New Field backgrounds/CG Cutscenes thread

[Timu Sumisu]

The most visited scene is the opening train platform. Even if you hate the game and only played it once, you have seen it.

I'm working on that one

P.S. the camera is most difficult to lign up.

[Kudistos Megistos]

I'd say the most important thing would be to get the first section of the game done completely.

If you get, say, everything up to Cloud meeting Aeris done, or even everything from the Reactor 1 mission done, you'll be able to play a significant amount of the game with entirely high-res backgrounds and maybe even release a kind of "demo" patch. This will give a greater sense of progress, and therefore more motivation to complete the job, than just doing random scenes (or the most common scenes) from all over the game in no order and having nothing playable until the job is near completion. Since this project will take a very long time and involves remaking hundreds of scenes, motivation will be a big issue sooner or later.

[sl1982]

Well you better include the train scene. Since thats the one i already did lol.

[obesebear]

I'd say the most important thing would be to get the first section of the game done completely.

If you get, say, everything up to Cloud meeting Aeris done, or even everything from the Reactor 1 mission done, you'll be able to play a significant amount of the game with entirely high-res backgrounds and maybe even release a kind of "demo" patch. This will give a greater sense of progress, and therefore more motivation to complete the job, than just doing random scenes (or the most common scenes) from all over the game in no order and having nothing playable until the job is near completion. Since this project will take a very long time and involves remaking hundreds of scenes, motivation will be a big issue sooner or later.

This 1 million times

[Timu Sumisu]

I'd say the most important thing would be to get the first section of the game done completely.

If you get, say, everything up to Cloud meeting Aeris done, or even everything from the Reactor 1 mission done, you'll be able to play a significant amount of the game with entirely high-res backgrounds and maybe even release a kind of "demo" patch. This will give a greater sense of progress, and therefore more motivation to complete the job, than just doing random scenes (or the most common scenes) from all over the game in no order and having nothing playable until the job is near completion. Since this project will take a very long time and involves remaking hundreds of scenes, motivation will be a big issue sooner or later.

Thanks for the direction kudistos! Methinks we'll be going that route!

[BlitzNCS]

The only problem I see with this is that midgar needs to have consistency. Different modellers have different ways of doing things. And if Timu's working on Midgar, Are we all just gonna wait 'til he's done and then move onto the next thing? If we help out with Midgar, consistency is jeopardised, and even if we disregarded them, Lining up Midgar's gonna be hell when we've all got different parts of it.

[Timu Sumisu]

well, you can do things that arnt in the main scene... like interiors. inside the reactor fo example. i dont wanna do that

[Kudistos Megistos]

A way to spread the work for Midgar and retain consistency would be for one person to do (for example) exteriors on the upper plate, one to do interiors on the upper plate, one to do exteriors in the slums and one to do interiors in the slums.

[Timu Sumisu]

And some poor sod can have /all/ of HQ to themselves

[BlitzNCS]

inside the reactor fo example.

Incidentally, I can't seem to find those Field files. Any idea what they're called?

[craziinova]

*is learning how to model*

I'm gonna disregard everything you just said and call out temple of the Ancients ;P

It's so much easier with a pen & tab. Does anyone else use one or just stick to keyboard and mouse?

[Naast]

Has someone made a tutorial about all this? If not, it should be done, I guess you'll have more help that way.
I'd really like to help you guys, but I don't know a thing about modelling. I was thinking about learning it for some times, but I guess it's not something I can do even with a year of experience. 

[sl1982]

I knew nothing of modelling when i started. Learn as you go.

[BlitzNCS]

A Tutorial! I shall make one immediately!!

[Timber]

as long as the major traveled areas get done, i think the project will be heading in the right direction. Focus on the opening cine to grab people attention, then hit all of the major town centers (Kalm, Rocket Town, Cosmo, etc...) that way you get a nice sample in the largest dose. Fact is, many areas are only visited once and could be done last (or not even at all) and no one would realy mind.
No sense in painting the back of the stair case, right?

just my 2 cents.

That's a really good point. I suppose a good priority list would be:

1. Places that need to be visited repeatedly during the story.
2. Places that need to be visited once during the story.
3. Places that don't need to be visited during the story.

I wonder what the most visited field screen is? The bridge of the Highwind probably.

The most visited scene is the opening train platform. Even if you hate the game and only played it once, you have seen it.

Obviously I was talking about 'during the story'. Assuming people actually play it.

But yeah the demo thing is a good idea.

[ff7rules]

A Tutorial! I shall make one immediately!!

I would welcome this for sure i wouldd love to try and help you guys out, but I know nothing of modeling buildings so would be awesome if you could do a tutorial for this.

[Timu Sumisu]

look at a building... what is it? its a box! simple as that. Put extra little boxes on it and other details n stoff... dats bout it   Anyhow i await your tutorial Neo, I hope to learn somethin!

[BlitzNCS]

I finished filming the sketchup part of it now. This tutorial will mainly be for max users, but i guess if you use blender it's not too hard to transfer the info.
At any rate, what would you guys prefer? 3 Different parts covering seperate things at a relatively normal pace, or just one part sped up really fast? The Max section might have to be split up anyway, since I dunno how much detail I'mma go into yet.

[Timu Sumisu]

split up with more detail, no question. We need to provide thorough instruction.

[craziinova]

NCS, I can deal with the modelling myself. I would like to know which program to use to view/extract the field backgrounds. Thank you.

I am using Maya 2010 with pen & tab, but I plan to move onto Max when I am more learned.

[Timu Sumisu]

use palmer, you can find it in the gametweaking section.

[BlitzNCS]

Ugh, seems Max has failed me, And I can't import any .obj files now (I need to be able to do this for importing walkmeshes)
Tutorial is on hold until I find a way around this.

[sl1982]

Bit of a status update. Tried my hand at texturing a bit. Opinions would be welcome.

[Covarr]

Noticeable tiling effect along the right wall. Possibly use a different texture for each object of the same type, to make it look less uniform. Otherwise, fantastic!

Also, slightly unrelated, the lighting in the front part of the train car is too dark.

[sl1982]

Noticeable tiling effect along the right wall. Possibly use a different texture for each object of the same type, to make it look less uniform. Otherwise, fantastic!

Also, slightly unrelated, the lighting in the front part of the train car is too dark.

The original is quite dark as well, but ill see if i can tweak it. As for the tiling effect i would have to uv map everything, which i don't want to do if i can avoid it.