Update - Bear Tavern

James -

Since the last post, there has been a lot of progress made with my assets, The Bear Tavern in particular. The model was finished and textured, and loaded into the Cry engine among the first to make it in, so it was very exciting seeing it in real time along side the other buildings as the level progressed. I have been making ongoing tweaks and changes but really the last thing left to do is to get the lod in and working and fill up the courtyard with my other assets in production, some of which will be spread throughout the our map.
We have really begun to nail the composition and lighting too a point where I feel happy we are achieving the mood and atmosphere that we set out for, but perhaps most importantly I believe we are on the right track to achieving that realism element which was so fundamental to our idea.

So I just like to illustrate the progress that has been made over the past few weeks on the tavern specifically, along with other aspects of the level.

- At this point my textures were nearly complete and the main design of the Tavern was constructed.
I wanted to take that opportunity before we were able to import and try out our models in Cry engine, to experiment with lighting inside of 3ds Max. Since we conceived our project plans, one of my main idea's as co-art director was to set the mood and atmosphere of the map with night lighting.
- Using the moon and artificial light sources like lanterns and fires to bring it to life and create some really striking and beautiful atmosphere. Mystery and immersion I felt would be a huge selling point if we could pull it off.
 - Plus it would also add some believability and realism to our scene. Early on we soon identified that adding any characters would be too much to undertake, but I felt that would leave us with a ghost town effect if we followed the other groups directions to make there scene hit the daylight timezone.

I added staircase and balcony/ walkway - Used for viewing archery or lingering. should be interesting to explore and five an added vantage point.

At this stage the Bear Tavern was In cry engine now, the level was taking shape thanks to Laim, and we had some lighting to test maps were working correctly. For a while the night time lighting that I spoke of earlier was dropped due to it being difficult to achieve, it was replaced for early morning/ sunrise, and there was some disagreement in the group as to whether changing to daylight was better or worse. Ultimately daytime just seemed to conflict with realism having lanterns everywhere, and empty streets but no natural explanation as to why, which is the advantage night gave us.

With some technical help from some of the third years, Jimi and I were able to find a basic night setting that mirrored what I was after originally. With the positive feedback it received from the rest of the our group and other peers, it has now been adopted and we are decided on moonlit night which Liam has been enhancing. I think we are all really pleased about and it has given us an extra boost of morale for the finish line!

View from the main street looking directly at the Bear and the Gatehouse

View looking down into the entrance area of the tavern courtyard.

We still have some things to figure out but all the last assets from everyone are being created and added to the scene, including particle affects and decals. Its all coming together - Not long now!

Over and out.