Cutscenes?

[Chris]

Searched and havent really found anything, so sorry if this has been asked before, but do you plan on going with the traditional rustmonkey style cutscenes?

 

These really made the thief games as good as they were, imo, they were critical in settings the atmosphere. Would be a shame if you couldnt do them. On the other hand, they are probably difficult and time consuming to construct. Btw, if anyone knows exactly how to make them, i'd love to know, i'm a fair lick in photoshop (i'm employed for my efforts), so i can draw, and i have an idea of how they are made (moving layers, etc), but if anyone has actual knowledge....

Edited March 22, 2007 by Chris

[Order of the Hammer Bureaucrat]

Making those movies is specific to each of the missions being made, and initially what we have here is not missions. Whether the toolset will provide outright support for such movies is unknown, but imo also irrelevant, because it's not hard in doom 3 with scripts and those screen thingies.

[Crispy]

Yes, Doom 3 has support for in-game movies (you can even use them as textures in the game world if you like, though admittedly I can't think of a use for that in a non-sci-fi setting of course full-screen movies can be done as well). This topic on Doom 3 world has some rudimentary instructions - I expect we'll write our own docs for it in due course.

 

As OotHB says, TDM is a toolkit and won't have an official campaign (at least initially).

[Chris]

The question was irrespective of whether missions have been made yet or not, so are you saying there are no rustmonkey style cutscenes planned/nobody knows how to make or implement them?

 

Dissapointing if so.

[Crispy]

No, I'm not saying that at all. I have no idea how you got that impression from my post.

 

I'm saying:

 

1. Doom 3 is very capable of doing cutscenes.

 

2. So far, we haven't been focusing on things like cutscenes. IMO the AI is just slightly more important. What cutscenes are we supposed to make, anyway, without any missions to apply them to?

 

3. Mappers can create cutscenes, and I'm sure they will do so. Furthermore, I'm sure that some mappers will indeed create Rustmonkey-style cutscenes.

[New Horizon]

The question was irrespective of whether missions have been made yet or not, so are you saying there are no rustmonkey style cutscenes planned/nobody knows how to make or implement them?

 

Dissapointing if so.

 

Just to re-iterate what was said.

 

Chris, The Dark Mod is a 'map building' toolset. Producing cutscenes does not really fall into our line of work. Cutscenes are the domain of 'fan mission authors'. We WILL release a couple of stand alone demo missions with the toolset when it is released, but they will not be a campaign. We have discussed working on a campaign after the 1.0 release, but given we will have already worked on the toolset for 4 years, we may just leave the map making up to the community.

 

Implimenting the cutscenes is already supported by the doom 3 engine...no worries there. Making them should be no different than how people make them for T1 and T2 fan missions currently. There are plenty of knowledgeable folks and I'm sure they would be willing to write some tutorials when the time comes.

[ZylonBane]

What does D3 use as its native video format anyway? Bink?

[Mr Mike]

ogg

[OrbWeaver]

Ogg is used for audio, AFAIK Doom 3 uses ROQ for video.

[New Horizon]

Ogg is used for audio, AFAIK Doom 3 uses ROQ for video.

 

Yup, correct. There is a ROQ encoder somewhere...I think I posted it on our internal FTP. I think they used the same one for the quake games as they did for doom 3.

[bardic]

If you can texture a wall with a video, could you create a distant backdrop with swaying trees or perhaps when you look out a window you could have video of people milling about in a courtyard below?

 

I wonder if there is any way to make that look correct in a level for speacial circumstances.

[New Horizon]

If you can texture a wall with a video, could you create a distant backdrop with swaying trees or perhaps when you look out a window you could have video of people milling about in a courtyard below?

 

I wonder if there is any way to make that look correct in a level for speacial circumstances.

 

Heh, that's a neat idea. Wonder if it would work in a skybox? lol Could be possible to make some type of looping animation of a far off complex scene. Could certainly add a lot of depth to a backdrop.

