Dev Blog : FX in Martha Is Dead – Part 1
Hello again and welcome to the latest Dev Blog for Martha Is Dead, last week we shared the story of how Gronkh streaming the game made Achims heart pound! Take a quick scroll back to catch up if you haven't already!
This week we have an in depth look at the creation of some of the stunning visuals in the game - supplied by the talented Lorenzo Cardile, one of the 3D artists at LKA!
This is the first in a multi part series of blogs looking at the visuals of the game and techniques used, so please feel free to comment with any questions you might have, and we'll cover them in future updates!
Without further ado - I hand you over to Lorenzo!
Ciao! My name is Lorenzo Cardile, I am a 3D artist at LKA working on Martha is Dead. My Job within the group is primarily to take care of the game's FX. There are many graphical effects within Martha Is Dead that mainly serve to make the environment richer and more alive when combined with SFX.
If you imagine walking in a forest for example, numerous elements should come to mind… All of those insects… the leaves that fall… water that flows… the dust that moves under the weight of a step. There are many microelements that we often ignore in life but when they are absent, we feel a sense of emptiness. One of these particular effects that I have created is a flock of birds and I'd love to tell you about it.
First of all, it was essential to find birds that could actually be found in Tuscany (The games setting), but also a species which would be common to see flying in August. I wanted to create those beautiful movements that flocks make when they turn, that kind of synchronized dance that makes them all move as one.
So, I tried to find a way to reproduce a bird or silhouette at the lowest polygon count and with the smallest texture possible. These birds are to be seen from far away and I don’t need to worry about the player seeing them up close. The photo camera accessible to the player is of a period which cannot zoom in like our smartphones can today!
Once the mesh and texture was made, it was time for the shader. We chose to use Niagara to create our effects and not wanting to weigh it down too much, I chose to animate the bird's wings directly from its material, not by creating a skeletal mesh. I did this by connecting the world position offset channel with a black and white gradient that inverted the colours when asked.
By doing it this way I was able to make the rhythm of its wing beat parametrically.
As one bird was now created, a system was needed where the bird is duplicated and made to behave like a real flock.
By using Niagara, I created the classic spawn nodes, substituted the mesh for the particle and created two points of attraction of the particles that were able to move in a random way. The effect wasn’t bad… if the intent was to launch these birds into space!
The motion they produced and the force of attraction meant that after a certain period of time, they acquired such a force as to make them end up both underground and in a distant galaxy! – So a limit was required.
So I limited the area of movement of the attractive fulcrums to a much narrower area, and increased the resistance with the air so that the flock never reached the speed of sound.
I made two instances of the flock to create a little more variation and scattered them around. The result seemed satisfactory to me, what do you think? …
With this newly created system, I was able to duplicate it which helped me to create other similar effects; such as gnats and moths that go around the street lamps at night and the insects that wander in the woods.
Obviously I had to make some changes. For the moths and night flies it was not necessary to create all of the variations of directions, so I simply exploited the point of attraction system. Animating the velocity of the particles with a sine curve meant that I always kept them close to the fulcrum, I also created some variation by simulating the wind slightly and breaking their trajectory with a curl noise.
These nodes, working in synergy with the point of attraction and the vortex velocity, perfectly simulate the chaotic and rambling movement that midges do around summer street lamps in real life.
I used a very similar expedient to create woodland insects such as blow flies but with less chaos. In this case the player is very likely to see the particles up close so I once again had to take advantage of the static mesh. Their wings are animated in the same way as birds, with an animated black and white gradient that acts on the world position offset pin of the material, all at the lowest resolution textures possible (To maintain performance).
Pretty fascinating right? And another reinforcement as to the intense attention to detail that LKA are putting into the smallest of things within the game that really makes Martha stand out from the crowd!
If you want to catch more Martha content across the internet, then hit the links at the bottom of the blog! And as always, make sure Martha is on your wishlists - and tell your friends!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/515960/Martha_Is_Dead/
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This week we have an in depth look at the creation of some of the stunning visuals in the game - supplied by the talented Lorenzo Cardile, one of the 3D artists at LKA!
This is the first in a multi part series of blogs looking at the visuals of the game and techniques used, so please feel free to comment with any questions you might have, and we'll cover them in future updates!
Without further ado - I hand you over to Lorenzo!
Ciao! My name is Lorenzo Cardile, I am a 3D artist at LKA working on Martha is Dead. My Job within the group is primarily to take care of the game's FX. There are many graphical effects within Martha Is Dead that mainly serve to make the environment richer and more alive when combined with SFX.
If you imagine walking in a forest for example, numerous elements should come to mind… All of those insects… the leaves that fall… water that flows… the dust that moves under the weight of a step. There are many microelements that we often ignore in life but when they are absent, we feel a sense of emptiness. One of these particular effects that I have created is a flock of birds and I'd love to tell you about it.
First of all, it was essential to find birds that could actually be found in Tuscany (The games setting), but also a species which would be common to see flying in August. I wanted to create those beautiful movements that flocks make when they turn, that kind of synchronized dance that makes them all move as one.
So, I tried to find a way to reproduce a bird or silhouette at the lowest polygon count and with the smallest texture possible. These birds are to be seen from far away and I don’t need to worry about the player seeing them up close. The photo camera accessible to the player is of a period which cannot zoom in like our smartphones can today!
Once the mesh and texture was made, it was time for the shader. We chose to use Niagara to create our effects and not wanting to weigh it down too much, I chose to animate the bird's wings directly from its material, not by creating a skeletal mesh. I did this by connecting the world position offset channel with a black and white gradient that inverted the colours when asked.
By doing it this way I was able to make the rhythm of its wing beat parametrically.
As one bird was now created, a system was needed where the bird is duplicated and made to behave like a real flock.
By using Niagara, I created the classic spawn nodes, substituted the mesh for the particle and created two points of attraction of the particles that were able to move in a random way. The effect wasn’t bad… if the intent was to launch these birds into space!
The motion they produced and the force of attraction meant that after a certain period of time, they acquired such a force as to make them end up both underground and in a distant galaxy! – So a limit was required.
So I limited the area of movement of the attractive fulcrums to a much narrower area, and increased the resistance with the air so that the flock never reached the speed of sound.
I made two instances of the flock to create a little more variation and scattered them around. The result seemed satisfactory to me, what do you think? …
With this newly created system, I was able to duplicate it which helped me to create other similar effects; such as gnats and moths that go around the street lamps at night and the insects that wander in the woods.
Obviously I had to make some changes. For the moths and night flies it was not necessary to create all of the variations of directions, so I simply exploited the point of attraction system. Animating the velocity of the particles with a sine curve meant that I always kept them close to the fulcrum, I also created some variation by simulating the wind slightly and breaking their trajectory with a curl noise.
These nodes, working in synergy with the point of attraction and the vortex velocity, perfectly simulate the chaotic and rambling movement that midges do around summer street lamps in real life.
I used a very similar expedient to create woodland insects such as blow flies but with less chaos. In this case the player is very likely to see the particles up close so I once again had to take advantage of the static mesh. Their wings are animated in the same way as birds, with an animated black and white gradient that acts on the world position offset pin of the material, all at the lowest resolution textures possible (To maintain performance).
Pretty fascinating right? And another reinforcement as to the intense attention to detail that LKA are putting into the smallest of things within the game that really makes Martha stand out from the crowd!
If you want to catch more Martha content across the internet, then hit the links at the bottom of the blog! And as always, make sure Martha is on your wishlists - and tell your friends!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/515960/Martha_Is_Dead/
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