#xb3992futureworks

XB3992 Honours Project: Character Arm Creation & Rigging

With my honours project Sensory being a first-person interactive level based around a character one of the aspects I am aiming to create a character that feels more like an actual organic game character for the player than a looking glass into the game world.

To do this I have expanded further on the character modelling of the protagonist character adding baseline clothing for the arms and began the animation/rigging process for the arms themselves.

For the clothing to stay within the theme of the opening environment of Sensory being set within a low poly apocalyptic street I have created a jumper sleeve and a pair fingerless gloves as these are common attire seen within post-apocalyptic themed games and visual media due to the practicality the clothing provides within such an environment.

Such attire can be seen on character meshes within games such as Metro Last Light, The Last of Us and Television shows and comics such as The Walking Dead.

After creating such clothing for the character I began the process of applying skeleton bones and creating a basic character reference that once finished will serve as the bone structure for a complete set of character arms and legs.

My overall design goal for the arms and legs is to animate a natural arm swing that replicates that of an organic human being when casual walking and a set of legs that move in accordance to that of an actual set of human leg movements when casually walking through an environment.

Image References:

https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwi93oWMps3WAhUEuBoKHQerDtIQjRwIBw&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.pinterest.com%2Fpin%2F183099541073090284%2F&psig=AOvVaw0SGscXxS0ADFMKkdE08wpP&ust=1506873089795191

https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjqluegps3WAhUB2RoKHUR6Ba4QjRwIBw&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.rockpapershotgun.com%2Ftag%2Fmetro-2033-last-light%2F&psig=AOvVaw2oekdZuhaTJeupAONL9ZVq&ust=1506872944911293

XB3992 Honours Project - Sensory - Official Release Trailer:

Above you can find the official Youtube video for the official launch trailer for my honours project Sensory.

With one of my deliverables being an official launch trailer for Sensory to add an additional portfolio piece to my body of work but also present within a professional showreel for the Futureworks degree show.

Focusing on my specialism of game production I wanted to also add to my showcase of production knowledge that I can also prepare a piece of media for marketing purposes that could be used to release to target audiences and to the world as a whole.

I worked with freelance video editor Kieran Rogers to produce a trailer that would be fit for marketing purposes should this game be launched as an indie title, displaying the overall narrative of the game without revealing too much of the environment or overall narrative as a whole.

Overall I am extremely pleased with the trailer as it fits my stated deliverable as a game trailer and could be marketed as an official launch trailer for an indie game should I choose to develop Sensory further outside of my academic studies. 

REFERENCES:

All editing in this trailer was performed by freelance video editor Kieran Rogers. 

XB3992 Honours Project - Sensory Finished - Final Honours Project Walkthrough - Honours Project Completed:

Above you can find a complete walkthrough of my honours project for XB3992 Honours Project, Sensory a first-person, interactive narrative based experience.

From the initial concept idea for my honours project, I always set out to create a narrative focused experience based on a singular character’s experience with sensory overload and how the disorder affects the individual within the current situation they find themselves in.

The original concept from a narrative, gameplay and world-building aspect was always to create the story of a young woman who wakes up in the apocalypse to find everyone has vanished, and the shock of the reality sends her into sensory overload.

To save her from going into mental shutdown her mind mentally takes her to a place of comfort, a world where the noisiness and decay of the real world no longer exists and instead she is taken to a place of life, wonder, purity and calmness where she can be safe from the reality her mind is desperate to save her from.

Overview:

Overall I have been able to achieve, produce and develop more than I originally intended for Sensory, with the original environment only consisting of a single apocalyptic street, through constant feedback I have been able to develop the once planned street into a full section of a city & make the overall gameplay experience longer and more content packed for players as a result.

I am pleased with the voice acting, audio and music elements of the project also as they have been done to an excellent standard and have only helped me deliver the narrative of the world to the player even more as the audio/music really help immerse the player into the world.

I am also extremely pleased with how the art/visual elements of the project turned out as I have been able to create the visual style I originally aimed for with the game but also replicate concept artwork created by Naia Skrinjar for the project to help make the visual aesthetics of the sensory overload world even more appealing from an art style perspective.

Successes:

. All intended VO, audio and music was implemented into the project allowing for the narrative of the story to be told to the player

. I extremely happy with how the apocalyptic and sensory overload world have turned out from an art and level design perspective as they have not only matches what I set out to achieve but have surpassed their original concepts in terms of scope

. In terms of technical performance, I am pleased with how the project performs at a high framerate capacity and also has all planned mechanics/systems implemented into the final version of the game itself

What I would change:

. If I had realised how much artistic impact Naia Skrinjar’s concept art would be within the environmental structure/aesthetics of the sensory overload world, I would have brought Naia onto the project sooner when developing the apocalyptic city environment, to help increase my own understand of what other design routes I could have gone down with the environment

. Due to the audio team's personal project deadlines, I was forced to speed up development of the sensory overload world losing an additional week, in order to gain all ambient game audio within Sensory, this caused me to not be able to fully develop the autumn season section of the sensory overload world as much as I wanted, going back I would have allocated more contingency time to allow for more development

References:

All artwork produced in this post and throughout the project has been created by artist Naia Skrinjar and is of her own production and not by myself Simran Whitham.

XB3992 Honours Project - Sensory - Developer Diary Finished!!:

Working alongside post-production student Lauren Georgia the final polished and deliverable developer diary documenting the development of my honours project Sensory has now been finalised and completed.

The developer diary showcases the entire production of my honours project from start to finish tieing into my specialism of production and showing how I can manage multiple aspects of game development and manage a team of specialists with multiple skill sets and specialisms to achieve an end result and final media product.

What went well?

