Week 27 Summary

Week 26 Summary

This week was similar to last week with the addition of a lecture. The sessions focused on showing us how to use Marmoset, and were also like last week in the sense that they were more like drop-in sessions. We were told that we need to use Marmoset for our time machines and pillars in order to create a turntable videos for them, which would have been nice to know before, since we only have a week left until hand-in, but in all honesty there was not much to learn and creating the turntable itself only takes a few minutes.

The lecture focused mostly on our essays, any final questions we had on it before hand-in and how some games break the 4th wall. It was shorter then most of the other lectures, but we still got some great information from it.

Like last week I decided to come in for most of the sessions in order to focus on my work, and I have now completely finished my time machine with all of the different maps, with it also placed into Marmoset with a turntable video created. As well as this, my essay is almost finished and I have almost everything else completed. I need to finish off a few bits of information regarding my work, such as the creation processes, creating the turntable for my pillar and creating the PDF documents ready for hand-in.

Week 25 Summary

This week was the return from out Easter break, over that time I managed to get a good chunk of my essay done and ended up finishing most of my own models. Our sessions from here on have been cut down to a single 3D workshop, but I have gone into most of the other sessions so I can keep working on my time machine. The sessions did not cover anything new really and were mainly used as drop-in sessions if we needed help with anything. By the end of the week I managed to have my time machine UV mapped and ready for texturing, so I should be finished with all of the 3D models very soon.

Time machine help

http://polycount.com/discussion/138413/how-to-create-roughness-map-in-photoshop

Essay plan

Character Diversity in Smash Bros.

Body Image

-Overweight characters (King Dedede, Wario, Mario?, Olimar?, Villager?, Miis?, Ness?)

-Tall women (compare Samus to other females)
-Non-muscular (Mario characters, Earthbound, Kid Icarus)

https://www.reddit.com/r/smashbros/comments/2foh6h/silly_height_chart_i_found_for_smash_characters/
http://imgur.com/a/pnB1v
http://i.imgur.com/rdVuaMZ.jpg
http://www.vgf.com/forums/threads/vgb-nintendo-characters-height-weight.83443/

Sexualisation

-Female (ZSS, Bayonetta) 

-Male (Captain Falcon, Shulk)

-Palutena pole dance taunt

-Panty shots removed from previous Smash games.

-More sexualised for a Nintendo game? Or all the little sexualised bits put into one game?

http://www.nintendolife.com/news/2014/08/talking_point_a_history_of_the_sexualisation_of_samus

http://www.dorkly.com/post/67210/why-samus-new-zero-suit-outfit-is-unacceptable

http://capriceandwhimsy.tumblr.com/post/82459338493/zero-suit-samus-heels-why-its-a-big-deal-and

http://lipmag.com/culture/from-bounty-hunter-to-busty-babe-the-sexualisation-of-samus-aran/
http://www.ship2block20.com/tropes-vs-men-videogames-male-sexualisation/

Gender

-ZSS and Sheik? (Transgender or not? For Sheik, male, female or transgender?)

-Pokemon? Most depicted male, despite Pikachu being the only definite male. 'Male as default'

-Corrin sexuality? (very minor but still)
-Gender ratio: 35 male, 8 female, 7 either gender, 7 unknown, 1 transgender? (Sheik)

http://www.themarysue.com/metroids-samus-aran-transgender-woman/
http://thefederalist.com/2015/09/11/the-contradiction-of-claiming-samus-aran-is-trans/
http://www.zeldainformer.com/articles/Why-Nintendo-and-the-Zelda-Community-Have-Sheiks-Gender-All-Wrong

Competitive

-Dominance of the female characters (ZSS, Sheik?, Bayonetta, Rosalina)

Important notes:
-Smash mixes franchises as opposed to being characters made specifically for the game. Comparable to Playstation All-Stars or UMVC3.
-Amiibos - how you have physical sculpts you can take of and train them- puts more attachment onto the characters from the audience.
-Gameplay - how it attracts a lot more casuals players as opposed to other fighting games. Easier control scheme and items.

http://gfaqssb.wikia.com/wiki/The_lack_of_diversity_in_this_game
-Fans view on the lack of diversity in Smash Bros.

http://www.hypable.com/marvels-cinematic-diversity-problem/
-Diversity lack in Marvel's Cinematic Universe.

