Video issues and corridor lighting test

I said that i would post a video of the level today but due to my video software playing up and some unforeseen issues i am unable to at the moment after many hours of trying but i have taken screenshots again of the progress that i have made.

Today i have focused on putting the corridor pieces together and testing out how they would look with lighting, i have been adding normal maps and specular maps to all of the assets in the scene and concentrating on the basics of putting the level together finally, I've been placing all of the corridors to map out the beginning sections. But unfortunately that's all i can do at the moment as i still have to make the rest of the rooms, but now that all of the corridor assets are created and with the last few needing to be textured i have begun designing what the rest of the rooms will look like.

These images are just with basic lighting i haven't got it right yet or done the fine tuning as it was just a test to see what the assets would look like, as they were showing up corrupt and distorted when just imported into a scene without rebuilding the lighting.

Corridor section completed

Corridor with light placement

Corridor from the players viewpoint

The roof of the corridor

All about the detail

The complete wall and pillar

Back to it once again

So after another long, long break away due to stress and distractions in my day to day life i have been working away on creating all the rest of the assets for the corridor so that i can begin to move on with the level and begin getting some game play implemented into it now that i have re-planned the level and narrowed it down a tad, giving the starting section a bit more structure and focus.

Coming back to the level i have recreated assets and created new ones to make a better look for the level for example i have created a new door section to fit in with the new wall section, this piece will be on the corridor side of things instead of on the cell block side like before, it is now bulkier and has a specific door section, in which there is a specific room for the door so that once animated the door can now sit snugly in this indent and not stand out like it did in the previous version. I have also created new doors for the entrance sections, as well as a floor piece to go under it.

Changes will need to be made to all of the old cell-block assets as most of these will no longer fit with the current assets and schemes. Mainly the main floor piece of the cell blocks as it must now fit in with the higher poly floor pieces that link up to the corridor sets. At the moment i am currently finishing creating the grates for the floor and roof pieces. I will be placing all of these assets into the level and creating the main corridor late on today, i will be posting a video of the my work so far on the level later.

This is just a quick update to show what i have been doing over the past few days, again i will upload a video later today showing what the corridor will look like in game and the basic layout of the level. Here are a few images of what i have been doing.

New doors and entrance to cell blocks

Corridor with cell block entrances

A wall communication/ command console

New wall model and slight issue fixes

So even though i haven't been posting over the last few days i have still be working away on my projects, now setting my full focus on my main project once again going back to creating the assets and starting to build up the level inside of UDK.  The first thing i addressed when coming back to the level was finishing the texturing of the new wall piece off and making sure that once placed inside of the editor it worked with the lighting and didn't have dark shades across it where the old piece did. As i did this i bought myself a texture software package in which i could create myself some normal and specular maps for my models.

This is the rendered image of the new wall asset from inside of max.

Asset with standard diffuse map

Asset inside UDK with specular and normal map

What the wall pieces will look like when placed into the level.

Once i had finished texturing the wall piece and had placed it inside of the editor i found that there was an issue when it came to joining the wall pieces together when they came to create a corner. There was a gap in the middle of them so i had to go back and make some quick assets to place in these corners. You can see the pieces in the image above, i created the metal beam for the inner corners and another wall piece for the larger outer corner gap. With building these another issue arose this being that now i had built this extra asset to place along side the walls to join them, the floor piece that was created would no longer be long enough to fit together when connecting to the corner section. This problem is the same with the roof, so i am currently working on the smaller assets to fit in these to fix this slight little issue. Also as i mentioned before i have just purchased a new texturing software package, so now i can create normal maps and specular maps etc. for my assets below is the floor as this is and the wall above are the only two assets to have them on at the moment i will be getting around to creating them for all of the assets currently made as soon as i have fixed the corridor and have gotten that fully finished.

The floor with just a normal texture added to it.

The floor with a normal map and specular map added.

The difference between the two.

Link to Website and the lighting shots

So finally i have published the website and it is now up and running, the website is still in progress and i will continue working on this as i make progress with my projects. Here is the link to the website for anyone who wishes to view it. http://peterknowles.weebly.com/. I have now re worked the lighting in the level to show the two other states within the section, both alarm lighting and the power cut sections.

Alarm Lighting

Power cut sections

Today's progress

So after working away throughout the day i have been working again on my website and within the axis game factory and i have some updates. First off is the work i have been doing inside of the axis game factory as of this morning i had a base map that i had created and just thrown some assets onto while i getting to know the software. But over the course of the day i have scrapped what i originally had and set about a start to actually creating a piece of work for my portfolio. While i was creating the map i have also created some more assets within the editor using the pieces that the software provides, creating these to build up the environment of my level. The assets are as follows.

Manor

Town Hall - Front

Town Hall - Side on view

The level is set on a small little island that is home to a little village that is shut of from the rest of the world. These images are the ones of the map in its original state when i began it earlier today.

The next images are the screenshots i have taken at the end of the work i have done towards it today. These aren't images of the final level as there is still alot i have to do towards it, this is just a stopping point for the day.

