Mudbox Model

Low poly model

Here is the base model I have made in 3DS max. Totalling 552 tri's, now I need to send it to mudbox and begin creating a vector displacement map, to make the low poly mesh have a lot more detail..

Here I was testing out light's and seeing if it was possible to make the alien glow, much like micro-organisms. 

Character progression..

Here is a little development from initial sillhoutte, trying to get a good design down. 

This is my final design, taking bits from each idea to form this. A micro-organism alien being that is being taken over by a deadly virus. 

Design Change.

Because my last Idea would be unachievable in under 300 poly's I decided to go back to the drawing board and think of a simpler, biped being. In the shape of a human but much less developed... The addition of the tribal body paint suggests that he may be a developing species that has formed tribes and have developed intelligence.

Low Poly Character Design

Here are some silhoutte idea's for micro organism based characters, I decided to progress with the very bottom one. 

 Here are some designs I came up with based on a micro-organism..

I liked this design but just wouldn't know where to start modelling, especially under 300 poly's as it's based on spheres..

Low Poly Design.

Due to my idea centering around a new universe being created within a petri dish, I thought it was adequate to research into micro-organisms, finding some interesting results, their bold colours and simple structures, consisting of spheres, cylinders and spikes. Not the best of news for a 300 poly character...

Old Man- Renders

After many hours of trial and error I have finally learnt how to apply vector displacement maps successfully in 3DS Max. Here are a few test renders displaying the working maps... There is still a little deformation around the wheel area, but I'm sure this will be an easy fix, I will come back to it when my Low Poly character has been finished.

Mudbox Sculpt

After working through several tutorials I have created this sculpt in mudbox, now I must work through a few more tutorials to work out how to export the displacement maps in order to make my low poly mesh in 3DS Max have similar detail to this very high poly sculpt in mudbox.

Teaching myself Mudbox..

I am going to have to work through a few tutorials in order to learn how to use mudbox and form an efficient workflow from max, to mudbox and back to max. Here is a video I will start with...

Base Mesh

Here I have modeled the basic 3DS Max model for my character. Next I plan to export the model to mud box and make a sculpt, later exporting some vector displacement and specular maps to give the model some extra detail

Character Concept

Here's my final character concept, could do with a little more work but I am going to begin modelling.

Character Design- Development

Thinking about my theme...

So I've been thinking about my theme, The Perception of Reality. Instead of adhering to my project plan and following the route of Split Personality again, I have decided to look into another idea; The Multiverse Theory. I have thought of a Character based on my previous Old Man design... He is now an scientist (inventor) that is trying to find way to enter a parallel universe. Being the victim of many previously failed experiments (including one that took his legs) he expects to fail again, to his surprise he succeeds and finds another superior alien race, and befriends it- this can be my low poly character.  

          

Character Design

Using shapes in design... 

Today I have been experimenting with different shapes in my design. Shapes can be the base of the characters personality, and is usually the tell tale sign of their characteristics; because my character is an old ex-military man, he will have to feature predominantly squares.


This character is based on the body shape furthest right; he is predominantly squared, due to his military background. He has droopy cheeks and fat due to his age, the army patches and poppy are a symbol of his previous military experience; similarly to his hair cut. This is quite a stern, emotionless character; however, there is lot's of room for alterations upon the switch to another personality. The droopy cheeks and oversized features will easily shift to best highlight a different expression.






Here are a couple of design's I did based around circles and tear drops; using more rounded shapes gives the character a harmless, dopey feel to him.

Design Ideas- Beard

I thought a good way to portray the different personalities would be through an item being used in different ways; here's an Idea of a Beard. 

Facial Expression Research

I have been researching how to convey facial expressions most effectively on a Character. Here are some examples I've found online that I will use for inspiration..

Facial Expression Sheet
Keane, G (2011) Tangled
Retrieved from: http://theartofglenkeane.blogspot.co.uk/2006/07/rapunzel.html  

Facial Expression Sheet
Keane, G (2011) Tangled
Retrieved From: http://theartofglenkeane.blogspot.co.uk/2006/07/rapunzel.html 

Facial Expression Sheet
Shange, P (2010) Coraline
Retrieved From: http://jukilo89.wordpress.com/2010/01/18/coralines-character-design-expressions/ 

Character Design- Old Man

After researching into DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder) I realised the character could originally be anything, but must be a design that will best highlight the different personalities. The best way to portray personality in a character is through the pose, and the facial expressions; the best character for this job- an old man with eccentric facial hair and facial muscles. He can have a number of persona's such as: Ex Military, Farmer, Little Girl, Old woman, Middle aged man, Baby.

Mood Board: Old Man- Ex Military/Adventurer 

I then drew a few thumbnail poses to try and get a good base design down for the personalities. Because the character design is based around multiple personalities I had to make sure the personality came across strongly in the pose; here I tested out a number of character ideas, from the little child, to the mad gunman. I will now have to pick one and develop it into a design.

Thumbnail Sketches- Poses showing personality

Character Design Research- Multiple Personality Disorder

I have been watching video's of people with Multiple Personality Disorder, in order to get a clearer picture of how they behave/look. The changes can be so drastic, as far as being blind as one personality and have 20/20 vision as the other. The disorder seems to come about after an abusive childhood or traumatic event, where the person cannot mentally cope with the effects of the trauma and will split into different people, living in the same body. Sometimes this will often result in a child personality, where the person with the disorder cannot read nor write and will act exactly as a child.

Sometimes, the personality may wish to harm the beholder,  even cutting the body to injure the other personality. In the film, one lady refers to herself as 'she' and refer's to 'the body', with different people inside; sometimes she will not know where the body has been, or what it has done and asks people to force her other personalities to write a diary; each one has different hand writing. People can have up to a hundred different personalities.

