Okay second blog is about how your brain corporate with what you visualize. Brain is not limited it expands and expands and never gets filled basically it never has enough. This task should be easily answered as it’s been experienced occasionally for the course I am doing.

Okay let’s just say you was handed with a project which was to produce anything that is futuristic and acceptable. Your brain will instantly switch on. This is because of what we all observed through our life time. I’m sure you watched or did everything that is specified below…

TV, games, movies, or even read books and a lot more. There are no limitations on observing ideas. So we should thank the software’s for expanding ideas but mostly we should all thank our eyes and brain.

Lets come back to me…shall we…

What happened to me when I was given a project which was to create a tripod…what happened?

Yes it is true! I didn’t come up with random ideas with flashing lights!! It all comes with what I’ve experienced or visualized. Like for example, I wasn’t like what the heck am i suppose to do or had no ideas what’s so ever... but i was just confused due to all the ideas I had jammed in my head which led me to confusion... it was crazy i tell you.

Well eventually i looked at tripods from movies, books from library, checked on the net etc. because everything comes with research. I then put all my research together and combined the lot which definitely led me to a great concept. I strongly believe planning strategy works like this…you first research and then combine ideas and then you create concepts and then show it to everyone and get feedback and carry on what majority of the people got attracted by and then develop further from there and then model the thing..=D

The best process of planning isn’t what you create at the end but it’s the research behind it. It’s the progression that makes the work quality. For example I could look at a final and say “wow! That’s nice but if they show more of the planning and progression from start to end. I personally will think that it draws more attention and gives the viewer the understanding how much effort he or she put on to the final”. Hope you know what I mean and that’s my way of thinking =)

Anyway....at the bottom I’m going to show you the task that i mentioned earlier on...the example will show the process from start to end. Here goes the example...hope it makes sense...

Firstly as I mentioned earlier I did some research on the net and checked some movies that could be related. Soon after I got some images and Ideas I developed from there. I instantly sketched a few ideas…

I quickly got some designs on to the paper from there I chose a few basic shapes and developed from there.

I now had the basic shape and from there I developed further.

My idea grew from these ideas. I then finally chose one which is going to be modeled very soon. It will be uploaded =) anyway that’s my way of planning. Like mike said all your sketches should be the product of evolving, iterative process. See you in my next log =D

2nd Week.Year 2 progression =D

Visual design – Week 2

Second week was quite disastrous for me = (… I visited a place for the visual design it was located in Loughborough. In car the journey would be a total of 4 miles, so I’m sure you could imagine walking. Hence, I took the bus and the bus driver had informed to that I had arrived so excitingly hopped off the bus and I was truly in the middle of no mans land. All I was able to see in the far distance were long roads and one pathway. I asked around for directions but the people where really rude and ignored me and walked by. I was speechless, but inside I was thinking honestly what the f***!!... Anyway I was there looking for the place for almost 2 hours, then I suddenly see a small town and a shop (SPAR) I yelled of the top of my voice “THANK GOD almighty”. I brought a few snacks and killed my thirst with a bottle of Evian water. I then approached another guy, he kindly enough gave me the directions to my destination. Deep down I thought… At least not everyone’s the same. As I was walking, from a distance I saw few people from my course, including; Nicole, Damien and Aaron =D. I went in to take photographs but sadly the place was closing. So I missed my opportunity and fell behind on my visual design. In order to maintain at the same speed of other and produce my highest quality of work, I revisited on Wednesday, where I gathered references and drew some sketches.

Finally, my mission was accomplished =D…sorry about my story, I got slightly carried away. But, common’ it had to be told!! It was a bad day, however, on the bright side…Things started to turn around I got my thumbnails done and my final for the train. It’s uploaded just below. By the way for this year I’m planning to do at least 2 to 3 final for each project. Anyways back to the drawing...

So what you think?? And here’s my second final

In order to create the effect of my final piece, I painted it with coffee then went over it with dark brown paint and small amounts of white paint I then carefully burnt the edges. My intention for this piece of work was to give the viewers a thought about being a 1960 painting as it mentioned on the brief. Overall I was pleased with this final piece. Due to the unique composition and right perspective, feel free to correct me if I’m wrong. =D

Game production – week2

Okay back to my game production…So where was I…oh yeah I basically completed modeling the treasure chest and what I planned for this week was to get the UVWrap done and that is exactly what I did. Below are some images of the progression for my treasure chest.

This took me a whole week until I got everything separate. Once that was done it looked like this..

