The Engine Giving Problems!

There are some problems with the engine not playing some of the animations correctly and because it is near the end of the project. James and Ben need to quickly find the cause of the animations going messed up. We all want something good and playable at the end of the project.

A lot of animations done!

A lot of the animations are now done. I helped Ram get the animations and some of the objects which he done and just needed to be rendered and put in game. The pistol, jetpack, smg and jumping, running forward animations were also done today. All of these were put as a .PNG so all now James and Ben have to make them work. Azam has also completed his animations and made PNG's and are copied to James harddrive.

New Turret and Animations!

The turret is animated and it is on it's own layer which means it can fit anywhere on the level. It spins around from right to left and James said he can make it follow the player which will be very good. Azam modelled the turret for me. I animated it so the cover opens and the turret comes out, this can be used so if the player is not in range the animation can be played in reverse and the that would be awesome.

This is the map finished. It's PNG so the black cannot be seen in game. It looks very reasonable. Azam has made his boss level and Boss and he is working on making the animations. Ram has completed the hero character and he has also made a jump, run, jet-pack animations which are just needed to be put in game now.

Engineer Type of place Done!

This is the engineer pipe work place for the map. I made this using the broken vent place in the map with adding some new pipes which gave it a new effect.

This is the final render it works really well with the rest of the map which is a great achivement.

Almost finished the whole map just need to add the floors and the collision for the game because this would be a flat single image.

New Corridor and Props Done!

This is the other corridor in the game which is just made using the other corridor with a new lighting system.

 This is how the final render looks like it gives a effect of light coming in from the roof.

This is on top of the corridor which I just made it was very quick and simple to make.

One problem with the render is that it is too bright compared to the rest of the places which I might have to rectify later on.

Control Room Done and Dusted!

This is the control room which I made using Ram's train models from the previous project. So we got the work done fast by using the models from the storage room and placing them correctly.

This is the render which is going to be used in the game. It looks very reasonable.

Corridor Done!

This is the corridor in maya it looked very nice and the detail is also very reasonable.

The above image is the image I used as a reference.

This is the corridor finished, I used the broken vents because it fits in the scene and the boxes which look like frames are supposed to be like vents. A little change to the map layout is allowed. The black lines are the floors which the lift will stop on. The corridor looks reasonable. A lot of the detail didn't come out in the render.

Started the Corridor!

I started on working with the lower corridor. The ladder was integrated in the scene so it doesn't have any lighting issues and looks nice in game. I made some extrusions in the walls so it looks sci-fi I just hope that detail comes out in the render :).

Some small stuff!

This is a door, it looks weird but in the render it looks very reasonable. The triangle thing at the top of the door will indicate red or green light showing if the door is use-able or not.

This is the door in the game. It looks very good and I am pleased with it. 

I thought of making the staircases as well. Which James told me we can't have because it would make confuse the player with a top down view of the stairs so I decided to make new stairs after this one.

It looks very nice.

This is the new drop ladder. The walls are there to give it a better render.

This is the render it looks very good but it might not fit with the corridor which I need to start working on. 

Change To Art-style!

This is a wall for a lift that will operate in our game. It has to be activated so it can work. I made the background for the lift first because for the lift to be able to go up and down it has to be on a different layer.

We all thought about changing the game by adding a better art style. The ladder needs to be done again which I will fix very soon. Azam and Ram are working on our characters the enemies and the hero. Azam is also making the boss level which we will have after this level most likely. I like the new grey and white mixture in the level. It creates a very good scary type of feeling.

This is the lift I made for our game it will be on a different layer so it can be moved easily.

The lift just needs a little shadowing and it will look very nice.

Broken Vent Done!

I made the broken vent using Maya and Photoshop within no time because it's so fast using Maya and just retouching using Photoshop.

This is the Maya scene I just made the platform break intot he pipe area.

It could be improved which I might think about later on.

New Storage room made!!!

Today I made a the plan and added text to the map so we know exactly which part is where. James told me where every part is and how it will work. I still need to colour code the floors and show which floor is lower and which floor is higher. This will make the work a lot easier.

Azam and Ram are working on characters, Ram's working on the main hero and Azam is working on the main Boss. Yesterday Ram also made the small minion characters which are going to be used the most in Maya which need to be coloured and displayed as a image. It still also needs animations work.

I worked on the storage room which is on the top of the level. Me and James also decided to have the level in one image. In construct James can add invisible collision. I worked on getting the vents, ladder and the corridor in the image.

The storage room was made in Maya and this time I found out how to render the ambient occulsion, this saved a lot of time creating false lighting in photoshop which seems pretty bad.

This is the screen of the storage room. I used layers and rendered each layer by layer this way i got each element in the scene on a different layer in photoshop which let me work on arranging them according to the ambient occulsion.

Above is the ambient occulsion and using this as a overly in photoshop let me make the rest of the stuff in the scene look more cleaner.

This is the current image of the map and it shows how much of the map is done as well. Stairway needs to be done and the engineer room. Also a variation of the corridor needs to be done. This would leave the characters to be done.

Work on the ladder!

Today I made the ladder which is after the vents to get to the top of the level. It was very simple and easy to model. I did the same pocedure of using the alpha maps to texture the render and than make it tilable.

This is the Maya screenshot for the image.

