Yinfara Concept Art and Ideas

[Eschaton]

Very nice, July, anyway, it was scaring me because I and a few others were already plotting out a very ice-heavy age, and some of th areas required translucent ice. Was just wondering if the engine supported it.

And no is allowed to bark at me for starting on an age. It's nothing that can't be stopped, and all the large details are pending. Mainly in a design and story phase at the moment.

It's a pretty neat concept, but I'm cautious in taking on more people until we have word from Cyan on how this will all go down, and I also want to keep it from going too far only to get cancelled. Not to mention, waiting for the forums to go forward to get a project forum, but that is all in the future. Anyway, I can't draw, so I've no concept art for you yet . . .

[JulyForToday]

When it comes to the ice thing, there are some tricks you can pull with alpha maps. Depends on what you have it mind.

Another update, I was working on the trees (on and off, I was just watching SW E III deleted scenes.. woo!).

FYI, it must be my gamma, but I have to use Photoshop to raise the brightness levels to make it easier to see.


The top one I had a lot of fun with!.... I ran my own personal stress test for Uru.

I have literally hundreds of those trees (with alpha maps for the leaves, both tops and bottoms, and each leaf has 4 quads, 8 triangles (rather than just a plane). I exported the age and crossed my fingers and blender used up a full gigabyte of memory before it finished. The file for the geometry was 40mb! There must have been a few hundred thousand vertices! Linking into the age took less time then I thought it would (but it took a little while towards the end of the bar). And here I am walking about with a literal forest (no billboards here!!!) of these trees, and Uru is just laying back and taking it easy. Now that's a testament to Plasma right there. I'm finding it a gratifying experience.

So everyone who fears about putting too many trees, and killing computers because of it, doesn't have to worry. Just have to spend the time to make them look good. Now that is tedious! *looks for coders <.<*

Oddly, Uru doesn't seem to handle Relto this good for me when the grass is turn on in MOUL... *shrugs*

And does anyone know why alpha mapped textures have issues when overlapping other alpha mapped objects? It's obvious the leaves on my trees are doing it. But the same thing happens in Relto on the autumn trees, but most of Cyan's stuff aside from that doesn't seem to have a problem with it.

[Kierra]

That looks great July!

There does seem to be a limit to the number of vertices's in a given age....I tried leafing my trees in Aerie and Blender gave me a big gnarly "ouch! can't do that!" error message when I tried to export it. Not sure what the cut off point is, but its there somewhere.

~Kia

[Justintime9]

wow! the Hut looks just as I Imagined it! good job july... so, is this doable? cuz if it is, i've always wanted a relatively larger scale Forest age

O, and i typed up the Journal. this will help u understand the age better. pleese Excuse the typos, I just now typed it up, and don't have Microsoft word to use spell check o, and since I can't find a spoiler tab, I'm putting it in a code tap (even though i don't know wat it's sposed to be for, I'm sure it'll be fine for now.)

Code: Select all

This age is not all that different than some of the other ages I've explored, It reminds me of haven, Negligahn, Laki ahn, and Eder delin!. The air here is moist and humid, and combined with the heat almost feely steamy.
   The linking spot is apparently in the middle of a  wet rainforest Environment. the trees are Emerald green and the leaves of some appear to be purple, red, pink magenta, and many other colors. they are large leaves and each one is one meter in length, and a foot in width.
   These leaves have stiff stems that lift them to almost a perfect 90 degree angle, relative to the trunk. The result of this causes an almost perfect canopy over the forest. the light from the sun filters through the colorful leaves and projects multicolored lights on the forest floor below.
                                                                  ~~~
   oday I was walking through the forest of Emerald green trunks, and colorfull leaves, and I was shocked when the light began to dim, and it began to rain, I know this seems Natural in a rainforest, but the Intencity of the lightning was unexpected. when it flashed, the usually mild colors projected from the leaves, showed darker and deeper colors, and my shadow (and other shadows) were amazing. I stood there for minutes mezmerized by the sight, when a cracking noice shook me to my sences, it was different than thunder and I soon knew what it was. One of the trees nearby had been struck by lightning, and now others were also. some set on fire, others just broke. Fearing for my life, I quickly Linked back to my relto.
   When I returned, I was surprized at how little a toll the storm had had on the trees. the few trees that had been struck, lay on the forest floor., but nearby where the leaves were, were strange "stones" they appear to be glass but are more of an abstract ashape, the colorful leaves seem to be trapped inside the rock. this Orb is definitly an amazing natural wonder, and makes a very good decoration.
   As I walked on, I found the edge of the forest, here I find a beach of sorts, it is a very tranquil place, the tide goes in and out, and some sand goes with it.
                                                                  ~~~
   After walking along the beach for awhile, I've finnally found a few buildings, one is Absolutely spectacular, it is a huge "temple" completelly made out of those strange glass orbs. As the sun glows through, the whole room Alive. there is writing on the floor in some forgein language. This may mean that I am not as alone here as I thought.
                                                                  ~~~
   It Appears that this age has a larger atmosphere than many other ages, the frequent storms would explain alot as well. for the sake of my safety, I have decided to build a lightning rod and hut at the linking spot.   
   A high metal pole will run through the hut and into the ground. The walls are made of yinfara tree bark. Thave also installed similar lightning rods throughout the island.
                                                                  ~~~
   Today I was walking around, Exploring and I descovered a delightfull little pond at the edge of the island. It's very small and there is a mountain waterfall, at the edge. somehow the mountain was able to take water from the surrounding sea, and deposit it in the pond.
   On the sides there is a small wall separating the Land from the water. this is apparently man made by some ancient civilization. Or perhaps from a primitive people from a faraway Island. I've decided to build a dock to the side.   
   It is also in a very small clearing, and the sun shines cozily in the middle of the pond. It is a perfect place to fish.
                                                                  ~~~
   Yinfara is much smaller than I'd Expected. after only a week of exploration, I have explored the whole Island. The wildlife still has yet to be discovered though.
   I've discovered  the reason of the leafy glass stones! a strange bird has been creating it's nest with condenced sand. the bird (which I've named the Yinfara Dodo, due to the fact that they are stupid enough to keep building nest in high trees, despite the Lightning.)
   The lightning strikes the trees, and often hits the nests, therefore merging it with the leaf. In a hot orb of alass. Unfortunatly I've noticed that by Installing the lightning rds, the yinfara dodo have began to Increase in number, and the beautiful orbs have stopped being formed.
   Apparently the lightning was keeping the dodo population under control. I've decided to rebuild my lightning rods so they can tetract like Antenas. I will keep them down unless I leave the linking hut. Hopefully this should solve the problem.
   

