Monday - Visual Design
After having just modelled my character from the previous week, I was exited to see what everyone else had produced. Although, since mine was made form Plasticine, it was damaged rather badly through transport, so I guess it was a good thing that we didn't layout all of our models... Oh dear. Moving on though, we were given the self portrait project to do for this week. How I went about it was researched a little into the facial structure by looking at the underlying muscles, and having looked more at the skull in the previous project, there was a foundation that I could work from.
Taking the 30 photographs of my face from different angles and facial expressions was interesting I have to say. It really makes you aware of what you look like to other people when in motion. I started with some quick sketches of my face, studied individual features alone (e.g. Nose, Eyes, Mouth etc), then did a couple which brought all of it together and settles on a final which turned out not bad - There's still something off about it, maybe the head needs squashing down every so slightly?:
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| Self Portrait - It's a bit off: Lips slightly off, and nose is misshapen! |
I would have liked to have done a digital painting too because I know it would be great practice to do so - I therefore might do one over Easter (if I get the time), just because it will be fun as well as beneficial to my learning.
Life drawing was also rather good, we did some more with water colours, focusing on contrast, form and negative space. I didn't feel very well at the start and had to leave for about 10 mins, but carried on after as normal. We painted everything but the model, leaving us with a white silhouette. To finish, we did the same with, but then painted the model after painting the background, so this was rather tricky because if you got the size of the model wrong, it was essentially forcing you to paint the wrong proportions, knowing you made a mistake but couldn't go back and change it.
Tuesday - Game Production
This week's lesson was quite interesting (as usual), since we were taught the basics of rigging our characters. I know mine is far away from rigging, but it was good too do some prep work before I get to that stage so that I don't panic. The process for this rig is very straight forward and just how I imagined it to be, although, I naively thought that you wouldn't have to go in and adjust the weight of every single vertex to go along with the movements (Maybe a button which did that for you?... No). This isn't a problem, it just means I'll be able to really get stuck in and deep with the tweaking until everything looks good - The downside if obviously more time will need to be invested than I previously estimated, putting me a little behind in terms of where I should be at by this stage.
Currently, my gladiator has got all of his armour (unwrapped), and I am in the process of unwrapping his body appropriately. I've come across a couple of problems in the modelling such as overlapping vertices, but have fixed them rather swiftly.
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| Gladiator so far |
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| Currently unwrapping the head |
To be honest, I really would like to have my armour textured and his body completely unwrapped by now. I really don't know why I haven't done that yet, but hopefully I'll get it done soon so I can move on to texturing the body.
Friday - Critical Studies
Another late night beforehand made it difficult to get up for the 9am lecture, but I soldiered on in good 'tired student' spirits. The lecture presented by Emma was quick and information filled. She went through with us the stages of level design. I don't know what I thought the general stages were before attending this lecture, but it certainly wasn't as long as what it really is. I guess it broke everything down into the different elements in a level which is something probably overlooked by many people because most of the time it all just blends together so well that you don't notice how much thought has gone into making everything work together. All in all, I thoroughly enjoyed hearing about more or less how a level is designed. There maybe times when multiple iterations of the level need to be assessed and worked on much more before settling on a final, but the principle remains similar.
The seminar looked into applying for a job in industry, and I'm going to be completely honest here and say... It scared me a little. Don't get me wrong, the idea of actually getting a job is amazing, but the level of skill that is required even for a technically 'simple' job is still so high, that you really have to bring your 'A-Game' with your portfolio. There's so many other people potentially after the same job as you, and you need to be so much better than them to get hired. I think this will be my biggest challenge.
I know soft skills also play an important role in employability, but if I am in a group and we need to get a task done, I know that I'll be easy to work with - I guess that's my big positive!
Analysis of another job:
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| Example - Junior placement artist |
They want:
-Someone who works & communicates well in a team = Tick
-Creative person with a passion for games = Tick
-Strong skills in both 2D & 3D = Working towards
-Good portfolio = Working Towards
-Willingness to learn = Ticked a thousand times
-Excellent knowledge in 3ds max & photoshop = Working towards
Everything about this job appeals to me, the only thing that would stop me right now is the fact that I'm not yet at the standard required, hence why I'm on this course trying to get better. I think everyone doing this type of course is aiming for near enough the same goal: To get better than the majority of people in 3D work & 2D work to create amazing new things for games. In order to do that I MUST, continue practicing everything we cover on the course, and widen my knowledge of just about everything there is in terms of software packages, design processes, art techniques etc.
Personal interests this week
For quite some time now, I have been watching online tutorials for Photoshop retouching. I think I have mentioned this in a very early blog, but I've continued with it and it's become a bit part of what I like to do in my spare time now. I am bursting to try out so many things I've learnt on actual images (Not ones from the internet), and a friend of mine allowed me to use some of her modelling photos to 'play about with' and just try different things. I originally started with the intention that it will help with my texturing/photo-manipulation, but carried on because even if it isn't being used for my uni work, I have developed a large interest in this area. I'd like to further my understanding in Photography, lighting, what works aesthetically etc, and hopefully buy a decent camera of my own... The only problem as always in money. So, I don't know when in the future, but my aim is to get a decent camera and take my own pictures from life and edit those using the Photoshop techniques I've learnt and hopefully create some cool images!
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