KNB221 - CG toolkit

[knb221ash]

Assessment 2 Final submission

The series of assets developed for the project included 4 dynamic buildings and a series of modular ground pieces.

Each building is individually constructed of between 7 and 31 individual pieces that upon placing it in the 3d environment automatically randomizes itself to create a unique structure, though most of them retained the same silhouette, some modifications significantly changed the design of the building, making it significantly different.

The construction scripts in each of the blueprints were relatively simple though did in some occasions become quite large and awkward to manage. On reflection I would have preferred to split the buildings up further in order to split the silhouette up further and allow each structure to be more unique in its variations like the following building.

The Tower created for the project was an interesting piece though the design did not translate very well from the concept art. Like the other designs I would prefer to break up the design further next time and add further elements to the design.

The modular ground pieces, though fitting together well and functioning as required appear too static, and require more elements to break it up. Next time I would create a number of objects such as garden areas to fill the space and make the environment more interesting.

Many of the buildings also would have benefited from smaller details such as air-conditioning machines or electrical boxes, these smaller details are less noticeable, though still important, and could also be made to utilize the same randomizing technique that the rest of the buildings use.

The last change I would make would be to look into using the blueprint system to randomize the textures in the same way as it selected the meshes, allowing me to utilize the same meshes in some cases to create multiple buildings. The concept was touched on during the project but was never investigated further as I had already built most of the assets.

[knb221ash]

Assessment 2: Update 2

Timeline:

After the first few weeks of working on the project I have finished most of my goals. The meshes are, with few exceptions, finished with only some tweaks remaining. Most of these models have been optimized and after exploring a number of tutorials on youtube I discovered a technique for generating normal maps using extra geometry that I was not previously aware of, and though the extra geometry has been created for most of the meshes this process still needs to be finished.

With more time put into the project I will probably be able to catch up to the timeline, though it is likely that the extra work that I intended to complete will not be finalized, or at least will suffer in quality, though that will not stop me from attempting it.

The timeline required little in the way of amendment, though the updated version is here:

·         Week 11:

Finish unwrapping and exporting models - generate normals based on extra geometry, Begin texturing meshes and working on materials.

·         Week 12:

Finalize texture and materials work – due to the nature of the scene provided many materials will be the same across different assets and will therefore be faster to complete. This week will also be used to integrate said materials into UE4 and the dynamic assets if they have been worked on previously.

·         Week 13:

Final polish for product and extra work on Dynamic assets and rigging as time permits.

Pictures to be uploaded when my internet stops being completely dead.

The development process so far has not suffered from many internal issues and the creation of the models has been fairly easy, especially with the techniques I have learned through investigation online.

External issues, especially organizing myself to work on the project has been more difficult with a large number of other responsibilities outside of university.

regardless of these Issues I am confident that I can step up the rate of work and complete the project on time. 

[knb221ash]

Assessment 2: Update 1

For the second assessment piece I have confirmed my choice of asset development, more specifically I have decided to move foward with modular asset creation.

Due to prior experience developing dynamic assets in UE4 I will also attempt to create at least 1 dynamic or configurable building to further build on that knowledge. In addition to this to expand my skills I will be experimenting with rig creation, though this is a tertiary priority behind dynamic assets which is in turn behind modular assets.

More specifically, I will be using one of the pieces of concept art (shown below) to develop a a series of modular buildings that will be highly customisable with at least one custom building that fits into the aesthetic of the concept. I will further attempt to improve on these modular assets usability by creating customisable blueprints in UE4 with which to quickly swap between different elements within the structures if time permits.

Finally I will attempt, again only if time permits, to develop my rigging skills by creating a proxy mesh (and perhaps full model) and skeleton for the following character. Due to the low priority of this task it will not be included on the plan below and only be worked on in the case of tasks being finished ahead of schedule.

The basic plan of action has been laid out as follows:

·         Week 7:

 Work on and complete concept art and break-downs of the images provided.

·         Week 8:

Work on and complete block outs for the meshes in appropriate modelling software, begin work on modular design.

