So first of all my weekend before hand in has been more than hectic. I have never had such stress levels like the ones I had over the weekend. Everything was majority done but I kept finding things to do and wanting to add to. Overall I think what I created was ok, I really enjoyed making vehicles and trying to bring them back to there original self as they would of been seen in the day.

Modeling I think has to be my strongest feature when creating something and I have found out through out this project that there is so much to learn, even more so than what I have been taught at university, plus there is so much resource to help you learn what you want. I need to get out there.

Throughout the project I have had the constant problem of time management. I must get over this, I think it was a huge problem due to the fact I got to make my own brief and being open to endless possibilities. If I had made everything alot stricter and consistent and I would of been able to push myself alot further than I have done. Working alone has really made me understand that it isn't all it's cracked up to be. Teamwork as you would when working in a company would be alot better as you can bounce ideas off each other and also keep yourself grounded and not have your head up in the clouds when working. Keeps everyone level headed.

On a more positive note, I enjoyed myself through all of it, including the stress, downs and thinking that I couldn't go on anymore. Even though I do not think I will achieve anything, I have learnt so much. The skills are there, I just need to expand on them and get out and explore. Build sketchbooks of colour and traditional skills, how I've missed that, and photograph everything and anything.

I guess in a way university has made me realise you don't need to be told what to do to achieve something, you need to get out of that box and do something more original. Set the goal for yourself and along the way achieve the goals that are set by other people.

Just a little side quest, that will take you miles from the original quest. There will always be goodies on the way.

I need to add so much more detail to the trailer but this is the basic colouring for the trailer on the diffuse map. 

Really starting to slow down the work flow, I need to bring something in that will keep me motivated for the last couple of weeks. 

I have just downloaded marmoset toolbag to help render out the final models on a turntable, hopefully they will look super cool! only joking, but they should look nicely finished off in the end result. 

So I went down to a couple of stable yards and my own and rummaged around to see what was about, the objects that you over look and don't really considered, even when I use them every day. This made me think of assets I could add as a little extra to the vehicle when set up on a turntable. For example;

Nice quick little assets; two types of bins (one with food in), mounting block, bag, bag of...sawdust, desk and a radio. I've also made a tire that i'll be able to clone and create some horse jumps with.

First model is fully textured, I really like how the wood texture has turned out, all hand painted in Photoshop. I just need to add some lights to show off the specular map. I only have a couple more weeks before final hand in and the stress is starting to rise, I feel like I am falling behind and I am worried the final outcome will either not be finished or not at a standard I want. Just have to keep pushing on...

So earlier at the beginning of the project I thought about having the vehicles set within a scene, to help show them off. But looking at my calendar that I have set for everything, I feel like I will run out of time if I run with this idea. Now time management is a huge deal to me as I am a complete nut at it, (seriously). Time seems to drain everything out of me and I just become a complete mess and stress head. 

As I am scrapping the idea of an environment, I have been looking into other ways of completing a vehicle and to show to an audience. Car games usually start with your vehicle in a garage or something similar, but I have also seen, turn tables. A scene image, out of focus, (as this will stop the player looking else where) with a turn table in the center of the shot with the vehicle on it. Maybe even a styled floor space with the vehicle on, this could help show style, shadows and theme. 

Some examples of what I thinking of for the end render and animation, hopefully. I need to make some development sketches and what exactly might and might not work for each individual vehicle. 

So I have two models out of the three. The first one is partly textured, the second one is modeled and I just need to add some minor detail, and now here is the third model;

At the moment the modeling side is going really strongly and I am really enjoying it, I have learnt alot over the three years, even if it doesn't feel like it.
Considering the time I have left I think I am on track at the moment but it does depend on how long the unwrapping and texturing goes on for. This is the part I am most worried about overall.
I have three models all consistent of the theme that is set in my brief, 'horse boxes', that is an achievement as I do tend to change my mind and ideas, still half way through yet.

