Labryinth VR - Eighth Update

During this two week period, a lot of my time was devoted to creating the rig for the second door knocker. Due to some issues importing the initial knocker in game, I delayed creating the second one perhaps a bit too long as I still have some work to do to complete this rig. I was hoping that I could easily copy the first door knocker's rig over to this one with a few changes, but unfortunately that proved to be incorrect. Trying to reuse the rig has been fraught with technical difficulties. As a result, I'm working on a paired down version of the initial door knocker's rig.

I plan to have this completed and handed over to our animator by Sunday so Tyler has the entire sprint to work on it.

Based on feedback I received last week, I made some alterations to the starry galaxy, creating a simple mask instead of layering two types of noise to create the twinkling stars. This allowed for the sky to be less busy and more appealing, especially in VR.

In the previous sprint, I wasn't able to implement and test the new aura I created for interactive objects as the level was checked out, so I devoted some time this week to ensuring everything looked and worked properly on the Bog Level.

For now, ignore the water shooting up into the air. I used UE4's water system to place some ripples in the water in an earlier sprint, but for some reason they're no longer working properly. This is something I'll have to trouble-shoot next week.

I also finalized the appearance of the swamp bubbles, re-rendering them in Houdini, and changing the material to give them a better appearance. I also created a simple blueprint for the bubble, allowing them to be placed throughout the bog, each one with a different size and "pop speed." I also added in a 3D sound node of some "deep" mud bubbles popping, and placed it in the center of the bog.

Labyrinth VR - Seventh Update

As I was out of town for a few days, this was a somewhat lighter sprint for me. I originally intended to complete the second door knocker's facial rig, but as I got it Wednesday afternoon, I decided to focus on making some tweaks to various VFX in the experience instead.

I was pretty unhappy with the custom galaxy cubemap I made for the final level. No matter what the quality of image, it remained stubbornly out of focus, so I didn't consider the quality up to par. As a result, I began looking into creating a "twinkling" sky of stars instead. The material is composed of overlapping noise textures that slowly pan in a circle.

I made this material in UE4 based on a glitter shader I found, and created the base color for the sky in Photoshop.

Galaxy "clouds" - overly bright and stylized so it would show up properly behind stars.

Even this had to be multiplied by a factor of 10 in order to look sufficiently visible!

Twinkling star material.

I also made some tweaks to the "glow" that signifies what the player is supposed to interact with in the experience. The new glow has less harsh edges, and a more interesting ripple effect around the edges of the objects. It still needs to be tested and implemented in the Bog Level,  but below you can see the effect in place.

Below you'll see the changes I made to the goblin eye VFX in the tower. The original effect was a fairly simple orb, meant to stand in until I could polish the effect and make it spookier and more realistic. I drew the shape of the eyes in Photoshop, then took them into substance and made a "blinking" material.

Goblin eyes.

Texture created in Substance Designer. The gradient becomes a dynamic parameter that causes the eyes to "blink" when in the particle system.

Moving forward, I'm hoping that the rig I made for the first door knocker will transfer over to the second one with a minimal amount of tweaks. I know the shapes of the faces and features are quite different, in theory,  I can take the initial rig and move some parts around to get it to better suit the second door knocker.

New "mute" door knocker (right), modeled by Pedro, and original facial rig/controls (left).