User blog:BrickfilmNut/What I've Been Working On

Since the whole "Sharing Progress" thing is not as necessary now that we've been reduced to a handful of members, I figured I'd just put my progress here. It's not as cool or helpful as what Allen's progress has been, but I'm trying my best to make some headway.

Short Legged Minifigure Model
I made a short-legged minifigure for characters like the dwarves and shorter ice monsters (provided we're still doing the latter). It was made with Allen's Minifigure 34 as a starting point, so the legs themselves would probably have to be transferred over to whatever the current model is, but hey, now we have it. :P

Book
Took LeoCAD's book piece and modified it/added to it so that all the normals are good, it has interior detail, etc. Some detail may be able to removed further if the tri count is too high (it's at 411 right now), but I don't think too much could be removed since it's basically already just a piecing together of prisms. As can be gathered from my last statement, the modelling itself is not that impressive, but I've managed to rig it using copy-rotation and rotation-limiting constraints so that it folds in and out very nicely.

Laptop
This one I had to model from scratch, so it's probably not too accurate. I tried looking for a good reference image, but nothing fit my purposes, so the best I could do were LDD screenshots, which are hardly accurate, so Jeyo's probably going to kill me... :P Luckily for me, I'm not sure if Acrea has any laptops, so maybe the inaccuracy won't be a concern at all. Why would I model it if SoA wouldn't use it? Well, I decided to finally finish my sig-fig, which uses a lap-top, and it was a pretty quick thing to model/rig once I had finished the system for the book. Oh, and I got to learn how to use the boolean modifier! Well, if it does get used in SoA, I'll probably make a few changes. Some for aforementioned accuracy, and some because the tri value is currently estimated at 1000, but that should be an easy-enough fix through normal mapping, which I've recently discovered I am able to do without screwing up. :P

Builds and Stuff
Other things that I'm not sure about SoA usage are little creations in LDD. These are not necessarily exceptional, but they're ideas that I think could find their way into SoA if need-be. You can see these in another blog I'm posting later, which I won't bother to link to since it'll be easy to see under WikiActivity/RecentChanges I'm sure.

Learning to use Unity
Recently, I've been learning to use Unity. I now am able to code a bit in C#, and I have enough of a grasp of most of the concepts to make my own small games. It'll still probably be a bit of a while until I can contribute my own code, but for now, at least I can code, technically, and I understand the significance of normals and everything now. :P

Trees and What I'm Working On Now
Now that all the above is done, I'll just make a few touch-ups to one or two of the models above and primarily continue working on environmental models and whatnot for the game. I have found the basic "technique" that I want to use, and attempted one model using it as you can see in the thumbnail. Boba and Mvp commented that it's a bit too realistic-looking for SoA, and honestly, it wasn't perfect anyway, so I'll try some new styles and update my progress as I create models for them. I really don't want to go full-LU, as I think their trees (especially the conifers) are a bit ridiculous, but I'll maybe find some middle-ground. Like some less-realistic textures, more interesting tree shapes, etc. If you have any ideas, comment below.

[[File:TreeTest1.png|400px
 * thumb]]

The tree in the thumbnail is about 690 tris.

Anyway, that's all I have now. I wish I had more to present, but my productivity is increasing, so hopefully my progress will continue to increase its rate. I'll be working on trees and other environmental objects at the request of Boba, then perhaps getting Jeyo's Inferion armour to a point where it can be put in the game. Perhaps I'll begin scouting for some more members as well, though that generally hasn't turned out all too well in the past.

UPDATE: Made a new tree. This one's about 1091 tris, but I can reduce a little detail if necessary. If everyone's good with this style, then I'll work on some other tree varieties and reduce this one's tri count if necessary.

Last Thing's Last
Oh, I also finished my personal minifigure model, and I now have my own 3D sig-fig! :D



Anyway, I hope to update this blog soon. I'm getting eager to do more.