[Order of the Hammer Bureaucrat]

Or blinking lights in the distance on towers, that'd add some realism. Clouds which shift position and sometimes partially obscure the moon or stars?

I can't think of a use for that in a non-sci-fi setting

A white wall movie-textured as shadow theatre?

[Springheel]

If you can texture a wall with a video, could you create a distant backdrop with swaying trees or perhaps when you look out a window you could have video of people milling about in a courtyard below?

 

Theoretically yes. Any video that you can make (in roq format, anyway) can be applied to a brush.

[Izeman]

The question was irrespective of whether missions have been made yet or not, so are you saying there are no rustmonkey style cutscenes planned/nobody knows how to make or implement them?

 

Dissapointing if so.

 

Making those cutscenes is pretty much moving/morphing layers with keyframes. You should definitely try Adobe After Effects. Photoshop users should feel right at home (eventually ).

[Komag]

Quake 4 had stuff going on in the skybox, like the ships flying by, distant smoke from a tower, etc.

[ascottk]

Hey, it's Komag's b-day btw Happy Birthday!

[demagogue]

yeah, skybox animated art can look seriously cool.

I'd love to see some steampunk elements for some TDM skyboxes ... trailing smoke, maybe a massive dirigible floating by in the distance.

 

Edit: No kidding. Happy Birthday, Komag! Have a good one.

Edited March 22, 2007 by demagogue

[sparhawk]

That skybox in Q4 was annoying. I kept shooting at incoming planes, because I always thought they are enemies.

[ZylonBane]

Or blinking lights in the distance on towers, that'd add some realism. Clouds which shift position and sometimes partially obscure the moon or stars?

A looping video would be a horribly inefficient way to do such simple things.

 

Wait... there is a way to do a plain ol' scrolling cloud deck in D3, isn't there?

[Ishtvan]

Yeah, there are animated textures that can be set up without any ROQ video. What OHB described is already ingame using some textures and skyboxes.

[Crispy]

You can have all kinds of moving stuff in the skybox... no actual videos necessary. Of course you can if you want, but you don't have to.

 

So if you wanted an airship you could just make a small low-poly airship model and script it to fly around in the skybox. For example.

[Chris]

Making those cutscenes is pretty much moving/morphing layers with keyframes. You should definitely try Adobe After Effects. Photoshop users should feel right at home (eventually ).

 

Gave it a first go tonight, seems very simple, but characters/complex scenes will be more of a challenge. So far i've just done a typical thiefy city scene, just to test the water. If anyones at all interested (and yes i'm aware of mistakes in perspective etc, its just a quick play around):

 

www.volcbat.com/vids/sofar.wmv

Edited March 23, 2007 by Chris

[Gildoran]

About using ROQs for swaying trees, scrolling clouds, etc, that's really not necessary. I've set up textures which use sinusoidal shearing to appear to sway; with multiple layers and different scaling, you could have a whole forest appearing to sway, all without using a large ROQ. (you could also use non-sinusoidal tables for less predictable swaying)

 

As for things like scrolling clouds, all the demo skies I've made have done that. The second one even had the in-level moon-light be dependent on the density of the clouds covering the moon. (so you could predict when the clouds would obscure it and time your moves accordingly)

 

I've also added code to make skyboxes rotatable, so they can be used to simulate the view from a turning airship. All the things described such as blinking lights, smokestacks, etc are possible in a skybox. You could even synch the skybox with the player position and provide low-poly low-fillrate versions of nearby level geometry such as a clocktower, so it can be visible from the whole level without making PVS difficult or inefficient. (this was the technique I suggested for two-state LoD using skyboxes in the thread about how to do cities)

 

@NH: Would you mind if I tried to make a demo video of the V2 sky I constructed a while back, to show what D3 textures can do?

[New Horizon]

@NH: Would you mind if I tried to make a demo video of the V2 sky I constructed a while back, to show what D3 textures can do?

 

Go for it dude.