07 - Using CG tools in game creation

AI systems, 3D scanners and rendering tools are used in both films and games.

USING CG TOOLS IN GAME CREATION

It isn't just staff crossing over from the film business into games either - the software used to create 3D in film is now also used to create 3D in many games. Although film and game companies often write their own tools, or customise an off-the-shelf package such as Maya to their own needs, they also use a lot of standard software.

One obvious example is Massive, the ground-breaking AI software that WETA Digital developed to create the huge, intelligent armies seen in 'The Lord of the Rings' films. Cinesite's Sue Rowe explains that with Massive 'you have a number of "agents", and you can make them walk from A to B, and tell them to attack when you come across a blue agent, or walk around. It will create a battle, and it's very efficient rendering-wise. You can use the mid-distance characters in close-ups, but this isn't the use for which it was written. Massive can literally double your crowd system'.

On top of the software, you can also buy agent libraries for Massive depending on the types of crowds you want to create. This includes a 'Mayhem Agent' for creating scenes of riots and anarchy, a 'Combat Sword Agent' for battle scenes and a 'Stadium Agent' for filling out sports scenes. When using Massive, the individual characters are intelligent enough not to walk off the terrain, and you can also make each model look slightly different by changing a few parameters.

Massive has been a godsend to the film effects industry when it comes to creating crowds, but EA's Sanjay Mistry explains that it's also used by EA for game production to create multiple characters. 'We use quite a lot of tools that they use in CG,' says Mistry. 'We run Maya, and we've previously used 3D Studio, Lightwave, Z-Brush and Autodesk's Mudbox.'

The latter has also had a dramatic effect on the 3D film industry. Mudbox allows you to create a virtual 3D sculpture on a computer; you can use a pen on a robust touch-screen to mould your clay, just as you would with a real sculpture. It basically provides the opportunity to use your 3D art skills on a virtual 3D model. Cinesite's Sue Rowe comments, 'My personal bugbear is when people say, oh it's all done on computers nowadays isn't it? Actually, it has to start somewhere with somebody making an object and understanding how it moves. So, yes it's all done on computers, but that doesn't mean that an artist isn't behind it.'

Interestingly, Rowe also remarked that the games business has now progressed to the point at which 'some companies working on films now have their games company running alongside them, and they share assets. If they're going to build a CG rocket for a film, they'll pass that asset over. There will probably be some changes with the texturing and so on, but that's the sort of parallel they're going down'.

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