AdamBrome

Hey guys, sorry I'm a bit late in a response. I haven't had a very open schedule open lately to do much work on this. It's completely unwrapped, but I can't texture it for another few days. There was no type of game decided when doing these screenshots. And, as an environment artist, I wanted to focus on the scene and not the character. I'm simply providing a made-up backstory. Cyanide - as far as I was thinking, with Ben's 'character' within the FT 'universe', anything is possible. I'm not forgetting to elaborate on Mo, and the other characters, I'm just focusing on the main one for now Thanks though. Hopefully in the end you'll come to like it as theres a few surprises still planned to sell this as a fake sequel. I'll post more later on once I have something to show.

Hmm - I disagree. It's totally skateable. In real-life? Of course not, but its a faux PSP title that wouldn't rely on real-life physics to make it fun (see: TonyHawk games). If I get a chance over the weekend I will see about some flats. I have a few projects on the go right now though :\ thx for the comments guys

Agreed, they are insanely vague. Whether you call yourself a prop artist, level artist, set dresser, or whatever it may be that your title is your role is to the environment. And a successful one isn't a bare hallway with a tipped over oil drum. It's a single frame that shows history. That shows a past. There's a story in it, and its up to US - the "environment artist" - to make sure its told successfully.

It's called a level designer. Env artists should just take care of the props and then the level designer will take of placing them so they make sense and tell a story, thank you. Judging by your portfolio you could use an artists eye when trying to tell a story. And with that, I'm not sure if you get what the point of the article is. It's not to make a generic hydrant, or crate, its to give it history. And to read something so naive as to think any Joe level designer can simply art up a map and use the assets PROPERLY (key word here) is surprising. Like the article said, part of the environment artist role is to work WITH a level designer and make sure that the proper story is told. I'm really surprised by your reply, especially if you're a professional. And I'd hate to work with someone that has your mentality. Every single designer - thats EVERY. SINGLE. DESIGNER. - I work with works with the environment artist to make sure the overall story is told. It's no one specific departments job. I don't mean to come off on the defense, but I really want to make sure that those who read the article I wrote truly get what the point is. And so far, from all the feedback I've gotten, you're the first to feel there's no relation between the roles and it shows in your work.

Hey guys, I wrote up a small article for my blog on the importance of story telling as an environment artist. It's been something I have been 'preaching' now for a while and I finally put all my thoughts down in writing. The last couple of weeks my inbox has gotten an influx of e-mails asking for critiques and every one I replied to got the usual critiques on their mesh and this one important suggestion: Expand, tell a story. I tried to write it for aspiring & new artists, but would love to read input from all likes of game artists. Check it out! Environment Artist: The Story Teller Thanks everyone!

Starting to put some thought in to the final composition of the camera in relation to the scene. The mountains in the background are temporary. They were created to fill in the space in the bg so I can get a better understanding as to how the final shot will play out.

No spoilers here my man Everything written on the pictures is for my the environments story, not the original titles Play on!

Here's a couple more for you guys. This is all I can do until about the 8th when I am back from vacation. I'll let those who're fans of the original game point out the couple of items from it that I've thrown in to this piece. I'm planning on including a few obvious elements from the original title in this piece, but this is all I managed to throw in there. And thanks for the kind words everyone. I'm glad there's a fan base out there for this game. As I said its one of my all time favourites so I really want to push for story telling in this piece. I hope you guys enjoy it!

Hey everyone, I've started my next home project and its one that I will probably hold to myself a lot closer than the others. Growing up I was a huge fan of action-adventure games, primarily of the LucasArt's sort. One of my all time favourite games, is Full Throttle. I thought it'd be fun to picture Ben (main character) and where he is now, some 14 years after the story/adventure took place. My back story for this piece is that Ben left the Polecats a long time ago and is now a washed-up biker who hardly rides any more. He prefers to keep to himself, spying on the wide world from the confines of his secluded residence, somewhere off Highway 9. Those who were fans of the game, much like I am, should see a lot of subtle 'nods' to the game in this piece when I'm finished. My references come from here, and here. The WIP shot:

This level was made in vein of Tony Hawk - where every surface imaginable is skateable! And really, its a fun little doesn't-need-to-make sense game where logic was thrown out the window before I even placed the first quad. Flow though, I some what agree in that it could have been more properly planned. I can still look at the pics though and imagine the little dude rippin' around on this thing. Ah and thanks, glad you liked it.

