Delta Patrol: Setting the Scene

With completion of the ROUGH CUT, Craig now has the long and "fun" process of special effects creation to look forward to. Or not as the case may be.

Though it all seems straight forward, creating special effects can be quite a deceptively complex and complicated process.

One of the first big challenges Craig faces is creating the setting of the movie... SPACE

In 3D terms space is in some ways easy. In all 3D programs you just start with an empty void as your workspace. A perfect simulation of Space. However of course you have to add some things to that or it'd seem too empty.

A generic star field is easy enough with a JPEG working as a backdrop. Yet in our movie the action all happens in a planetary system. The Delta system. Meaning Craig now has a location to build. Even if it is not a location of the scale we normally think of as one!

This was his first stab at it in 2006. Wanting something a little more visual interesting then just a planet floating in space, Craig opted for a nice blue nebula as an additional backdrop element. He's theory being that it will help contrast the spaceships once their added (a trick he picked up from his teen favourite Babylon 5).

However this still seemed pretty bland and pedestrian to him (and us!) so he went back to the drawing board. Or as they call it in Carrara the building floor.

For his second go, Craig added a second ring around the planet to spice it up. It also gives him a better setting for a very key action sequence where some spaceships battle it out in the asteroids that make up those rings.

To help liven up the nebula Craig added a sharp contrasting pink to the cloud effect. Giving the setting a much more lively and engaging look. Plus with some spaceships (the old abandoned design for the heroes vessels) you can see how the nebula helps bring them out of the background.

However with the lose of that particular 2006, Craig was forced to reinvent the wheel a little bit this week when re approaching the scene.

He also wanted the rings to be a little more dynamic, and so reoriented the planet to the camera. The problem being the bigger ring disappeared all together.

So with minor tweaking he has corrected the problem!

Now for the "bigger" problem of space. Due to the cloud effects used to create the nebula it takes a lot of time to render. However for the purposes of animation this is a real time waster as it doesn't move. In fact being so big and far away conceptually neither it nor the planet need to be actual models any of the scenes.

Craig's solution is to figure out how to make a proper "background" which will encompass the modelling space. Backgrounds can be thought of as a jpeg wallpaper that is plastered all around the imaginary spherical boundary of the modelling space. In theory if Craig can figure out the dimensions of this imaginary boundary he can set up the Delta system as a essentially constant, yet non existent element of his scenes.

He has a lot of R and D to do to get there. However he has done some building on the environment which is promising.

Integrating the Asteroids he previewed last year he has come up with a nearly finally quality sample shot. Though he tells us he wants to slow the asteroids down a titch.