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About the materials, I'm personally more concerned about mapping, rather then the actual materials. If the mapping is not done correctly you have to revisit all objects in order to fix that. That is a nightmare, especially for the more complex objects. For mapping I would use a colored checkbox kind of texture, however if you don;t intend to do any texturing, I would advise to keep it 50% grey, that will give the best presentation result.For these buildings and structures, I agree that mapping is important. I think that mapping is very much linked to the process of making materials. The document I sent covers a good chunk about mapping, namely when I made an example for the concrete texture (for instance, when you want to convey the fact that a structure is made of concrete slabs).
You forget that programmers are also needed. The current way to get the walkmeshs and import the final rendered picture into the game is a bit pedestrian. This should be done faster. An expert for opengl2.0 shaders would probably also a huge help.While the problem of importing layers is there, I have found some workarounds. An improved workflow is for the artist to account for the positioning of the layers at the designing stage of the scene. Things can be done a lot more efficiently than what I've done, but sometimes you can only learn by stumbling and fumbling it seems
Yes, I know what you refer to. It's not easy to explain what I'm talking about, so let's just say that the supported input resolution of my TV isn't exactly as large as the TV itself is, so it looks much better to use the whole width of it rather than 3/4 of it. Imagine 1024 x 768 resolution on a HD TV; it's just so small I'd have to sit with the TV in my face. Which is not practical, considering I scrapped my old 1280 x 960 monitor precisely so that I wouldn't need to sit with my face nearly glued to it and eventually ruin my eyesight. Using the full dimensions of my TV allows for a much greater distance between myself and the display and I can see all of the details of any given game so long as the internal rendering resolution is altered accordingly. (for FF7, Aali's driver handles that automatically depending on window size and aspect ratio)Ok, that's a set of particular circumstances and preferences, I understand that.
So in short, I have a cheap and dodgy TV and a 4:3 aspect ratio will always be unbearable on it, stretched or not. Therefore, I might as well use the full width and height to achieve the best image quality this TV can offer.
...I do believe, though, that the aspect ratio is not really debatable since it's a matter of opinions when it comes down to it. While someone prefers widescreen, another guy can prefer 4:3. Hell, there may be people who have even uncommon aspect ratios such as 16:10 and so on. I know I like 16:9 more than 4:3 for reasons stated above, heh.
Well the fact that'd you'd be willing to lead a project is good enough news. If I were try and advertise on social medias, what kind of qualifications and commitment levels would you want me to list?
Yeah I've been rather busy with work lately. I'd definitely love to be able to model like I used to. I put in improvements here and there though.Welcome back!
The modeling I do is... strange to say the least. I'm not sure how useful my models would be to be honest.
You've got a point with the aspect ratio, to be fair, but I can't do 4:3 because it will look absolutely ridiculous with the TV I have. The entire image will be about the size of a stamp in the middle of an A3 paper sheet. (or not, but you get the idea) That irritates the eye pretty badly, since it essentially means I'd have a bigger image on my old monitor than on TV, which kinda defeats the original purpose of me switching to a bigger display.Actually I'm not sure I grasp the problem you have regarding the aspect ratio. With Aali's driver config, the point is that you can play the game in HD (1920 x 1080) with vertical bands on the sides which allow to display the graphics in 4:3, without distortion. It wouldn't make the game played in low resolution. The outline would be a bit like a SD TV channel displayed on a HD TV, but the resolution itself would still be HD. Or am I missing something?
And I actually did resize the models before, but I switched the flevel archive and completely forgot to re-apply the changes. Talk about derp.
Mayo, if we were able to recruit more people to do the kind of work you've done here, how many folks would we need to get it done within a year or two, and would you be willing to lead that kind of project? I imagine in order to produce the work that you've done, we'd not only need the talent, but also coordination to get all the scenes reproduced in the same artistic style.Unfortunately, we would need an army to have the project done within 1-2 years. Based on my own work rate (I consider I spent "as much time as possible on the project while being able to have a life"), we would need... 40 people *cough* to get it done in 2 years. Of course I would be very happy to be able to lead such a project. I'd be happy enough with 10 people, also considering an increase in productivity with people becoming more proficient in their 3d modelling abilities. Additionally, productivity can increase if we have the ability to pool resources (if somebody models redundant items which are used in a number of scenes, no need to remodel the same object). I would also say "all levels of modelling ability are welcome", because I actually started my own practice of 3d modelling because I wanted to help Team Avalanche, which was a mere 2 years and a half ago. All in all, finding people with enough drive and commitment is a big issue. But the amateur 3d modelling community is huge, so the potential is out there. In a sense, it's all about trying to mesh people with an interest in FF7 with people from the 3d modelling community, or show people with little knowledge of 3d modelling that they have the potential to contribute.
Can we use those textures with 7H + Yarlson fields configured ?It should be doable. I asked EQ2Alyza if it was possible to combine TA's fields onto whatever other series of fields the user would like to pick. I didn't have confirmation though.
I've been tracking Avalanche's progress for quite some time now, and I must say these new backgrounds all look absolutely superb, but I do have two big questions about them:Regarding model sizes: When doing the modelling work, I paid very close attention to the relative size of the characters vs. the size of the objects populating a scene. There were many inconsistencies, mostly because small items were grossly enlarged to make them be recognizable at very low resolution, but since HD can make one see the small details, many things had to be addressed (tea cup the size of a salad bowl, beer can the size of a bucket, etc.). In some cases, nearly all the objects have wrong dimensions with respect to the scene layout, while walkmesh and layering constraints does not allow me to change these sizes. Example: in ealin_12, originally, if you pay attention you'll realize that the table height reaches Cloud's shoulders, it should be actually twice smaller. The only way to address these inconsistencies is to actually change the characters sizes, and keep most of the objects relatively similar. Objects were also designed using Kaldarasha's models to get the proportions right, chibi models may look more awkward (if something is realistically designed, it obviously cannot fit chibi design).
What do you mean by these models sizes? Should you manually change the sizes of all your character models every time you enter a different area, or should you just use models the size of Kaldarasha's?
Also, are you guys eventually going to release the models that you're rendering these areas from, in case someone with ambition wants to do a full remake of FF7 in a true 3D engine, like Rich Whitehouse tried to do a while back?
Good work What's next on the plan? You'll have done all of Midgar before long!I wish! Sadly the reality is very different, considering it took me 15 months to complete 11 scenes. We would need about 10 more people with the same work rate for this project to go somewhere.