Today it started to snow in Tokyo. What a surprise that was. Thats my first snow this year! Yay! Finally I can go throw a few (for more there wont be enough snow) snowballs!
So I am in Japan again for a bit and decided to take some shots of things I see. Here we go:
I love those sometimes odd characters we find everywhere. Naughty mind…
Ahh and where else but the land of vending machines could you buy your latest manga at the station before hopping on you train home!
If you take a long time to unwrap your models in any 3d package then this is for you. Blender 3D users are familiar with this tool but how many other people are? Creating good UV maps is a skill not many people have, and even fewer can do it really fast. It is not so much a case of having not enough skill but a case of not having the appropriate tools.
3ds max introduced peltmaping but how useful is it really? Not really you might say. Buggy and unrealiable. So you spend a lot of time going back to traditional methods and it takes ages until you have a propper unwrap.
Now LSCM or “Least Sqare Comform Mapping” is an unwrapping algorythm where you simply select edges on your mesh along which you cut up your model and so define the outside border of the shape you want to unwrap.
How does it get it right? The algorythm basically looks at the size of adjacent polygons and the angles of connecting edges and tries when flattening the mesh to keep those realtively even to each other as, similar to what they are in the 3d space.
Now as said this is more efficient then Peltmapping for the way LSCM works. Once you in fact use it, it becomes super easy and fast. You need to have to good spacial visualization ablity and think ahead of how your mesh should unfold, else you end up with a mess.
There is a plugin for 3ds max that allows you to use LSCM without having to go through Blender and its clunky interface. Just make sure in 3ds max to collapse your model down into a clean edit poly (else it wont work, dont use just an edit poly modifier, make sure you collapse your mod stack) with all double verts merged (thats two or more verts in the same place creating unnessecary open edges) or you might get gaps in your UVs.
You can download the Plugin here:
http://www.luxinia.de/index.php/ArtTools/3dsmax#lscm
I sometimes need to run some things under windows natively, and the biggest problem is that Windows seems just unable to control my fans properly = overheat. There have been a few tools already to control your fans more effectively under OS X (namely MSC Fan Control) but under windows you always had to find some kind of work around with tool such as Input Remapper that are relatively unreliable and buggy and make your system hang at times.
I thought I give it a try again to find something better and voila I stumbled over Lubbo fan Control. It is easy to run, no fancy install required and for a change actually works.
Now if I could just find a proper tool to adjust my clock speeds for CPU and GPU on the fly in bootcamp….
It has been a while since the updates on Heliosphere. Life is busy as usual. Florian has been working on the new GUI code and I finished almost all the the actual game design. Same time I also managed to get started on texturing our little spaceship.
Also as a new addition in the art department, I want to welcome Justin. My old buddy from uni is also joining in to help us making models.
Finally I was able to get around and complete the Pink Baron. Please enjoy!
A few months ago I attended a small two day art workshop by Feng Zhu here in Singapore as part of CGOverdrive. That got me going on some more robot design doodels in my sketchbook. I figured that the design could be really interesting and started out on a small model. The result of it you can find below. It is also still a WIP, the joint’s don’t move yet but I thought about posing it anyhow just to see if the shape really is working in 3D. I feel rather satisfied with how it is coming along but there definitly is more work to do and some cleanup of the mesh.
Thinking of WWI airplanes and fierce battles in the sky, most people (in Europe at least) will think right away of Manfred von Richthofen, or better know as the Red Baron with his famous red triplane.
I am exploring by good suggestion a rather new art style that seems to fit more the sye of drawing that I have been practicing for the past years. I am particularly because of this suggestion become enthralled by Japanese Ukio-e (Japanese Woodprints) and the artwork of famous artist Hiroshige.
Hiroshige - Evening Shower at Atake and the Great Bridge (1856)
All Ukio-e has a very cinematic feel to it, uses heavy perspective but keeps things simple and above all is not afraid of bending the rules of the real in order to get the story across.
Now what does this have to do with the Red Baron? I am starting to be a bit fed up by the seriousness of all the early modern war era and thought I give it a bit of a modern spin to it. Adding a bit of “gayness” in the original sense of the word to it and some Roy Lichtenstein could maybe do the trick. The result (still requiring some cleanups) of my thinking plus something can be seen below (including process drawings below).
I decided to relase some initial informaiton of Heliosphere that I am devloping together with Florian over at Codeflow.
The game is a multi-player 3d action space shooter in the fashion of Descent but in outside environments. The game is built on OS X in Phython and OpenGL but will be available for OS X, Linux and Windows.
In the movie file (double click to play) you can see some initial navigation of the game around some large asteroids. The scene is over 200k polys and oh dear does it run smooth on the fps, sorry currently without textures. Florian is doing a great job on the physics and hope he gets around to finish implementing the weapons so I can add some guns to the ship (screen further down).
On that note I have to warn you, the art style has not been completely designed yet and is still undergoing some drastic changes. Hope this makes some mouths watery!
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…to the portfolio blog of me, Levantulee.
Periodically I will update the different sections with new drawings and illustrations and some new links to interesting places and people.
Hope you enjoy what you are finding here, please leave comments!
Yours sincerely!
Levantulee aka Simon Et. Rozner