FMP Evaluation

Evaluation

The assignment brief was to create our own piece with the skills we've learnt during our time in collage before the start of the Final Major Project.

I have chosen to make a 2D game concept the reason why I have done this is because I think I'll be good at it, also I think it would be good to show off my skills in this area as I am hoping to go on to the level three Games Design and Development in September.

Obviously I couldn't create a completed game in the time that I had because 1) I don't have the required skills or knowledge to create it.

2) I don't have enough time; even for a highly professional game developer, I don't think that the time allocated to me would be enough to make a good, working game.

The primary research that I did was a survey on surveymonkey.com, asking people a few questions about 2D games, which overall seemed to go reasonably well although I feel that more people could have answered it so I could more of a variety of answers.

I also took some images outside in the countryside and although I think that it didn't go as well as I would have liked (because all the images that I took were blurry and unfocused), I think it still served its purpose as I managed to create the trees in the background from the image that I took of the tree, the lighting wasn’t at its best because it was cloudy too, although I could have countered that with a change in one of more of the camera settings and it’s possible that I wasn’t close enough to the tree itself so therefore the focus of the image was off and possibly the camera was unable to pick up the detail of the tree, which might have been nice to see some of the other features of the tree (like the branches) more clearly.

The secondary research that I did was on Google, I searched up 2D game backgrounds so I could give myself an idea of what it that I might me making. This way, it could inspire me to make a game concept, I also when to the collage library and looked for books on logo design for the company.

I believe that my nether of my research was that influential, mainly because I ran off my own ideas about how my game concept should look like, although; I think that my secondary research played a part by giving me an idea about how the game should look.

 I have decided to make three "In Game" Screenshots for my game concept, the colour scheme I decided to choose was the primary colours; red, blue and green with grey and black as two other colours, this represents a "Five Bit" colour scheme.

The way I got the images that I used in my game concept was by drawing them out first, then editing them on Photoshop after scanning them in. Either that, or I'd make them on Photoshop in the first place, then size them according to what I felt like. 

I did learn one skill during this project, which was "Gradient Overlay", this made the moon in one of my images look even more realistic, and I definitely like the look of it, although it might be a while before I manage to replicate the skill, seen as it is pretty complicated.

My time management in this project wasn't very good to be honest, I feel I could have handled it a lot better than what I did, I also didn't stick to mu schedule either; which is something I really should have done as part of my general project I was meant to learn that, I ended up coming in on days when I didn’t really need to and doing work at home too; I know that apparently it was a good idea to do work at home, but if I’d handled my time correctly I would have been able to make all my work at collage and wouldn’t have had to even think about it at home.

There were many moments during the production of my final piece where I either forgot what I was doing or I had to constantly go over the same thing time and time again to make it the way I wanted because I like to pay attention to detail, which may have cost me a lot of time in my project, I didn't and still don't really know how to counter my attention to detail, I've never found anything good enough to detract me from the smaller parts of a picture so I could focus on the bigger picture as it were, it could have the actual character in it as well so that there was a constancy in all the screenshots.

I think that generally I'd change one of my screenshots because I forgot to put my character and their health and ammo text boxes into my screenshot, so that the person viewing them could still see that it was part of the game rather that something external to the game.

My target audience is young people because I feel that there are still some people out there who would play this type of game and also my target audience may be older people too because I'll be nice for them to see that people are still creating these types of games and may also bring back happy memories for them of when that kind of thing came in.

I feel that my presentation went well as a whole, I manage to counter my fear/ lack of self-confidence by just getting up and getting on with it, also I felt that I have grown in confidence since the begging of the year, which is good because back then, the idea of doing a presentation would definitely not be on be my mind.

Peer Feedback: Linda- I find these images very creative especially the top one as the blue background makes the image stand out more and also the trees are very unique. Also I really like the stars which adds more detail to it as it makes it clear that it is night time. to improve I believe Dan should add more colour to his character such as the face of it. Overall his work is great.

FMP Presentation

How I think my Presentation went.

