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.

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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. 

Got some perspective !

Today we all sat down to figure out what we need to do and how we will do it. We figured out that to make the 2D animations work we need to create sprites, series of pictures. This would work in Construct 2 so we tested this by making a dummy character do a punch which than was exported as a JPEG (big mistake) following a manual on Construct 2's website we figured out how to put the animation in and how to also make it work while moving. But the white background with the image came as well which was a fail and to get rid of that we had to export it as a PNG. Overall we now know how to animate a 2D image and also how to place it in the engine. Now to make it work is not our job of course , James and Ben have to make all of this work.

Me, Azam and Ram sat down and created a list of animations which we need to create for each character. This way we know exactly how many frames we need to have to make the game look convincing.

Fighting Scenes Only

Number of Frames  

         

6                                              Moving- Side to side movement

4                                              Jump- Jumping and landing

3                                              Hand hits- Punching, fist

3                                              Leg hits- Kicking

3                                              Block- Defence   

2                                              Take Damage- When damage taken

9                                              Ultra 1- Major ability 1

9                                              Ultra 2- Major ability 2

9                                              Ultra 3- Major ability 3

3                                              Idle- Still animation

6                                              KO- Death animation

                                               

(Crouch) - Under Consideration                                 

(Jump Kicks) - Under Consideration                                             

(Jump Punches) - Under Consideration

Free-roam

Number of Frames

3          Each                             Each Direction Only Square movement (Up, Down, Left and Right only) 

First Day Proposal!

We started a new project today which is based on a 2D game which has to be made using only Construct 2. I never saw or used of this engine luckily only the designers have to use this. But something new for the artists is that we have to create art assets which are 2D and animated. This I haven't done before either so something new for both of us. We have to create art assets either by using vector or pixel art style for the designers to use. I already have a team which we have sorted a lot of roles and responsibilities with.

James Finnegan: Lead Designer - taking the role of working on the mechanics of the top down view part of our game.  

Azam Khan: Project Manager, Artist, in charge of making character design and co-ordination team

Ben Price: Designer to be working specially on making the fighting scene mechanics work

Me: Co artist for special effects animation and character design

Ramojus Bucys: Environment artist and also character artist

We also have a working plan which has what we need to have ready by what time. I have also created a mood board which shows the type of game we want.

 Above is the contract which we made for artists and below is the contract for the designers which we all have signed corresponding to our roles