This was originally suppose to be an entry for PolyCount's 35th challenge but I never made it in time. I was busy with other stuff and such. Anyhoo, here's a brief re-cap for idea behind the environment then I'll roll in to the pictures. What is 'Skate Rascals'?: Skate Rascal's is a hand-held skate boarding game made in vein of the Tony Hawk series. The story behind it is theres a group of 3 or 4 skaters (the 'rascals') that will only skate on hard-to-reach, very exclusive, and probably illegal locations. It is up to the gamer to successfully navigate past all the obstacles on the way to the skate park and once there "pull the sickest tricks imaginable!". Each map would load with an animation of the player finally breaking in to the location (as seen in the first screenshot). More technical info down below, after the screenshots. ROOFTOP SHENANIGANS!! -Originally made for a Polycount.com challenge. -my first go at low-poly environment art/design -Only a couple items are 1-off assets, everything else is based on modular design -The rules were to create skate park or race track, 5000-6000 triangles and no more than 1024x1024 texture space -I'm not entirely sure if I can get away with such a thing on a handheld. The limits were quite high so I designed the environment assuming it would be for a handheld. -I just picked the PSP, it wasn't apart of the requirements of the challenge. It has a wide-screen ration, which I enjoy using in my final renders. -diffuse, colour, spec, normal, environment map, ao/lightmap -no post *phew* I'm glad to be done this, my home PC is ready to die on me. I enjoyed worked on this a lot. Thanks to those who helped with with lighting, Vahl especially - thanks Frencho.

I like the blue. Wasn't going for any sort of natural lighting in any of my test renders. Exaggerated lighting was my goal on both ends (night and day). My WIP thread has some tests in there. Thanks though

Didn't quite go 'exactly' with the paint over above, but referenced it often. Wire shots tomorrow.

Done! It's late (2:30 in the morning ) so for now I'm just posting this picture - I'll follow up over the weekend with the rest of the goods, including closer angles to make good use of the large textures. HIGH RES VERSION In hind-sight I chose the backdrop image rather quickly and should have at LEAST flipped it so that the clouds were catching the orange lighting from the top. And the ground itself could have used more attention, but really this piece was about the shop so I'm too worried about it. I'm going to try and take a break for a while to finish up something else I'm working on that is NOT a portfolio addition but am anxious to show everyone. However, if I do decide do another project I'm thinking this: [image]http://www.adambromell.com/crap/next.jpg[/image] One thing worth noting is almost all texture photo sourcing was taken from CGTextures.com. Big thanks to Marcel for having that site around.

Finally got that foot in the door. Congrats on getting in... ...BUNT.

Bitmap, if you'd like to keep the gun as you have it now - which is fairly close to those references - then I suggest you lower that texture resolution. It'll look the same. Keep it high if you plan on using that space to its fullest by adding in interesting details.

EDIT: Why is this thread titled 'idiots arguing'? Difference of opinion without actual belittlement hardly makes those involved idiots. Surely it wasn't the mods that renamed the title of this thread? Let's give Bitmap some respect and keep things on track here. This is a community of artists and designers after all and without a difference of opinion all of our work would be the same and no one would be able to help anyone else. Original reply before I realized the ridiculous thread title: Well, you guys noticed his high-res textures and ran with it: I'll give you that. How about we actually look at his work and forget about what size is better? My friend, Bitmap, using 2048x1024 is texture space is completely fine IF (!!!) you are going to utilize this large space to its fullest. In the case of this gun, I do not think you have. For a gun such as this that may have seen a lot of action it should be a considerable amount more worn. Things to consider: Hand placement. You're not going to want to have the areas of the gun where the hands touch it constantly (re: the handle) be as dirty or used as the rest of the gun. Typically those areas remain smooth as any dirt that is on there is removed by your hand. I'd also think about lighting up the colours around there and increasing its specularity: The paint won't be nearly as shiny as the metal underneath that'd be revealed from constant usage. Dried paint. This is a paintball gun after all. Visually, this gun would be a lot more interesting to look at if it had random colours of paint here and there that are either thin surface marks or thick caked in areas. Proper surface details. Right now I barely see any indication as to what this gun would be made out of. Is it metal? Plastic? Rubber? Goo? What is is? You've got basic flat colours on top of basic flat colours with no real surface information.

