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View Full Version : Mastering Unreal - Project 1 - Egyptian Level 1 WIP

Lee3dee
10-03-2003, 11:03 PM
Well, i finally started working on the first lesson. The Egyptian level. Here is my level layout, with rough sketches.

Let me explain the level. Its 3 levels, with circular arenas on each. On the top floor are 2 main rooms and 2 hallways that lead into the 2nd layer.
- room 1 is the snake chamber, and will have snakes, moving inside. hopefully, going to achieve this with animated static meshes. Above the door, is the snake guardian, who will also be animated.
- Room 2 has a pharoh's face with the tongue coming out that leads the player into the hall of mummys. The pillars will contain coffins with undead mummies sticking out of them.

An obilisk sits in the middle of all the rooms, its broken into 3 pieces, where the level meets, and will contain a power up.

The 2nd level will be mainly a center level, connecting the 2 other levels.

Level 3rd level, Is a pit which holds the redemer. but, surrounding the redemer is hundreds of scarabs. For the scarabs animated, I'm going to animate 1, and then use the max crowd simulation to create the texture of hundreds of them. so, the player will have the option to double jump to the redemer, but they may have a harder time, getting back.

This level is going to be very complicated, compared to most levels that I have played and seen. Most levels don't contain animated static meshes, and I want to make my level streaming with life :)

http://www.lee3dee.com/level/egyptian/egypt_con01.jpg
http://www.lee3dee.com/level/egyptian/egypt_con02.jpg
http://www.lee3dee.com/level/egyptian/egypt_con03.jpg

comments are always welcome ;)
Lee3dee
10-03-2003, 11:04 PM
http://www.lee3dee.com/level/egyptian/egypt_pharoh01.jpg

http://www.lee3dee.com/level/egyptian/egypt_snake01.jpg

comments are always welcome ;)
Lee3dee
10-04-2003, 01:51 AM
damm, working like a madman today. Snake texture is about 20% complete, but i did manage to sneak in some test animation during work time.

please take a look, and let me know what u think. This is the snake guardian, its 35 frames and will repeat. its 15 frames a second, so it may seem a bit fast. I have to test it in the level tonight, to see the right speed.

Snake Animation Test 01 - 248kb (http://www.lee3dee.com/contents/level/egyptian/snakes_test2.avi)
SecretAgent
10-04-2003, 06:10 PM
Hey, this is looking pretty interesting. When I first read about how you want to have all the animated snakes I immediately thought of that board in the old game "Smash TV" with all those snakes on screen.

Anyways, so far it seems like a good concept as long as you can pull off all the animations like you mentioned - it would look very nice indeed. Your right about the snake animation being a little fast but, it looks good.

keep up the good work, I look forward to seeing more.
TheWriter
10-05-2003, 06:04 AM
I like how it's going so far. I myself hate seeing levels/games that are too static. Just watch the poly counts so you can keep the framerate high. One thing I HATE is lag with my mouse.
Lee3dee
10-05-2003, 05:23 PM
Thxs for the comments :).

Eric: "big money, big prizes, I love it" "good luck, you'll need it"
smash TV was one of my favorite games. I must of spent more than the machine was playing it. :)

TheWriter: I am a low-poly geek, so for example the snake u see here is only 862 polys and the pharaoh head is about 2000 polys, im shooting for 1500 after optimization. I agree with u about the lag time and I do have that in-mind ;). I hate when the screen laggs on my geforce 4 ;)
Hysteria
10-06-2003, 02:46 AM
Looking good, but what do you mean by Mastering Unreal?
Lee3dee
10-06-2003, 03:26 AM
Mastering Unreal (http://www.masteringunreal.com) is a 3D Buzz Online Class. They have videos called VTM's that you can download if you want to learn the Unreal editor. I've been wanting to learn the UT editor and this was a great opportunity for me. Whats great about the class, is that its in your own time, there are no due dates. So its great for us working people, who enjoy modeling at home too ;)

The class is fairly simple, u watch the VTMs and then take the quizzes. which allow you to so the projects. here's an expample taken from the 1st assignment.

THEME: This first level must have an Ancient Egyptian theme. It must “feel” like it takes place in Ancient Egypt (no steel walls, pipes, fusion reactors, etc.). You will, however be allowed to add elements give a “supernatural” effect, such as crystals, glowing objects, etc.

We will only accept your first submission, so please make sure you are happy with it before you send it. The room must be able to load and play relatively smoothly. Remember to play-test your level throughout the creation process!"

needless to say, im putting alot of effort in ;), I want it to look and play good.
Hysteria
10-07-2003, 12:15 AM
Oh yea, the course based on the VTMs he made a while back... I already watched all the vids... Pretty good I guess, but it really didn't teach *all* that much... Oh well. You seem very equiped for the project :p I totally suck at mapping and don't have any original ideas so why bother :p
TheWriter
10-07-2003, 01:43 AM
Hmm 3dbuzz has some funky signup thing where they sell your info to other companies when you download their videos. Anywhere else I could check these out without my privacy exploited?
SammyB
10-08-2003, 01:54 PM
Originally posted by TheWriter
Hmm 3dbuzz has some funky signup thing where they sell your info to other companies when you download their videos. So? He's providing the video's for free, I don't see why it's an issue...
TheWriter
10-08-2003, 06:41 PM
Just forget it...
Lee3dee
10-08-2003, 07:24 PM
ok, ok. I signed up and I get no junk email from them. U have the option to get newsletters. Its just a great resourse to be able to learn using the free videos that 3d buzz provides. Please, lets not bash each other :)
Lee3dee
10-09-2003, 04:14 AM
Pharaoh texture, about 60% complete. suggestions are greatly appreciated. poly count reduced to 1722.

