COLLAB2021 – HQ – Stylized Fantasy Environment

[Kent Trammell]

@vincent Good question – Spikey is right that we generally use the current official release at the time the project starts. If a new version of Blender releases during our project we will decide if it’s worth upgrading. However usually it’s best to stick with the same version we started with (as is true with professional productions).

I will post about this today in the official “kickoff post”.

[Kent Trammell]

Thanks for the heads up, Jake. Best wishes to your relative 🙏

[Kent Trammell]

Heh no worries and best of luck with the house transition!

[Kent Trammell]

I’m glad you decided to dive in! I have no doubts you will be glad you did 🙂

[Kent Trammell]

You are not too late – I’m going to keep registration open today since I said “sign up by April 5th. Welcome to the team!

[Kent Trammell]

You are exactly right @rstich . I’m going to post a “kickoff message” today acknowledging the official beginning of the collab including basic instructions for getting started. But all the in-depth details will be covered during the stream tomorrow.

[Kent Trammell]

@wardred I’m afraid frequency is the only thing that will make shortcuts stick. Which should be a benefit of this Collab since we’re all committing an extended period of time. If you use Blender every day for an hour or more, I’m confident you would have the essential shortcuts locked into muscle memory.

[Kent Trammell]

@wograebn Sorry for the late reply – this one fell through the cracks. Last year we had about 20. But last year happened by accident honestly; no official collab was announced or even envisioned, so that’s 20 people that joined the projects organically / grass-roots style.

[Kent Trammell]

📢 Announcement #1: Collab2021 has officially begun!

I. am. excited! March was quite a build-up of anticipation and even saw substantial work done by the rogue TSFHI initiative. Today marks the official start of the project and I want to welcome everyone who registered!

At 130+ registrants I’m floored by the enthusiasm for this collaboration! NOTE: I will be leaving registration open for the rest of today since I said “sign up by April 5th”. 

More contributors means bigger, higher quality results are possible / likely. It also increases the potential for confusion and team members getting lost about what exactly they should be doing. Tomorrow’s stream will go over all the details of the project in-depth but here’s some notes for what you can be doing today:

• Look over the Asset List. I’ve divided the concept art into categories and individual assets via google spreadsheet. Look over this list to get a feel for the categories / organization of the assets. Based on the registration data about 50% expressed interest in specific assets while the other 50% said “not sure” or “anywhere I’m needed”. This should work out well for an even spread among asset assignments.

  Today I encourage you to look over the list and consider which category and/or specific asset you want to tackle. NOTE: The stars beside each asset name denotes difficulty:

  • * = beginner/easy,
  • ** = medium/intermediate
  • *** = intermediate-to-advanced/difficult/involved
• Begin watching the recommended courses. Reminder that recommended courses are listed for each week outlined at the top of this thread. If you haven’t seen the recommended courses, please begin watching them as they will prepare you to commence working on your assets.
• Practice. Since we’re not choosing / assigning assets officially until the stream tomorrow, you can start practicing your asset creation skills today. Especially if you’ve already watched the recommended courses or have already developed those skills prior to this collab. This practice can be a course topic (treasure chest, sapling tree, etc), as specific relevant skill like sculpting or texture painting OR something from the asset list.

  Just be aware that after we discuss the asset list during the stream tomorrow you may want to do something else (which is fine) or the discussion reveals info that could alter the way you’ve built your asset. In other words, don’t get too attached to your practice material.

• Sign up for a Google account. Remember that we’re utilizing Google Drive to sync all of our project files together. You will need a Google account access the project files. This can be a burner account that you only use for this project.

  Once you have your google account, please email this message from your Gmail to kent@cgcookie.com:

  Subject: I’ve drunk the Google Koolaid
  Message: [CGC username] reporting for duty. I’m ready to access the project files and receive commenter access to Collab google docs!

That’s all for today! Again, MUCH MORE will be discussed during the stream tomorrow.

[Ben Nicholes]

@beefkeef @blanchsb I spent a little time last month working on modelling a variety of tiles to populate the roof. If they’re not up to the quality level needed for this project and/or you’d like me to work on a different portion of the house, I’ll happily do that. I intend on spending the majority of my spare time this month on this project, so I’d love to take on additional components if there’s a need for it.

[Omar Domenech]

Yes and remember, this here be the digital house of the Collab, the physical house of the Collab is in Tierra Del Fuego, Chile.

Just after the small bridge, behind the waterfall.

[Kent Trammell]

It never ceases to amaze me how excellent the wifi connection is behind that remote waterfall 👌

[Omar Domenech]

Lol, ok that made me laugh out loud. 

Because we all know what really happens when you step through…

[Shawn Blanch]

@legobenj It is looking good man. I have not looked in depth at the sheet yet. Are you taking on the roof tiles or are you just practicing and stretching your modeling skills?

Looks like you even did some research on Clay Roof tile installs too! I noticed the offset upside down crossing the rump-side up.

My only comment at this point is that you will want to make sure you set up the scale and origin properly once the collab is underway and you have an idea where the roof needs to be (I’m assuming that you will be one of the roofers haha)
Here’s the critical feedback with the scale just to show you size comparison verses Melvin.

He kinda reminds me of a colossal monster like on the game Rampage:

[Ben Nicholes]

Yep, I’ll help take on the roof. I wanted to get a jump start on the project and I picked the roof tiles precisely because of scaling. I figured they would be the easiest to resize once we get the blockout.

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