Here is some original reference of my own trailer that I used to help model the one above;

Considering where it is, it is very clean, I might have to add some dirt to the model when texturing or it will look boring...

Continuous research. Research is such a huge part when wanting to create anything, even if its imaginary or not, you still need a good source of information to help create it.

Types of wood; depending on what I am aiming for there are ridiculous amounts of wood to even think of. To be honest it doesn't matter about the wood, but the look on the varnish. I want to go for something that looks new but has seen a good part of the world. So not so new that the wood all looks clean and tidy, but it has some sort of age and character to this. For me the wood is the main feature to this vehicle. There is so much detail in each grain of wood, the normal map is going to be interesting to achieve...

Some original images that I used to help model;

So I have started to casually unwrap the first vehicle that is the Bed-ford TK 3.5, the smaller lorry of the two. I wanted to start this unwrap early as to be honest I suck at it. 

To help with still understanding unwrapping and how to neatly lay out the UV map, I have searched the internet to help me out. Just to help see what other vehicle UV maps look like as I learn alot better by seeing what other people do, no this is not copying but just some helpful in sites to everything. 

I noticed when researching that alot of maps only have one side of a vehicle as you would use a 'Symmetry' modifier. So unwrapping the half model and then use the modifier, this will help give you more texture space on the map for later on. This does mean that each side would be identical and you wouldn't have any different detail, unless maybe I could use some decals on later to give some extra detail and effect. 

The main problem I have with unwrapping is the scale part of it, everything has to be in the right proportion or parts will become pixelated or stretched. Stretching isn't that much of an issue now after alot of practice and the love of pelt mapping.  

Instead of just diving in and sticking to the unwrap once, I tried it multiple times to see if I could make any progress in unwrapping. I have split the model up into two ID's to keep everything tidy but to also give me some freedom with the texturing. I aim to hand paint everything on the vehicles, but might also add in a mixture of original photos if I get stuck and what a certain look for example; realistic.

 Finding alot of weaknesses and positives through out this project and hopefully being able to get better at them with continuous practice. 

After looking at open spaces to help feature the vehicles I made a few white box plans to help generate idea's and to also get some thinking room in my brain, (so cluttered).
I planned these out in 3ds max, just boxed out spaces and added a few minor details;

This was a quick stable yard idea. So the vehicles would be situated within the building and one of them would be place outside so there is a variation. This meant that the camera or the player would have to walk around and through the building to see them. I really like this idea but I would be very worried about the time it would take to make, texture and import into UDK. I don't want to be too short for time as that is a major fall back for me; time management. 

2nd beauty! I am really enjoying modeling these. Seriously I could make twenty of them and not get bored. Anyways here is the second one modeled; Bedford TK 7 tonne horsebox.

This one is alot larger than the first one I modeled as it is meant to be able to carry 3-4 horses rather than two. The front cab is also wider and I had difficulty trying to get the width the right size, it was either to skinny or way too fat but I get there eventually.
Why cant I just leave them like this, they are so much nicer plus I need to really focus on the texturing as you sometimes find you have a really nice model but the texture makes it look awful or you can have a rubbish model but the texture makes it look great. I always end up with the first one. *sigh*

Following my previous post, I have looked at what vehicles are set in over games. I will definitely be using an open plan space as this will give a nice space to view the vehicles from every angle. 

As the vehicles I am focusing on are horseboxes, this gives me a 'Theme' in some respect, I was originally thinking of making a stable yard with the vehicles placed around and shown in a 'working' styled environment but thought otherwise as it would take too much attention away from the vehicles. Also I want to import the scene into Unreal Development Kit, this engine benefits more of an enclosed environment inside instead of outside. 

The plan that I have thought of is very simple. A wooden barn to keep the connection between stable and horses or a farm yard. The vehicles will be placed within the barn/garage. There will be smaller assets around the walls and edges of the barn to help create an atmosphere of working/used. Also adding assets also shows that it isn't just an empty barn with cars in it, (seems kind of pointless and boring).

