tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-64850093435703516432024-03-13T22:20:50.434-07:00Will Schoolcraft FXWill Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.comBlogger43125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-53364091809280786242014-04-15T06:26:00.000-07:002014-04-15T06:26:59.396-07:00Winter Is Coming<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So I've just been playing around with a few things, mainly trying to keep my skills polished before I start my new job. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ribbons are a really powerful tool that I've quite neglected. I figured a good exercise to learn a bit more about them would be with weapon trails. Here's just a quick bash at a sword trail. I'm thinking I might do more work with ribbons following a set of particles, kind of like how they use them in Infamous Second Son, but I've got plenty of things on my plate so who knows.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I've also been keeping myself busy with weather effects. I've not done a whole lot of ambient effects so it was good practice. I was trying out a couple of techniques to imitate the way the wind whips up the snow along the top. In this first video I use the same sprites as I do in the snow storm.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But with this one I tried a material more like a ribbon than a sprite. I think they both yield good results, it's just a matter of preference on the style.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And this was just because I thought that the material I made for the snow storm worked quite well as a dry ice effect.</span></div>
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Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-88565431387164706542014-03-23T08:24:00.000-07:002014-03-23T08:24:46.031-07:00Spirally Stuff<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is just a quick run through to show how I did these spirally effects using meshes. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You want to make yourself a simple spiral mesh like the one above, you can do that either using a spline or a cylinder. But make sure that the pivot point is at the centre, so that it looks like everything's either being drawn into or pushed away from the centre of the effect.</span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vYa9W2FJHPY/Uy7sPqQVwsI/AAAAAAAABPU/VNnWqQ3bfAg/s1600/2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vYa9W2FJHPY/Uy7sPqQVwsI/AAAAAAAABPU/VNnWqQ3bfAg/s1600/2.jpg" height="225" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You want to unwrap it to a straight line like this so that the texture can pan across it properly. The way I built the material in UDK means that if you want it to look like it's being drawn to the centre then you'd only need to rotate the UV's round 180. As they are now they'll look like they're being pushed away.</span></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-r6WB-AUUdhA/Uy7sN0roHYI/AAAAAAAABO8/fhfOPq5KZF0/s1600/Spiral_Mesh_MASK.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-r6WB-AUUdhA/Uy7sN0roHYI/AAAAAAAABO8/fhfOPq5KZF0/s1600/Spiral_Mesh_MASK.jpg" height="200" width="200" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You'll need to create a couple of textures like this. The square gradient is just to soften the edges in the alpha. And you'll want to create a tileable that tiles horizontally. I imagine you'll want something maybe hand painted and quite ethereal looking. </span><br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-TUBru6qypO8/Uy7srFqWPFI/AAAAAAAABQU/oHr8-3YIpXA/s1600/3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-TUBru6qypO8/Uy7srFqWPFI/AAAAAAAABQU/oHr8-3YIpXA/s1600/3.jpg" height="225" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Once you've imported everything into UDK you'll want to get started on the material. Start off by setting the Blend Mode to Additive and the Lighting Model to Unlit. Then click Two Sided. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Search for Linear Gradient in the Material Function Library (the bottom one) and then search for a Power and a Mesh Emitter Vertex Colour in the Material Expressions Library (the top one) and bring those in. Plug the U Gradient into the Base of the Power and the alpha of the Mesh Emitter Vert Colour into the Exponent. This will be so that you can control the fade along the mesh in Cascade. Now multiply all this against the square fall off texture you made. Then plug this into the Opacity.</span></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Qn5cX7Rz9dA/Uy7ssLoV3uI/AAAAAAAABQc/N2XMwZcIEpo/s1600/5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Qn5cX7Rz9dA/Uy7ssLoV3uI/AAAAAAAABQc/N2XMwZcIEpo/s1600/5.jpg" height="225" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bring in your tileable texture and a Panner (by holding P and clicking) and a Texture Coordinate (by holding U and clicking). The Texture Coordinate is to control the stretch of your texture and the Panner to control the speed. Make sure your values are in the positive X direction. (I have two different textures that I add together but you don't need this) Then bring in a Vector Parameter (by holding V and clicking) to control the colour of the spiral. I then multiplied this by a Constant to improve it's intensity but you don't need to if you don't want to. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Then multiply the Vector Parameter against the panning texture. And multiply all of this against the Mesh Emitter Vertex Colour. And plug the result into the Emissive.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">(Once you've finished the material, assign it to the mesh in the mesh editor, just to make it easier later on)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now create a new particle system. In the blank space between the top orange box and the parameters; right click and go to TypeData, then down to New Mesh Data.