Models, For the Kids.

Yes, that's right. Models for all the boys and girls. But mostly the boys. And the girls.

So now I'm done with phase one, which is modeling all of the man-made props. The main thing I was keeping in the back of my head the whole time was to try to stay true to the original setting, while also adding in some shiny new design aspects to make them pop more in 3D. Plus, it's nice to add that personal touch. You know, sort of make it my own. You look:

1) Dr. Andonuts' lab was pretty straight forward. I changed how the lights looked, added a back garage area, and also put in an opening hangar in the top. More on that later. 2) Stonehenge was also pretty straight forward. Making it look exactly like the sprites would be extremely boring, so I'm making the arrangement of stones a bit more like its real world counterpart. There are 6 pieces in all, made to look realistic at first. But then I went in and exaggerated the shapes to give them that cartoony look. 3) The same goes with the entrance to Brick Road's dungeon (the entrance with a bunch of wooden boards nailed together). I chose to give it that messy makeshift look, because the character Brick Road is a bit disheveled himself.

 
 In the sprite it's a lot cleaner looking, due to graphical limitations I'm sure. 4) The pencil statue is of course a hallmark for the game, couldn't leave that one out. It's a pretty simple prop to model, though I added some detail where I could. 5) The tents are fun and they look a lot like the sprites. I still need to make two variations: one with its flap open, and the other with it closed.6) The gate is another example of a simple prop that I added some detail into for visual interest. I'll have some alpha planes in it to add some fancy detail elements as well. 7) The walls surrounding it have snow piled on top, yet another opportunity for exaggeration by modeling in big lumps of snow for personality' sake. 8) Last but not least is the drugstore that sits outside of the dormitory. It also has that signature snow, and is pretty simplistic. The size of the windows are multiplied for exaggeration (Word of the day) like yes you guessed it, in the 2D sprite.

So now I'll start digging into making the organic props. Trees, grass, caves, and the terrain itself. Speaking of which, I've done some research and decided that the best route to take is to do the flat areas using UDK'S terrain, and then add in custom static meshes for the cliffs. This is mainly due to the fact that making holes in UDK's terrain is next to impossible, and custom, zbrushed meshes will look nicer anyway. The snow and grass areas will be nicely blended, with custom materials and grass meshes. I'll make 2 or 3 variations on the trees which coupled with rotation and scaling, should do the job in selling variety. I reckon that the next update will be after all of the above are completed. It's kind of weird because there are actually people that are genuinely excited about this project, so I feel a little extra pressure to get things just right. Can't go ruining the Mother name now, can I?  :)

I'm also (possibly) finishing up on my contract at Phosphor in a week, so I'm sure part of my time will also go into polishing up some of the work I did there, and throwing it into the portfolio site.

Also, it looks like someone has (sort of) already done a 3D take on Winters. Though it's not true 3D, it's still pretty neato: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q99Z9pp1ASQ