·         Week 9:

Continue to develop assets to satisfaction, work should not be complete but should be approaching completion.

·         Week 10:

Finalize meshes for modular assets, begin work to import these assets into UE4 and lay groundwork for dynamic assets in the engine if time permits.

·         Week 11:

Begin texturing meshes and working on materials.

·         Week 12:

Finalize texture and materials work – due to the nature of the scene provided many materials will be the same across different assets and will therefore be faster to complete. This week will also be used to integrate said materials into UE4 and the dynamic assets if they have been worked on previously.

·         Week 13:

Final polish for product and extra work on Dynamic assets and rigging as time permits.

[knb221ash]

Reflection

Over the course of the first assessment piece a lot of invaluable skills and knowledge has been learned.

During these first weeks I have had to utilize Autodesk Maya, unreal engine 4 and adobe after effects to create assets, render them and take them through post-processing to create finished animated sequences. The quality of these products has varied, and in some cases was not quite as satisfactory as hoped, but regardless the products were completed and the knowledge and skills by which to create them has been acquired.

To create theses shots, The process of creating a character and rigging it for animation was learned. Despite only using characters created using the Art v1 animation tool my research did provide me with a variety of sources that provided further information on manually rigging characters and animating them, though further practice in this regard is desirable.

The processes surrounding the use of depth and colour masking in Adobe After Effects was also one of those learnt during these weeks.

during the production I found that I preferred the modelling side of things, and that animation tended towards being tedious and difficult to accurately create, as such I feel I would be better suited to focusing on asset development, including modelling and texturing though the other areas worked on will require some further practice as well, as they are highly useful and should not be neglected.

Moving on to assessment 2, I have chosen to stick to the asset development steam, focussing here primarily on the development of environmental assets, which in this case will involve creating at least one, and preferably several, modular structures and environmental features at a production quality to create a realistic and engaging environment.

Throughout the assessment I will strive to improve my skills in designing and developing not only the models themselves, but the environment in total, including building my skills in planning the production such that the final product appears as a single coherent while, something I have had trouble in in the past.

In this, I will be acting as a games artist (https://creativeskillset.org/creative_industries/games/job_roles/330_games_artist), designing and creating all the assets for this production in such a way that they can be re-used consistently to create new and interesting environments as desired.

To continue down this development stream, I will need a number of very particular skills. These skills include the ability to create complex and interesting 3d models from concept art, the ability to unwrap these models appropriately and develop both textures and materials that fit the style of the production. I will also need the ability to effectively utilise Unreal engine 4, and to create blueprints and modular assets in the engine.

In addition to the responsibilities above, I will likely have to create some supplementary 2d artwork to more effectively visualise the assets I will be creating and to plan it all out properly.

For the most part, I feel quite confident in my abilities here, though my ability to create modular assets will stretch my modelling ability and my skills in unreal engine, particularly when it comes to creating blueprints, will require some work to get up to the level needed to finish the project.

Finishing this next assessment piece will require using a number of resources to assist in developing my knowledge and skills, The first such resource that has been identified is Lynda.com, which has an enourmous amount of tutorials that can teach me to use any programs that I find myself requiring the use of.

Another resource that is available is Youtube, for similar reasons, though it is less reliable it has a greater range of content that will allow me to find answers to almost any f the questions I might have in the process of developing the project.

Finally the forum, Polycount, has a great number of resources that could be used to assist in development and if all else fails the community is available to answer question I might have during the production process.

[knb221ash]

Milestone 1C

The process of producing this weeks milestone involved many techniques that were known but had not been used in a long time, many of which had been unused for long enough that they needed to be re-learned.

The first step involved updating the environment. This was done in blender due to the familiarity with the program and was relatively simple to complete. The models were divided down into more separate pieces, and each piece was separated into multiple materials based on the concept art.

The environmental models did not require much in the way of learning, and mainly consisted of re-hashing and reinforcing existing knowledge.

After this, a new character and animation was envisioned: an overweight and incompetent and ungainly opposite to the example provided for the milestone video.

