's performance. We've done good progress and we're heading in the right direction.
Last week we were lucky enough to have Creative Assembly visiting school and giving us feedback on our projects. They really liked our idea of an art school as it has great potential, but got concerned about the workload we have planned out so we have been cutting down on unnecessary assets and I've spent last weekend trying to rearrange the asset list so it's ready for production.
Once production have started, my main role beside being the Art Director is to create the architecture for the project. I've redesigned some elements to get closer to the reference images we have and started breaking up pieces into individual materials and modular parts. With the first pass materials applied to them, they already look decent.
In the lunch breaks and after classes I've been experimenting with photogrammetry. Last weekend I've took around 200 photos of a rustic olive loaf which was a great exercise how to get good images using a flash and the "cross-polarizing" technique. During the week I've developed the photos, then used Reality capture to create the high poly version and it turned out great. (insert bread pic here)
With all the excitement of getting decent results out of RealityCapture and photogrammetry, I went on a photo trip on Thursday.
I've visited the British Museum and the V&A Museum to capture some of their statues to be used in the project. Due to lot's of visitors and the placement of some of the statues, I was only bale to get limited amount of pictures, so I'm yet to see how they will turn out, but I'm looking forward to see the end results!
Oh and as the final note, corona virus have reached school so no teaching next week and we're working from home. On one hand, I can't use reality capture and project work is going to be a bit more difficult, but on the other hand, I save a lot of time and money by not commuting, so I'm sure we will have a very productive week!
Urim - Prop Artist
This is the first week we've started production, very pleased the way things are going. The scene already is starting to take shape. We decided to create a sprint for next week to have all the necessary assets in the scene with a first pass texture so we know what we want and what we need that's a higher priority. For this week, I've been working on the main water feature fountain on the wall and trying to get that model done. It includes a lions head which took up most the time in sculpting but I managed to get a first pass sculpt and texture in the scene.
I also managed to finish the model for the ornate chair with a basic texture on it. My plan for next week is to finish all the assets on the asset list assigned to my name and get the first pass in the scene. We want to get an idea of how the scene will look like with most of the assets in the scene first before completing the assets to a high level.
Adiran - Prop & Environment Artist
I was given the task of making some benchmark assets within 3 days, 2 stone mason tools, on block of stone with different material types and a stool.
I managed complete 2 out of the 3, but struggled to finish the stool to a satisfactory level (and well continue to work on it).
This Week I started off by finishing the Stone Tools Set (11 number) in total, after feedback from Viktor I will make some more variations to the end have a splintered mushroom head on the 2nd pass.
Tuesday I got a little confused with the one of the assets names "Raw Stone Block", for some reason I thought it was one of the relief stone carving in the art bible.
But it turned out to mean 3 separated blocks of stone, Big, medium and small. So I switched to those making those.My plan is to continue marking the props as per on the asset list for the first sprint goal.
Josef - Prop & Environment Artist
First week started strong, the block out is moving towards a full 1st pass really quickly. I created the base block out and started work on a few props, I created the ornate table which is based in the old Spanish references I gathered.
The scaffolding storage area is constructed and may be a bit too big? It does look great as a first pass and will be a great environment asset. An amateur sculpture which is Also first pass and completed. Everyone has been grinding out their assets and making great time.
Viktor and Sapphire then restructured and re-evaluated the asset list to what we have now.
I'm currently making my way through the asset list and getting everything done to 1st pass at least. I Also plan to follow what Viktor did and do some photogrammetry sometime.
Shay - Material Artist
The first week of production went very well, everyone seemed to get quite a bit done. I personally worked on getting the first pass of materials in the scene so It didn't look like a grey box.
I first started with the terracotta floor. I played around with POM and Bump offset to see if it would help with the flatness, also to see how expensive it was. I got some pretty nice results with it. Next step for the terracotta floor is refining the texture and using vertex blending to blend between this material and a washed out version.
I also worked on a concrete material for the workshop floor and a brick material to blend with Hannah's plaster. They also both need refining. With the bricks I was thinking maybe it would be better to do Photogrammetry to capture more details that would take me a while to replicate in designer.
I also made the roof tiles using mesh, originally I was going to bake them down on to a plane to limit the poly count but my team suggested just making the mesh super low. Although you wont see the roof tiles unless with we give the player access to the second floor, If that doesn't happen I don't think there is no point in doing them.