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/sep/10/video-games-diversity-problem-runs-deeper-than-race-gender
-Lack of video game diversity. Smash is another fighting game, but is also a wacky party game bringing characters from various genres of games that has a very wide, diverse audience. Mario and Kirby attracts those who like platformers, Pokemon and Fire Emblem for the RPGs, LoZ and Metroid for action adventure, various minor characters for veterans(?), Ryu and Little Mac for the fighting game enthusiasts, Earthbound for story, Villager for the simulators (as such)


-Introduction: How Smash Bros. Wii U's character roster, whilst certainly not perfect, is more diverse then almost any other fighting game.
-Body Image and Minorities: How the characters within the game represent a large amount of minorities, and how it doesn't.
-Sexualisation: How it has dealt with sexualisation, before well and poorly, and balancing it out across genders.
-Gender: How gender is dealt with within the game, well and badly. The male default.
-Competitive: How the competitive community is dominated by the female characters, despite the gender ratio in characters, and how players playing female characters are the most loyal to their characters.
-Amiibo: How the game features a system where you can train your own fighter, and how these figurines and their function bring a new kind of bond to these characters.
-Conclusion: Why Smash Wii U has both a great diversity in characters, and how it has a bad diversity of characters, and what it could do to resolve this in future releases.


Games to compare to:
Playstation All-Stars, Soulcalibur, UVMC3

Other comparisons:
Marvel Cinematic Universe?


https://www.reddit.com/r/GirlGamers/comments/2gcfpk/sexualization_in_gaming/

Week 24 Summary

On Monday I came in and managed to have the pillar finished off completely, with the textures applied in Unreal 4 and edited to give it a more rocky appearance, which I have since taken screenshots of. I'm very happy with it, although there was a couple of things I wanted to add to it such as some red to the damaged parts and a tear on his face, although I really don't think I have the time to worry about minute details since I have the time machine to work on. The lecture in the afternoon was another live workshop one.

On Wednesday I had a Photoshop session and we was shown more about masking which was quite fun, as well as layer styles. I'm enjoying these little Photoshop sessions as I'm learning more things I didn't know, and I know these will all be helpful for the future, in anything I do within the program.

The session on Thursday I started creating my time machine, which is a robotic woman. I have created most of the torso and head in ZBrush, and later on on Thursday I managed to finish the arms and begin working on the cables coming out of her back as well. The afternoon lecture was about phenomenology and thinking through senses, which was another great and interesting lecture. I also discussed some ideas for my essay with the lecturer and received some input on my ideas, to the point where I think I have a solid idea on what I want to do for my essay, so I shall be working on that during our 2 week break.

In my free time I've simply just done some more written work and finished off a couple of bits here and there, but I am slowly getting everything complete now, so hopefully over the course of the holidays, I can get a good chunk of things finished.

Pillar in Unreal 4

This is my finalised pillar inside Unreal Engine 4, with the normal map of the high poly model placed on top of the low poly. I'm very happy with how it turned out, although I think it could of gone better. Regardless though, this was the first time I've properly used ZBrush and thus I'm happy with it when seen in that light. The damage is the main problem I think, as it is not very realistic (I originally wanted to go with an almost zombie-esque look), but because I never textured it with colour this was never truly shown off. The damaged parts also look slightly pixelated, although I am unsure on whether this is due to me having to greatly increase the size of the model when bringing it into Unreal, whether the texture was too low in resolution, just how I damaged it or a mixture of any of these.

Time Machine: Iterations

Our final task for this project is to create a time machine and put it through all the processes that we've been taught throughout this project. I had a couple of ideas straight away when first thinking about this, but I wanted to create a few concepts before finalising my plan.

I created these within Photoshop and have mixed feelings about most of them. The top left design is completely uninspired and the two underneath it are supposed to be based off a random rock formation with a portal in the middle. The one to the right of those is a meant to be some kind of game console based off of the Sega Mega Drive that when you place a cartridge into it, it will transport you to that time period.

The ones I really like though, are the bottom two and the top right one. The bottom left one is loosely based off of a ball and chain that would either:

1) Transport anyone hit with it back to the time that is shown on the four dials within it.

2) Anyone attached to it is transported back to the time shown by the four dials. 

The octopus (created from a bad pun that came through my head, called the Clocktopus) follows a similar concept with the four dials which spin around inside at different angles, except you place it on the face of the person wishing to time travel.