Unfortunately Art v1 had decided to stop working; attempting to move past the second stage of the rig creation would simply not work, no propmts would appear and no way to continue on in the process was available.

Even attempting to use the computers in at university proved to not be viable, as the rigs brought home raised errors on opening and could not be used.

Finally, after perhaps a total of 4 hours spread across multiple days and multiple reinstalls of all the involved software, it was decided that the older prototype model from milestone 1B would be re-used with a new animation.

The process of animating itself was no different from the last milestone, though a number of points that could be improved upon were identified.

using reference footage, for one, could have improved the quality of the animation, and in the end the action was too subtl, and could do with a fair amount of exaggeration to more effctively portray the character.

Bringing the new models and animations into Unreal and modifying the animation speed in the sequencer provided no new challenges, though a number of experiments with lighting and fog were made.

First, changes to the sky-light and the directional light in the scene were made in addition to exponential height fog to create a more interesting environment.

After these were done the character was provided, first, the default epic games texture, and then later a customised texture with subsurface data to create a more skin-like appearance.

Once the new animation, lighting, fog and environment were all implemented to satisfaction, the sequence was animated out into 3 seperate passes: final image, depth and subsurface colour.

These three sequences were imported into after effects and, like before, provided no new challenges due to the similarity to milestone 1A.

The subsurface color was tested and then rejected as a color mask, due to the even sharper edges it created, and in the end the depth pass was used as a luminosity mask due to the more interesting effect. Further, the video was modified to have higher contrast and modified levels to counter the faded appearance that the fog from unreal created.

Time in separate programs:

1 hour in blender 3 hours in Maya (not including time spent troubleshooting Artv1) 2 hours in UE4 1 hour in AE

[knb221ash]

Milestone 1B involved numerous different processes, some of which were already known and some of which were new.

Installing the unreal ART system was rather straightforward, as was creating the character using said system. The full capabilities of the toolset were not utilized here, though some effort was made to explore the different morph tools available and a general understanding was achieved. For the next milestone the character will be designed in a more exaggerated fashion and preferably with long, physicalized hair, to fully leverage the tools capabilities.

The rest of the animation process after that was fairly simple, and the characters animation was completed without difficulty.

Problems arose, however, when it came time to export the characters animation. Whilst the geometry and skeleton had been exported and then imported to UE4, the process for exporting the animation was not readily available from online sources. Eventually the appropriate video file was found and the animation was quickly taken into UE4.

In the engine, the character animation was applied through the sequencer and layered in order to experiment with animation weights, the effects of which can e seen in the rendered outcome. Additionally, the animation, when exported from Maya was too slow. This was fixed by doubling the speed within UE4.

In lieu of a normal camera, a cinematic camera was utilised for this render, and significant experimentation was done on the numerous settings available therein. The settings used in the final outcome was the apeture setting, the contrast and the gamma.

Due to the proficiency acquired in the last milestone within after effects it was considered uneccesary for this milestone to utilise the program to add further touches.

The most time was spent in Unreal engine, with a total of 4 hours spent in experimentation and development of the scene. A total of 3 hours in total was spent in Maya, split evenly between Character creation and animation. Finally The reflection was completed in a single hour.

[knb221ash]

A short animated sequence exported from UE4, Models created in blender.

In the process of creating the scene it was decided that a more dynamic camera action would show off more of the scene and as such a camera crane object was used.

From initial investigation, using the depth pass in after effects has a great dea of versatility. Aside from simply compositing basic shapes as was done in the milestone render, the depth pass can also be used to create realistic lens focus, to simulate exceptionally dark shadows as shown, which could be useful for either creating a darkened foreground such as a cave or creating exaggerated shadows for other purposes, or to composite 2d effects over 3d effects for a more realistic output.

Most of the time spent on this milestone was in after effects, as that was the program with which I have the least experience, which in comparison to the modelling and UE4 work which I found quite easy was initially difficult to figure out.

More time on this project would likely see an extended shot with additional cuts and a more coherent end product rather than simply a render of my experiments in addition to more screenshots of said experiments. The pipeline was different than I am used to working within, though it does conform to what I knew previously of animated film production.