Dev Diary: Westminster Palace and Big Ben
Good news everyone! Our journey into the development of the landmarks for Cities in Motion: London DLC continues with another foray into the wilderness that is called... well, landmark modelling. So grap your seats and get ready for a trip into the stars and... wait, this is the wrong slide...
*awkward pause*
Anyways! Onwards!
Like every other landmark in Cities in Motion, the London Eye's modelling started with gathering as many high quality reference photos as possible. Also getting to know some background information can be uselful in designing such assets.
For example, the number of passenger capsules on the Eye is a reference to the London Boroughs. The Eye has 32 of them. That was one of the features I didn't want to alter while figuring out how to make it work in the game. Also worth noting is the fact that the rotation never stops but moves in such a slow pace that the passengers can walk in and out of the capsules while the wheel is turning.
The Eye is massive in size and I wanted to get that feeling transferred into the game itself. The design of the framework is relatively simple at first glance but once you start to study the wheel you see all the little details and once again I needed to decide what to keep and what to leave out from the model.
Having done the ferris wheel in the core CIM, I had a pretty good idea how to approach this asset. I made some quick calculations how to divide the wheel so that it would be relatively easy to model and especially uv-map and texture afterwards. The capsules were modelled separately since they had to be animated according to how the wheel works (not only does the wheel itself turn but the capsules rotate to the opposite direction to keep them from turning over
).
The frame of the wheel itself is a mix of geometry and alpha planes. The cables are all alphas while the outer structures are made of geometry to give the wheel the feel of ”mass”. In structures such as this it is important to keep the the balance between cool looking and affordable (in terms of polygon count).
A bit of thought had to be put on how the Eye is placed in the map. In reality the wheel is hanging somewhat over the water on the bank of the Thames and that was one of the things that was pretty cool about it so when modelling the support structure it had to be taken into consideration that it needed to fit the bank of the river in the game as well.
After the modelling and texturing was done, the model went to the animator who usually needs to study the structures in motion. Whether it is a rollercoaster or a ferris wheel, it is important to see the actual movement before animating a single frame.
In general the same basic principles are evident here as well as in the Westminster Palace/Elisabeth Tower design. The biggest difference is the need to plan things further ahead before committing to the task because of the animations required for the landmark. Like they say: ”Well planned is half done.” Here it is very true.
All in all, the London Eye was one of the most interesting landmarks for myself to model (in addition to the Westminster complex) and I am glad it turned out pretty cool, if I can say so myself.
Hope you guys dig it, too!
The first image is a rough, almost box model-like version with no alphas or anything except the basic form and placement of the parts.
I started to model a single capsule that would be cloned after the initial modelling. Still no 3D geometry (other than the "boxes") to give it any solid feel to it.
Ok, now we are getting somewhere. I have placed the instance clones of the capsules in their correct places around the wheel and mapped the wheel itself so that I can see how the alpha structure looks like. So far, so good! You can now start to visualize the final landmark. It has become more of a ferris wheel than a hollow cylinder.
Some texturing with the cables now visible. They are also alpha planes. I have also placed the support structure that is semi-submerged once place in the map.
More texturing. I add the specular and normal maps (or in this case it is still a bump map since I convert it only after I have done all the other maps) and try it out with a simple light.
Final render with skylight in 3ds Max. Obviously the model will look somewhat different in the game with its own lighting conditions. The capsules will have a nice specular shine to them and so on.
See you in the next Dev Diary!
Good news everyone! Our journey into the development of the landmarks for Cities in Motion: London DLC continues with another foray into the wilderness that is called... well, landmark modelling. So grap your seats and get ready for a trip into the stars and... wait, this is the wrong slide...
*awkward pause*
Anyways! Onwards!
Like every other landmark in Cities in Motion, the London Eye's modelling started with gathering as many high quality reference photos as possible. Also getting to know some background information can be uselful in designing such assets.
For example, the number of passenger capsules on the Eye is a reference to the London Boroughs. The Eye has 32 of them. That was one of the features I didn't want to alter while figuring out how to make it work in the game. Also worth noting is the fact that the rotation never stops but moves in such a slow pace that the passengers can walk in and out of the capsules while the wheel is turning.
The Eye is massive in size and I wanted to get that feeling transferred into the game itself. The design of the framework is relatively simple at first glance but once you start to study the wheel you see all the little details and once again I needed to decide what to keep and what to leave out from the model.
Having done the ferris wheel in the core CIM, I had a pretty good idea how to approach this asset. I made some quick calculations how to divide the wheel so that it would be relatively easy to model and especially uv-map and texture afterwards. The capsules were modelled separately since they had to be animated according to how the wheel works (not only does the wheel itself turn but the capsules rotate to the opposite direction to keep them from turning over
).The frame of the wheel itself is a mix of geometry and alpha planes. The cables are all alphas while the outer structures are made of geometry to give the wheel the feel of ”mass”. In structures such as this it is important to keep the the balance between cool looking and affordable (in terms of polygon count).
A bit of thought had to be put on how the Eye is placed in the map. In reality the wheel is hanging somewhat over the water on the bank of the Thames and that was one of the things that was pretty cool about it so when modelling the support structure it had to be taken into consideration that it needed to fit the bank of the river in the game as well.
After the modelling and texturing was done, the model went to the animator who usually needs to study the structures in motion. Whether it is a rollercoaster or a ferris wheel, it is important to see the actual movement before animating a single frame.
In general the same basic principles are evident here as well as in the Westminster Palace/Elisabeth Tower design. The biggest difference is the need to plan things further ahead before committing to the task because of the animations required for the landmark. Like they say: ”Well planned is half done.” Here it is very true.
All in all, the London Eye was one of the most interesting landmarks for myself to model (in addition to the Westminster complex) and I am glad it turned out pretty cool, if I can say so myself.
Hope you guys dig it, too!
The first image is a rough, almost box model-like version with no alphas or anything except the basic form and placement of the parts.
I started to model a single capsule that would be cloned after the initial modelling. Still no 3D geometry (other than the "boxes") to give it any solid feel to it.
Ok, now we are getting somewhere. I have placed the instance clones of the capsules in their correct places around the wheel and mapped the wheel itself so that I can see how the alpha structure looks like. So far, so good! You can now start to visualize the final landmark. It has become more of a ferris wheel than a hollow cylinder.
Some texturing with the cables now visible. They are also alpha planes. I have also placed the support structure that is semi-submerged once place in the map.
More texturing. I add the specular and normal maps (or in this case it is still a bump map since I convert it only after I have done all the other maps) and try it out with a simple light.
Final render with skylight in 3ds Max. Obviously the model will look somewhat different in the game with its own lighting conditions. The capsules will have a nice specular shine to them and so on.
See you in the next Dev Diary!
