Below is reflection of the whole process of designing this trailer.
Concept Stage
Once given the task of creating a trailer to market a space game with the setting of a Space Hanger, we sat down and made a detailed plan of how the project should be split up in the time schedule given.
Time Table
• Diagrams: 1st Draft
o Oct 31st - Nov 2nd Done on Monday
• Diagrams: 2nd Draft
o Nov 2nd - Nov 6th Done on Friday
• Basic Geometry
o Nov 6th - Nov 9th Done on Monday
• Add Detail, Static Meshes, etc
o Nov 9th – Nov 13th Done on Friday
• Add Scripts, Animation, etc
o Nov 13th – Nov 15th Done on Sunday
• Add Camera Work
o Nov 15th - Nov 17th Done on Tuesday
• Finish Work and Refine
o Nov 18th Wednesday
• Hand in Work
o Nov 19th Thursday
We planned a long period to get a good plan for the diagrams. This was to make sure we had a level we were comfortable with. Rough sketches of areas we wanted such as the Space Hanger and the Bridge were made and then refined using Microsoft Visio. What isn’t noted in the time table was that the Story boards were also created during this period of production. During the week of November 2nd – 6th, it was may take to create the cinematic camera angles that were going to take place in our trailer. Since we planned to have a story element I also had to come up with a script to create a story that will capturepeoples interest. The creation of these scenes was much easier to imagine. This is because we could tell a story using simple animations within UnrealED to create the scenes to great effect. To go with this story element was an action scene at the end of the trailer. These scenes were more difficult to create because the simple animations would reduce the quality of the product. This problem was solved to waiting until we got to the Scripting section of development (Novemeber 13th – 15th) to see what realistically we could create as an action scene.
Once the diagrams, storyboards and script were created, we set out to create the basic geometry of the levels we were going to use during our trailer. It was at this stage we encountered we would need smaller rooms to use for effects throughout the trailer. Example of these can be seen with the shot of Earth.
This shot of Earth is just an image on a wall we used in a small room within out level of UnrealEd. During the design process we never took into account that we would need to create the small rooms to create these kinds of effects. Lucky for use these rooms were rather smaller and quick to make, so it didn’t take out much of time we organised to create our level.
Once happy with the overall geometry over the levels, it was time to add details and textures to them. Realistically if we were making this in a game company, we would have had a Game Artists design the overall look to the levels and try and create the themes and atmosphere we wanted to convey in the story. However since we didn’t have the time or the artistic talents available we looked at how Epic created their space themed levels within Unreal Tournament 2004 for inspiration.
Scripting
The next stage of the production was adding the scripting to the level. This would help create our scene and have our bots animated to help produce the scenes we created during the storyboard stage. During this stage we encountered a great deal of problems and changes had to be made in order to get our product out in time. The changes that had to be made because of time constraints were:
• Voice Acting was replaced with Subtitles only
• Projector of the Robot Captain in the Bridge Scene was replaced with a textured image.
• General character was cut from the story and his scenes were replaced with the Captain.
With the limitations of the animations available within UnrealEd meant that some to the scenes had to be tweaked and changed to compensate. Though there were changes that cut quite a lot out, there were aloes additions made.
Originally we had the idea that Robots would invade the space hanger in these fighter type ships we found in the Models within UnrealEd. However with looking more into the models available, we found a model of a big Battle Cruiser. Once we found this model we thought that we had to take advantage of it somehow and changed the scene to have this Battle Cruiser board the ship and have the robots come out of there instead. This also helped solve the problem of adding more robots to the scene. With the small fighters, there can only be a set limit of how many could come out of them realistically. With the Battle Cruiser we could have however many we wanted for the scene. Another addition to the level was the Malcom Animation. During our research on Animations and level designs Epic used in their own levels, we found a scene where Malcom does an acrobatic move to take out some enemies. We felt that we could try an implement this action scene into our own scene and use Malcom as our Hero character that the player would want to play as during this game.
Overall
After showing the trailer to the class, the feedback was more positive that expected. The problems that were noted I think were noted ourselves due to time constrains and quick changes that were made due to the software limitations on our overall vision. In the end though, the work seemed to match the goals we tried to set and the reception to it was good.
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