The top right one is based off of a character concept I created a while ago, that off which is based off of characters I have made before, which were heavily inspired by Hans Bellmer's mannequin photography. They are a robot or doll-like attached to wires coming from the ceiling with a literal hourglass in their torso, and are capable of creating portals to other time periods via the sand which can be poured out of their hands.

Overall, the robot is the one I am most happy with. I want to really push myself in this final task and not only is this the most complex looking design, it would most likely require me to use ZBrush a lot more, which I want to learn more about and get more experience using. Since I also want to be a character design or concept artist, this one would be good practice for this. 

Time Machine: References

The videos below helped me figure out how do make a basic female torso and how to use ZSpheres, which lead me to making the almost the entire time machine model.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvxFAlsEsLc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rR3b1JfE0qc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGRFBfXZatQ


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JWF4SKhWKfI
http://docs.pixologic.com/user-guide/3d-modeling/modeling-basics/masking/

Contextual Studies: Task 2

Game mechanics that compliments the story - Undertale

Undertale's story revolves around a human child having fallen into the world of monsters, and they must find their way back to the human world. Throughout your adventure, you encounter various monsters ranging from goat-like humanoids, sentient skeletons and giant armoured dogs that will commit to actions depending on how you treat other monsters. As you explore the monster world, you will come across various random encounters of monsters, with the options to kill them or befriend them, with various consequences coming from either action. Befriending them, or giving them mercy, will result in a more diverse story, new friends and ultimately a much happier atmosphere, but at the cost of no experience, meaning the further you go the harder it is to defend yourself. Killing on the other hand, grants you more experience at the cost of other monsters wanting you dead or avoiding you, diverting you away from the plot of the story and bringing forth a new one, to some degree.

Giving mercy to all of the monsters grants you the experience of encountering loveable characters and with them interacting with you like friends or even family. You begin to learn each monster's backstory and personalities, and pushes you in the direction of a rich plot. Causing mass genocide on the monster nation will twist the music to creepier proportions until the music is non-existant when every monster in the area is dead. You can feel the toll of killing each of the, ultimately, innocent creatures and watch as your character turns into a murderous psychopath that will begin choosing actions in the overworld to their own accord.

This kind of mechanic really ties in well with the story. Each action you commit to impacts the story in some way, and the monsters will also change their opinions of you accordingly. Committing good deeds will let you become attached to each character, uniting them all together into one large, happy community. Bringing the apocalypse to the monsters will bring out some of their darker sides as they try to defend themselves or their family and friends. The game is about a child's desire to get home and questioning morals in order to do this, in which the combat system delivers upon with decisions on a monsters life and the story as a whole purely within your hands, bringing a memorable experience no matter the outcome.

Contextual Studies: Task 1

For this task we was asked to look at 2 of 3 links provided in the presentation, and relate them to a game we have played.

Ways of Seeing Episode 2, by John Berger - Soulcalibur IV 

This video discusses the female nude, how in old paintings women are often painted naked, "to be put on display" as such, more of an object then an actual person, and are done so for the male audience or even for the painter's own satisfaction. This basic summary alone can be applied to a large amount of games, in fact most of them, but I want to grab some of John Berger's quotes and compare them to the video game Soulcalibur IV, a fighting game set in a fantasy, medieval time with some very questionable designs.

"You paint a naked woman, because you enjoy looking at her. You put a mirror in her hand, and call the painting 'Vanity'. Thus morally condemning the woman who's nakedness you have depicted for your own pleasure, and thus indecently, repeating the Biblical example by blaming the woman."
This is similar to the idea as a whole behind the female character designs within Soulcalibur, but with a twist on it being their figure and outfits instead. As much as some of the fans of the game can say "why is she wearing a tea towel when armour makes so much more sense", the designers depicted these characters like this for both their own pleasure, and for the pleasure of the male audience. A large number of the female cast are in outfits not even remotely ideal for combat, especially that involving bladed weaponry. Only one of the female characters is armoured out of the fifteen playable with a couple more having some sort of armour like a gauntlet or shin guards, a large contrast to the larger male roster who are all armoured to some degree, and when armour is not involved then they have clothing that covers up most of their body (however a good portion of the men are shirtless). In fact, the only male character who obviously looks sexualised is the character Voldo, an man in his fifties in BDSM gear who's dialogue consists entirely of weird groaning and moaning, and even then this character is considered more of a creature and weird joke.

