Toon Line is Working!!!!

Before

After

Design by Matt Williams, Shader Inspired by http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=69086
and many other forum posts, Assets from UDK

OK so after weeks upon weeks of working on this toon line shader.  I finally found out that there is a little checkbox in on the "Screen_Pos" node in the material editor that says "Screen Align", all that I had to do was check that, plug my material into a post-process chain, and apply to world properties.  Anyways, I am tired of looking at this, so I'm gonna go get some sleep.  Woohoo!!!

PS-I now have about 5 working toon shaders after discovering this

Modular House!!!!!

 Model by Matt Williams

Model by Matt Williams

So the last 5 or 6 hours of my life has been dedicated to making different walls for a modular house. Woohoo!  But it works! Everything lines up and hooray.  There are a couple reasons for making modular houses(or anything for that matter) to put into a game engine.  The first reason is performance.  The less unique objects in your environment, the better your game will run.  The second reason is diversity.  With modular assets you can create a lot of unique buildings in a short span of time.  I'm going to add some modular details like pipes 'n such as well as modular balcony pieces (railings, plants, etc).  Andy is also making pillars and arches for a covered bottom level area.

Playtesting/Optimizing Models

So I've got the terrain working with a mix of an unreal terrain and static mesh for the underground.  Basically I used the terrain editor for the stuff above ground and then matched up the underground tunnel to the terrain.  So that was all of Wednesday night, and I mean all of it.  Then I started UVing the power plant, at some point I realized that I hadn't optimized my geometry yet...woohoo startover.  So that was all of Monday night...again, all of it.  I am optimizing the jail right now.

Model by Matt Williams

When triangulated manually, the models are much more efficient going into the engine.  The model on the left is a model of all quads that has been triangulated.  The reason I did this is because when you import the model into unreal, it triangulates it anyways.  So in the end, if I left it all quads in Maya, I would have a model in Unreal with 1020 tris, but when I triangulate it manually, I am left with 514 tris with no loss of detail.  In fact I added some windows on the left side, so it is half the polys with more detail.  Hoorayyyyyy.  While the one on the left may look neat and clean, its not efficient.  Optimization is to be done only after you are absolutely done modeling and before laying out UVs.  Its still a good idea to model in quads and then optimize.  Having some tris while you are modeling is alright, but I still try to avoid N-gons(faces with more than 4 faces) at all costs.

Although manually optimizing is time consuming, it is a necessary evil.

Power Plant

Model by Matt Williams

Its not complete yet.  I need to add some more details, clean up some edges, and add the power distribution station to the side, but its coming along nicely.  Its crunch time and we need to get these buildings textured.  But I'm going to keep modeling away and working in unreal until I'm satisfied with the progress.

UDK Exploding Boiler

Models and UDK by Matt Williams

Kismet Work by Matt Williams

So I got the boiler explosion working.  I have it set up with a remote trigger right now, but all I have to do is make it a "take damage" trigger and put it on top of the boiler.  Once I do that, you'll be able to shoot the boiler to make it explode.

Boiler #1/Destroyed Model

Model by Matt Williams

So I know, I know.  It needs more gauges and pipes and such, but for now its going to be the placeholder for setting up the destructible boiler mechanic in UDK.  Also I'm not going to actually have the rivets modeled for the final boiler, they will be part of a normal map.  Been working on this on and off for the past couple days.

  Model by Matt Williams

And here is the destroyed model.  Decided to go with banana peel style.  So I'm gonna bring it into UDK, make an explosion, then as the explosion is happening and the player camera is shaking, I will swap the models.  I will also have a couple of the separate pieces of the boiler(gauges, thermometers, pipes, etc) as hidden k-actors (physics object), then unhide the objects in the explosion and activate an impulse actor that will shoot the pieces in various directions  Its all fun and games :).  Any questions/comments?

 Andy's Blog

Jail and water wheel in blockout

Models by Matt Williams

I'm not sure if its just me, but this is giving me a much better of idea of how this is going to look overall.  I can just imagine all these buildings finished and the terrain textured with the wheel turning and boilers...boiling.  Ahhh but tis only a vision right now, not in a 5 1/2 weeks though!!!

 Models by Matt Williams

Which one do u like?  The one in front seems like it would be more functional. We want all of these objects to look like they can function. 


Andy's Blog

More Water Wheel

 Model by Matt Williams

Model by Matt Williams

Just some more Ambient Occlusion(AO) renders of the water wheel in the blocked out environment.

Andy's Blog

Water Wheel/Terrain

Model by Matt Williams

 Model by Matt Williams

Well, I haven't posted in a few days, but I've been busy.  I finished up the jail, modeled the water wheel for the power plant, started modeling the gallows and some boilers, finished the base mesh for the terrain, finalized the layout of the city, and I've been working on the post-process material.  The solution to my post-process problem still eludes me, but at least I've been messing around with it.  The water wheel will go through an "artificially" dug hole in the ground to the river below and through the surface of the terrain.  I will post my progress on the boilers in the next few days.  I'm making intact and destroyed models so that I can switch the two out when the boilers explode in game.  Anyways, its been a lot of work so far, but at least its fun.  If you have any questions or comments, please tell me.


Andy's Blog

Jail Model

So major modeling is finally finished on the jail.  Its not highly detailed because of the style we are going for.  We also plan to populate the area with a bunch of assets.  I had planned on having this done last week, but due to some work put into post-process shaders and other classwork, it took a little longer

Model by Matt Williams

Any input or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.  PLEASE COMMENT!

Andy's Blog