The Dojang

Ah…now I understand…thanks

Bazza

Some time ago Alan suggested a Dojang ( a martial arts traing hall) thingie for my futuristic city scene.
I liked the idea but thought I could do a better job with a medieval scene. I trawled the net for some ideas but came up with very little so all this is just made up as I went along.
This project was going to need quite a few figures to bring the scenes to life so I had to watch the poly count from the word go….not just the structures but for the figures as well. There are 16 animated charcters in the main hall with more to come.

First up, the main hall….the figure in the center is one of Polybuilders characters…a Kendo type guy…still very much WIP, around 1200 polys
The figure to the left with the stick is my teacher character, again about 1200 polys…the guys stood around the sides are novices..these are very low poly…around 600 polys each with a very small uv map…only 256×256.
All are animated to some extent, apart from the Kendo guy…this needs the anims and texture finishing.

All models built with 3DC
Textures with Paint Shop Pro and Photoshop
Unwraps with Ultimate Unwrap 3D
Lightmaps with Gile
Screenshots from Blitz 3D

Bazza

There are two chambers off the main hall. The main hall is where the training takes place, the two side chambers are for combat…that should be an interesting bit of animation…as yet they look a bit empty without any figures but I’ll get that sorted next.

Bazza

From the main hall you can cross a courtyard to the workshops, I enjoyed building this…only three figures here at the moment…a blacksmith in the background…another teacher and my latest figure….a heroine type…I call her Bex.
My animation and figure modelling isn’t all that good so for Bex I increased the poly count to around 2000 and the uv map to 1024×1024…She is only partialy animated…she walks the tough guy walk and I’ve done 3 different idle routines…but it takes me ages….LOL
More about the blacksmith later…he’s fully animated….he knocks hell out of a metal bar, I created the sparks in Blitz with Particle Candy…they actually bounce of the anvil…great stuff.

Bazza

This pic really doesn’t do the scene justice….I wanted to create some kind of power scource…so decided on a large water wheel which is at the other end of the workshop…..I NEVER learn….LOL
Having built the wheel and the water I then had to get the water to reflect the scene…including the animated water wheel…groan.
Anyway, I sorted that but then had to get the water to move and lap around the edges of the well thingie..bigger groan.
So I got that sorted but then needed some water falling from the wheel and splashing onto the main surface water…should I go for electric power…much simpler.
Anyway I used Particle Candy in Blitz and after a weeks work I got it sorted….tumbling water that splashes onto the surface and creates ringlets as it does so..not only that but I added some 3D sound of splashing water to the particles.
As you get closer to the wheel the sound gets louder. So although this still image is a bit weak it looks and sounds great in game.

Bazza

The courtyard…not much to say about this…I went for the moonlite appraoch…the doors in the distance are the entrance to the workshop…the doors on the left are for a temple thingie (when I get it built).
There are 25 flaming tourches around the scene…Particle Candy again.

Bazza

The blacksmith character…this like the water caused problems but I’d built the figure so this routine took ages to sort.
I wanted him to hit and inspect the hot metal bar…not a problem….Pics 1and2. However after a couple of mins watching him do this it became obvious more was needed…So….
I decided to make him quench the metal bar…no problem…Pic 3
Of course, when he removed the bar from the water, it still glowed red…AAAAaaaaaaaarrrgggghhh!!!!!!
I’m not going to tell you how I solved this one but I did…see Pic 4
I now had a blacksmith with a cold metal bar so had to get him to turn round and re-heat the bar in the forge behind him, I now had the opposite problem…when he removed the bar from the forge it had to come out glowing…solved that as well…LOL…About 1200 polys unwrapped to a 512×512 uv map

Bazza

Bex the heroine.
About 2000 polys, unwrapped to a 1024×1024 uv map. This has taken about 3 weeks so far. I’ve never done a female character before so there where many false starts…all those curves and stuff…then you sit looking at the blank uv map thinking..’What is it that makes a face look female?’…I still don’t know…HeHeHe.

Bazza

The teacher …About 1200 polys unwrapped to a 512×512 map. Guys are much easier to model but figures are something I don’t really enjoy doing much…maybe bacause I’m not that good at it…I find it very hard work.
Anyway he’s animated and struts around inspecting people and bowing a lot.
The cloak was a bit awkward to animate, I thought it would be easier then building legs but it’s harder to get the ‘cloth’ to move correctly in a walk anim I found.

Bazza

Last up…the Kendo charcter….As I said earlier this is one of Polybuilders figures….I’ve left it in so if anyone is interested this is how they look during construction.
The model is built in 3DC…then exported to Ultimate Unwrap 3D for the unwrap.
Next it is imported into the game/demo scene in Blitz3D, unpainted. It’s much easier to paint the uv map with the figure in place in it’s final scene and lighting set up. You start painting the map and then running the Blitz file to see how it looks.
You can start animating at any time, you don’t have to finish the map first. This is how this figure is at the moment, the map is really only ‘blocked’ in for now, although the face is in place and completed.
Now you can load this same file into your favorite animation app to start the animations.
I use a program called Fragmotion for animation, James(Polybuilder) uses PaceMaker.
However James is at University now learning all things to do with 3D modeling, animation etc so it could be a while before this figure is completed.
Thats it for now.

Bazza

This all looks great. Expecially the Backgrounds… and the blacksmith, nice.

Thanks hashpling….appreciate the feedback.
I’ve got the Bex figure fully animated now…my best yet, so I’m quite happy with that.

I’m messing around trying to get some moonbeam/sunbeam effects…getting there slowly.
It’s still very WIP…don’t usually show this stuff till it’s finished. Thanks again.

Bazza

missed this one – sorry.

Looking very good Bazza – A lot better than any of the halls I used to teach/train in <!– s:) –><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_e_smile.gif" alt="" title="Smile" /><!– s:) –>

Keep up the good work ! <!– s:) –><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_e_smile.gif" alt="" title="Smile" /><!– s:) –>

Thanks Alan…just need to get some action going now in the main hall.

Bazza

Dreamcast called. They’re doing another Shenmu and want to talk.