I also Started modelling the desk for workshop it it going well so far but still some improvements I need to do. The plan is to have everything in the scene with 1st pass so we can have an idea of the space we have.
Willow - Lighting Artist
The first week of production for me, like the rest of team has been super busy!
A lot of my focus has been on creating a first pass sky for the environment. This involved finding the desired HDRI and painting it out in photoshop to remove the foreground and any other undesired sections. This was a long and slow process, that had to be repeated multiple times. I've done about 7 or 8 different versions of this so far.
However I feel I now have a good starting point in the environment that helps set the tone. I also roughed out sun position. This was originally going to be quite low but since the walls of our architure are so high I decided on review to raise the sun further into the hemisphere.
I have also created some tools for the sky such as a navigation tool for the sky so it can be rotated, allowing me more control over the sky light.
I used this as a basis to create a first pass on the lighting, a lot of this was about establishing direction, which will likely need a bit of work but is now is a good starting point. I have tried to keep as close to references we have, pulling on the warm colours and long shadows. I also tried to start to establish bringing in the highlights on the areas of importance such as the central statue but as these forms will likely to change in the next few weeks I'll adjust these when needed.
This week I also modeled the first pass of the wall lamps that will help break up the wall space. A lot of the work here was within the textures where I feel like a lot of the quality of our assets will have to be pushed. But as of now looks good in the scene.
All in all its been a great start to the production pipeline and its exciting to see the potential in the environment starting to form!
Hannah - Foliage & Prop Artist
First week of production has been really productive! With the aim of doing first pass assets I quickly put together some terracotta pots which I knew would be important to accent the foliage.
Thinking sculpting would take me a while, I started my first pass of the unfinished statue asset which came out better than I thought it would!
Eventually I got around to my main plant, the Clematis, used as a climbing plant around the scene. I also helped Shay in setting up the foliage master material so the clematis flowers can change colours and boost the SSS saturation a little. Continuing to act as Shays assistant I dived into Designer with a limestone and plaster wall material so Shay could focus on more complicated things.
Finally, our Art Director, Viktor, really wanted a vista. I put together a quick vista scene making an arch that matched Viktors architecture, some stone paving and reusing some of the assets we already had. As the field of view is quite small, I think we will be able to get away with just planes for the mountain, however if we want to open up windows or a balcony this will need to be geometry!
During the first weeks of March we began production of our final 3rd year project for The Art of Video Games at Escape Studios. As a group we really wanted to focus on something outdoors and bright and sunny. Through a few pitches and a lot of research we settled on the idea of a Spanish Courtyard! Along our journey we will also be mentored by Creative Assembly!
Viktor - Art Director & Environment Artist
This week we've started production and I'm very impressed by everyone's performance. We've done good progress and we're heading in the right direction.
Last week we were lucky enough to have Creative Assembly visiting school and giving us feedback on our projects. They really liked our idea of an art school as it has great potential, but got concerned about the workload we have planned out so we have been cutting down on unnecessary assets and I've spent last weekend trying to rearrange the asset list so it's ready for production.
Once production have started, my main role beside being the Art Director is to create the architecture for the project. I've redesigned some elements to get closer to the reference images we have and started breaking up pieces into individual materials and modular parts. With the first pass materials applied to them, they already look decent.
In the lunch breaks and after classes I've been experimenting with photogrammetry. Last weekend I've took around 200 photos of a rustic olive loaf which was a great exercise how to get good images using a flash and the "cross-polarizing" technique. During the week I've developed the photos, then used Reality capture to create the high poly version and it turned out great. (insert bread pic here)
With all the excitement of getting decent results out of RealityCapture and photogrammetry, I went on a photo trip on Thursday.
I've visited the British Museum and the V&A Museum to capture some of their statues to be used in the project. Due to lot's of visitors and the placement of some of the statues, I was only bale to get limited amount of pictures, so I'm yet to see how they will turn out, but I'm looking forward to see the end results!
Oh and as the final note, corona virus have reached school so no teaching next week and we're working from home. On one hand, I can't use reality capture and project work is going to be a bit more difficult, but on the other hand, I save a lot of time and money by not commuting, so I'm sure we will have a very productive week!
