Summation #9 - Maya Studio Projects: Game Environments and Props

The book Maya Studio Projects: Game Environments and Props is a book created to give new and experienced users an idea on how to construct assets for a game environment. The book is based in Maya but at times shows you how work would look in a actual game engine such as UDK. It is divided into two large parts. The beginning chapters are about texture creation and while the later is about modeling low poly assets for game importation.
The first part of the book about texture maps goes over the basics of all game texture maps, diffuse, normals, and specular. These are the most common three maps used on all game assets. A Diffuse map is a texture map that gives a asset its basic colors and is the most basic and widely used of all the maps. The Normal map is a texture map that is a bluish purple color used to imitate variations or dips and bumps within a assets surface. It does this by used precomputed information that gives the texture a Red Green and Blue channel that is used to immolate depth on the surface by reflecting light in different ways. Normal maps are created specifically for games because they do not take to much processing power to import and use in engine and they help give assets in a scene more depth than they normally would have on a base mesh model. Specular is the last map that is extremely important. This map gives information on how the surface reflects light and is based of a grayscale image. This grayscale image gives the game engine information on how light reflects or is absorbed on the surface of a material. For instance if I had a shiny metal object the Specular map would be a bright gray to a white to show the engine that it has a reflective surface, while if I was making something like a tire, the specular map would be more black so to not reflect to much light. The important thing to remember with specular is that all objects react to light in one way or another.
The later chapters of the book focus on modeling assets that are low poly for use in game engine. The three major models created are a revolver, a racecar, and a city skyscraper. The most important one relating to my project is the skyscraper as he uses modularity to construct the building. Modularity is the use of small chunks of a building fitted together to create the whole. This is done so that you can import a smaller number of geometry pieces and maintain a quality but fast running environment.
Overall the book was helpful in understanding pipeline organization and overall understanding of modular design.
Works Cited
McKinley, Michael. Maya Studio Projects: Game Environments and Props. Indianapolis, IN: Wiley Pub., 2010. Print.