[Help Wanted] "The First King" - FPS game. PRE-ALP

Halifax · Post by **Halifax** » Sun Dec 23, 2007 11:05 pm

lostclimategames wrote:look up binary space partitioning.

I am pretty sure we all have heard of this, but I think they are looking for a little bit more of a simple culling system.

christianclavet · Post by **christianclavet** » Mon Dec 24, 2007 6:58 am

Hi. Small update today.

I've updated my IRRlicht .DLL to be to the lasted 1.4 release with DirectX 9.0 support. (Recompiled with DEVCPP) Support for DX8 and the software drivers are disabled.

All the IRRlicht files required for the compiler are now in a folder named IRRlicht 1.4 (.DLL, library files, and includes files)

Tested again the display bug with reflective-transparent surfaces and the problem is still present.

dejai · Post by **dejai** » Mon Dec 24, 2007 7:50 am

christianclavet · Post by **christianclavet** » Thu Jan 03, 2008 1:06 am

I've created a documentation for the project, it was inspired by Halifax on his project planning.

The link to the project thread containing the document planning:
http://irrlicht.sourceforge.net/phpBB2/ ... 528#132528
The direct link to the document:
http://first-king.sourceforge.net/TheFirstKing.pdf

dlangdev · Post by **dlangdev** » Thu Jan 03, 2008 1:12 am

very nice work, i just read the pdf file.

Halifax · Post by **Halifax** » Thu Jan 03, 2008 2:11 am

Great work christian, I would hope that the whole community turns to the trend of writing documentation, especially white papers.

By the way, just curious, what program are you using to sculpt you hi-res meshes? ZBrush, Mudbox, ...or Blender

?

christianclavet · Post by **christianclavet** » Thu Jan 03, 2008 8:41 pm

Hi, Halifax.

I'm actually a Lightwave modeler. I plan to use ZBrush for the Hi-Level modeling for the details. I plan to learn 3DS Max soon (Registered to a program in College), because Ubisoft (Far Cry II dev, I met this summer) gave me a trick to create the High level mesh, but it require 3DS max (Need for a script)

What they do, is create the details on a flat surface (based on the design of the UV Map). Then the script will wrap the meshes around the object following the UVMap. They will only have then to bake the Normal map.

So for a character suit, they created zippers, pockets, and some detailed materials but they put it on the reference of the UV map. The script will then wrap this around the mesh to create the jacket. Then they bring that into Zbrush to create the seams and bends in the jackets. I think the Normal Map is baked there (not asked them for this).

I also know that for the color texture, they use masks. They take 2-3 seamless textures, and use the mask to blend them together to create the detail (Like we could "paint" details on ground with Gile[s]). I think that to implement this, It require a specificaly created shader.

vermeer · Post by **vermeer** » Thu Jan 03, 2008 8:53 pm

very interesting...

dlangdev · Post by **dlangdev** » Thu Jan 03, 2008 9:41 pm

thanks for the info, chris.

Halifax · Post by **Halifax** » Sat Jan 05, 2008 12:35 pm

christianclavet wrote:Hi, Halifax.

I'm actually a Lightwave modeler. I plan to use ZBrush for the Hi-Level modeling for the details. I plan to learn 3DS Max soon (Registered to a program in College), because Ubisoft (Far Cry II dev, I met this summer) gave me a trick to create the High level mesh, but it require 3DS max (Need for a script)

What they do, is create the details on a flat surface (based on the design of the UV Map). Then the script will wrap the meshes around the object following the UVMap. They will only have then to bake the Normal map.

So for a character suit, they created zippers, pockets, and some detailed materials but they put it on the reference of the UV map. The script will then wrap this around the mesh to create the jacket. Then they bring that into Zbrush to create the seams and bends in the jackets. I think the Normal Map is baked there (not asked them for this).

I also know that for the color texture, they use masks. They take 2-3 seamless textures, and use the mask to blend them together to create the detail (Like we could "paint" details on ground with Gile[s]). I think that to implement this, It require a specificaly created shader.

That is definitely very interesting. I have only fooled around with ZBrush a little bit, it seems very good, I just wish I could afford it.

So, while you were at Ubisoft, did you get to fool around with Unreal Engine 3?

Or were you just there getting some advanced modeling tips?

JP · Post by JP » Sat Jan 05, 2008 6:20 pm

I can play around with the Unreal Engine 3 at work, but for some reason i haven't... i really should.. just because i can

Another irrlicht forumer has access but i shan't mention his name incase he wants to remain anonymous

christianclavet · Post by **christianclavet** » Sat Jan 05, 2008 7:48 pm

Hi Halifax.

I wasnt at Ubisoft this summer. I was at an artist conference named "ADAPT 2007". Most game compagnies were there (EA, Ubisoft, Activision, Lucasart Bungie, Eidos, etc) also FX shops like ILM, Pixar, Dreamworks.

I'll give you some details of what I saw there:

For Ubisoft, they where talking on methods to work on a pipeline. I met Alexandre Amanccio, art director for FAR CRY II. That explained their new engine "DUNIA". He showed us a demo of the engine, explained how they would create assets for the game, textures, etc. That engine is able to render ambient occlusion in real time with proper shadows. They will release the game with a level editor.

I also met Arman Akopian who worked at Ubisosft on Rainbox Six at now working on A2M project: WET. He showed us some trick to model faces (3DSmax).

I was really impressed with the work of David Gireaud who's was working on Assasin's creed as Senior Character Artist, he also done most of the characters models on the Prince of persia games. That's guy, demonstrated how he created a character, starting from a base mesh in 3DS max, then bring it over Zbrush and gave it incredible details. David is working for Eidos now.

Had also some time to see John Clark from Sony Pictures who explained how they created the water and waves effects on the movie Surf's up. And talked with Pierre Raymond from Hybride Technologies who's done most of the effects on the movie "300". They also done effects on Spy Kid, Sin City, etc.

dlangdev · Post by **dlangdev** » Sat Jan 05, 2008 8:16 pm

good story, chris. keep us in the loop about it.

christianclavet · Post by **christianclavet** » Sun Jan 06, 2008 12:00 am

I updated the first post of this thread to reflect all that was done and give link to some of the elements.

link:
http://irrlicht.sourceforge.net/phpBB2/ ... 885#134885

omaremad · Post by **omaremad** » Sun Jan 06, 2008 12:27 am

What they do, is create the details on a flat surface (based on the design of the UV Map). Then the script will wrap the meshes around the object following the UVMap. They will only have then to bake the Normal map

Most artists do it in reverse to save on sampling rays during the normal map bake, a bolt on a car is very small compared to the rest of the car, to capture this detail you would need lots of tracing rays(which would be slow), the rest of the car however can be done with low number of rays. so instead of adding the bolts on the high poly mesh, they just bake the bolt on its own with lots of rays (this wont be slow since its only the bolt) and take the result and paste it on the uv map in photoshop.

This means they can add lots of bolts without increasing normal bake times or getting ugly artfacts due to intersecting and overlapping polygons.

The only situation the technique you described can be benifical if its a world space normal map, but yet there is tangent to world space converts.

Its intersting to know why they use that harder technique(they are pros so they must have found advantages for it)describe how they used this technique, and what sort of normal maps were produced (colourful, or blue purple?, or green red).[/quote]