Now I was ready to texture… this was basically a pain in the ass. I was tweaking this piece for approximately 5 whole days. It gave me migraines but it had to be edited to the best of my ability. Once I had completed it, the texture will be ready to be done for next week. I always look forward to texturing. I personally believe texturing the model is the fun side to 3d max.

1st Weeks WORK =D

Here I am…just completed my first week of my second year at Uni. It wasn’t too bad. I can confess that the inner me now feels more confident and highly organized in comparison to Year 1, as now I am aware of the work load, the high expectations, and the quality of work required. Lets just focus on talking about my first week; right, nothing has rather changed… I have a task to create three separate models, these include; Visual design, Game production and a Critical study.

Visual Design

Part of my first week at Uni involved me in taking a visit to Abbey Park, where I was required to produce 12 thumbnails and one final piece. I merrily enjoyed my experience at Abbey Park browsing around, but I wasn’t motivated to draw due to the cold weather. So, I only managed to get 8 thumbnails done, the reason why I had failed to complete all 12 of my thumbnails can be blamed entirely upon the force of the wind, and bitter coldness of the weather. By the time my day had come to an end I was unable to feel my hand!! =(…

At the bottom I have uploaded my final for the first week…

Here is the first final I was quite proud of its outcome but I continually made myself think of how it may look if digital painting was applied. I have never experienced what it is like to use digital painting, but hey there’s always a start! Subsequently, I was pleased with my final piece, but at the back of my head I knew that somehow I was able to further improve it. So…. I then edited it using photoshop and it gave me a better final than the original, I was so was proudJ. I only believed it was good because It was my first attempt on Photoshop and it didn’t come out bad what so ever. So, next time I approach this landscape, I will most definitely have a positive start.

Below is a picture which presents my progression throughout the completion of my final piece, this helped me to gain several views and understanding of development from start to end.

I’m now thinking to do another version in white/black version… maybe Christmas holidays would be the right time for my additional imaginative thoughts… I need to get cracking on with my game production!! =D

Game production

Back to square one I guess…well I attended the Tuesday class and was given a whole new project, which required me to create a treasure chest model. It didn’t seem that hard to model, well I had that thought for the first time for 3d max. But I knew the legs of the chest were going to be challenging. Anyways for the first week my plan was to get the model which was accomplished… this boosted my self-confidence in using 3d max.

Pictured above is the wireframe for the model I had created. Well I planned to unwrap it next week. But I definitely thought it was a good week and I didn’t stress out….. ermmm… well so far! =)… Until a few problems appeared, but these were solved with the help of constant tweaking here and there, which seemed to take forever. This is my first week, it has given me a positive start … I’m looking forward to my next weeks challenges!

seraching for my career??

Well, where can I start...What would you like to be in the near future? What career would you like to pursue? Well...these questions were directed to me on numerous occasions most commonly during the past two years! These questions occurred to confuse my mind but I was glad they were brought to my consideration! I was very eager to discover what I really wanted to do with my career after completing this course. So I’m going to begin my research and in depth reading to see what jigsaw will fit into my missing puzzle. I must admit that Mike advice was really helpful;
“Search on the net...find jobs that relates to the course that I’m currently doing and then read about the job and highlight the skills/experience that is needed and if there is anything missing I should fill the missing gaps throughout the 2years of university”.
Back to the task!
I have just read the thought about a student, Del walker! His comments on a being a game designer is very direct. His thought was straight to the point and eye opening. I wouldn’t say that I’m the best 2D drawer or the best 3D modeller but nothing stops me from practising. All it needs is time, practise and most of all passion that could lead us to achieve the best of my talent. Well I really liked the sentence that Del had in his thought which was...
“Nobody cares how much passion you “claim” to have for games. Your passion should shine through your work”.


The verse from the article particularly attracted my attention.
I am not going to lie but after reading Del Walker and Ben Mathis thoughts has really put me on the spot. I felt really bad but I won’t let it affect me. What they are saying is harsh but it is the truth. No one likes hearing the truth when it’s bitter. It made me realise that i need to work even more and enjoy it twice as much. Now it starts to make me think in the holidays i did not once touch my sketch book but if i had i would have improved a lot more. Reading their thoughts has literally opened my eyes. Now all I need to do is work my ass off and put more hours in to my work. Oops...sorry I’m getting carried away. I need to get back to answering the task....

this is really hard for me to answer just yet! cause im still confused on which direction i want to go to...i will come back to this question hopefully with a direct answer within a few weeks..