"Most nudes in oil paintings, have been lined up by their painters for the pleasure of the male spectator owner, who will assess and judge them as sights."
The female characters are judged by some of the male audience and will be liked purely by sight, as an object, as opposed to their actual personalities or play styles. Their designs will play on this for the pleasure of the spectator.

"Those who are not judged beautiful, are not beautiful. Those who are, are given the prize. The prize is to be owned, that is to say, to be available."
This is included within the designs of this game. The female characters are all depicted as small, thin, young and pretty with large breasts and/or hips, considered the 'standard of beauty', where as the male characters have a bit more diversity, ranging from huge, monstrous creatures, massive beings of pure muscle and old, powerful men. There are no monstrous female characters because it would not appeal to a male audience as much. 

"...but the way her body is arranged has nothing to with that kissing. Her body is arranged in the way it is to display to the man looking at the picture. The picture is made to appeal to his sexuality, it has nothing to do with her sexuality."
This is played to some degree within the official artwork of the game. Most of the men are drawn battle ready, poised to strike or showing off their power. Whilst this is the same for a good portion of the artwork for the female characters, they are drawn in ways that show off their bodies as well. The breasts or buttocks are in pure sight to the viewer, the angles or poses showing them off (although the clothing does not help their case either), almost bringing those to the centre of attention. A couple of them are even drawn in a pose that does not make them look battle ready and shows off a more innocent demeanour. 

"...For a similar reason, women in the European art of the oil painting, are seldom shown dancing, they have to be shown languid, exhibiting a minimum of energy. They are there to feed an appetite, not to have any of their own."
This is another one that can be applied but not to the full extent that Berger meant. Most of the male characters have artwork that either looks like they are in motion; about to swing their blades or strike down on a foe, or are in a powerful or confident pose that shows off a calmer or more passive personality. The female characters however, whilst some do look like they are in motion, overall have more static artwork. Most of them have poses that would not be ideal in combat, or even hint towards combat at all, and instead have been done to feed the male appetite. 

"The nude in European oil painting is usually presented as an ideal subject....."
I think this can be applied to the female characters when compared to the males within Soulcalibur IV. Most of the men's designs seem to make sense, being large beasts, armoured warriors or at least clothed to a standard that can make sense, where as the female characters have designs that deliver heavy fan service to the male audience instead of making sense, showing them off more as sexual objects then actual people, and almost all of them have that 'ideal' body typically depicted throughout the media.

http://soulcalibur.wikia.com/wiki/File:Soul_Calibur_IV_All_Character.jpg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1GI8mNU5Sg&list=PLlhSx0L1hpaGKfq1qXe1vWUhG1EgIN9Yf&index=2






http://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED335262

Contextual Studies: 1

Pillar creation

My pillar was first created in Maya, where I used a cylinder for the base and extruded it multiple times and edited the scaling of parts to eventually create the base. The main body was created with a flattened cylinder, the middle part towards the bottom was deleted and the remaining parts bits the bridged together to create the legs. The head was created with a simple sphere that was then bridged to the torso after a few faces were deleted. The hat was created from a cylinder extruded a couple of times, with the long extension upwards also being an extrude. 

Once this was done I exported it into ZBrush as a tool. I did not create the eyes and arms in Maya as I felt it would be a lot easier to make within ZBrush. I started off by subdividing the model a few times in order to make is smoother, and then I added damage to it by using the brush

Week 23 Summary

During our lecture this week (which was another live workshop) we was told we ideally should have this pillar done by this Friday, which would of been nice to have known earlier but I guess it did kickstart me into doing more work. We was also told that we needed it to be imported into Unreal Engine, even though this was initially stated as a goal and not an actual requirement.

On Thursday we had another simple drop-in-like session but we was shown about a coding script that allowed us to harden UV edges easily, which was very useful. The afternoon lecture focused on game mechanics and how they could be used as a metaphor or have some meaning to them, which was incredibly interesting and I really liked this lecture once again.

In my free time, I managed to get my pillar from being in the initial stages of the low poly, to having it finished, UV mapped, baked and the model imported into Unreal itself, with the only thing left to do is apply the texture map to it. I did this mostly by coming in on Tuesday and staying behind until late into the evening on Monday and Thursday in order to properly concentrate on it with no distractions and so I could use all the programs I needed. I also managed to do some more of the written aspects of the work, and overall I think this week has been hugely successful, I just wish I spent more of my weeks working as hard as this.

