Online and feeling fine.

In the process of making an online portfoilio :)

racheldix.daportfoilio.com

it's still in the very early stages so there isn't much to look at.

Possible Degree show pictures

Plagiarism, penalties and punishment

Now as I sit on the back row of the computer I can usually cop an eyeful of others students progress and something I’ve started to notice more frequently is the use of downloaded textures.

Now it clearly states at the bottom of every brief, in bold red text, that downloading textures is plagiarism and you may fail, but quite frankly I don't think this is quite getting across to everyone and the punishment that should follow has yet to be demonstrated.

I have a couple of non-game art friends who have witnessed a fellow course-mate kicked out of uni for plagiarising a mere 300 words.

Culprits on this course use the excuse that 'well industry do it' but this is a university course not a games company.

It infuriates me because at the start of every project I carefully plan outings to gather photographs and textures for my own library, this process can take up to a week as I patiently wait for the perfect overcast day. Whereas a few fellow course-mates never leave the comfort of their room and just happily click away taking a whole 5 minutes to complete the process.

It just annoys me to think that there students who are going to better marks than me, when I put so much time and effort (which doesn't always show btw) into sourcing my own materials and experiencing the brief in the real world, I mean I rarely even use google for reference.

I know it might take time and effort to cross reference all the sources, but a quick loop around the labs are even a quick look through their texture folders will be more than enough evidence.

Source, live and experience it.

Learn from the old

Taking a break from a serious case of mind mush, after, god knows, how many hours and weeks I have spent constantly on Max or udk. However it's paid off as i'm finally approaching the final hurdles of my FMP.

All major buildings are done as well as over 100 different assets all textured and imported. It's now at the point where adding the final touches of detail will complete the look, but it's getting pretty hard to spot them. Maybe a few pairs of fresh eyes will be able to pick out the flaws as I have staring at my level for so long I think I’m missing some major aspects from it.

A major problem I have is with trees. Some trees in my level are nearly as big as the windmill but they are all behind the buildings and out or reach so it seems pointless to waste time and tris on something you can barely see. On this basis, I have created some Tomb Raider style trees, that do the job and use my own tree photographs for that added realism.

Game Art not Games Design

With the majority of the FMP behind me it's time to stimulate my mind in a more intellectual direction.

Today's blog takes inspiration from the interviews I’ve sat in on for the past couple of weeks.

One main theme I noticed was how many applicants were currently on a college 'Games Design' course, thinking it would fast track them into the games industry.

How wrong they are.

For starters, judging from examples of their work. These courses are poorly researched and structured. Their portfolios produced no evident skills that would ever prepare them for the games industry. In fact they would be a lot better off enrolling on a more structured art or foundation course as these will at least develop your fundamental art skills.

The major flow of these 'Games Design' courses is in the name. A lot of people confuse Game Art with Game Design. Countless times I have had to correct people as they think I will be responsible for design games.

Far from it.

Game Art is purely commercial, if you apply to DMU wanting to deigns your own game then don't bother as that does not entail the life of a Game Artist. Sure we can put our own spin on the concepts but for the majority of the time we are working to a strict brief as part of a pipeline.

Another flow these courses have is the broad approach they take to the Games Industry. The teach everything from concepting to scripting, to character design and programming sound. This would only be helpful in a crash course where it would help students gain better insights to how games work and then follow a specialised path. So that their time at college isn't wasted on a vague and skilfully weak portfolio.

Fundamental skills of a Game Artist is the ability to perceive the world for what it is and get that vision down on paper. We need to demonstrate skills of perception, lighting and colour theory which will show through with the 3D side of things.

We are Game Artists and we like to draw.

Scaling Concepts

A lil update on my FMP, have done some quick whitebox concepts, playing around with the scale. Haven't changed the original layout much.

Let the FMP begin ....

As the new semester begins, so does our Final Major Projects. As everyone is producing their own thing I feel less pressured to compete with the other students so upfront as this time around there are no direct comparisons between our work.

However that's not to say there isn't any competitiveness there, after all, this is the ultimate showcase of our skills.

As a little recap, my FMP is aiming to produce an interactive environmental scene using a Windmill and café close to my home town.

I have chosen this area to base my FMP on for a variety of reasons. Mainly, it is overall a very interesting area. In the photos, you can see there are a variety of shapes, colours and textures all brought together in an aesthetically pleasing layout. The dramatic height of the windmill is contrasted by the low-lying buildings which are packed full of interesting textures.

Another reason I selected to build a windmill is for its originality. Sure there are cutesy-pie, fairytale windmills in games such as fable and oblivion, but you don't see many up-to-date commercially working windmills.