[JulyForToday]

It's do-able. But I'll have to take some liberties with fleshing out the physical detail of the age. And more questions:

And is that glass hut really made of millions of glass orbs?
Is there an interior to that structure?
How big at these birds your talking about?
how many of them are there?
Is that retaining wall made by the same phantoms that made the glass structure?
Are there any moons, or noticeable features in the sky?
Are there any islands?
How precisely was the hut constructed? (I wasn't sure about this when I made it, started coming up with my own ideas).

The story may need a lot of work and attention too in order to flesh it out. I'm not bad with that sort of thing, but not the best either I'm sure.

[Justintime9]

1st question: it's mostly constructed from all those glass orbs, but there's probably something else to provide a more structured celing, u know, like framework or something, I'm not too picky about how this turns out, but I'll try to make more detailed, Interiors of the hut.

2nd question: The Birds are about... i dunno, maybe the size of an average Bald eagle. I'm not too good at drawing birds, but i'll do my best to get some concept art. there are a fairly large amout of them, enough to be able to get constantly struck by lightning an not go extinct. they mostly stay around the beach, or in the trees.

3rd question: Yes, the wall was appartently created by the same people who built the glass structure.

4th question: I hadn't reallyt though about the sky... it's a blue sky with a reletivelly good amout of couds. just, u know a regular average sky... when it rains though, the sky get very dark, and it's almost pitch black in the forest, and the lightning casts a harsher, more condenced projection from the leaves. the beach part of the age is not as calm as befor the age, the tide is comming in faster, and the sky looks darker. Again, I'll make some more concept art for this.

5th question: no Islands that the player can see, there may be island way off in the vast sea, but none that will concern the player. the "phantom" people may have come from these faraway islands.

6th question: the Interior was only partially Imagined in my mind, there are a bunch of beams inside, keeping the celing up, in the middle of the room you can see the tube where the lightning rod is, to one side of the room is the control pannel for retracting the rods throughout the island. there may be a table or chair somewhere in there, for resting. there may be carpet, or some rug in there, I mean it's a fairly cozy atmosphere in there, because, it's the best place to stay durring the storms. there may be some... electical devices that will require electricity from the lightning to use, this could become a good puzzle, but anyway, I'll make a sketch of the Interior of the hut as well. I'm not too good at comming up with history, so if some "Historian" or someone who's good at stories, your help would be much appriciated.

[TomahnaGuy]

Wow thats incredible July! And Justin a nice journal script there.

I could draw some concepts for that age that might suit the style of the age. And that also depends on whether you would want to (have time to) model them, into the age.

TG

[Justintime9]

Go ahead TG, just PM them to me before u post them if u can
O, and here's a few pics of a model i made of the structural, skelleton of the Hut, hopefully this will help you understand it better.

that's the one that came out the best, heres a few other veiws:

here's an overhead veiw of it

and this shows where the door will be. I hope u can understand these pics, a few of them are a bit fuzzy... but hopefully it helps show the structure of the Hut.
And here is a pic of What the Interiors of the hut may look like, if you'll notice, it has an Easy chair, a desk and chair, and a place for the control pannel. it also has carpet. this, is because durring a storm the best place to be, is the hut because it's shelter. so, it should be cozy enough to stay in durring a storm

o, and btw, the whole age Idea wasn't my Idea, Kyashii came up with the name he's reely good at comming up with age names. he also kinda gave me the Idea about the storms, and forest, so hopefully he'll join the forum soon

[TomahnaGuy]

Okies, i'll go ahead and start modelling that tomorrow!

TG

[Justintime9]

Are u saying that we're actually gonna make this age now? Or are u just testing to see if we're able to do it?
hehe, I've reely gotta learn these terms... maybe I could download Blender sometime... it's free rite?