Small on purpose - consider it more for its colour values overall than its details on the specifics. Thanks to both of you for the comments

variation of the one above, done with the help of my AD,

Thanks everyone - unfortunately theres no high res. Nor did I save the native PSD. This was quite literally a quick test and comp job I did to see if I'd like to go this route. The next one I do though (tonight) I'll be sure to save the comp job for you guys to see the difference from render to final.

Long time no post. Soooooo.. an update! I've been working on this ever since my last post but for a fraction of the time I normally would a home project. The reason being my home computer is on the fritz. I can barely have Max and PS open at the same time - and damn my doesn't stop altogether when I render. Aaargh. Rather than simply upgrade its parts I'm going to be getting a brand new beast. So, until I pick up a new machine I'll get some work done on this at work and work on some lighting tests. The next assets in line that I'd like to do are the weapons and armour and I'm going to use a cube map for their reflections. I'll be using these lighting tests to get a feel for the final cubemap pass and an idea as to what the reflections could look like. A few quick notes: -The dust is a (shitty) paintover and looks more muddy than dusty :\ -Athe extension of the frame that goes out to the right is also a paint over -Wanted to see how it'd look with some dust being kicked up around the base and entrance of the shop -I will probably go with more close-up shots than far away so don't consider this angle to be the final angle or the final composition. What I'd change if I went with this setup: -tone the dust down so it doesn't hide the pot assets like it is there in the foreground -change it to something more like dust blowing in wind, rather than looking like soft mud which was obviously over-layed atop of the image

I've worked with source now, professionally, for about a year. I'm all too aware of its FOV issues. However, I still think your scale is off. Certain objects, when compared to others, make the scale all over the place. I know you're finished with this piece so theres no sense in continuing to explain it - just keep an eye out for in in the future. Again - good work

Hey, this piece damn near solid! I've a few comments.. First off the texturing is nice, but very noisy. It looks as though everything shared the same detail texture. I'm sure you didn't use a detail texture, but everything looks as though there is. Secondly, and probably more important than texture noise, is scale. Your scene has scale levels that are larger or smaller in some areas than in others. The paint can, for example, looks to be about the size of a keg. Same with the oil/gas container - they're huge. But then you look at the stool or the shelf and they're small.. almost scaled down in height but left 1:1 in width and length (re: scaled lower along the 'up' axis). I think another major factor in the scale looking off is the size of the windows compared to the rest of the room. Other than that this piece is really tight. Perhaps some smaller markings on the ground - like oil drops/gum/wrappers or something. Keep it up, -Adam

Heya... I wrote a white paper for Threewave about 6 months and it was just recently published @ GameDaily.com's business section. I've reposted it at my website (with permission) and figured I'd share it with you guys. You can check it out here. I wrote about 75% of the document and did the majority of its research. Threewave specializes in multi-player design & content and wanted to have our ideologies of a great experience written down. I researched the experiences for about a week and spoke with a number of people from different studios to get their thoughts on multiplayer as well. The article is a culmination of all ideas, thoughts, and theory on what makes for a great multiplayer experience. Enjoy!

lee: Thanks man seir: woo, danke FrieChamp: I believe it was for Gauntlet? Yah I can't wait to get down and dirty with the textures. (Get it??) bitmap: I'll be mudding the damage details - pieces of wall missing, cracks, shaved surfaces, etc. etc. This is the 'render mesh'.. there'll be a separate one for the sub-d version. The mudded stuff will just be done on planes. Dark: Thanks Bunt