My final reason for choosing this windmill is for it's accessibility. I am a very strong believer of sourcing my own research and I very rarely hand paint a texture without knowing every little detail of how to achieve it from my own-sourced texture library.

I like to keep google at arms length on my projects so to have the opportunity to take my own photographs and document my own personal accounts of my windmill is a must.

As this final project is a test of my skills I have learnt and developed on this course, where better to start than with my experiences.

As I have learnt from my previous projects, I will religiously update my design document as if my life depends on it. Even falling a week behind can lead to unnecessary confusion and I plan to avoid it this time.

Vehicle Update

This is my vehicle project. I chose to do a caravan as i spent a lot of my childhood holidaying in one and the benefits of owning our own caravan means i have unlimited access to reference and hardly needed to use the internet.

Rooftop Project

Time for some render updates. This is my rooftop project. Inspired by the recent foggy days we've been having, my level has depth fog and animated fog planes as well as particle effects and fracture meshes.

There are many life lessons I have learnt during my time at university. In my first year I had to learn how to cook and clean for myself, as well as co-habit with complete strangers. In my second year, I had to get to grips with paying bills, managing my time and learn how to co-habit with friends (big mistake).

And that brings me to my final year. So far I have learnt that gas is expensive. So expensive in fact, we practically never have it on. As painfully cold as it is there are many benefits to claim from this. The first one is having more money but the most important one is I now seem to spend most of my time where it’s warm, and labs happen to be very warm.

So far this year I spend pretty much 10am-5pm, Tuesday to Friday in the labs and as a result my work is practically finished and to a much higher standards than previous projects.
Now I am my own worst critic so I can honestly say I’m not happy with every little detail but that is going to taken care of after I have relaxed and refreshed for a few days.

Guest Lectures .... an inspiration to everone

I’m rather impressed this year to see an increasing number in the amount of guest lectures we’ve had.

It’s encouraging to see that the main selling point of this curse is very much true as the connections we have with the industry grow stronger.

My favourite lecture so far has definitely been Sophia and Meghan from Outso. I’ll admit I didn’t know much about the company but I was so inspired by their presentation. It was great to actually see work produced by the studio as it reinforced their commentary and left me feeling enlightened. It’s even more inspiring to know they are past DMU students that have achieved so much in so little time.

I always enjoy the motivational wonders from Jolyen at Blitz as it always puts me back on track but I’ve seen their lecture 3 years running now and it would be refreshing to see their content change every now and then.

Up, Up and away

Although this whole business with rising tuition fees doesn’t directly affect me I still think it’s worth commenting on.

There are many key points to consider when taking University education into account. A rise in tuition fees will ultimately cause a drop in the number of people going to university as only those of a wealthy background will attend.

Selfishly this will mean my degree will be worth more as higher education will become more elitist and those with degrees will be sort after and job prospects may become easier.

However it does not give everyone a fair chance. A super intelligent student from a working class background may never get the university place they deserve, but Daddy’s little princess growing up in South Kensington can happily pay her way through uni.

I also feel that the impact this will have on society will affect us all. At the moment it may be a quick fix to the governmental debt problem but the long term effects of people with less of an education and higher unemployment rates will bring the county to it’s knees.

Universities will also feel the effects, as less people attend, courses and departments will have to discontinue possibly resulting in the closure of some universities completely.

Ultimately the education system will turn into the one we see in America. Parents will have to save up college funds before children are even born and ridiculous schemes and pageants will introduced in order to fund scholarships.

However, students may learn to really appreciate their education and not take it for granted. It may also mean that the more deserving will get into higher education. Students who actually worked hard and achieved good results will deserve their place at uni, instead of being accepted with 4 Ds just because it fills the institutes quota.

Overall it’s definitely not right to take away someone’s right to an education just because they can’t afford it but remember just because you have the right doesn’t mean you deserve it.

Floor 8 ... Welcome to Animation

As the lift doors slide open I gaze upon the full wall mural for animation, sure it may not be the best drawing I’ve seen but the bright colours and creativity is both inviting and respectful to the animation course.

Turn-around, however, and what does Game Art have to offer - two miniscule guru posters. Not only has it little to do with the course but the artistic skill involved is that of a 5 year old on photoshop.

Thankfully they have since been replaced by some student work but it still attracts little attention and doesn’t really celebrate the success of our course.

We are skill-set accredited, there should be a full wall digi-paint up there. Not only will the technical skill be far greater than the animations offering but it will also claim back the corridor as ours.

