Peer Reviews

Level Downloads

Crysis Levels Download Here

Google Sketchup File Here

Final Machinima and Tutorial

Please Watch in HD 1080

Video Tutorial

I decided to create a video tutorial to fill in the gap of terrain and environment/level design.

Through the observation of past assignments it has come to my attention that many people’s concepts could have been improved with the help of a complex or interesting landscape.

The tutorial covers how to use an external program called GeoControl to create unbelievably detailed and complex landscapes for Crysis and other applications.

Through using the built in Landscape and environment modifiers in Crysis, it came to my attention that there must be a more superior method to create your level as I tend to spend a large amount of time making sure that the environment I have created is good enough.

The following extract is from GeoControl.com:

“The revolutionary concept of GeoControl2 opens up totally new dimensions of creating virtual landscapes.
The unique combination of more artistic tools and semi-scientific algorithms makes it possible to create realistic, breathtaking landscapes, based on conceptual layouts..”

The tutorial I created walks through how to simply use the GeoControl program to create a basic landscape for export to Crysis. Of course the program goes much deeper and there are many tools and settings which can be tweaked and changed to edit your terrain.
The tutorial utilises the preset terrain types which are built into the program, so that the viewer following the tutorial will achieve a similar result.

This tutorial will be suited to the more advanced Crysis users who wish to create levels with much more definition, detail accuracy. Although the tutorial is only a basic look into the program, it gives the viewer a basic understanding of how the program works, and will hopefully be able to give them enough knowledge to create some detailed landscapes.

My video tutorial is based on a basic written tutorial from maxedgaming.com.
'The tutorial was written by 'xxxgamer' and the tutorial is called “Creating Awesome Heightmaps”. Full credit goes to this first tutorial I came across and thank you to him for introducing me to this wonderful program.

GeoControl Screenshot

GeoControl Screenshot

Custom Content

The cityscape content in my sketch installation for my porosity lens plays a small but crucial role. The city relates to families and living. The porosity lens makes more sense if i is set in a habitable space than in a space such as a field or open landscape. 


The city content was downloaded from crymod.com 
Creator: RayFanMan [RayFan9876]
 
http://crymod.com/filebase.php?userid=32588

 

Week 5

The video below is my custom sound in Crysis. I recorded some of the introduction to Andy Mckee's 'For My Father'. When the 'o' key is held down the song plays, when it is released it stops. 

Through researching details about my Porosity lens, the research already contains data representation. The social analysis graphs are detailed graphs of social connectivity. I am going to try to convey the social analysis graph in my Porosity lens through the Ai's moving along specific paths throughout my sketch installation.

The social analysis is 'an attempt to analyze a situation or a social problem objectively..'.

The following image is a social analysis graph of the Twitter Network:

 

The nodes represent areas where people connect, or are in the same space, or visiting the same webpage.

Using this technique, I will try to convey how social classes of families move about and connect with each other. Ai's will stay stationary for a couple of seconds to create nodes, then move off again to create the edges of the graph.  

Week 4

I began thinking about the tutorial I am going to complete. Whilst completing Experiment1, I spent a lot of time refining and creating an environment that i was happy with. Creating environments and landscapes takes time and a lot of practice to do well.
I came across a written tutorial on how to create terrains for Crysis in an external program called GeoControl. After completing this tutorial myself, I am going to create a video tutorial version myself and maybe go into the program in a little more detail. 

Week 3

This is my sketch installation I will use for my Porosity lens.  



This is the final sketch installation for my Machinima. I changed the environment completely, a motive for doing this was because a large part of my documentary focuses on the particle effects that the AI's are spawning and the environment before is too distracting for them to have my desired effect.

Week 2

This flowgraph uses both the spawn particle and the entity:getPos to spawn a particle every given amount of time.

Week 1

This video shows an AI entering the selected vehicle. There is also a KeyInput so the AI doesn't follow the selected path until the key is pressed.

Research

MAKE AN AI FOLLOW A PATH



MAKE A MOVING TRAIN (TRACKVIEW)



MAKE AN AI ENTER A VEHICLE



CRYMOD WEBPAGE


INCRYSIS WEBPAGE

http://www.crymod.com/filebase.php?cat=48 - Great place for some good Time of Day settings for Crysis

Nodes and S.W.A.T Analysis

AI:FollowPathSpeedStance

Strengths:Simple node, easy to use, easy to understand and find in a busy flowgraph.

Weaknesses: lacks options. Large node for one task.

Opportunities: Makes making a flowgraph easy when you only need one node.

Threats: Simple Node, limits functionality.

