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   Advent Rising E3 2004 Trailer I was a scene lead on the Advent Rising cinematics team. This means I handled layout animation, (designing the composition, location of the action and camera movement in the scene) gathering, editing or creating all model and texture assets needed for the shots, lighting, giving constructive feedback and direction to the character animators, responding to direction from the art director, and executing rendering and delivery of shot elements to the Art Director.In addition to cinematics, many shots were created for marketing the game.

One example is the E3 2004 video shown at left.These shots feature Gideon Wyeth, the protagonist character . I was tasked with adapting the game character for the cinematics, adding required additional modeling features to support facial expressions and other character details to support the extreme close-up cameras and complex lighting.		  Ocean Crash  Advent Rising was full of intense action sequences. One of these is the scene at right where Gideon is aboard a crashing Seeker ship. These shots were among the first I worked on when I came aboard the project.  

 One of the goals for all the cinematics of the game was to draw-in and impact the player emotionally so as to ensure that the play experience had the desired interest and urgency. The cinematics punctuated the several pivotal emotional moments of the game.  As the ship breaks apart, Gideon struggles to survive, and for a moment  all hope appears lost -  but something amazing happens as he refuses to accept certain death.

A significant amount of effects elements had to be created for these shots, including fire and smoke particles, damaged and broken ship geometry, hair rigging and animation, and water.
Escape Pod Another key moment is when Gideon must choose to save either his brother Ethan, or Olivia, his girlfriend. The in-game Gideon character had very limited emotive capability, so it was important to add these features to the cinematic character models.  

Gideon’s character  goes through several emotions in this sequence and each one is important to the narrative involved with the gameplay. The finality of the separation is emphasized by the pod blasting away from the space station and the firing of the burners, to the chaotic re-entry burn, to the scene’s finale, punctuated by the meteoric crash-landing.  

The decision Gideon makes has reprocussions that are felt all the way to the final scenes of the game, making this sequence perhaps the most important of the game. It is one of my favorites for sure.		   For the Planet Escape scene at right, I handled the layout of the shots of Marin preparing the ship while Gideon stands guard, and various shots inside the ship, animation of Gideon manning the guns, hair rigging, and preparing the Marin and Gideon character models and textures Marin’s ship model and textures for close-up shots.

Like the other Advent Rising sequences, the scene is full of action and emotional impact.

Advent Rising's original game design featured a scene where large docile elephant-like creatures are alarmed by some explosions and stampede toward an alien structure. The defense system on the installation fires on the herd.

 

It is a cool sequence, but due to scope issues with finishing an ambitious game design, it was cut, so the promo video at right is their last appearance.

   Dropship Landing Another ship sequence from Advent Rising, this time a seeker dropship flying over land and water, then landing in a deep canyon.

Advent Rising Intro For the opening shots of the game, the ship models needed an upgrade, and additional shaders and textures for rendering offline.

 

These shots at left set up the initial mission for the game which is to fly the ship into the dock at the space station. Curiously enough this is the only time the player gets to fly a ship.

 

Anyhow, I digress. For whatever reason, Gideon is relegated to riding on or falling out of spaceships after the opening mission. Perhaps there was to be more flying in the sequels.

  

The Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver intro at right was created in 1999. There were two of us on staff at the time. While the animation appears dated in parts, the sequence still holds its own as a whole.

 

I handled character modeling, texturing and animation, lighting and rendering for the first half  of the intro. For the second half I contributed special effects work and lighting.

 

This was an ambitious project that led to a lot of work for GlyphX in the following years as the franchise continued for nearly a decade.
My contribution to the TMNT Pilot produced at Rainbow was the April O’neil model and textures. I also handled the integration of the models, animation and motion capture data, final lighting and rendering of the shots.

Click on the image at left to view the animation.		  

Donner is a Christmas special that aired on ABC family. This scene is one of several that I animated. I also handled the facial animation setup for all but 2 of the characters. Since all of the reindeer head were based on Donner, the facial system could be adapted to each character.

 

Because of the stretchy, ply-able nature of the characters, and the extreme nature of the expression, creating a morphing system to handle the challenge was a big task. I also created the finished head models that were used for the reindeer.