The things you learn

One thing that I have definitely learned from the rooftop project is how to manage my time.
I had very clearly written a little calendar schedule which I religiously stuck to but I still found myself going over my personal deadline.

This is because I had miscalculated the amount of time it would take to unwrap, texture and import all my assets. The Unreal engine I have gotten to grips with but the unwrapping and texturing took ages.

But the positives I take from this are how to manage my time for my FMP. As I will be doing an environmental scene I can now budget more time for texturing and I will most definitely be unwrapping as I go along because doing it all in one stint is just brain-rotting!

One thing I was proud of was getting the particle effects to work. It took a while but I was ecstatically happy and now I feel that Unreal isn’t this big scary program but actually a lot of fun and I will definitely incorporate it into my FMP.

The only thing I am not happy about is my skydome and I might re-address this problem before the summative assessment as I am in the zone with y vehicle project.

The main issue I have with it is making the panoramic image. I made my own using photographs taken out of the fletcher building but it doesn’t look crisp enough as other examples of work I’ve seen. Without pointing fingers this is most likely because their magical panoramic images were pulled from the internet but I am going to stick by my morals and use my own textures.

I did originally use the skyline from a recent foggy day as it was spooky and mesmerising but this didn’t come across in Unreal as there are no dynamic elements so I might rethink the weather and lighting over Christmas.

Patience my young Grasshopper

As the Gurus and Grasshoppers comes to an end I thought it appropriate to put my thoughts on here.

Overall I think the scheme is beneficial for both sides and turned out to be rather successful.

At first I was apprehensive that none of the first years would be interested but luckily enough they were still in that bewildered phase where they turn up to every lecture religiously and soon enough they become genuinely engaged and listened to what we had to see them take on-board our advice and improve and I must admit I learned a few things myself. Working closely with other Gurus gave me the chance to see their techniques and shortcuts they use and giving mini tutorials every week has definitely improved my communicated skills.

However the scheme did have its downsides. No clear timescale was set so the tutorials and texturing projects we planned to give were cut short as the scheme was brought to an abrupt end and some weeks when stress levels ran high, it was extremely annoying to have a first year hanging off your elbow.

Overall I’m not sure how much the Grasshoppers benefited. They pretty much learned to model and texture quicker than our weekly meets but I guess it’s the little shortcuts and timesavers that will help them most. It also makes the course more close-knit as we all work and learn together which is very rare to see in other university courses.

Rooftop Mania

A quick look at my Rooftop area. I put this together in 3DsMax quickly just to see if the level would look coherent.
This area is adapted mainly from the workshop area outside Fletcher as it provided me with enough reference and the layout looked rather appealing and interesting to me.

Rooftop Mood-boards

Day 1 of the rooftop project and so far I'm sticking to my schedule.

Today's task was to source my own reference to make moodboards, so armed with my camera i set off for Leicester - or at least as far as I could go due to the EDL protests. But have no fear as i came across a fountain of endless reference right here on the DMU campus. Pipes, vents, alarms you name it I found it.

Well as you can clearly see i put together 3 moodboards showing the different aspects I felt make up a successful rooftop environment.
Moodboard 1 shows rooftops in general so that i could get a feel for layout, size and height.

Moodboard 2 shows assets found on existing rooftops so that i could determine what assets my own rooftop would need.

Moodboard 3 shows the textures, materials and colours found on my travels and from these i created a colour table so that all my concepts will follow along the same colour scheme.

There's a Zombie on your lawn

Oh dear, my latest obsession is yet another Popcap game.

It’s a challenging, problem solving and intellectual game that pushes the boundaries of in-game humour

Oh yes, and it all centres around zombie eating plants.

Plants vs. Zombies is the latest sensation to take over my life. I would be ashamed and embarrassed, what with major upcoming titles being released but I’m not.
Because it is awesome.

As my loved one sits glued to his PS3 drooling over the latest Final Fantasy, I can be found sat at my pc, fending off a horde of brain-eating zombies with sunflowers and wall-nuts (I said it was intellectually witty). The simple, colourful 2D art and cheerful jaunty music can keep me entertained for hours.

Which has inspired me to do a bit of detective work. I am now curious how Popcap has such a huge following of casual gamers…what is their secret?

Let’s start with some background info, which I’m pointing out I didn’t pull straight from Google.

Popcap was founded in 2000 and currently has around under 180 employees under it’s control. Their major-title ‘’Bejelewed’ sold almost 50 millions world-wide over all major consoles such as the Xbox 360 and PS3 and their efforts have won them over 25 industry awards.

Their latest title ‘Plant vs. Zombies’ was apparently an App store record breaker selling 300,000 units in the first 9 days of its release onto the I-phone.