Week 22 Summary

On Monday we had a lecture similar to the last one, where it was another live workshop and I feel the same about it as I did last week: a few useful parts that made it useful overall.

On Wednesday I had a life drawing session focusing on fantasy, so the models dressed up in medieval style clothes with weaponry, which was pretty good and very different from the usual, but once again my drawings were not finished, but it was still very enjoyable.

Thursday was just another simple drop-in-like session similar to last week, but we was given a slight recap on how to bake a model. This was very helpful with re-jogging my memory on it, and I managed to get notes written up on anything I did not already know. In the afternoon we had a lecture about gender and intersectionality, which was incredibly interesting and I really liked it. It was very informative and has really gotten me into the idea of writing this essay which we have to write, although I'm not sure what to actually write about at the moment.

In my own time I've UV mapped the Hydra Splatling model I made and have continued working on my pillar to the point where I have decimated the model and am ready to take it into Maya and begin turning it into the low poly model.

Life Drawing 6

My life drawing session today was quite a bit different to previous sessions, as we had two models and a fantasy theme to it by having them dress as medieval characters. 

These are the first drawings I did. Each one was 12 minutes long and it's blatantly obvious that I was drawing to slowly, but I am happy with a couple of them despite this. They were done on what was called 'cheap paper' and were mostly drawn in charcoal, although the first one was done in pencil.

This last drawing was a 45 minute drawing which went by surprisingly quickly. Again I did not finish it but funnily enough I was a lot closer to finishing it then any of the others. This was done in a mixture of white chalk for the highlights and the charcoal for the shadows.

Week 21 Summary

I attended the drop-in session this week in the hope I could get some help with UV mapping, only for a year 2 to not only assist me with my problem, but to also show me much easier ways to UV, allowing me to quickly UV map the Klefki and Bronzong models. I also had a lecture on this day, which was a live workshop where our tutor made a pillar whilst answering any questions we had. Whilst not greatly helpful, I did learn a couple of new things about ZBrush, so overall it was worth it in the end.

On Wednesday I had a Photoshop tutorial, where we painted a portrait of someone. This was pretty fun, although my drawing was disastrous, but nether-less this is just my inexperience with this way of working, but I do want to give it another shot when I can.

Thursday was simply a session for us to come in, get feedback and help, and to work on our pillars. I managed to get it mostly finished in Zbrush, with only attaching the arms and adding damage to them remaining. The afternoon lecture brought up our essay and what we really need to do for it, which was definitely helpful for us to know.

In my free time I textured the Klefki and Bronzong models which came out with really nice results. I also made my pillar before my Wednesday session so that I could simply import it to ZBrush and immediately begin working on it.

Pillar designs and inspiration

Our fourth task is to create a pillar, and it has to be altered within ZBrush in some way, essentially being similar to the first task of "make a lamp", but with the additional process of ZBrush. This seemed daunting at first considering how confusing ZBrush was when I used it before, but I'm interested in getting to know it better.

Below are some initial designs I came up with for my pillar. They were inspired by a mixture of things. For example, the one on the far right was inspired by a silly ornament I own, the one to the left of it includes a test tube and is a concept for something to do with a character design I have been working on, and the far left one (one with the man) was actually inspired by the video game Binding of Isaac: Rebirth. Personally my favourites are the man pillar and the test tube-like pillar, although at the moment I am struggling to decide which to go with, so for the moment I shall be making both of them within Maya and will decide from there.

The man pillar was inspired by the titular character of The Binding of Isaac, as seen below, but also by Hatty Hattington from the video game Battleblock Theatre. It is mostly the simplistic design to them that inspired it, but I felt this works a lot better for a pillar as opposed to a more realistic design.

The 'silly ornament' I mentioned that inspired the rock-like pillar is below. I have absolutely no idea what this ornament is from beyond having bought it from a charity shop, and am convinced that it is just something someone glued together in their spare time.

The tube-like one was inspired by the general idea of some sort of test tube or cryostasis tube used in fiction to create clones or freeze people. My example below is a deleted scene from the movie Pokemon: The First Movie: Mewtwo Strikes Back, where Mewtwo is created within a tube filled with liquid.