I think that generally my presentation went well.
I managed to get straight up to the board and just speak without much interference from my nerves or lack of self confidence. I think that my presentation was a good way to build up my self confidence.
I explained myself well, but I think I could have been a bit louder.

Something I forgot to do is peer feedback, so below is a section for that:

Peer Feedback.

• Beth Byron: I like Dan's design because it looks like a real game and I would like to play it because it would be fun to play on. I have notice that first screenshot trees are on the ground but on the second screenshot they was bit in the air unless they are supposed to be flying trees then it would make it a lot cooler and a sweet game.
• Kaza Brookbanks: The images for the game looked interesting it was mostly basic but with some advance things like detail trees and adding things giving it a new look. For the hours it took he took his time to make these nice basic images and hope to see it as a proper game.

FMP Game Screenshots

Game Screenshot 1

The image below is the original image that I took while I was with me parents at the weekend. I used this to base my game screenshots around.

I then started taking out the blurry background from the main tree frame (skeleton) and so that I could get a clear picture of just the branches and not the leaves or surrounding trees.

I completed removing the background from the main tree and drew over the main structure of the tree with the "Pencil Tool", to give it a rougher more natural look to it and because the branches of the tree were blurred and I couldn't see them very clearly.

Once I made a basic outline for my the tree, I zoomed in and started working at at a higher level of detail, removing the grey parts of the tree and making the branches bolder.

I then started to use my imagination to create the rest of the branches and smaller twigs after that.
This was the thing that took the longest in my project because I found it quite hard to make the tree look realistic and almost like I never edited any part of it and because of my high attention to detail; the final product for my tree was created (which it the image below).

I then used the "Magic Wand Tool" to select all the white around the tree so I could drag and drop it into another file.

I then created a A3 page that I was going to use to display my work (after turning it from Portrait to Landscape).

After turning my background sideways (Landscape), I pasted the image of the tree into the new document.

I can clone (or duplicate the same image by holing the Alt key and then clicking dragging the image I want to make more of.
If I wanted to clone more than one image, I could select the two images I want to duplicate and simply press and hold Alt whilst clicking and dragging.

I then used the same technique (Alt, Click + Drag) to make six of the same image and sized them so they'd all fit on the background.

I then set about making each and every tree individual, to emphasize the natural, original look to it.
Making them different sizes and shapes and even putting more branches on some more than others.

Also, a fellow student noticed that each tree was leaning slightly to the side, I didn't notice this when creating my tree, but once I noticed them; I didn't try to re-make or modify the trees so that they looked straight rather than leaning.

After a few more modifications to the size, shape and positioning of the trees I started working on the general background of the image. Creating the ground that the trees would lye on and the colour of the sky wasn't made by the paint bucket tool, the background is actually an image take of the sky, in the early morning time. This is how I managed to get that colour, I took the image of the sky purposefully because I didn't like any of the colors that Photoshop had to offer.

I did however make the ground below the trees a strange grey colour.

The image of the sky I took is below, I had to make a few adjustments because part of a tree branch what sticking into my photo, something I didn't notice until I started editing it in Photoshop.

The below images I what I did to get the image of the sky into Photoshop and size it so that it fits right.

I then took an image what I'd sketched out and scanned in and edited in Photoshop. I called the image "Dave", this is because it is the main character and I wanted to be able to put "names to faces", as it were.

The image below is my final piece, I added a sun to the world and a health bar in the top right hand corner,  

Game Screenshot 2

Game Screenshot 3

Below is the final image that I made on Photoshop of my third game screenshot.
After adjusting the colour of the background, and changing the size of the rectangle at the bottom, changing the font of the "Robot Master" and adding laser bullets firing from the main character's gun.

Peer Feedback: Linda- I find these images very creative especially the top one as the blue background makes the image stand out more and also the trees are very unique. Also I really like the stars which adds more detail to it as it makes it clear that it is night time. to improve I believe Dan should add more colour to his character such as the face of it. Overall his work is great.