This is the photoshop final image which is going to be used and also tiled to the top. Although some of the detail was lost in the render so I am goign to find out how to render the ambient occulsion so it keeps a lot of the detail and it will also make the images look better.

Working On the new Idea!!

Worked on the bottom level of the map, the vents which James described to me as pipes and a very tight space. So using Maya and Photoshop I made the pipes which i than rendered in Maya and took into photoshop to adjust the textures and fix some of the problems.

Using the alpha channel in the Maya render I added a background and tiled the image, using a number things in photoshop I made the resonable image which can be used for the vents in the game.

Massive Change to Project !!!

Today we all sat down together and thought about our game at it's current status and we all came to a conclusion to change the idea of a fighter game because it is hard on both the artists and the designers. Because the sprites and animations have to be made for every character with atleast the basic animations which all 3 of us thought was too much. Also, for the designers to code combo's and lots of sprites, damage collision etc. Is too much.

So we started a new idea which James worked over the holidays on, this idea is very simple and we can surely achieve it maybe faster than we think. So we might extend our level if it is done fast enough. The idea is of a platform based game which has the lets the character walk around and pick-up powerups like jet-pack etc which can be used.

This is the very early design of the game, tomorrow or the day after I will label every part of the map with colours and text stating what every place is. The main scene for the game is a crashed spaceship which is in space. So we have to make vents, control room, storage space and some other level backgrounds and assets like the character and enemies.

Block and Full Kick!

 

Today i completed some frames on the kick with the leg fully out. I used the previous frame and erased and mvoed some of the leg and shoes around and erased the left leg and drew it again . It still can be polished by increasing the colouring quality. 

This is the blocking frame which needs some filling in with the white spaces but most of the overall shape has been completed. It looks epic . The torso was used from the previous frame with some erasing and drawing the arms and legs again it was done in no time. 

A new frame for the Combo

This is the next frame for the combo where the character will kick I will do another frame where the leg is fully stretched out like a kick. I still need to improve some of the frame which I will do later like the face needs to be made properly. Overall it looks very impressive. So now I have done a Idle, Punch, Combo Punch and a Combo Kick, which will be a special ability perhaps which I can apply fire or another special effect to so it looks like a very good special ability.

Combo Animations!

Today I made a combo punch after the previous animation of a punch we can use that first sequence as a normal punch than for a combo it would do this 

It would be like this if the player does the combination. I will also add a uppercut to the combo that will make the sequence a lot better. The third frame was quite hard to make because I had to draw the back of the arm and also reposition a lot of factors. But it looks very good and I will keep this. We all need to speed up because we all still on our first characters. Azam is thinking to make the character is 3D and then animate and render vector frames for the game. This I think would take longer than drawing it so we will try it with a dummie character (no detail).

Some animations done!

Today a lot of progress was made from both artists and designers. James made a test platform today where we tested our animations and characters in the construct 2 engine. I started with my frames at 500x500 pixels and then reduced it to 200x200 which I don't know was a good thing to do or a bad thing. First improvement from yesterdays frame was that I made the shirt and trousers have a better look and feel to them by giving them the army texture which I don't know if it works with a cowboy.  

Above is the first frame for the punch animation it is also the idle frame one. The army trousers are a texture from google which I used. There is still some refinements to make to make it look nice.

.

This is the second frame for the punch it just basically brings out his arm. To make this frame I used the previous frame and erased the arm and drew it again, shaded and coloured it. Which did take some time. 

Than I made a idle animation with simple arm and head movements. 

This animation has very small movement in it. The legs,arms and head move slightly. It looks scratchy and needs retouching. I need to fix the third frames right arm and I need to give all the frames more movement on the second arm. 

For the first week and first time at doing this I think it isn't bad but I'am still worried about how Ben and James can make all of this work. 

Ram and Azam also made their first characters. Azams was very near to the pixel art style and Rams the furthest away because his frames were 700x700 pixels whereas mines is 200x200 and Azams 100x100 so we all need to decide on the same pixel count so it doesn't differ that much in game. This can be easily altered in photoshop. 

Starting to take off!

Today I started working on my first character design which is a muscular cowboy who uses hands to fight rather than guns. I started by first getting the basic shape down by using a 500x500 pixel grid which I will then minimise to 200x200. Using a simple brush tool on black I made the outline. Which I than refined by using the erase tool to get rid of excess lines and making it look a lot neater. I need to complete a character concept and design in the first week according to our plan. This is the frame 1 for the idle pose which will have 3 frames arms moving down and up.

Above is the initial stage which I refined and I still need to add more detail to it and I also need to fix the cowboy hat and face too. But it's getting there.

I added the detail for the trousers and the muscles it can be still improved by fixing the hat which I tried to do and it seems to mess up. I moved onto colouring after this stage.

I added some of a darker red to the trousers first and after this I am going to add a lighter red showing where the light is coming from.

I added the lighter red which I think could be lighter to show the light more effectively or the dark red could be darker.

Now i added some skin colour for the muscles which are going to be visible and the rest of the upper body will have a shirt without sleeves on. This is because it would show how strong my character is. I started a little shading on the muscles but more to do.

I added some better shading showing the muscles in a lot better way. I could improve it by making the dark shade more darker.

Gloves and belt coloured still needs some more shading and a different colour for the belt metal bit.

I done the shirt for the character which needs more work on the shading which I will do tomorrow.