As for the other pillars, they are all fairly uninspired, and were simply just random things I thought of, which I did not like anyway.

http://www.giantbomb.com/hatty-hattington/3005-26119/
http://bindingofisaac.wikia.com/wiki/Characters
http://archives.bulbagarden.net/w/index.php?title=Category:Mewtwo&filefrom=M16+poster+alternate.png#mw-category-media

Week 20 Summary

I was ill on the Wednesday so I could not attend that day's session, but Thursday's session was a ZBrush tutorial and it was actually quite fun, we was shown how to apply damage to objects and then tasked with creating a pillar in 4 weeks, which in turn has motivated me to do more work since I have a time to aim to get it all done for. The idea of the pillar has also grasped my attention a lot more since we actually design it ourselves instead of just creating something from an image, like with the phone.

I've also made a couple more models in my free time, which are of Pokemon, since I wanted to try something other then a weapon, and felt like some of the more robotic Pokemon could work quite well in Maya. In the end I made Bronzong and Klefki, to which I am incredibly happy with Klefki and in fact, I think it's probably one of the best models I've made so far.

Bronzong and Klefki

After making the Hydra Splatling I decided I wanted to make a couple of Pokemon since I thought it would be quite interesting to make them. Because I have very little experience with ZBrush, I wanted to work solely in Maya, meaning these Pokemon would need to be more artificial looking ones. 

I started with a simple one, Bronzong. 

This was relatively simple to make. It started off with a cylinder that I extruded a little bit at the top, and expanded at the bottom to create that slightly wider base. The top segment was just another cylinder cut in half, central faces removed and then faces at the bottom filled. I then cut the entire thing down the middle, and then began extruding one fill faces downwards to create the arm, and then bridged two small cylinders to the top. Once this part was finished I mirror it over to the other side and then added the eyes to the main body. It was pretty simple to make, but I was satisfied with it as I felt like I could of done a better job with it, so I moved onto another Pokemon (although this model will still be UV mapped and textured).

This is the UV map I made for Bronzong, which was almost completely Planar mapped, although the main body was cylindrically mapped.

This is the final texture map that I made. It was very finicky to make and resulted in me having to go constantly backwards and forward between saving this as a PNG and placing it onto the model in Maya to see how it looked. Multiple problem also rose due to me not scaling all the UV shells properly, resulting in some parts of the texture looking pixelated or off when the texture is placed on the model. I also noticed that whilst I was texturing it that it is quite disproportionate compared to it's actual models, so various parts of it look off when compared to official artwork of it, but regardless of this it still is obvious on what it is.

This is the final model once the texture is placed over the top of it, and honesty I think it looks pretty good, although not as good as it could of been if I both scaled the shells properly and made the proportions more accurate. As stated earlier, the errors are obvious when compared to actual artwork of the Pokemon, but on it's own it looks pretty accurate in my opinion, and despite the errors I feel I did a good job on this.

This was the next Pokemon I decided to make: Klefki, a small keyring Pokemon. Whilst this seems very simple to make, I wanted to make it for a mixture of really liking this Pokemon and looking at it and realising how I could experiment with a lot of different tools in order to make it.

Much like the Hydra Splatling, I neglected to take many screenshots of the creation process, but I started off with a simple cylinder for the head and extruded the bottom centre point downwards multiple times to create the sack-like appendage. The top centre point was next and was extruded upwards to create the key-like head piece. To create the small parts that extended outwards, I extruded a few faces running down the very top part of this key-like part, with the top one being extruded further. I then used the Multi-Cut tool to places edges around the ends of these two parts so that when I smooth it later on, they remain more rectangular then curved. Next to do was the arms (the ring part of its main body), done simply be create a curve around the model, creating a cylinder and using the constrain options to assign the cylinder to the curve (exactly the same technique used for the phone's wire). This was then duplicated and mirror to the other side. With it's main body done, all that was left to do was the keys.

