Invisible walls

I noticed a trick in a 3D scene I was reviewing. It was a rectangular room, and whenever the camera faced a certain wall (the one that tend to be in the way of a shot of the room) it would disappear, and only reappear when the camera rotated around the room. This allows you to take more wide angle shots of your scene without exterior walls that aren't meant to be in the shot getting in the way. I looked up on Autodesk's website to find out how to do this. It only works on planes, so I had to delete my cube polygon wall structure and replace it with 4 planes:

I added thicker cube polygons walls though for the stairway as I won't be taking a shot from behind the stairs:

The trick is to toggle with the planes render stats, preventing it from being double sided so it only shows up when the camera is facing one of its 2 sides. Rotate the planes accordingly only certain walls will disappear when the camera faces them, making it easier to take wider shots of the scene:

Final scene first draft development

I've remade the layout again to the right size and now added the wainscot paneling in the right places, re-sizing parts slightly whenever I hit a corner of a room so it fitted. I also adding in the models of the shelves and a bar which i haven't shown yet. Its a very simple design but I haven't added the beer pump, soda fount and extras to it yet:

New layout development (with stairs and wainscot paneling)

This time instead of making the layout out of planes and made it out of one extruded polygon cube (although the stair and extra wall were made separately):

I then added the wainscot paneling, which will need measuring when i actually make the official scene layout as it doesn't quite fit right yet:

3D ideas

Bar shelf:

 Doorway:

Simple layout:

Wainscot development

The bar room has wainscot paneling all around its walls. I had a little look on Google images to get an idea of what to model in 3D. These are my reference imagery (all photos and not renders but I do not own them):

http://www.contractortalk.com/f13/mdf-wainscot-32663/

http://pixgood.com/wainscoting-bathroom-floor-to-ceiling.html

http://www.colorfullhome.com/easy-steps-in-installing-wainscoting/

Here's my attempt at modelling wainscot paneling in 3D:

Final floor plan

Here is the final plan for the layout of the bar room. I removed the large table in the middle because although it was originally a room that held large parties, it no longer is, and the place is described as quite empty and more of a tourist attraction in the present time of the short story. Therefore, I can only image that some of the large furniture was taken out, and seeing as it isn't even described in the short story, it won't be needed:

1) Wall outside main entrance (may be replaced with a door later)
2) Square table
3) Square chairs x2
4) Armchair (one that old man is sitting in)
5) Tiled chimney piece
6) Circle table
7) Armchair (one that narrator sits in)
8) Windows
9) Circle table 2
10) Circle chair
11) Bar
12) Bar staff entrance
13) Kitchen entrance
14) Decanter shelves
15) Entrance to stairway
16) Stairway

Decanters - 3D practice

Using photographic images sampled from Google, I made some quick creations in Maya:

Port decanter:

Whisky decanter:

The Bar room - new floor plan

Here is the new floor plan for the bar room although it may need to be slightly largely. It was only after i had designed this that I then looked up the term 'Levee' which is apparently a large social gathering near New year's day. I'm not sure there is enough seating in my current design for a big party, so perhaps just a bit more seating is required:

This is a work in progress angled shot in the bar room:

Research imagery

I collected a bit of reference imagery of the interior of bars and pubs to get inspired of how I should shape my room and a how to make the layout of my bar room most practical:

http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Restaurant_Review-g274924-d1582049-Reviews-Whisky_Bar_44-Bratislava_Bratislava_Region.html

http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Restaurant_Review-g60709-d3296172-Reviews-Paddy_s_Irish_Pub-Bar_Harbor_Maine.html

http://www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/edinburgh/pubguide/bowbar.html

http://weebeefyspubblog.blogspot.co.uk/2009_11_01_archive.html

Storyboard first draft - part 2

Storyboard first draft - part 1

The storyboard only contains the parts in the short story that describe the environment or when characters are interacting with the environment:

Short story reference

Here are the 2 sections of the short story that tell the most about the features of the bar room.

First part:

"It was in this apartment, I presume, that the ancient governors held their levees, with vice-regal pomp, surrounded by the military men, the councillors, the judges, and other officers of the crown, while all the loyalty of the province thronged to do them honor. But the room, in its present condition, cannot boast even of faded magnificence. The panelled wainscot is covered with dingy paint, and acquires a duskier hue from the deep shadow into which the Province House is thrown by the brick block that shuts it in from Washington Street. A ray of sunshine never visits this apartment any more than the glare of the festal torches, which have been extinguished from the era of the Revolution. The most venerable and ornamental object is a chimney-piece set round with Dutch tiles of blue-figured China, representing scenes from Scripture; and, for aught I know, the lady of Pownall or Bernard may have sat beside this fireplace, and told her children the story of each blue tile. A bar in modern style, well replenished with decanters, bottles, cigar boxes, and net-work bags of lemons, and provided with a beer pump, and a soda fount, extends along one side of the room. At my entrance, an elderly person was smacking his lips with a zest which satisfied me that the cellars of the Province House still hold good liquor, though doubtless of other vintages than were quaffed by the old governors. After sipping a glass of port sangaree, prepared by the skilful hands of Mr. Thomas Waite, I besought that worthy successor and representative of so many historic personages to conduct me over their time honored mansion."

Second part (comes half a page later):

"Descending thence, we again entered the bar-room, where the elderly gentleman above mentioned, the smack of whose lips had spoken so favorably for Mr. Waite's good liquor, was still lounging in his chair. He seemed to be, if not a lodger, at least a familiar visitor of the house, who might be supposed to have his regular score at the bar, his summer seat at the open window, and his prescriptive corner at the winter's fireside. Being of a sociable aspect, I ventured to address him with a remark calculated to draw forth his historical reminiscences, if any such were in his mind; and it gratified me to discover, that, between memory and tradition, the old gentleman was really possessed of some very pleasant gossip about the Province House. The portion of his talk which chiefly interested me was the outline of the following legend. He professed to have received it at one or two removes from an eye-witness; but this derivation, together with the lapse of time, must have afforded opportunities for many variations of the narrative; so that despairing of literal and absolute truth, I have not scrupled to make such further changes as seemed conducive to the reader's profit and delight."

Bar room floor plan

Here I've taken the elements that i have from the description to place into the scene and added a couple of my own that would undoubtedly be included. I also showed what each wall would look like to show what the windows and doors roughly look like:

Some development on the chimney piece:

The bar room of the Province house

The women's place was too complex for me to take on. I couldn't concentrate on a certain piece of the scene so eventually i went for one of the short stories supplied by our lecturer. I took a segment from 'Legends of the Province House: I. Howe's Masquerade' by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Here there is a small part of the story describing a bar room:

The segment:

Initial look at what is in the bar room:

The Women's Place

This time I took a section from the book 'Nation' by Terry Pratchett:

The passage I picked has a description of a part of a tribal village called 'the women's place'. Here's my initial development for this scene:

The Alchemist Hut

Our task for this module is to create a 3D environment from a written description. It needed to be something that has not been visualized before as to not cause us to be too inspired by a current design. Our lecturer provided us with a selection of short stories, however first I attempted making my own. Of course later i realized I really needed something someone else had written as i found difficulties designing the story board.

Nevertheless, here is my initial development on my own scene 'The Alchemist Hut':