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Go into Mesh Data and click on the spy glass I've highlighted. This will bring up the Content Browser and go and find your mesh and assign it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">If you've assigned the material to the mesh in the mesh editor then you're done. If you haven't, you'll need to assign the material. Go into Required and use the same method with the spy glass to look up the material and assign it. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You can start by deleting Initial Velocity because you don't need it. Then go into Initial Size and set the Max to 3 in X,Y and Z. And set the Min values to 0.5 X,Y and Z.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now go into Spawn and click the little drop down tick and select FloatUniform. That'll change it to Min and Max values. For Max set it to 6 and Min set it to 3. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I forgot to screenshot it, but go into Lifetime and set the Min to 2 and the Max to 3.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now go into Colour Over Life. Start by going down into Colour Over Life. There should be a Constant Curve with two points already set up. Change the In Value of the first point to 0.7 and the Out Values to 1,1,1. (I've gone with 3,3,3 because this will multiply the intensity of the colour in the material you've chosen, so just put it at whatever value you feel gives the best look) Now go down to the second point and change the In Value to 1 and the Out Value to 0,0,0.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Go down to Alpha Over Life and it is pretty much as before. Set the first point's In Value to 0 and the Out Value to 50. And set the second points' In Value at 1 and the Out Value at 0.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now you'll want to graph it to get a smoother look. If you click the little graph symbol next to the Colour Over Life, you'll graph that to the Graph Editor. Click the little yellow square next to Alpha Over Life to hide that graph so that you're only dealing with Colour Over Life for now. Click the Fit to View All icon to see all the points. Select the first point by clicking on it and then click the AutoCurve button to smooth out the tangents.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now unhide the Alpha Over Life curve and hide the Colour Over Life curve. Fit to view all again to see all the points. And select the first point and click the AutoCurve button. You should now see a tangent curve adjuster handle on the point you've still got selected. Use this to adjust the tangent to get it to curve down like the above picture. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This curve adjusts the speed at which the texture fades across the mesh. So using this handle adjust the curve to get the look you're going for.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Right click in the space below all the adjustment parameters and go down to Rotation and then Init Mesh Rotation. This is what will be used to break up the repetition to make it look like it's spreading out in all different directions. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Without changing anything, this will make the mesh choose a rotation on all axis'. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But if that's not what you're looking for and you only want it going out and up then for the Max values, make X and Y 0 and leave Z at 1.</span></div>
<br />Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-22413897717506072312014-03-06T07:00:00.001-08:002014-03-07T10:10:31.808-08:00Bits 'n' Bobs<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So in between finishing off my reel and redoing my CV and countless cover letters, I decided to have a little fun and work on a couple of projects. The majority of the work I do is realistic and the basic stuff you'll find in almost every game, so I thought it'd be fun to do practice magic and sci-fi elements.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The magic was trying to emulate healing spells so I was aiming for the yellowy golden colours mostly used in those. And in all honesty, I'm not sure what the sci-fi effect is supposed to be, I just tried to practice hitting sci-fi cues like colour palette and geometric shapes and patterns. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I'm currently trying to get a website up together and rewrite my CV, but I'm sure I'll get on with more projects. It's nice to be able to work again without it all having to be for my reel.</span></div>
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Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-26025275848623205192014-02-21T05:10:00.000-08:002014-02-21T05:10:06.627-08:00VFX Reel Version 2.0<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So I got some really good feedback on my work and made some changes to my reel. So here's the latest version.</span></div>
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Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-52553616986142225702014-02-01T11:42:00.000-08:002014-02-01T11:42:22.084-08:00Even more fire..<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I was unhappy with the my previous render that I had for my work on fire. So I thought I'd have a go at redoing it. My previous render was of a bonfire but I thought with this I'd go with a burning room instead as it's a far more interesting render. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">For this I also redid the fire material as well as the textures. And I also redid the smoke material and textures. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I'm much more pleased with this render in comparison with my previous one. The fire has a much more realistic movement and energy to it. I really struggled with getting the density of the smoke right, but after almost a day of finesseing I think I've got it at least in the ball park of being right. But alas, I'll get some feedback on it and see where to go from there. </span></div>
Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-30577095816100512762014-01-29T08:48:00.001-08:002014-01-29T08:48:39.430-08:00Reel Concepting<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I've been trying to get my reel finished off so that I can get some feedback before I start on job applications. Recently I've been thinking about how I'm going to present my reel. Below are some of my experimentations.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">These are dealing with a block of tone along the bottom.</span></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ORMX-WOZwtA/UuktO1HckYI/AAAAAAAABL4/I2QAtdaui0E/s1600/Reel_Render_Concept_01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ORMX-WOZwtA/UuktO1HckYI/AAAAAAAABL4/I2QAtdaui0E/s1600/Reel_Render_Concept_01.jpg" height="225" width="400" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-aXnhoo6D2Xw/UuktOzq1TPI/AAAAAAAABMA/VuaP19RM3uE/s1600/Reel_Render_Concept_02.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-aXnhoo6D2Xw/UuktOzq1TPI/AAAAAAAABMA/VuaP19RM3uE/s1600/Reel_Render_Concept_02.jpg" height="225" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And these few have more of a gradual fade, so that it doesn't obscure any of the image.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I was curious as to how it looked with the text on the other side.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And this is just testing how it looked against the different parts of the reel, especially dealing with scenes that are very much darker.</span></div>
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<br />Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-58746216362743263472014-01-15T12:12:00.000-08:002014-01-17T09:23:08.892-08:00<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I've been doing more work with lens flares the past couple of days. I feel like I'm getting a hold on the lens flare editor, though I still think that I need to work on the textures for the lens artefacts. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I'll spend another couple of days working with lens flares to try and refine my texturing before I move onto different projects.</span></div>
Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-57532128198935359272014-01-12T11:34:00.000-08:002014-01-12T11:34:03.280-08:00Lens Flares<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I've been trying to teach myself about unreal's lens flare editor, as I've never used it before and I thought that it was about time I learned how to do lens flares. I thought I'd start with anamorphic lens flares as they're probably the more widely used.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I'm not such a huge fan of the modern approach to lens flares that have started to saturate films, I much prefer the aesthetic of older films. I tried to make mine more simple by basing it off examples I saw in older films like the indiana jones and die hard films. </span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yXcRqjiTMno/UtLg78v2rrI/AAAAAAAABLU/l1gKkf8AYsw/s1600/LensFlare_03.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yXcRqjiTMno/UtLg78v2rrI/AAAAAAAABLU/l1gKkf8AYsw/s1600/LensFlare_03.jpg" height="195" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's definitely something I need to refine and it was enjoyable working on it, so I'm looking forward to getting more practice done and learning more about the lens flare editor.</span>Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-13743769322385882082014-01-05T15:21:00.001-08:002014-01-05T15:21:34.066-08:00Adding Detail<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Recently I've been working on trying to add to more depth and detail to my FX. I've found that in the past I tend to rely too heavily on sprites. With this I was trying to implement the use of meshes and shader work to flesh out the whole effect.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The base is a shader to mimic the smouldering ember effect of the burnt materials. I then added the mesh with the fire material to give the fire more mass and a better shape. It also blends between the floor and wall in a better way. I split the wall and floor particle systems up so that if I were making a bigger scene I would be able to distrib</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">ute them separately. <br /><br />This approach was inspired by the work of Orson Favrel and his work on Remember Me. </span></div>
Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-5743571522783364692013-12-23T14:09:00.001-08:002013-12-23T14:09:17.619-08:00VFX Reel<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So I've finally got a rough copy of my reel up. I'll put this up on some forums to get some feedback on this before I produce a finalised version to then start applying for jobs. Exciting stuff :)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><u>Breakdown</u></b></span></div>
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<b>0:0</b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>4-0:36</b>: Alleyway Scene; responsible for all assets and textures, as well as all effects</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>0:37-1:00</b>: Gas Station Scene; responsible for assets and all effects</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>1:01-1:10</b>: Fire and smoke</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>1:11-1:16</b>: Bullet tracers and impacts</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>1:17-1:23</b>: Electric energy shots and impacts</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>1:24-1:45</b>: Energy beam</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>1:46-2:02</b>: Portal spell</span></div>
Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-42189243558036611892013-12-11T08:46:00.005-08:002013-12-11T08:46:51.331-08:00Portalicious <div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So I'm finally finished with this project, having added in a quick animation that I did for the staff in 3ds max. It was actually really fun working on even such a simple animation, it's definitely something that I'm looking forward to getting more into. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now I'm looking forward to starting some new projects. Maybe work on improving the way I render out my projects.</span></div>
Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-82819984534940432852013-12-06T08:16:00.001-08:002013-12-06T08:16:10.282-08:00<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Just a quick update with some slight changes I've made to the effect. All that I've got left to do is try and make an animation for the staff and set up a proper render.</span><br />
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Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-41169979066892663922013-12-03T06:19:00.002-08:002013-12-03T06:19:24.084-08:00Bringing it together<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">After being out of the country for a quick break, it's time to get back to it. I've got the majority of the work done for this project now. The only parts that are left are to do with the final render, like building a small environment and putting together an animation for the staff etc.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Having just put this together I've noticed that the core light of the energy build up fades out a little slowly so I'll just have to quickly tweak the timing, but that's only a small issue. However, I'm still not sold on my approach to the portal itself. I came across an interesting approach to this type of effect by Epic for the UDK itself, in which they use a mesh and bend the UV's to get a really nice tendril effect in the material. I'm thinking of exploring this option because I experimented with having the portal by itself, supporting effects both infront and behind it but nothing worked in my opinion so I feel I will need to revise it before finishing this off completely.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In other news, this is the last project that I had planned for my portfolio so now I can start to think about rendering out my other projects and putting them together in a show reel.</span></div>
Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-39182708260163875072013-11-15T08:38:00.001-08:002013-11-15T08:38:38.470-08:00Portal Update<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Just a quick update on my portal effect. This is just a simple emitter at the moment with it spawning the portal shader in cascade. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's set up so that I can control the growth, edge colour intensity and the distortion on the portal interior all on the fly in cascade with a dynamic parameter. The colour of the edge is controlled by a vector parameter through a material instance. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is only the portal right now but I'm going to give it a lot of supporting sprites to help sell the effect of it bursting into life and also some to give a bit of extra visual fidelity to the portal itself, as I feel it's a bit dull by itself. I also want to go back and add a bit more visual interest to the portal interior, like some nebula clouds to just make it look more interesting.</span></div>
Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-30518314127080374702013-11-09T08:13:00.002-08:002013-11-09T08:13:58.106-08:00Magic and Portal <div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So it's been a while since I last updated my blog, but at the start of this month my laptop decided to break unexpectedly and I've only just gotten my new one through and set up. It's nice to get back into work again and I thought I'd do a quick update on my current project.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is the progression of my idea from the previous post. The idea is that this part below would be attached to the top of a staff, through a bone and socket. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The staff would then cast the element below. The intention is that this will be a build up of energy that will then explode outwards leaving behind it a portal type of effect.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I'm thinking of doing the majority of the portal effect through a shader, like using techniques for material transitions to adjust the growth and expansion of the portal. I'll then support the portal with a particle system to tie the whole effect together.</span></div>
Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-21782853147032332022013-10-01T13:19:00.000-07:002013-10-01T14:05:45.866-07:00Fire and Ribbons, what could go wrong<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I've been trying to hone the basics recently, more particularly working on improving my fire effects. These are just some tests focusing on using different textures to obtain a different look and scale of fire. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I feel like, even though there's still a lot of work to do and progress to be made, that it's definitely coming along. And I've also made some progress on the gas station scene. I think it's getting very close to being finished.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In other news, I decided to knuckle down and properly learn how to use ribbons. I thought that doing some bullet trails would be a good way to practice using ribbons. So here are some concepts I came up with so that I could do some more exciting ribbons than bullet tracers.</span></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-9RGjbpqjqWA/UksZk82-41I/AAAAAAAABJs/qI1bvHIPOvg/s1600/Concept_Energy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="158" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-9RGjbpqjqWA/UksZk82-41I/AAAAAAAABJs/qI1bvHIPOvg/s400/Concept_Energy.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And here are the renders for the outcomes. I like the overall outcome, in that I think they have an alright aesthetic and that I learnt a lot about how to use ribbons. But I do think that perhaps the impact effects of the electric and energy shots are a little too visually noisy and complicated. I think that they could probably do with being simplified.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is something that I worked up for my next project. I want to work on something that has various stages to it and also something that forces me to use different skills. Plus, it'll be nice to work on something not based in reality.</span></div>
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Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-21669994996126980152013-08-29T05:31:00.001-07:002013-08-29T05:31:14.909-07:00Before and After<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Been working some more on the gas station scene now that I've got the majority of the trial and error out of the way. Below is how it was looking before.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And now for how it's looking at the moment. It's still very much WIP but at least it's an improvement.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As I said, it's still a WIP but it's a vast improvement from my previous attempt. First of all, not sure why the initial explosion is rendering so poorly. But other than that, I still need to rework the RPG as I'm not very practised with using ribbons but I was planning on doing some work with ribbons after this project to get a better sense of them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The fire needs some major work I feel. I think that the material and the particle system is good, but I think that the scale of the texture is wrong. Whilst this would be idea for a torch or a camp fire, it doesn't have enough textural detail to suggest that it's a large roaring fire. I need some more practice creating high detail fire sims anyway so I might do some more to generate the textures I need.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I also need to make the particle system for the fire on the pillar and once I've done that it'll tie in the fire licks that come up over the top, so that they look less out of place and actually have a cause to start. And I also think that I need to give the larger explosion a bit more punch. Though once I've got the ribbon done for the RPG I can reuse it for some debris trails.</span></div>
Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-84054927881119199142013-08-19T13:52:00.001-07:002013-08-19T13:52:57.504-07:00Explosion Updates<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So here's what I've been working on recently. Currently in the process of reworking this gas station scene and here's where I'm at with the explosion. It still needs a lot of work but thought I'd do a quick update. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">First issue is the trails of debris from the explosion. I don't like the use of sprites so I am thinking about using ribbon data instead. I just couldn't get the trails to not be so popcorny. I also need to re time the lighting and work some more on the shape of the explosion. It doesn't look right as it fades when you can see stray sprites. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is something that I've been reworking recently, just tweaking a bit to make it ready for when I redo my portfolio. Though this was also a test of render styles. I was looking back and I didn't like all the black emptiness so I was trying out how fog affects the feel of it. I like it, but I'll probably need to redo the whole scene to make it portfolio ready.</span></div>
Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-10871526439338847092013-08-09T14:56:00.001-07:002013-08-09T14:56:54.674-07:00Progress<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Just a quick update as I've been reworking one of my old projects and I thought it'd be interesting to compare the original and this new one I'm currently working on. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The one on the left is the original and the one on the right is the new one. Admittedly the new one still isn't quite there yet but it's just nice to see the improvement for myself. Though I'm struggling to mesh the fire and the smoke together in a coherent manner. I like the fire, it's got a nice fluidity to it and it has a lot of variation. And I like the smoke, the flow maps give a a good sense of internal motion. But I don't like how they work together, they look too much like separate entities. </span></div>
Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-37502117443123487232013-08-05T08:18:00.002-07:002013-08-05T08:18:32.366-07:00Flame On<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So I've been practising my work with fire in both simulations and realtime work. As I'm currently redoing the gas station scene from scratch I thought that I'd start it properly by going back to making some fluid sims for tests. This was a good opportunity to get some more practice using Maya Fluids. I feel like I'm getting more used to it now, I'm definitely more confident in my ability to use it to create flipbooks and textures. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I made other sims to make into flipbooks as well as use them to generate the textures below.</span></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-C6Nii4ZvcT8/Uf-sgIXc8cI/AAAAAAAABJQ/YEoaos3OojU/s1600/Untitled-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-C6Nii4ZvcT8/Uf-sgIXc8cI/AAAAAAAABJQ/YEoaos3OojU/s400/Untitled-1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Instead of creating flipbooks I decided to have a go at using UV distortion. Although it's more expensive than just using flipbooks, it provides more variation and thus looks more natural. I also implemented alpha erosion within the material as well as I thought it was a more realistic approach to fire, although it bumps up the cost of the material. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Although I like this approach, as it gives a good natural result, I need to work on the alpha erosion as you can see there's some popping. I don't know whether I need to rework the setup or switch back to usual alpha fading. I'll try to stick to alpha erosion as I don't like how the normal alpha fades in and out so uniformly because it doesn't look realistic enough. And yes, I think I may have overdone the bloom :) </span></div>
Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-68030019248637075942013-07-28T11:17:00.002-07:002013-07-28T11:17:49.076-07:00RnD and Sparks<div style="text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So recently I've been doing a bit of RnD whilst finishing off the sparks project. I've been trying to get better acquainted with Maya Fluid Effects. I've used FumeFX before so I have experience with fluid simulations but I've been trying to get used to Maya as I've found it less taxing on my computer and quicker to iterate on. So this is just a quick simulation to get better with it, but I want to get better with it so that I can actually use it for RnD for FX for creating better and more realistic flipbooks. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Another thing I was working on is using distortion for shockwaves in my effects. It's one of those things that I've found really lacking in my work, I didn't really know a good method for it. From left to right; using a black and white texture in the distortion, using a normal map in the distortion, using a panning texture with a sphere mesh, using a panning texture on a ring mesh. I feel that the one on the far left, using just a black and white texture in the distortion, is the strongest visual impact. A method I will employ in future work, especially with effects that have a strong impact or shockwave like explosions.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is the final render for the downed wire project I was working on. I created the animation for the wire in Maya, though it's not a procedural animation so it might not be the most effective approach. I then attached the emitter and animated it in matinee. </span></div>
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Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-23595265437441784692013-07-15T03:50:00.000-07:002013-07-15T03:50:08.480-07:00What's Keeping Me Busy<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So it's been a while I guess, but now that uni's done I'm free to work for myself again. Obviously I've not been working all that hard, but having not seen my family in almost six months means I've had a lot to do since being back. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But it's nice to have the freedom back again. I took a couple of hours the other day to just work on some idea generation. Admittedly, I still need to work on it but it's given some good starts for projects once I finish the projects for my demo reel. </span></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-pkUQRodG7Ro/UeKylw1t-lI/AAAAAAAABI8/X_7BP75slmk/s1600/Ideas_01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="218" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-pkUQRodG7Ro/UeKylw1t-lI/AAAAAAAABI8/X_7BP75slmk/s400/Ideas_01.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-0zJ5hlpvnVA/UeKyl4phDGI/AAAAAAAABIw/0Ikyu7L7dDg/s1600/Ideas_02.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="218" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-0zJ5hlpvnVA/UeKyl4phDGI/AAAAAAAABIw/0Ikyu7L7dDg/s400/Ideas_02.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-7yk9CFiWTPI/UeKyl6BU5HI/AAAAAAAABI4/-mvavcAMoLY/s1600/Ideas_03.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="293" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-7yk9CFiWTPI/UeKyl6BU5HI/AAAAAAAABI4/-mvavcAMoLY/s400/Ideas_03.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Speaking of, here's some of my progress on a couple of projects. First is the base for a downed wire. This is pretty much the particle system done, now I just need to make a wire and make an animation for it and then I can attach the emitter to it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And second is a simple incense burner. This is practically finished I just need to render it out properly as this was done at a low res for speed and ease. But this was a nice project to work on to learn the basics of flow maps and how to create and implement them. Now this is something that I can take over into other projects as well.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As for what I'm working on now, I'm completely redoing the gas station explosion scene. I'd been working on it for too long and I was feeling like it was going nowhere. So I decided to completely redo it and took this as an opportunity to get myself more comfortable with using fluid sims.</span></div>