Loops: choose how many times the AI runs the path

Path_name: name of the path you chose for the AI to follow

run= : choose how fast the AI completes the path, i.e. walks/jogs/runs

Stance: The stance of the AI when he/she follows the path

Effect:SpawnParticleEffect

Strengths:Easy to use and understand if you haven't encountered it before.
 

Weaknesses: Cannot select the particle effect from a list, you have to copy the name externally and paste it in

Opportunities: Great for spawning a particle effect when needed, such as rain or weather at a specific time.

Threats: Scripts and particles are a little dodgy when opening and changing them. May get frustrating having to reload often. 

Effect: This is where the user pastes in the name of the chosen particle effect. 
Done-> : This is handy to loop back around so the particles keeps spawning and is not spawned only once. 

  Entity:GetPos

The functionality of this node is similar to the Entity:EntityPos node but instead of triggering the output ports whenever any position information changes it only outputs when triggered to do so. The only input port is the ‘ Get ’ port, which when triggered outputs the according information on all output ports. In situations where a constant update is too expensive the Entityy:GetPos should be used instead of theEntityy:EntityPos node which continuously outputs on all ports when any position value changes.   

(http://wiki.crymod.com/index.php/Sandbox_RefFlowgraphEntityNodes#Entity:GetPos)

Inputs

entityId

Used when changing the attached entity dynamically. Displays the name of the node.

Get

Used to trigger all output ports.

Outputs

Pos

Position of the entity is output on this port.

Rotate

Rotation of the entity is output on this port.

Scale

Scale of the entity is output on this port.

FwdDir

Direction of the Y axis of the entity is output on this port.

RightDir

Direction of the X axis of the entity is output on this port.

UpDir

Direction of the Z axis of the entity is output on this port.

Strengths:The main strength of this node is that it gets the given position of any entity at any time. Some operations such as this take many nodes to calculate. It is handy having it in one.
 

Weaknesses:-

Opportunities: This node is good for determining whether an entity or player is within a certain range of something. It can be used to trigger certain actions or events. It can be used in this experiment to trigger actions on lights and objects to support my porosity lens.

Threats: This node can get confusing when trying to choose a certain entity. It takes some time to play around with to get it working smoothly.

Porosity Lens Concept

My Porosity lens is going to explore the connection of people to each other through the idea of networking.
Some ideas that are worth looking at are social networks and sociolinguistics. Sociolinguistics is the study of the effect of any and all aspects of society, including cultural norms, expectations, and context, on the way language is used, and the effects of language use on society. (John J. Gumperz and Jenny Cook-Gumperz, "Studying language, culture, and society: Sociolinguistics or linguistic anthropology?"). 

Socioliguistics can be used in my porosity lens to document how different class families, such as middle, lower and upper class, relate and network with each other, and within the groups themselves.

A Social Network Analysis Diagram

I am interested in documenting how the different social groups move about, mingle with who and the patterns they create. An advantage with my chosen field is that there is a lot of detailed information relating to my area of choice. 

The different groups of people will be distinguished by the colour of the trail they leave behind. 

Lower class: Green

Middle Class: Blue

Upper Class: Red 

The coloured particles glow brighter the longer a class is stationary, this documents the amount of time that the different classes spend together or away from each other.

The yellow particle represents the player as an onlooker. The yellow is a neutral colour when compared against the others so it is easy to pick out which path is the viewer. 
The yellow colour as a seperate colour to the others represents that the viewer is not part of the world or in-motion graph.

The aim for my documentary is that the paths and journeys of the different groups are clearly visible.

The static, dark environment I have created will be an advantage when having to analyse the groups paths.

Student Marking

Documentary

TO WATCH IN HD (RECOMMENDED), CLICK HERE TO GO TO YOUTUBE

Files

File Front

Crysis Environment

Google Sketchup
Stair and Platform

Documentary Style

I have chosen to use an Observational Mode Documentary style. I chose this mode because it will in the end make a more interesting and gripping documentary, through the use of thought out film clips. Using this style helps the documentary to flow better and transition between clips is smoother. This mode is most appropriate to my hypothesis as my hypothesis is not to complicated to understand, therefore a complex documentary is not required.

Hypothesis

'Through the careful placement of C4 explosives throughout the Town Hall structure and Village houses, explosions within a smaller, compacted area such as the enclosed village houses, do a significant amount of damage more than in an open exposed space.'

Using Ropes

Explosions on Houses

EXPLOSION 1 - Explosives placed on the exterior of the houses

 

EXPLOSION 2 - Explosives placed on the underside of the roofs

EXPLOSION 3 - Explosives placed on the interior of the houses