From the initial research stages, production and final polishing stages of the project Lauren Georgia has been great to work with on the direction and visual communication elements of the dev diary and its overall purpose.

Every month I have recorded and labelled the weeks/purpose of each development video and met up with Lauren to pass the content on with constant communication and feedback on the editing of the developer diary being a constant direction between us both in terms of a final product.

Overall:

XB3992 Honours Project - Sensory third island & entire world’s finished:

Last week I finalised and finished off the remaining polishing of the third island within the sensory overload world of my honours project marking the end of the all the 3D modelling, world building, environment art and aesthetic elements of the project and resulting in Sensory being officially remaining now that all audio/music and blueprinting elements within the project are finished.

All that remains now is to polish some blueprinting elements of the project & potentially package the project which will then result in Sensory being officially ready for hand in date alongside my other project deliverables.

References:

All artwork produced in this post and throughout the project has been created by artist Naia Skrinjar and is of her own production and not by myself Simran Whitham.

XB3992 Honours Project - Sensory Audio Update - All VO and sensory overload world sounds/music implemented & finished!

Working alongside Futureworks game audio students Joe Foulds and Tom Bennett we have now managed to implement all the narrative voice acting & ambient sensory overload sounds into the whole project.

With Tom Bennett just adding some additional polish to the now complete game sounds we can say that all the voice acting/game audio has now been implemented into Sensory and all that remains for the project is some blueprinting polish.

What went well?

From the moment of the project’s production, the production pipeline of the sound’s production has been at a very high quality with Tom and Joe working to an Excel sheet list of sounds displayed at all times.

We have been able to implement all the audio, Kym Veldman’s voice acting and Martyn Stonehouse’s music soundtracks into the game with no issues or errors surfacing making the entire audio elements of the project a smooth operation and not holting development of the project much.

What could have gone better?

Due to Joe and Tom not being able to work on the same project as me at all times due to the technical complications of installing Sourc Control into Unreal Engine, we we’re forced to pass the project back and forth between one another whilst the audio team implemented their audio/Martyn’s music into the core build of Sensory.

This at times halted my development by a maximum of 3 days twice whilst Tom and Joe made sure all the audio was in a quality state.

Overall?

XB3992 Honours Project - Sensory Feedback Session - Autism Nurse Jeanette Donnelley:

At the beginning of the academic year (September 2017), I invited Barry Bennett, autism nurse Jeanette Donnelley to Futureworks to provide me with some suggestions on how I would originally go about communicating the sensory overload narrative to players of the game and how to go about developing it into the game from a visual standpoint and how the condition affects individuals on an individual basis.

On the 20th of March 2018, I invited Jeanette back to Futureworks to get her opinion on how the project has developed and what her opinion on the final production stage of the project does for communicating sensory overload to players.

Feedback:

Jeanett’s feedback on the overall project in it’s current stages were as follows:

. Overall she loved the visual style of the game, and from her many years of experience of dealing with patience who have suffered from sensory overload feels like this world does an excellent job of community the safety mechanism a lot of autistic individuals brain’s lock their hosts into to stop the body from going into physical shock

. From an audio standpoint she thought the white noise was a very good audio signifyer to indicate how an individual suffering from sensory overload would slowly sink into a state of overbearing and unbearable phycological shock and that the noise is progressive is a good element of the audio feedback

. Due to her lack of knowledge of video game systems or functions Jeanette was not able to give much feedback in terms of how to better develop the narrative from a mechanical standpoint, level design or narrative design standpoint however did say that from a visual standpoint she was very impressed with the project

Moving Forward?

XB3992 Honours Project - Foundry 42 - Cloud Imperium Games - Star Citizen - Vehicle Artist Joe Neville & Environment Artist Chris Reid - Sensory feedback and critique session:

On the 22nd of March 2018, we received a guest lecture from Foundry 42, Star Citizen environment artist Chris Reid and Senior Vehicle Artist Joe Neville, in which after the lecture they performed a critique of people’s honours project to provide creative input.

From both individuals, the response was massively positive on the project as a whole and much creative input was provided and slight touches that could be added now that the project has exited it’s production stages and into the final polishing stages.

Joe Neville Feedback:

. The overall art style is extremely beautiful and contrasts very well with both environments and is visually very pleasing

. Whilst the game is an FP, interactive narrative based experience Joe really focused a lot of emphasis on how the art style I have created for Sensory could best be implemented into a platformer type game and think’s that’s where the game’s art style truly lies in terms of gaming experience

. The low poly water present in both environments is extremely visually pleasing to both Joe and Chris and feels like blue water in the sensory overload world really helps sell the tranquil atmosphere I have been trying to build with the environment

. Joe was also extremely impressed with the concept art behind the project produced by Naia Skrinjar and liked how I have been able to take her concept designs and manifest them into a game world and believes the project should be continued after university with us both working on it

Chris Reid Feedback:

. Without the VO implemented throughout the whole experience, Chris struggled to understand the overarching narrative of the project.

To counteract this issue I have now passed on Sensory to the audio team Joe Foulds & Tom Bennett to implement the remaining VO, game audio and musical scores to the project to better communicate the narrative of the game

. The snow placed on the floor of the cave exit leading into the sensory overload world environment needs to be removed as this is a world that is meant to be pure and clear of the busyness of the previous apocalyptic world in terms of environmental asset placement, and having the snow clutter the floor of the cave entrance contrasts with the overall narrative theme of this world, I have since after receiving this feedback removed the snow from the cave exit floor

. Like Joe, Chris stated the overall art style of the game works very well and thinks I have done very well with the colour palette selection and the game is very strong in terms of visual development as the transition between environments is beautiful as the whole world changes but the style of environments remain consist and consistent throughout the game

Moving Forward?