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Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-52070577520908301542013-06-21T03:35:00.002-07:002013-06-21T03:35:32.826-07:00Depth Bias Alpha and Plans<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So now that I've effectively finished with uni I can finally take the time to get back into doing what I love. So I took some time to sit down and try and learn how to make my own depth bias alpha as it's something I end up using a lot in my FX and it's just so expensive. The base of this is from a section in Bill Kladis' recent tutorial. But I modified it to work directly in cascade as well as using some of the techniques from Uncharted 3's excellent FX presentation.</span></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-pd_8_rD02uk/UcQluEXwaAI/AAAAAAAABHw/rGpA3PQ9qA4/s1600/AlphaTest_01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-pd_8_rD02uk/UcQluEXwaAI/AAAAAAAABHw/rGpA3PQ9qA4/s400/AlphaTest_01.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Above is just a simple test emitter with a simple circle sprite. As you can see where it intersects with the geometry it creates a hard edge.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Using a simple scene depth and pixel depth equation I was able to smooth out the edge. But I linked the control with a dynamic parameter so that I may control the softness of the intersection directly in cascade.</span><br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QI88Rkbl-5Y/UcQlvmxJdeI/AAAAAAAABIA/evxvrX3f6EE/s1600/AlphaTest_04.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QI88Rkbl-5Y/UcQlvmxJdeI/AAAAAAAABIA/evxvrX3f6EE/s400/AlphaTest_04.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Then using the idea behind the fire techniques in Uncharted 3 I was able to run a couple of gradients through the scene depth before it had the pixel depth subtracted from it. This breaks up the straight edge of the intersection to make it more natural and varied. This is great for effects such as fire, which is what I ended up trying it with. Again I can control the amount of noise with a power node connected to a dynamic parameter so I can control it on the fly in cascade.</span><br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1g7FRNlBNQU/UcQlvmTK54I/AAAAAAAABII/OD3PwjXhPZA/s1600/AlphaTest_06.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1g7FRNlBNQU/UcQlvmTK54I/AAAAAAAABII/OD3PwjXhPZA/s400/AlphaTest_06.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Here you can see the material. It's still not exactly cheap so I have to be wary of how many particles I spawn but considering a normal depth bias alpha node generally pushes my materials above 50 instructions it's certainly much cheaper. And I could make it cheaper still, if it's just a smoke or any normal material that needs it I could remove the gradient stuff. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And here is how it looks on a really basic fire emitter. But now I've learnt the basics of how it works I can start implementing this in my pipeline and decrease the instruction counts of my materials.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But now that this little experiment is over I should start thinking about what I'll be working on next. Now I've got the time to start working on my show reel properly, and not a rush job in a week for deadlines. I think that I've got a good starting point for one; I might render out my rain shader properly by itself as a break down of the street scene. I think I need to almost start from scratch with the gas station explosion and redo it. I can take this as an opportunity to really get to grips with Maya Fluids and improve on my skills using fluid sims. As for that spell effect, that just needs to go, it's just weak. But I think that if I worked just a bit more on the beam that I could get that to be a really nice effect.</span>Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-59320477820504213832013-06-14T06:12:00.002-07:002013-06-22T04:45:10.086-07:00Showreel<br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: left;">00:00-00:36 - Alleyway Environment. I worked on all the environmental FX in the scene </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: left;">including all particle emitters and rain shader in UDK. All assets made by me as well.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">00:37-01:00 - Gas station explosion. I made all the emitters and textures. Flipbook textures made in Maya using Maya Fluids and After Effects. In UDK.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">01:01-01:30 - </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Energy beam. I made all textures and emitters. In UDK.</span></div>
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Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6485009343570351643.post-61965991592134807222013-05-22T15:33:00.001-07:002013-05-22T15:33:10.755-07:00Updates and Stuff<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Here's a brief update on my gas station scene. I've not done much to it since the last time I updated. The only major change I've made is redoing the smoke plume after the second explosion. The rest is mainly just tweaking.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In other news, I've also finished up the majority of the work for my final major project at uni. It's so nice to have this finally in it's finishing stages. Not only did I learn a lot from this project but it's nice to have to finished so that I can be free to move onto other projects. </span></div>
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Will Schoolcrafthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03107016582103025262noreply@blogger.com0