Character Customisation in Unreal

It seems do-able....

As I can't find any tutorials on a customisation menu in UDK, I'm finding videos on YouTube that show the function, and messaging the guys who uploaded them. Hopefully I can be steered in the right direction.....

If I can get hold of this guy - http://www.sanzpont.com/chosker/elium/?p=133, I think that would be a lot of help.

M16A1 Progress 2

Hit a brick wall with coding, waiting for a friend's help tomorrow...... in the meantime!...

Using a single image plane and a video as a reference.

M16A1 Progress

After hours of frustration trying to get my map to load in my custom game, I decided to get modelling. Here's the progress so far on my M16A1.

Much more detail on the body is needed.

Suburban Houses

As I previously mentioned, the villa is going to be situated in an American suburb, so the houses need to be designed. I've gone looking for house plans for suburban houses and found a number of different ones. I'm going to go for two different layouts -


Layout number 1:

 

Layout number 2:

The style of the houses will be much like these:

Weapon Research

 The main character, Shaun Carter, is an ex US cop. The game is a 3rd person shooter, so obviously it will involve guns. I want these guns to relate to the police force of the 80's, as if Carter still had access to the weapons though retired.

I plan on implementing 3 different guns into the gameplay. A pistol, automatic rifle, and a shotgun. Three very different guns.



This forum was extremely helpful in finding guns used in the 80's, maybe not by the police force, but I'm sure Carter could get his hands on (some of) them - http://www.zombiehunters.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=65256&start=0

Unfortunately, I can't model them all, so I need to choose just three, and here are my decisions up to this point.

Pistol:

The SIG Sauer P230: A small, semi-automatic handgun produced 1977-1996, used by various Police forces in the United States.

Shotgun:

The Franchi SPAS-12: A combat shotgun that was manufactured by the Italian firearms company Franchi S.p.A from 1979 to 2000. Used by various Police SWAT teams.

Automatic Rifle:

The M16A1: Essentially the same weapon as the M16 with the addition of a forward assist and corresponding notches in the bolt carrier, produced in 1967. Used by the U.S Army (of that era).

Scripting

I did a little bit of scripting and alterations to my game at the beginning of the year, but not the right way I don't think, where I need to be using Visual Studio.

I have already altered it so that it is a 3rd person view as soon as the player begins the level using Kismet. I've decreased the speed of the character, and I also swapped the character with another, so that I have little bit of knowledge when it comes to implementing my own main character.

Other things I need to look into include creating a modular pawn, as my game will include customisation. Will was extremely helpful, providing me with a tutorial - http://udn.epicgames.com/Three/DevelopmentKitGemsCreatingAModularPawn.html

Villain Concept

I decided it was time to draw out a concept for Aldo Batelli, the main villain. Although I don't plan to model him, I want to show his image in the trailer or something. Also, I want his gang members that you'll be seeing throughout the level to look very similar, appearance and attire.

Here's some sketchbook work:

Obviously, with a name like Batelli, I wanted him to appear Italian, so I thought of/looked up some Italian looking actors that I'd like him to resemble. Actors that came to mind included Andrew Rothenburg (The Walking Dead) and Steve Buscemi (Boardwalk Empire).

I felt there were two different types of villain I wanted to choose from, which were the younger, more charismatic and cocky villain, or the older, more intimidating and authoritative villain .I decided to go with the older villain, but not too old. I found an actor named Robert Davi, who appeared in movies such as 'Die Hard' and '007: License to Kill'.

Much like the process for my main character concept, I created a FaceGen of Robert Davi, and altered it accordingly until I had a good reference for my character.

I've produced two concepts, one without hair, and one with hair. I'm leaning towards the one with hair at the moment. As well as the final images, I also recorded the process, and have made a 12 minute speed painting video.

Video: http://youtu.be/wxKyeiLoecw?hd=1

Android App Development Tutorials

I came across a very helpful series of tutorials by a YouTube channel called thenewboston. I thought the series was 20 parts long, but I must have read it wrong because it's actually 200 parts, though not all of theses videos contain information that I need.

For example, in tutorial number 41, there is a finished application using the function of the phone's camera. I feel I need to get to this point before I go any further -

Video: http://youtu.be/I9ldAcnx_jc?t=4m25s

Also there are some handy tutorials on the Andriod Developer website itself - http://developer.android.com/reference/android/hardware/Camera.html

Mobile App description in more detail....

A brand new, unique software, directed to all game developers out there.
'Get Your Head In The Game' (working title) would be a free smartphone app accessible to the public, that would implement FaceGen technology, in order to get your, or your friends and family's face directly, and promptly into a console or PC game.

On start-up, the user will need to enter a unique serial code that came with their game in order for the app to know where to send the data.

The app will require the user to take two photographs, both front and profile, much like the EA GameFace process.

Once this is done, they will be instructed to place specific markers on the key features of the face, including the eyes, nose, mouth, jaw and chin.

A simple press of a button will render a complete 3D model of their head, ready to be uploaded to the game database.

From here the character can be accessed through the menus for further customisation with different hair, facial hair, height, weight and skin colour, ready to be used in-game.