House interiors, project updates

As the year comes to a close it is inevitable a lot of projects slow down a bit; but it doesn't really feel that way to me! One project I am doing is taking a two week sprint approach, which I didn't quite get if it was two sprint one break or what hah. Basically I just work at my own pace and usually find something to model or texture. The last couple weeks I have been wrapping up some house interiors:

These are some shots in unity with just some standard shaders and unlit textures. By no means does this represent a final look to the houses, just a general idea. Once the shaders are properly set up it looks a lot better. I just have a test ground so I can get a general idea of something in unity (other people have the project set up on their end).
next up are some shots of houses with sections hidden to get a little preview of layouts:

This is where my CAD background comes in pretty handy when it comes to creating houses! Still I am glad house interiors are done at the moment aside from maybe some texture tweaks. I definitely like making creatures a bit better. There is just a lot less elements to a creature. A house has tons of meshes (walls, doors, outlets, stairs etc.) while a creature generally only has a couple (body and head, maybe some clothes/armor). Same goes for textures to apply. Generally a house has around 12-15 textures, I have learned the hard way not to try to cram too much on one UV map. I mean you can put everything you want on it, but you either make it a huge resolution or everything looks like something seen through muddy water.

Finally I also got a snake done. Textures still a work in progress though:

Overall not too bad, the scales look a bit rough and messy though. Too hand drawn without much blending together. Then again, might work out if a player can't view it too close.

Anyway that concludes the rather large update! Trying to take it easy as the holidays and end of year come rushing in. Still learning tons and hitting up Udemy when I feel up for learning new stuff. Just the other day I even got a neat collect stuff type game set up pretty quick with my own stuff in Unity (well aside from code) which was neat. Hopefully I will post before next year but if not happy holidays all!

Another late update... Ah well lol. This time I have been spending a lot of time learning some of the finer points of rigging. I can't rely on pre-built skeletons forever! Aside from that I have still managed to get some models done for my two projects:

Perhaps black is not the best background... anyways a lot of this was texturing using a combination of textures I took pictures of and the freebies on CG textures. Painted some minor details with my tablet in photoshop as well, but for the most part it was adjusting images to work well the the maps I had laid out.

next up was a dog for my less realistic style game:

This texture is hand painted with the aid of photoshop and my tablet.
Still in progress, as I need to get some information on just what sort of animations this guy will have before I can finish up some edge loops. Might have something to do with why I am learning rigging hah! Next on the list is texturing another house and learning some more about rigging. Maybe I can even get something animated with my very own custom rig soon.

Whoops went and forgot about the blog again... I am terrible at this updating thing. It isn't because I have nothing to post but more I am just so busy. Now, some things I can't really show because rather than rendering out animations and posting them on youtube I have been just previewing in unity. Let it be said that there was a lot of animation reworks and improvements on one game. Also, got some more house models knocked out, though they are not textured yet. We got a new guy that may be able to help with some of the 3D work and I am letting him take a shot at that.

So far we plan on getting stuff at least semi decent and possibly going to PAX for a demo. Wish us luck there. The submission deadline will be tight but hopefully we make it.

As for my other project... I can't really say much about the status other than progress is a bit slow at this time. I really hope some decisions get made and we can move forward with some things but alas I am not really a decision maker, I am just the guy who works with 3D assets. Here are some bunnies in the meantime:

Probably not all the variations but good enough for now! This week I will probably move on to another creature and keep an eye out for more animation work. Probably a good idea to check in tomorrow and see what is up.

Alright, almost got wrapped up in work and forgot to update this again. I want to talk a bit about my unity works scene I have been building... At this point due to various agreements it will probably won't be something most people can tour for quite some time. However, it is still neat to get an overall view of all the accomplishments this year so far:

It is actually starting to look like enough assets for a small game now! roads, houses, a building, some rocks. Too bad I would need to animate a bunch of stuff and program a ton to do that though hah; that is why I have been working with teams though. I do like walking through here from time to time just to see how things are looking though. Get a feel for how they might appear in engine. Most of all though it is cool seeing skills improving and stuff getting to a finished if not fully polished state. I might still come back to some and update textures or add details at some point.

Anyways enough nostalgia for now, and lets zoom in on one of the assets I have been working on:

Another house! I am generally really happy with the exterior here. The interior might need a bit more cleanup we will see though (I also am not sure about that white paint inside, even though it does look great outside). Overall though it is looking fairly good!

Anyways, that ends this blog entry. A lot better in terms of an update now that it has been a bit less busy. I try to model/texture something every day, though I also don't want to burn out on certain things. Doing mundane stuff like houses for a week on end can really take it out of you. Anyways I could ramble on about things but I think I will keep it at that for this update!

Well still a lot of stuff in the works but things seem to be quieting down a bit now. Had some challenging models the last couple days as well as some quick ones. A lot of hospital props done:

Still lots more to go. Probably moving on to working on houses soon. Feeling a bit worn out today, so perhaps I will take it easy. Just thought I would post and say everything is moving along quite nicely, and I am pretty happy with how my modeling and texture skills have progressed so far.

Whew tons of stuff done. It was interesting working in a basically on demand environment; most assignments were hey we need this now who can work on it? Another example was: you know, it would be really awesome if this could be done by insert date here. The other thing that was cool about the tight deadlines is we got to see a lot of progress as things were rapidly updated as well. The side effect of all this was a lot of rapid improvement and experimentation with the tools and pipeline to get content to a usable state asap. I don't think I would like to work in such a frenzied state all the time, but for short stretches it is neat to see so much being done in such a short time frame. Anyways, enough with the writing time for some pictures! We have texture refinements, and a new creature among other things.

this is a pic of a flat color stage of a sort of undead ogre concept.

as I moved forward with the concept I also looked at some grim reaper images and tried to incorporate that sort of look to it as well. So in the end we have a undead ogre reaper basically, hopefully he turns out to be a formidable foe hah. It was completed and rigged in a mere four days, so I am sure some refining might be in the works at some later date. Look forward to seeing our games progress even more this month on facebook at Age of Aincrad and Infinitude studios.

Tons of stuff happening. It is pretty much crunch time as a lot of deadlines in October. Anyways lets kick it off with some finished stuff then move on to some in progress:

We have a goblin chief and a hospital interior. Larges textures done, but need to fill it with all the nice details like wall railings and interior windows.

Also, working on some hair model/textures:

Still could use some cleanup, but the base isn't half bad so far. Hopefully have time to give another update before too long... but going to be buried in work the next couple weeks.