This is the overview of the Island as it currently stands

This is the player start and the lead up to the bridge into the village

The bridge across the river to the village

The beginning of the path to the village

Further down the road to the village

A view of the road from a hill

Entrance to the village

The beginning of the outer edge of the village

The village's town hall

The assets in the village for the houses are just make shift ones that will be replaced when new ones are created to add a bit of variety to the town, there will also be things like roads and a town square of sorts in front of the town hall. Now onto the issue of the website, the website will be up and running after i finally figure out what i am going to do as a homepage and the last of the screenshots form my progress from today have been uploaded, it will be more than likely up and running by this time tomorrow and again a link will be posted to it. There will also be some screenshots of the prison cells with the alarm lighting on, i was hoping to have them ready to post with these but it is currently taking its time to bake the lighting for the scene so i will have to post these tomorrow with the link for the website.

Website,Lighting and New Software

So recently i have been working away on my website after letting it get away from me for so long, this has been where most of my time has been set getting that in order so that i will soon be able to publish it and add a link here. The website will however be up and running in the next few days. Anyways from that i have been testing lighting inside of my level in UDK, testing what the prison cells will look like once the lighting is added. Even though these assets are going to be remade i did this for the moment as a sort of place holder, so that without spending time going back and recreating the assets now and loose track of getting the rest of the level created, i could have the cells in there for demo purposes. Below are the images of the cell block with lighting. Today i will be making the lighting for the alarms and the power cut sections and i will upload my progress with that at a later time.

Now onto another thing that has been taking up alot of my time, recently i purchased the axis game factory and have been going about learning to use this. Im using this to create quick maps and levels for portfolio purposes, it is also giving me practice with terrain creation which will help when it comes to later points in the project when i need to create the levels on land.  I have only had the software over the last few days and haven't really gotten that far into building a level as i am still finding my way around the tools and the program. The images below are what i have created so far. I will also be working on this some more throughout the day and will upload my progress at a later point.

House 1

Back of the house

Variant 1

Variant 2

Cell Block Door Section

With the new wall completed I moved onto creating the new door section for the entrance to the holding cells, so far i have started to create the door section and have created the doors. I have also began to texture the pillar as i take breaks from modelling and have unwrapped the uv map for the wall to begin texturing once i finish texturing the pillar.

With the door i have placed lights into it, which on the image below appear to be blue, these will as glow green and red, but instead of online and offline like before with the assets in the cell blocks the lights will glow green for when the door is open and can be passed through and red for when the door is locked. I will also create a standard unlit texture that will be able to be applied to it so that in the sections where the power is off none of the lights will be on.

With the door section i kept it in the same style as the wall section to give it that seem-less fit. The door section will have a panel on the right side of it so the player can use it to get into the cells. This will be created separately because this will have and animated texture on it.

The image below is how the asset will look when combined with the other wall asset to build up the corridor, once the textures are complete i will post the updated version of the assets and scene.

Getting back to things.

I have recently picked back up on the project after working away on a few other things on the side and on coming back to the project i saw some things that needed changing. The first was the walls as i could not find out what was causing there to be a problem with the mesh when it came to lighting i decided to make a new model and model it to a higher poly count and add some extra detail to it just to give it that extra little visual boost. While i have been working on other things i have picked up a few tricks along the way so the textures will be changing between the two models which is what i am currently working away on.

Another thing i have cam back and changed was the pillar, after making it i didnt really think that it fit in with the rest of the assets so again i decided to go back in and remake this, again to a higher poly count to give it that little bit extra. With it i took away the bridged part across the top linking the two pillars and just created it to fit snugly with the roof asset that i went on to create. 

The last thing that i have worked on as just mentioned was the roof asset, this like the floor peices will be created a few times over with variations for where needed, mainly following the shape of the floor beneath it, i have created the main section first and have worked away texturing this, trying my hand at bump mapping and am beginning to look into other sources of mapping. The texture that is now on the asset isnt the final version of the texture as i will at some point be going back into this and editing it so that the there is damage added to it, this will happen for all of the assets adding both damage and wear and tear. 

I have also re-edited all of the floor pieces to now include the lights on the sides as they were on the original model, the main section of the flooring. I will be now replacing these inside of the editor and begin starting to build the corridors of the level as i continue working on the textures and rest of the assets for the level.

Update

Over the last few weeks I have been creating extra assets for the level, these being another few extra floor pieces to give the levels aesthetics another little boost making different ones for the various positions that they were going to be in such editing them but generally keeping the same style of them so that I can keep and overall look and feel to the section.  Alongside creating these I have been working away on concept art for the level, sketching out both plans for the rest of the section and ideas for weapons and characters etc. I will be uploading these soon once I have scanned them onto the computer, after which I will be going into Photoshop and adding extra details to them there.

Floor pieces

I have created all of the floor pieces I will need to create basic corridors within the level, I may at a later stage decided to create specific sections if the need arises but for now the ones I have made will be used for the flooring. I have create a few floor pieces these being the straight section, a corner section, a cross section for joining with rooms and doorways or simply a cross section of corridors and I have also created a T-junction section for the same purpose. I have been working away on getting them texture, all with the same colour pallet and including small lights in them all to give it that sci-fi feel.

Straight Piece

Corner Piece

Cross section

Junction

Main wall

I have also textured the wall, I have encountered a problem with the wall when it has come to texturing it as the texture looks fine when it is inside 3DS Max and when it is rendered in there but once it is placed into UDK and the lighting is turned on there is a problem with shadows on the mesh, so I will be going back to look into this problem further in the near future.


This is what the corridor looks like when it is placed together. There are still some parts missing that i am currently on working on, but this is the basic look of what the corridor will look like.