StarCraft II Official! (Pictures)

[Falchion]

Wow, it takes that many people that long to make something so short?

That really puts into perspective how utterly futile and pointless it is for someone like me to pursue 3d graphics.

Then what you call that cutscene for Armageddon Onslaught?  Just an experiment?

[WB]

The modeler isn't just working on one thing at a time, same with the lighting dude. The problem is render time, if you want to see how everything comes together, you render it. Then you find problems, and render again. Yea, its retarded.

I heard when they were rendering Toy Story back in the day, it took 24 hours per frame. 30 frames a second. Thats an hour+ movie, and the render time was a few months I think. 30 machines would get you 1 second of footage, I don't want to think about how many hundreds of machines blizzard must have to render all the cinematics for all their games.

Might also explain why they have the storymode cinematics for SC2 now. Render time is a bitch.

[IskatuMesk]

Falchion> Yes.

WB> I heard the render times for Minis Tirith or however it's spelled for lotr took like 2 weeks a frame or something ludicrous. Render times are definitely an issue, but it also proves that one guy can't carry his weight when they need so many people. So, the solo guy doing any kind of cgi is an unrealistic venture.

[Lavarinth]

The render times your talking about use custom render engines and feature we would probably have to attend graduate school to understand. Things like calculation light bounce, gravity, cloth reactions, the insanely high poly-count for pre-rendered footage from a large company all add up to the time. Something that looks decent, just not as realistic could be done by someone like you or myself just as easily. We just have to cut a few corners.

[WB]

WB> I heard the render times for Minis Tirith or however it's spelled for lotr took like 2 weeks a frame or something ludicrous. Render times are definitely an issue, but it also proves that one guy can't carry his weight when they need so many people. So, the solo guy doing any kind of cgi is an unrealistic venture.

Honestly, almost all media ventures are not solo projects. I don't know where you got the idea that one person can do everything alone, it is a fantasy. Generally you have a team of people doing things together for any part of a large project, not only because it speeds things up but because the creativity in such an environment just flourishes, put a lot of creative people in a room together and you'll end up with something greater than any of them could do alone.

For example, in Ocarina of Time, one of the programmers decided to create a little fishing minigame as a side project. If that guy wasn't on the team, an entire mini-questline, a chunk of the environment, and a fun little minigame would have probably never been made. Working with a team is a GOOD thing, its not an unfortunate side effect.

[tipereth]

Letting creativity flourish is a great way to miss deadlines.

(good thing blizzard doesn't have any)

[thebrowncloud]

Letting creativity flourish is a great way to miss deadlines.

(good thing blizzard doesn't have any)

True, but if everyone stuck to 1-2 year deadlines like EA, we would only have shit games. It's good to have a decent balance.

[Hercanic]

WB> I heard the render times for Minis Tirith or however it's spelled for lotr took like 2 weeks a frame or something ludicrous. Render times are definitely an issue, but it also proves that one guy can't carry his weight when they need so many people. So, the solo guy doing any kind of cgi is an unrealistic venture.

Honestly, almost all media ventures are not solo projects. I don't know where you got the idea that one person can do everything alone, it is a fantasy. Generally you have a team of people doing things together for any part of a large project, not only because it speeds things up but because the creativity in such an environment just flourishes, put a lot of creative people in a room together and you'll end up with something greater than any of them could do alone.

For example, in Ocarina of Time, one of the programmers decided to create a little fishing minigame as a side project. If that guy wasn't on the team, an entire mini-questline, a chunk of the environment, and a fun little minigame would have probably never been made. Working with a team is a GOOD thing, its not an unfortunate side effect.

I can personally attest to this. I led a team of artists on a game project (unannounced) whose input and various ideas drastically changed many of my initial designs, in a good way. The project would not have been the same without them.

As for independent, solo 3D cinematics, it is possible. You just cannot realistically expect to match the same quality, length, or variety that a team like Blizzard puts out. You could potentially match them in one specific area, but it will take time and a lot of work.

[IskatuMesk]

Nails in the coffin, pretty much.

[Hercanic]

Bah, always down on yourself. What does it get you? Avoidance of failure in exchange for assured failure?

I really like the cinematics you've done, and I hope to see more. I want to know what'll happen next.

Just keep pushing yourself to achieve.

[IskatuMesk]

I've been working with 3d graphics for a very long time, and I haven't achieved anything notable. I always worked under the impression that so long as you had the time and the motivation you could do anything. Clearly I was very wrong. Even experienced top of the line professionals cannot do what I want to do.

So either something really dramatic needs to happen or I will get no further.

[WB]

The problem is you DONT want to work in a team. These experienced professionals would RATHER work in a team than not.

[IskatuMesk]

Well, yeah. I'd rather not have a rerun of wc3 in which a dozen people said they'd help with this or that and then jumped ship as soon as I gave them something to do. A sizable team that remains dedicated is the hardest thing to possibly get. I've tried that route. It's really futile.

It's the way of things. If you can't do it yourself, don't bother trying.

[UntamedLoli]

The problem is you DONT want to work in a team.

I lol'd.

[Maglok]

Uhm, Minas Tirith was a model. Just background elements were cgi. All of the LotR buildings were pretty much models, some were scanned, but not Minas Tirith it was just enhanced. If those enhancements took so long, sweet mother of god. Barad-Dur, now when that had to blow, they did need a digital version.

Also: http://games.on.net/article/6771/Games_On_Net_chats_about_StarCraft_II_with_Dustin_Browder
Battle.net info, new bits.