Week 6/7 - A Little Update (And I Found This Amusing)...

I will be doing a big blog post tomorrow assessing my schedule, what I've got left to do, and setting myself some new targets. It will be a combination of Week 6 wrap up and Week 7 beginning. I've been super busy this weekend.

Also I found this picture and wanted to share it.

(Source)

Now to bed, bright and early for tomorrow.

- Hannah

Week 6 - Gregory Crewdson, I Think I'm in Love with You...

You know that feeling you get when you see something that is so unbelievably perfect that you don't know what to do other than whisper "oh....".

That is what Gregory Crewdson's work has done to me. 

He creates such a beautiful sense of atmosphere within just a single frame. His images are so dynamic, telling incredible stories with no words or movement. The colours, the lights, the composition of his shots... it all comes together to create perfection; perfection I am definitely going to be taking inspiration from. 

His work has the exact kind of aesthetic I want my environment to have. 

I thought I'd just pop some of his work up here to keep me motivated, and to share it with you. There is a documentary called Brief Encounters that I will be watching when I get home, and hoping to soak up all that magical artistic knowledge that he has. 

Damn it, Gregory... 

- Hannah

Week 6 - Fighting the Beast that is 3ds Max

Just a quick one today. Not a lot to update on. Just getting to modelling the assets for the scene. 

I should have all my priority 1 assets modelled by the end of the week. They are fairly simple so, I'm hoping to get most of them done within the first couple of days. I'll do a quick review on Wednesday. To see where I'm up to.

These are the priority 2 assets. If I'm lucky these should also be done by the end of the week. Again, I'll do another review on Friday to let you all know where I'm up to.

The difficult bit is past me now, seeing as I finished the base, so things are now going smoothly. 

Lets get going. 

I'm definitely not stressed in any way. 

- Hannah

Week 5 - Round-Up

Behind schedule. Need to sort this out.

Just a case of blasting through all the assets now the base is all modeled and unwrapped.

Material IDs all set up. Everything will be tilable with decals, other than the metal. Lightmaps done as well.

It's no longer modular pieces, although this entire base is build from the piece I made.

Next week will be blasting through modelling all my other assets. Should be fairly simple, hopefully.

- Hannah

(Edit - sorry this post is a little late. Completely forgot to publish)

Week 5 - I Need To Sort Out My Planning..

Quick update. Just to show modular pieces, etc.

Pretty much finished all of the modular assets, I just need to scale them down a little to fit in with my new layout plan. Now I know how much space I've got to play with, I can scale everything to fit perfectly.

First layout when I'd placed all my modular pieces together. 2m pieces we used.

Windows need to be made smaller to read better as a New York Apartment. Also, three always looks better than two. It's just a case of scaling things down to make them fit better. Fairly simple to do honestly. They are all unwrapped and ready to go, other than that.

The bed has moved position so's not to reveal the murder too early. I want everything to be smaller as well to make sure I can polish everything in time, and to give a claustrophobic feel.

Anyway, that's all for today.

- Hannah

Week 5 - Asset Moodboards

Asset Ideas - Pinterest

Asset Ideas - Kiss Me Deadly

Asset Ideas - Floors, Walls and Doors

- Hannah

Week 5 - Boss-Ass Asset List

Just thought I'd quickly post up the base asset list here. If you have any suggestions, let me know.

- Hannah

Week 5 - The Modelling Begins

Hey there everyone, just a quick post today letting you know where I am right now.

I'm currently sorting out my asset list. The organisation is incredible; so many different columns in Microsoft Excel. I'm making note on what can be reused and, of course, setting out a priority list. I will see how many of these I can get modeled and unwrapped by the end of the week. On Friday, I plan on spending the time putting the scene together properly, populating, and doing a quick lighting pass.

It's going to be a busy week.

Lets do this.

- Hannah

Edit: Also, you may have noticed that I have an updated the blog title. Thanks to Emma for the brilliant suggestion.

Week 4 - End of Pre-Production, Finally...

Its been tough, I'm not going to lie, and it feels like I've not done that much work.
I've been informed however, after a review today, that I have... which is nice.

So this week as been finishing up my final concepts and figuring out what my character is going to look like, which has taken out a large chunk of time.

So here is the environment concept that I'd been working on. It still needs colour overlays and such but that's something I can work on this weekend.

I also sorted out the character.

Photobashed together some magic.

Like I've previously stated, I want to heavily play on the noir tropes so I was looking at either a femme fatale or a detective.

With some feedback, we settled on 7. I've got some fantastic ideas to include her within the environment and some very basic idle animations. It's going to be great.

I also received some great feedback this week from a few different sources, so I'm just going to jot it all down here in a place that I can easily access it. It's also a good way to keep you all informed in the direction this will take.

• Look at Noir film quality - I need to do some more visual analysis regarding film grain, levels, camera artifacts (vignetting). I've actively put in various lighting passes throughout my schedule so I can make sure that I'm getting the best lighting possible, so I'll spend a long time refining my lighting setup. I'll also be looking into some lighting techniques and doing research on lighting rigs. 
• Minimize workload - Considering I'm aiming for a AAA position, I need each asset to be a fully realised, polished model. A lot of my assets will be reusable for clutter, so that helps. I need to spend a lot of time polishing my materials, something I've consistently had an issue with. The amount of polish time I've given myself should hopefully help there.
• Spend around 20-30 days on the character - I've set myself 3 weeks with another week for polish so this should be just right. 
• Think of lots of extra ways to make the environment feel alive - Blue and red flashing lights outside to represent police cars. Lights moving outside (Blade Runner is a great example for these huge panning lights). Sounds can be used. Taps dripping. Smoke etc.
• Settle on an era - 1950's is the kind of era I'm shooting for. The character designs I did have kind of shown I've been naturally leaning towards it for a while now. That means more research into prop design. Luckily, my film stills from Kiss Me Deadly have given me some great reference. Back to watching classic noir films for me!

So that's that. Next week, we're FINALLY on to modelling. I can't wait.

- Hannah

Week 4 - Extended Pre-Production Time

Yup, you read that right. I need to extend my pre-production by a few days. I need to finish off character designs. I plan on stopping Wednesday and quickly reviewing where I am with my asset list, style guide and overall designs for both the environment and character. Much of the smaller concept work can be done alongside modelling so that takes a small amount of pressure off.

This is just a quick post to keep you all updated. Concepts shall be coming along soon.

- Hannah