For the lighting, I have chosen the barn because of the wooden slates across the front and the back. I would like natural light to come through the gaps and onto the vehicles aswell as lights on the inside.

This is a quick spread sheet that I will be filling out along the process of my FMP. This is a really useful and helpful way to help me keep track of what needs to be done and what hasn't been done. I will make a similar spreadsheet for the time scale of each asset and what I need to do, set milestones.

As I complete each one I will fill in the colour Green, Orange for incomplete and I'll leave blank the parts I haven't done or the entire sheet will look red. (That will just look too over whelming to cope with)

I have only added these assets as the assets I have chosen are all small and there will need to be multiples of them within the scene.

I've been thinking more and more about the environment in which I want my vehicles to be set in. The environment needs to be in a way set for the vehicles. I do not want to take too much focus off the vehicles by the scene as they are the main focal point.

Here are some good examples that I found on the internet of what I am thinking of. The environments these cars are set in are nice open plan spaces with very little in them, this helps the player focus on just the cars. Due to the vehicles I have modeled I don't fully want an empty space. Id like to make something that connects with the cars. Something that has been used and not just to look at with a garage. Referring back to my brief I have chosen the Bedford Horsebox series as they were much appreciated vehicles and were used for a purpose. 

With this scene it has added assets and it looks and feels like it is a working/used garage. This is the feel I would like to go for and achieve within my environment. With this in mind I have started to make an asset list of things and object you would generally find in a garage or a mechanical work space.

I've been looking at the materials of the vehicles and narrowed it down to three main materials; Wood, Metallic and Rubber.

These are what I have been looking at using google to get some basic research down of materials. I then started to try and replicate them for myself. 

I need to practice the sphere styled textures to show some more depth of each of the textures. This mood-board is to help plan how the textures are going to work and where they are going to be placed.

It's been kinda slow trying to get something done. But I have been thinking about colours for my Bedford TK 3.5 tonne horsebox.

Just some basic colours to help with visualising what it might or could look like. I have not done the sides as they will all have a wooden paneling as that is one of the main features of the Bedford series.

As this first vehicle is a 3.5 tonne lorry, I have been looking and researching into a 7 tonne Bedford horsebox as they are alot larger. Also it will gives some variation between the final three vehicles.

Since the last post I have finished modeling my first vehicle, I am very pleased with the outcome. This is just the model with out any materials on it. I was playing around with lighting and rendering, which was good practice as I haven't actually rendered before. (don't judge) All good practice I guess and getting familiar with where everything is. 

I set myself a high-ish poly count that every vehicle should be between 25000-30000 tri's. This horsebox stands at 29,444 which is a hell of alot and I will be returning to it to get that down.

 I haven't done high poly before but If I have time i'd also like to make each model low poly and see how low I can get each vehicle. 

Modeling! My all time part of any project is the modeling, it is just love for me at the moment. But unfortunately I can't just model...Let's not think about that at all.

Ok so I looked at a good number of vehicle modeling tutorials and speed modeling videos over the Christmas break. There is so awesome stuff out there! Even video's that don't tell you step by step modeling but video's that show you how other people work is really helpful. I found these more helpful than the tutorials.

So before I dived into 3DsMax and got completely lost. I studied some of the Bedford pictures to help me understand the basic shapes of one and what features are a must and what has too look right.

I drew over the top to help set up some guidelines to help model it. This is the first time I have modeled this way and I didn't realise how much it helped me. 

As I used guidelines it was easy to make a basic mesh to the expand on. I only made one half of the front cab as I used symmetry to create the rest, this saves time but also stops the model from looking different on the other side. 

I thought about making all of the body parts separate and then adding them together just like a real vehicle is made but thought of the idea being too time consuming and frustrating. Also I would need some hands on reference material to get the feel and looks of each part. This was not possible.