B-Day Castle

So.... I'm not dead.  That's good, right?!?  Alot has happened since my last post almost a year ago, but I'll get to that later.  Recently I had the chance to make something for my Niece's B-day party.  I was told it was "Disney Princess" themed party and I could make something for the house.  

So I decided that she needed a walk through Castle entrance!  I measured out the walkway in the house and got the dimensions of the surrounding room so I could build around that.

I had low expectations since I have never done anything like this before. Irealized of the start that I needed to  approached it the only way I felt comfortable, by measuring it and building it in 3D and then printing that design out to use as a stencil/guide.  So knowing this i jumped right into maya and started to model and texture.

Model in Maya

Texture for printer.

I only had so many pieces of Foam core so I HAD to know If i would have enough to make the front and the back.  I ended up with plenty and with as few of seams as I could possibly do.

Cutting the foam core.  It took 13 Brand new double sided razor blades to cut this properly.

Base of spray painted pink, highlights and shadows with some latex pain.

Free handing the detials at 3 in the morning..... I learned not to expect straight lines when you're shivering.

End Product!

Darksided!

Ive been a bit busy lately working on the new contract (Darksiders 2) doing cutscene VFX.  It's a beautiful and  fun to play.  Here is a preview of the game.

Project1: Post1

I want to make games and the only way i know how to sorta do that is through art. So im starting there! This is two block out videos, im establishing scale, and mood while creating assets that will be replaced by better and cheaper versions.

Clouds

These were some tests for Microsoft Kinect Adventures. I really want to revist my last clouds that i made for this, i think they can turn out really well. (Unreal 3)

Final result

Various tests.

Crytek Tests

We recently had a moment in time where we were able to expand our tool set, so i learnt me some Crytek3!

FXVille Reel

I dont know exactly why i hadnt posted this after we made it this year, but this is a highlight reel from our company FXVille for the past couple of years. Enjoy!

Viva Las Vegas #1

So i had the experience of working on my first multi year game job and then the whole project was canceled. WB hasn't said it's official, but yeah... tis dust in the wind. Which is sad, because allot of great people worked on this game, and for quite a long time. I know i wouldn't be where i am now if i were not for "This is Vegas", but that being said, it was also rated as #3 for "10 Games we're happy were canceled" by Destructoid.

So for a couple of future posts I'm going to try and dig up some old FX work done by myself and maybe some of the more elaborate things that were made for this crazy game.

Part 1.
Water Fountains for a swimming pool. The particle effects had a material that was setup to act as if the light was being cast upwards onto the water diffuse. The particle system had to be made to turn on and then stay on in order to keep a flow of water, as well as if the particle emitter was moved (see below). This would insure that a show could be scripted easier because all that was needed was to turn a particle emitter on, delay it, move it, and then just turn it off and it would resolve itself. This "show" was scripted by co-worker Noa Barlow and i wish i had a polish pass after seeing it perform in a show like this. Ohh and it also had to be cheap, i could use no more then 2/3 particle systems each, since i knew there was going to be a crap ton of them on at once.

So much water in this game.

~Jeff