Urim - Prop Artist
This is the first week we've started production, very pleased the way things are going. The scene already is starting to take shape. We decided to create a sprint for next week to have all the necessary assets in the scene with a first pass texture so we know what we want and what we need that's a higher priority. For this week, I've been working on the main water feature fountain on the wall and trying to get that model done. It includes a lions head which took up most the time in sculpting but I managed to get a first pass sculpt and texture in the scene.
I also managed to finish the model for the ornate chair with a basic texture on it. My plan for next week is to finish all the assets on the asset list assigned to my name and get the first pass in the scene. We want to get an idea of how the scene will look like with most of the assets in the scene first before completing the assets to a high level.
I was given the task of making some benchmark assets within 3 days, 2 stone mason tools, on block of stone with different material types and a stool.
I managed complete 2 out of the 3, but struggled to finish the stool to a satisfactory level (and well continue to work on it).
This Week I started off by finishing the Stone Tools Set (11 number) in total, after feedback from Viktor I will make some more variations to the end have a splintered mushroom head on the 2nd pass.
Tuesday I got a little confused with the one of the assets names "Raw Stone Block", for some reason I thought it was one of the relief stone carving in the art bible.
But it turned out to mean 3 separated blocks of stone, Big, medium and small. So I switched to those making those.My plan is to continue marking the props as per on the asset list for the first sprint goal.
Josef - Prop & Environment Artist
First week started strong, the block out is moving towards a full 1st pass really quickly. I created the base block out and started work on a few props, I created the ornate table which is based in the old Spanish references I gathered.
I'm currently making my way through the asset list and getting everything done to 1st pass at least. I Also plan to follow what Viktor did and do some photogrammetry sometime.
Shay - Material Artist
The first week of production went very well, everyone seemed to get quite a bit done. I personally worked on getting the first pass of materials in the scene so It didn't look like a grey box.
I first started with the terracotta floor. I played around with POM and Bump offset to see if it would help with the flatness, also to see how expensive it was. I got some pretty nice results with it. Next step for the terracotta floor is refining the texture and using vertex blending to blend between this material and a washed out version.
I also Started modelling the desk for workshop it it going well so far but still some improvements I need to do. The plan is to have everything in the scene with 1st pass so we can have an idea of the space we have.
Willow - Lighting Artist
The first week of production for me, like the rest of team has been super busy!
A lot of my focus has been on creating a first pass sky for the environment. This involved finding the desired HDRI and painting it out in photoshop to remove the foreground and any other undesired sections. This was a long and slow process, that had to be repeated multiple times. I've done about 7 or 8 different versions of this so far.
However I feel I now have a good starting point in the environment that helps set the tone. I also roughed out sun position. This was originally going to be quite low but since the walls of our architure are so high I decided on review to raise the sun further into the hemisphere.
I have also created some tools for the sky such as a navigation tool for the sky so it can be rotated, allowing me more control over the sky light.
I used this as a basis to create a first pass on the lighting, a lot of this was about establishing direction, which will likely need a bit of work but is now is a good starting point. I have tried to keep as close to references we have, pulling on the warm colours and long shadows. I also tried to start to establish bringing in the highlights on the areas of importance such as the central statue but as these forms will likely to change in the next few weeks I'll adjust these when needed.
This week I also modeled the first pass of the wall lamps that will help break up the wall space. A lot of the work here was within the textures where I feel like a lot of the quality of our assets will have to be pushed. But as of now looks good in the scene.
All in all its been a great start to the production pipeline and its exciting to see the potential in the environment starting to form!
Hannah - Foliage & Prop Artist
First week of production has been really productive! With the aim of doing first pass assets I quickly put together some terracotta pots which I knew would be important to accent the foliage.
Thinking sculpting would take me a while, I started my first pass of the unfinished statue asset which came out better than I thought it would!
Eventually I got around to my main plant, the Clematis, used as a climbing plant around the scene. I also helped Shay in setting up the foliage master material so the clematis flowers can change colours and boost the SSS saturation a little. Continuing to act as Shays assistant I dived into Designer with a limestone and plaster wall material so Shay could focus on more complicated things.
Finally, our Art Director, Viktor, really wanted a vista. I put together a quick vista scene making an arch that matched Viktors architecture, some stone paving and reusing some of the assets we already had. As the field of view is quite small, I think we will be able to get away with just planes for the mountain, however if we want to open up windows or a balcony this will need to be geometry!