The personalities come out at certain emotional points, whether they are aggravated, scared, worried, enthusiastic. Each personality is better at dealing with certain situations, so will come out when the person is feeling the corresponding emotion.

Although the person is exactly the same, when they switch between personalities their physical appearance can change drastically, simply through the use of different facial expressions, body language and language.

The main route to recovery is to release the traumatic memory that caused the personalities to split, however, the person will often form a personality that prevents this from happening, making threats to the therapist and often resulting in violence.

Animals can also react to personalities differently, in the documentary the dog had been trained to stay out of the room, when he switched to a child personality the dog sensed his master had gone and entered the room, when he switched back the dog recognised his presence and left the room.

Different personalities hold different memories and each personality has a different purpose.

Types of Personality

Emotionless

Destructive

Innocent (Child-like)

Abused (Scared)

Focused (Smart)

Game Concept- Bob's Ice Cream

A young boy with split personality disorder has his ice-cream stolen. The player must learn to master each personality to complete this fast paced puzzle platformer and retrieve Bobby's beloved ice-cream.

Game Concept

Character Concepts- Adopting Different Art Styles

Todd- Sad Personality

Felix- Happy Personality

Damien- Angry Personality

Gus- Scared Personality

Game Concept

I wanted to base my game concept around the Perception of Reality, this gave me the idea to look into split  personalities, looking at how one persons reality can change based on their perception; therefore, one person with multiple personalities may see things differently dependent on how they feel.

Looking at this literally within a game scenario I decided to explore the idea in the 2.5D side scrolling genre. I came up with a game mechanic that allows you to 'switch personalities', altering the world around you and maybe even the player properties. Therefore, the player would have to utilise this switch mechanic in order to complete puzzles and progress through the platforming sections of the game. 

To further my Idea I decided the world should change art styles to fit the personality also. For

example:

Happy- Bright, Colourful, Cartoony
Isamegu (2011) 30 Stunning Digital Cartoon Illustrations 
Retrieved from: http://www.inspiremonkey.com/2011/04/30-stunning-digital-cartoon-illustrations/

Sad- Hand drawn, dull colours, sketched
Contraomnes (2010) 10 Artists With Very Unique Styles
Retrieved from: http://www.unstage.com/2010/03/10-artists-with-very-unique-visual-styles/

  

Scared- Silhoutted, black and white, atmospheric
Unknown Author (2010) Xbox Screenshots Wallpaper
Retrieved from: http://wallpoper.com/wallpaper/xbox-screenshots-410705

Angry- Sharp linework, red tones, heavy black shadows
Zahed, R (2012) Adult Swim to Ignite 'Black Dynamite'
Retrieved from: http://www.animationmagazine.net/tv/adult-swim-to-ignite-black-dynamite/

New Idea- The Primacy of Consciousness

Russell, P (2009) The Primacy of Consciousness
Retrieved from: http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/the-primacy-of-consciousness/

After watching The Primacy of Consciousness by Pete Russell, a documentary discussing theories surrounding reality/consciousness, I have learnt the importance of consciousness and how Pete Russell believes it is more important that space, time & matter. He believes that the world we see around us is generated by our brain and the true reality could in fact be nothing like we see it

I wish to use this theory within my Level Design assignment. I have decided upon having the character with a split personality, meaning he can switch realities unexpectedly. This gives me room to utilise Pet Russell's theory; e.g. having a fairly normal seeming world that can switch to a completely different image, generated by the brain, at any moment. This could hide/uncover hidden items, passages, puzzles, enemies etc. Later in the game the character could learn to control his illness and channel it into a power, switching realities at will and even forming his own realities by choice.

New Idea- Dimensions

Hargreaves, R (2012) Wind-up Knight Review- Clockwork Design
http://infogame-online.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/wind-up-knight-v15-apk-free-download.html

Based around the theme of Dimensions. The player begins on one axis using a similar camera view to Wind-up Knight; as you progress you unlock other dimensions allowing you to move towards and away from the screen. Player is given one environment and is free to explore and solve the puzzle, using a mini map to show locations of platforms in the other dimensions. Game starts on one axis and eventually unlocks into fully 3D.

New Idea- Meteor Shower

Art Direction

Secroit (2012) A Trip To Wonderland by Secroit

Retrieved from: http://secroit.deviantart.com/art/A-trip-to-wonderland-46545832

The meteor shower last night gave me an Idea for a theme; astronomy. A 3rd person platforming tower defence game where the player must defend a planet from incoming space threats such as; asteroids, debris, space creatures.

Gameplay

• Features star gazing, shield  constructions, weapon handling and space exploration. 

• Protect your planet from incoming threats, you must survey the skies and stop dangers before they reach you.

• Explore space using a map view that zooms out from the standard side view of your planet to show the surrounding area of  the universe, much larger than your planet.

•  Progress up to larger planets as you play through the game. 

• Space has creatures that attack your planet in different ways. The space creatures hide themselves within dark matter as they are made of dark energy. The protagonist has a dark matter camera that allows him to see the creatures and dispose of them. 

Idea for Theme

Secroit (2012) A Trip To Wonderland by Secroit

Retrieved from: http://secroit.deviantart.com/art/A-trip-to-wonderland-46545832

Formed around the philosophy that small things can have large consequences. Play through preset tragedies (Final Destination style) have to find what it was that caused it to happen and change it. The game is set in a mans trip. Don't realise it's a trip because you are being controlled by secret doses. Strange things happen that make you question reality. Big twist half way through where protagonist discovers the truth and the truth is stranger than reality...