http://www.lee3dee.com/level/egyptian/phar_text_01.jpg

editor screen shot
http://www.lee3dee.com/level/egyptian/hmmm01.jpg

Snake animation tweaking, animation crit also if you would pls :)
Snake guardian, loop animation - 536KB (http://www.lee3dee.com/contents/level/egyptian/snake_test3.avi)

2 am last night, I successfully imported the animated static mesh into UT, now in the process of scripting it to animate.

thx
Hysteria
10-09-2003, 06:42 AM
You're obviously very experienced with UnrealEd lol. Looking good, but I don't really like the animation.... It might just be the quality.
Lee3dee
10-09-2003, 01:45 PM
the snake animation is only 35 frames. I tried to keep it down, since it repeats. and I didn't want to have frame rate drops for the slow graphics cards. I can make i higher res avi if you need.
Hysteria
10-13-2003, 02:19 AM
more updates damn you.
Lee3dee
10-14-2003, 02:42 AM
sorry, going as fast as i can. during the day, I work as a 3d artist, at night 3 days a week i work on my level and 2 day I freelance on an xbox game. the updates are coming :) i promise.
SecretAgent
10-14-2003, 09:10 PM
the Pharoah statue texture looks pretty good but, doesn't seem to portray scale very well. You might consider adding lines that represent stone blocks that it was built out of to help out with the feeling of scale. does that make any sense?
fixxorion
10-21-2003, 12:34 AM
TheWriter: I've been a member of 3dbuzz for almost 2 years now, and recently, I've started helping out with the website and the making of videos. 3DBuzz is always struggling for money, but never has 3DBuzz sold information to companies of any kind. Please don't throw dirt on a website without knowing what you're talking about...it's very immature.

Later,

fixxorion
Lee3dee
10-21-2003, 08:54 PM
sorry, for the lack of updates, been busy at work. updating at the end of the week.

ps. Eric22, thx for the good advice, I did make it a little better.
Lee3dee
11-17-2003, 05:30 AM
its been like a month and total silence on my part. I wanted to appologize to everyone. Been very busy at work and no motivation when I get home. Not tonight :) its amazing what coffee can do at 12am!

scarab mesh complete
http://www.lee3dee.com/level/egyptian/scarab.jpg

Snake animation: This will be triggered by the player, when passed by. kind like a door opening, but the snake will move. should look very cool :)
http://www.lee3dee.com/level/egyptian/snake_anim.swf

Plan of attack from now until March 2004

Meshes to be completed:
Pillars w/mummies stuck in them
hand steps
mummified bodies
snakes mouth teleport
ziggurat temple
ziggurat temple rotating pharoah face
Urners (jugs)
nefretiti statues
broken walls
rocks
snakes

Animated Meshes:
Mummies Praying (to the pharoah face)
Mummies Cheering (in background)
snakes bodies pulsating (in walls)


challenge for me, is not to use any textures or static meshes done by epicgames. Will feature all original artwork. Goal is to have all modeled and textured by end of January 2004. Then start building and populating level, adding bot paths. Due for competion end of March 2004.
Lee3dee
11-26-2003, 03:05 AM
woah! Been a long time for a real update. Finished modeling the mummie to be use for praying, and crowd animations. working on texturing at the moment. I have approximately 10 static meshes remaining.

I completed the first of 4 animations for the mummies. For those who have played UT2003, the opening of the game has spectators in the stands. I thought to give my bland level some atmosphere, id try and do a similar thing, except have mummies as spectators. Should prove very cool, if I can pull it off. ;)

Please check out my pray animation, and let me know what you think. thx :)

Default Mummie for animating
http://www.lee3dee.com/level/egyptian/crowd2.jpg

Pray Animation, 40 Frames, 494 Polys (http://www.lee3dee.com/level/egyptian/prayTest.swf) 2mb file

Next animation, the pharoah stadium crowd, here's 1 with a foam finger ;)
http://www.lee3dee.com/level/egyptian/crowd1.jpg

Crits always welcome!
Lee3dee
11-30-2003, 01:52 AM
no crits on anything in a while :( my thread must have died.
kotter
11-30-2003, 09:07 AM
just keep posting, whe're all watching ;)

btw. the pray test look pretty good, just fix those twiches
Digital Ninja
11-30-2003, 07:06 PM
Heya Lee,

Sorry for not replying sooner :), I think the animation is really good, but the model I think needs some work, right now it looks more like a rag doll practice dummy like you would see in a dojo.

I am not sure whether it's the finished model, but some things I see you could tweak:

- The weighting between the shoulder and body, right now his arms seem dislocated at the shoulder. Also either the upper arm is a little short, or the forearm is to long, it hard to tell from the angle but his arms look disporportionate for some reason.

- The neck is a little thin, I think he needs more of a chin instead of the head just smoothing down into the neck.

It's hard to see the legs so I can't really crit on that, but since they will be kneeling anyway I guess it wouldn't matter.

Since its a mummy, you may want to thin him out a little, think of like a human that has rotted all his flesh and muscle away then is all wrapped up.

The mummy from Shinx: And the Cursed Mummy is a perfect exaple, no muscles, just bones.

Hope that helps, it's looking great so far, can't wait to play it!

-DN
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