Hello Neyyah adventurers! It's been a little while since I last updated you all on the further developments in Neyyah's ever-changing world. Currently, there is a lot of working taking place within Visionaire Studio 5, with animations being added left, right and centre, ranging from button presses through to full-length Journey Mode animations! [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/37531554/57d756bd2996996071f266dda8c6d95640c6dc5c.jpg[/img] Animations / interactions being brought to life in Visionaire Studio 5 Other developments include mechanics, which I want to go through on a later post, along with a commentary which delves into the differences between a 2020 test build, and how the current build stands! [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/37531554/827d80271f06c04bac80510b0182ff233d3e062f.jpg[/img] 2020 - Watch Tower Mini Build Showcase [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/37531554/f7a6c264997acf79e698019b744ba891343a8533.jpg[/img] Current build state [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/37531554/7e1620e4f932050320861eb48090c6ee9e6a1c0e.jpg[/img] 2020 - Watch Tower mini build showcase [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/37531554/e0cc820f8343abf6a6b9a00e172276c301f96e3e.jpg[/img] current build state Feel free to watch my 2020 Watch Tower test build / commentary here -> [previewyoutube=6o_9rLmzRUI;full][/previewyoutube] ________________________________YY_________________________________ I have also decided to bring a whole interior set into the engine as a series of OPEN GL / untextured draft renders from Blender. I do this with every animation I create in Blender, as I can render it out in seconds and throw it into Visionaire, program it and get it going within the game, to see what needs to be changed - speed, camera angles, etc. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/37531554/acb68b820e61da15bdc4cdb4a4c169af3be7d1cf.jpg[/img] Open GL / fill-in within Visionaire Studio 5 This enables me to get everything in the engine, working and flowing, while the renders take place and I can just replace these open gl images with the full renders when they're ready. It definitely speeds the game build development forward a lot faster! I also can't wait to see this area in full Neyyah-colour glory! ________________________________YY_________________________________ As well as everything else, I have also been touching upon portal transition ideas and how they will look within the game. This has already been touched upon earlier in the year, as seen in my dev log here: [previewyoutube=4eW2sAPQIRU;full][/previewyoutube] The idea is to be able to allow the player to see through the portal at the place they'll transport to, before actually travelling through it. Again, this was an idea I came up with earlier in the year, and I am now at a point where I can start actually pushing further along with getting these into the game itself. It will be a case of looking at the VFX which will really make the portals burst to life, and enable the player to feel as though they are being whisked away into the portal and through into the other side! [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/37531554/d33fe13ecaac92a82a8c58b0a6afa4ec62b4e821.png[/img] closed / neutral state [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/37531554/40ef49725e9967b0929398740a55e0b6dc438e01.png[/img] open state - ready to jump into! The overall effect is achieved via a process of effects, which I go through in the above dev log, but also documented, and have altered here and there to best suit the particular scene I'm working with. The main result is pretty much the same, however. Here are some examples of the stages I go through in order to achieve this 'open portal' effect by incorporating another scene from the game: [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/37531554/b3a720b34ce7935997c49faf605320c0db87151e.jpg[/img] - The first step is to grab the rendered scene which I want shown within the portal. I then scale this down enough so that the area in which I want shown in the portal will be exposed! I don't need the rest of the image. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/37531554/78e6b6269982ec1036f06f8b1e5c30b83d9f9370.jpg[/img] - I then experiment with a variety of effects in Photoshop, such as darken, hard light, and using a variety of eraser settings. The main goal is to blend the portal destination scene into the portal, so that the look and feel of the portal is retained, while the scene before the player feels real enough to touch ... But I don't want it to look exactly the same as it will when you arrive there. This is where the colour blend comes into the mix, while a full colour layer is slowly brought in to give it that extra colour in areas. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/37531554/92cd2bb55d504960d0e17bbcf1875bafbef83ed8.jpg[/img] - the end result is about the edges of the portal too - how much of the original portal look should fade away into the image, so it feels as though it could close back up at any point. This energy burst / electrical fizz effect is something still in development, but will definitely bring life to this overall open portal effect! And, of course, the effect created when the player clicks onto the portal to enter it! ________________________________YY_________________________________ Hope you enjoyed this post, Neyyah adventurers! There's so much happening at the moment in Neyyah's development. Outside of the main interior implementation, animation, interactions within Visionaire, I am also making sure the skip animations are all working correctly. An extra addition to this is the disabling of interfaces while an animation is playing - so the player can't open upon the menu. Of course, through the 'skip cursor' at a click of the left mouse button, the animation skips and menu access is restored! There are a lot of animations in Neyyah! Looking forward to touching base again with a more in depth comparison spread on the Watch Tower scenes within Neyyah from 2020 and now, and then looking further into certain new mechanics being introduced within Neyyah ... I'm sure many a player will find useful! Til then! - Aaron Gwynaire / Defy Reality Entertainment