The audience of most pop cap games is on average a 43 year old woman playing on social networking sites such as Facebook. This audience alone generates more than $1 billion which is mostly made from virtual currencies and buying in-game gifts. This specific audience gave reasons to their gaming addictions as to play with relatives and friends.

So it would seem that casual gaming is mostly comprised of a female audience. Simple rules and addictive gameplay is vital to draw their players into purchasing in-game products to keep this multi-million pound industry afloat.

Bye-Bye Z-brush, hello pixel art?

A Crisis of Faith

If I were to describe my university experience for the second year I would say it was demoralising.

The start of the year was great, I was engrossed in an interesting project, testing out new software and visited interesting places, overall I was a happy bunny. This led on into a relaxing Christmas holiday and some encouraging feedback that spurred me on into the second term but then everything seemed to collapse underneath me.

I had fallen out with my flat-mates and my self-esteem took a huge knock in which I still haven’t fully recovered. Not only that but I was asked to improve my life-drawing skills with no model, I was asked to stay sane with no weekly therapy sessions and I was asked to make a working group level with practically no group.

Now in all fairness some of these events are unfortunate, due to circumstances that couldn’t be helped and so I took fate into my own hands and tried to make the best of things.

I used my loving boyfriend as a life model, so that I could catch-up, I held make-shift therapy groups down at the pub with fellow peers so that we could vent of steam and having been re-assured that the group projects were individually assessed I began to concentrate more on me.

But this is where it boiled down to the main problem for me, what was said and what was done didn’t quite meet.

After having presented our group projects I was told that the lack of work from other group members wouldn’t reflect on me, but I think it has. I can’t help but think that the projects were assessed in the blink of an eye and those initial prejudices have stuck.

What hurt me even more was that after initial concerns with the overall size of the level, I personally explained our brief and our ideas with the new-improved layout, fairly early on in the semester and got the go-ahead, but then for some reason at the presentations we were told that it wasn’t good enough and too small. If this is the case then why weren’t these issues brought up sooner instead of just patting me on the head and sending me on my way?

I have apparently wasted hours of work on a brief that was never going to be good enough.

I also couldn’t help but notice that the main concern during the reviews was the lack of work with frequent references and comparisons to the 3rd years. I personally believe this is grossly unfair. Surely assessments should be based on the individuals capabilities and under no circumstances should comparisons to students who have 2 years more experience than us should be made, I have found the whole experience demoralising and now I am just focusing on improving my skills and planning the best-damn FMP there shall ever be :P

Although this sounds fairly rantish or possibly even rude. It is not at all intended this way. I am merely trying to keep my self going and to stay sane. These past few months have been testing for me and i have had to change as a person, but by no means am i giving up. I am learning and growing as a person for every day i am on this course and i have developed a repetoire of skills that i hope will be invaluable to me for the rest of my life. If anything, this year has taught me to keep fighting. Not to make excuses and shift the blame, not to run home and hide in the comfort of a mother's love. It has taught me how re-assess my life and instead of giving up on problems, try approaching them from a different angle.

This is not the last you have seen of this Game Art student.

An End of an Era

As the end of the year rapidly approaches I can’t help but feel sad that our group project must come to end.

Even though I no doubt have grey hairs now and have more than likely shortened my life span by a good decade due to stress induced rants I’m kinda going to miss working with my team.

At first the thought of working with unfamiliar peers scared me, I thought it would be hard to forge new friendships so late on in the year and I really did think our work would suffer because of it. But I can happily say that I have forged new relationships with brilliant, talented people that I am glad I had the chance to work with.

Had I written this blog merely a week ago, im pretty sure I wouldn’t have been so laid back. I took my responsibilities of team co-ordinator too seriously and saw the possible failure of anyone on the team as my own. But I feel I have reached enlightenment. I have peered into the inner depths of my understanding and now realise that self-motivation of others is not something I should worry about. It also helps that our level is coming on in leaps and bounds and everything is fitting together so perfectly I should be scared we’ve done something wrong.

Well one thing that does concern me is the size of our level. Other groups have chosen vast areas to play around with but I feel that the work we have done is well within our capabilities as I wanted the team to feel comfortable and to see work that puts into practice everything we have learnt so far.
The majority of the team have really impressed me and I really hope they are proud of what they have achieved. Even though communication between our group members has been lacking I’m really moved by how exicted they all get when they see our nearly complete level.

I can honestly say that most of us have slaved away at this project, literally putting our blood, sweat and tears into it (so much so that unfortunately my VD is lacking) and now I just pray that everyone gets the marks we deserve for our awesome collaborated effort.