These were a lot of fun to make, and the second key from the right was surprisingly complex to make. The furthest keys on the right and left were simply cubes which flattened and then extruded and pulled along the faces, and then by creating a cylinder, adding subdivision caps and removing all but the top, outer ring faces, I had a flat ring which I could place in, remove some of the faces on the key, and then combine and bridge together to make a small hole for a thin torus to go through. The furthest key on the right simply just had some centre faces removed and then bridged together on the sides, but also had some of the edges on the key brought inwards to created the ridged look. The two centre keys were a bit harder to do. The left central key was just a cylinder and a torus combined together, with the cylinder having a few faces extruded outwards and then multi-cuts applied to make it remain more cuboid when smoothed out. The right central key followed the same premise, but with the cylinder extended, the torus replaced with a cylinder and the extruded cuboid part having the middle edge pulled inwards to create the triangular look to it. The ring part of the key was the most challenging part here, as I had to cut the cylinder in half, extrude the face in towards the centre of the cylinder multiple time and then mirror it. Then I had to extrude the faces on these that were on the opposite side to the key part and pull them outwards gradually to create that curved part there. Then I had to apply the same technique that I used on the further left key to this one, but with a larger cylinder, and had to match the cylinder's faces to the amount that surrounded it so they they could easily be bridged together. Then I had to attach the key to this part when it was done, which was accomplished by deleting the faces and bridging them altogether, as well as having to use the Fill Hole tool due to the amount of faces not match.

Overall, I think Klefki was by far my best and most favourite model I've made so far. When creating these two, I had the video game Pokemon Omega Ruby running to aid me with anything that I could not see with their official artwork. This worked really in my favour, as I could get a proper look at each of them and judge proportions better. I will be UV mapping and texturing these soon.

Below is the UV map I created for this Klefki model. Most of it was Planar mapped, but the main body was done by spherically mapping it. Some parts of this model I decided not to unfold, specifically the cylindrical keys, because all that needed to be applied to them was a singular colour.

This is the final texture. Klefki doesn't really have much detail on it so a lot of it is grey, but I did need to add some details to a couple of the keys and add the face and droplet to the main body, which did not take long to make, and in fact I spent most of the time just tweaking the face in order to get everything placed and scaled right.

This is the final model of Klefki, which I am very happy with because I think it resembles Klefki pretty well. I made the model have a Blinn texture in the hope that it would give the texture a metallic appearance so it would save me texturing that sort of thing onto it, and it worked!

Week 19 Summary

This week was our week off, but I did create a model of the Hydra Splatling weapon from Splatoon which I'm very happy with the outcome of it, all I need to do is UV map it and texture it which I will do when I have a stronger grasp of UV mapping. I did a little bit of drawing in Photoshop but beyond that I have not done too much. I think the reason I have not done much lately is because we are not really being given any deadlines beyond getting the task done by April, so I'm not really rushing to finish things, even though I really should.

Hydra Splatling

I decided that I wanted to make something from the video game Splatoon, and came to the decision to make the Hydra Splatling, a mini-gun style weapon made from a chainsaw and a fire hydrant. Stupidly though, I forgot to take many screenshots throughout the creation of it.

So I started off making the main body of the Hydra Splatling, which was simply a cylinder extruded at one of the centre points and then pulled outwards to create the part where the barrels will sit. I then also extruded a few faces from the bottom downwards to replicate the small bit at the bottom of the Hydra Splatling that can hold the black support beam. After this, I created the barrels themselves. I did this by extruding a cylinder multiple times, and then duplicating this twice to create the other two barrels.

I then created the motor on the back. Originally this was just a cuboid that I then pulled some of the faces on the top and side to create the raised areas. I then extruded some of the faces inwards to match the grate-like texture applied to the gun in Splatoon, as well as creating a cylinder, removing all but the top face, extruding the edges upwards to create a little pit as such, and then removing some of the faces on the motor so I could combine and attach the faces together. The handle, which circles around the motor, was a thin cuboid that I duplicated multiple times, resized and then bridged all together. At this point in time however it was far too thin when compared to the actual gun itself, so later on I went back to this and extruded an extra set of faces out all the way around it.

Going back to the main body, I added three large hexagon to it to match those on the gun. One is used for the second handle, one for the pipe which is added later on, and one for a dial, although this will be added in when I texture it. The handle at the top was created by getting a torus and placing it just above the hexagon, then getting a smaller cylinder, and placing that in the centre of the hexagon. I then edited the cylinder so that it only had 6 faces, essentially being a hexagon. Because of how many faces I made the torus have, I could then simply bridge three of the small hexagon's sides to the torus, and they would be of equal distance from one another. Later on I then smoothed this so that the small hexagon is actually a cylinder once more. I also added the support/stand at the bottom, which was done by creating a cylinder, and working on just one side, creating all of it apart from the rounded end, then duplicating it, and bridging the ends together to create that round end.

