[...]... He is a regular speaker at the Game Developers Conference in San Jose, CA and serves as an Advisory Board member for Game Developer magazine Paul Steed lives and works in the Seattle area and can be reached at st33d@nak3d.com XIX Animating Real-Time Game Characters A great real-time game character can be measured by the success of five elements: the character's design, the model built on that design,... successfully fits whatever genre the game is being placed under, whether FIGURE 1.2 Some character designs need to differ while maintaining common design elements Animating Real-Time Game Characters that is sci-fi, fantasy, or Western Finally, the polygon count of a character impacts its design, although this is also an important technical consideration Because of real-time characters' polygonal nature,... the real-time character The difference that 1,000, 2,000, and 5,000 triangles make in a character's design is huge, but ultimately a good artist will accomplish plenty with whatever budget is handed to them Games played on the new consoles like Xbox™ and PlayStation 2™ are seeing characters that have up to (and sometimes more than) 5,000 polygons However, main characters seen in PC-based real-time games... of its own—if enough time and thought are put into it Uniqueness applies to not only a comparison of characters done before, but also of other characters within the same game Using different color combinations is an easy way to distinguish characters, but one of the most effective ways to keep your characters distinctly recognizable is the silhouette principle Figure f l illustrates the design differences... the result 7 8 Animating Real-Time Game Characters MODELING: FORM Great character animation relies on the foundation of a well-built model that adheres to and successfully translates a well thought-out design into 3D The most important aspect of a model in this regard is its form Suggesting mass and identity, form is defined by the proper distribution of vertices, edges, and faces A great real-time character... modeling real-time game characters, polygon modeling is usually the best approach Patch modeling is particularly useful when creating organic or soft-surface geometry like hair, cloth, or an undulating surface like water Other modeling methods, such as non-uniform rational B-splines (NURBs) and sub-divided surfaces, are valid and valuable tools but are more appropriate for rendered characters than real-time. .. little nudge, a little assistance Well, hopefully that's what I've accomplished—I hope to have given you something that does help and does provide a glimpse into the trenches of making and animating real-time characters for games So please, don't treat this book like a reverent tome of arcane knowledge I want you to fold corners, break the spine, and inflict a little tear here and there, staining it with... level of accuracy when called for, it's best to think of your reference as more of a diagram than a drawing While the action-pose approach works for most modelers, it always runs the risk of 6 Animating Real-Time Game Characters FIGURE 1.4 The loose approach was chosen for creating Betty Bad something being lost or modified from the designer's original vision when it's used as a basis for building the mesh... here, so bear with me As a video game "enthusiast," let me be the first to admit that there are a ton of gamers (read addicts) working in the comic book business and they have been following with great interest the incredible technological advances the video game industry has made in recent years And, yes, that's how I justify (read rationalize) playing hours of computer games Research, ya know! All the... on Viewport Background (or just hit Alt-B) Load your reference in by clicking on the Files button at the top of the Viewport Background menu and finding the appropriate image file Once 10 Animating Real-Time Game Characters the file is loaded, make sure the Match Bitmap, Display Background, and Lock Zoom/Pan boxes are all checked (Figure 1.9) FIGURE 1.9 Bringing an image into the viewport background . Paul. Animating real-time game characters / Paul Steed. p. cm. ISBN 1-58450-270-3 (paperback with CD-ROM : alk. paper) 1. Computer animation. 2. Computer games—Design. 3. Videogame characters. 4. Real-time. many to consider. My intent in writing Animating Real-Time Game Characters has been to share my work methods, thoughts, and ideas about animating real-time characters in 3ds max 4™ and character. (FAX) info@charlesriver.com www.charlesriver.com This book is printed on acid-free paper. Paul Steed. Animating Real-Time Game Characters. ISBN: 1-58450-270-3 All Betty Bad characters © 2002 WildTangent. All rights reserved. All brand