GAD301: Skydome in UDK

GAD 301: Alien Abduction Facility - 3D Models

Entry Ramp

The Entry Ramp is a short ramp that connects the human building facade to the alien facility within.  There will also be a door in the door frame.

Entry Ramp

Transition / Waiting Room and the Strong Doors

There are 3 models here: the waiting room and two large doors designed to slide apart.

Transition / Waiting Room

The Transition Room has a specular pattern effect in the texture.  There are hand and body prints on the floor, particularly near the large doors where conscious abductees are eventually forced into the facility.

Strong Doors

The Strong Doors separate the outside world from the inside of the alien facility.  In texturing the two doors separately, I was not able to match the diffuse, normal and specular maps.  I have since improved my process to match the textures (as seen in the models below), and I will re-texture the doors to match.



Sanitation Hallway

This area is made up of 6 models: the Sanitation Entry Wall, the pod, the wall that holds the pod (includes floor), the ceiling, and the glass in the pod and the glass on the floor.

Sanitation Hallway Entry

The follow models are modular and are repeated in the level.   I created 3 sets of textures for each mesh so that textures are less repetitive.

Sanitation Wall, Floor, and Ceiling (2 models)

The floor part of this model is also the ceiling of the hallway below it (bottom render image in the presentation board).  Also, the floor/ceiling area is partly glass, so the player can peek at the Stasis Hall below.  (Model for this area are not complete at this time so they have no texture information in the renders above.  The textures for the glass floor areas are not complete.)

Sanitation Pod

Like the sanitation wall and ceiling meshes, the pod mesh has 3 different sets of textures.  The textures for the glass mesh are not complete (maps are not shown).

If I have enough time during the project, I will add some bodies hanging in the pods.

GAD301: Alien Abduction Facility - Specular Patterns in Textures

OVERVIEW

Thinking of ways to treat the visual transition from the "human" environment into the alien environment of the facility, I messed around with giving some interests to smooth metal textures.  I put a pattern onto the specular map of the "Transition Room", the first alien space experienced in the level.

RENDERS

The ramp going down into the Transition Room

 Render showing ceiling details - Ramp to the Transition Room.

 Render showing floor details - Ramp to the Transition Room (no door yet).

Specular pattern shown on the floor of the Transition Room.

The surfaces of the Transition Room have a specular pattern on it that is seen from certain angles.  Watch it in action in Maya.

SOME TEXTURE MAPS

 Diffuse map for the ramp room.

 Diffuse map for the Transition Room.

Specular Map showing the pattern in the Transition Room surfaces.

GAD301: Alien Abduction Facility - Sanitation Wall Unit

Presentation Board 17"x11"

This is 3 modular models combined into 1 wall unit.  They are designed to line-up to make a hallway.  The environment has dim red and yellow lights.

GAD301: Transparency Texture Problem

OVERVIEW

I've been trying to get my version of UDK to display transparency correctly (or at least, the way I want it to display).  After many hours of experimentation, this is what I've arrived at so far.

17x11 Presentation Board

Using an alpha channel in the original 32bit Targa file did not work.  I tried connecting the files alpha channel into the Opacity of the Texture Material in UDK, then messed around with the blend modes of the material.  No good.


SOLUTION

Eventually, I tried the image below, as a separate texture connected to the Opacity of the Material.  Then I set the following in the Material:

BLEND_DitheredTranslucent, using an MLMPhong, and turn on 2-Sided.

Used for the transparency part of the pod.

I'm also using a texture file with Color and Baked Lights combined.  AO is kept separate.  I may change to using an alpha channel of the diffuse as the AO later.


ISSUES WITH THIS METHOD

It's still not ideal and it still does not display the glass the way I want it to display.

First, I found that the image can only have pure black and pure white.  Any gray in the texture map is turned to gray pixels in UDK.

Second, there is some magic number of minimum pixel width that is needed between the transparent areas.  In my case, the line honeycomb lines are 5 pixels wide.  These show up pixelated (much like how gray areas show up), and worse, while in game mode, the pixels flicker.

You can see some of the pixelation around the edges of the honeycomb lines in this close up.  The lines in the actual texture are sharp and clean, however.

And lastly, because UDK seems to accept only black as transparent areas on a map, I am not able to show diffuse color information on the glass, such as smears and crud.  There must be a way to at least get the AO map over the transparency areas.