At this point all that the model really needed still was the canister, the pipe and the handle on the motor thickening.

Although it is difficult to see in the image, the canister and the pipe were completed. The canister was  simple a sphere with the central faces dragged out to making more like a tube with rounded ends. The frame to hold it was a torus with several faces removed, duplicated to go at the bottom, and then extrude down towards the bottom duplication and finally bridged together. After this the bottom of the canister was extruded and flattened to create the neck. The main body of the Hydra Splatling and the the canister were then combined so I could begin working on the pipe. The pipe started out as a sphere that I removed almost all of the faces of apart from a select few which would act as the ends of it (duplicated so that there was one for the canister and one for the hexagon). Once this was complete the final part was the extrude the motor's handle to make it thicker and resemble the actual gun more. Various parts were done separately so that they stayed more consistent (such as the side being done after the bottom since the side need to be extruded along the X axis as opposed to the Y axis).

This is the final model, and I am incredibly happy with how it turned out. It resembles the gun particularly well, and has a lot of detail to it. It took about 2 or 3 days on and off to make, but I feel like a strong outcome has come out of it. I will be smoothing out various parts however since they are still quite angular, like the canister and the barrels, and it will eventually be UV mapped and textured.

Week 18 Summary

This week there were no sessions, with the only thing I had to do was come in and present my presentation with my small group, which went incredibly well. I was expecting a fairly large group of people to be watching, but it was in fact just two of our tutors, and they both had a lot of positive things to say about my group' work which I am pleased about.

My own time consisted of some random bits of work here and there, my phone is pretty much finished and I keep trying UV mapping out although I am struggling somewhat to actually do it because I am unsure where to start and unsure how to fix some of the problems that arise.

Week 17 Summary

This week we did not have a presentation on Monday so my first 'in uni' session, as such, was on Wednesday as a life drawing session, focusing on lighting and the usage of charcoal. The session was pretty good as I haven't really done any drawings with charcoal apart from the odd drawing here and there during one of these sessions. Some of the drawings were pretty enjoyable to make, especially with the limitations set to us such as only drawing with vertical lines.

On Thursday we had another Maya session, but this session was simply just more of a drop in with a couple of reminders about some things shown off before, but was more of a drop-in session. I never spoke to the tutor so I probably could of done this work as home, especially given the fact that a lot of the things shown to us I already knew, so I didn't really take anything from this session beyond just a couple of reminders.

We also had a lecture on Thursday where our course leader showed us some of his work, similar to the last couple of Thursday lectures, as well as learning about women in the gaming industry and was also given a recap on what we need to be doing for our presentations since no one really understood what we were supposed to be doing, but after this lecture everyone seems to have a solid idea (at least me and my group do) of what we should be doing, or rather what we can do. The lecture was definitely worth going to as we got more information and ideas about the gaming industry as well as actually getting a proper understanding of what we need to do.

In my free time, I've worked on my models at a couple of points, but have mostly focused on my presentation for next week with my group, to the point where we actually finished it on Saturday. I also wanted to spend a lot of time this weekend just doing some digital drawing since I haven't done any in a long time, even though I really do need to crack on with some of this 3D modelling.

Life Drawing 5

This life drawing session focused a lot on lighting, and the use of charcoal to make strong contrasts between light and shadows. 

The first drawing we did was just to start us off. It was simply on plain paper and we had to use the charcoal and erasers to create shadows. We was told to not create outlines and make an almost messy-like drawings. This one was done in 12 minutes and was pretty fun to create, this one was easily my favourite one of the drawings created today. 

This next drawing was done in 13 minutes, and this time we could only draw with vertical lines, which was surprisingly challenging but was also very enjoyable. 

The third drawing was done slightly differently. We had to cover the entire page in charcoal, and then use an eraser to bring out the highlights. Unfortunately, even though I tried to set this drawing with a spray so that the charcoal would not transfer or rub off, this drawing was messed up a little bit with some charcoal transfer. For this image we just had to create it from just horizontal lines. This task was fun, but not as enjoyable as the previous 2 drawings in my opinion.

This drawing was done just like the last drawing but without being limited to horizontal lines. 

These drawings were pretty interesting to create but I have to say I won't be using charcoal over pencil for drawings. I think the first drawing I did was actually pretty good as it quite easily portrays the figure of the model but has the somewhat scruffy appearance to it.