Africa is Waiting! Latest Art Pack is Ready and Posted!

Greetings all!

Well, I just got the confirmation from Garage Games. The Africa Savanna Pack is available for purchase here: www.garagegames.com/products/african_savanna_environment_pack.

This is the biggest content pack I have done. I hope you all enjoy and learn some stuff from it (I know I have).

Before I dig into this pack I want to throw out a sincere THANK YOU to Dan Webb. He designed the terrain and the base textures for the demo level that is part of the Art Pack. Thanks Dan. (Yes, he will be paid. See, it does happen with 'volunteer' work).

And the release video:

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All kidding aside though, when someone designs a level, one must never forget that terrain dictates everything from grassy areas to dense forests. I tend to gravitate to a more 'realistic' view with my levels, therefore, I could not have made this demo level without a solid foundation. That foundation was Dan's work. Dan used actual GEO data from Kenya to create the terrain. He went on to lay down the base textures and I just tweeked and added as I saw fit. Dan allowed me to see where the environmental effects happened and I decided what rock or plant went where. I really think this is one demo level that I can be proud of. It's not perfect, but the way it came together was.

Now on to the pack; I know some of my long term users *those that bought the Conifer and Tropical Packs* will notice an increase in the price. I am sorry for this but, in all reality, the Africa Environment pack is the same size as both of those packs COMBINED. There is a total of 50 models and a TON of scripts and stuff that I (as a lowly artist) had to work out. (therefore the huge delay from my anticipated release date.)

I started this pack back in September of 2012. I basically had five or six models that I began with and honestly, next time I will not announce anything until I am closer to complete. I hate missing a deadline, but I did. The good news, I missed it in order to provide more. Those 5 or 6 starting models ended up being 50.

Here is a quick breakdown of some of the content by model name:

1 Acacia Tree
2 African Mohogany
1 Generic Tree
1 Generic Africa Tree
1 Boabab Tree
2 Unbrella Acacia
1 Dead Tree
2 African Thorn Bush
1 Africa Bush
1 Yellow Bush
3 Generic Bush
1 Debris Block
3 Sticks and Stones
2 Generic Africa Grass
1 African Wheat Grass
1 Long Grass
1 Water Reeds
1 Hidden Barrier Block
6 Africa Rock
1 Large Rock
6 Volume Clouds
2 Shacks
2 Metal Fence Objects
2 Barrels
1 Pallet
1 Bridge
1 Kennel
1 Pole Building
1 Dock

Misc Items:

5 Grass PNG files
1 Ground Fog Precipitation Object
1 Heavy Cloud Preciptitation Object
48 Ground textures
03 African Motif Skys
07 Audio clips (Ambient and music)


There is quite a bit in this pack. I have also included the scripts and HLSL files for both the caustics and motion blur. These will continue to be refined and with some luck and bit of skill, everyone will see a new post effects tool in the next release of T3D. (See, I really am crazy busy!) You can also take a look at the way I have constructed the volume clouds, I really think the scripting technique in those objects has a number of applications (think speed tree) and I can't wait to see what someone does with it.

Alas, there are still issues with my cloud shadow projection resource. Artifacts, unacceptable frame rate drops and other issues have made it impossible to include it in this pack. Well, lets be honest here: I just am not up to the coding and stuff at this point!

Therefore, I have decided that I will release this feature to the community for free (as a resource and as a possible feature in T3D) once I get all the issues resolved. I may even add in proper atmosphere shadowing *maybe, depends on Direct X*. (ya know this is funny, a few months ago, I would have stated that it was broken and that would be it. I guess my tech artist skills have improved a bit.)

Additionally, I wanted to put this out so there was NO CONFUSION: There is currently NO .fbx format models available for this model pack! I will include these at a later date. The reasons can't be discussed at this time.

Finally, I wanted to send out a thank you to the community. 2012 was the first year that 3TD Studios has been reborn in a number of years. Between the military and deployments, I just did not have time to try to make my dream of an art/tutorial studio come to life. This last year, 3tdstudios.com launched. My goal with this venture was not to make money but, I wanted to create a solid 'art forum' for T3D game dev. I am just thrilled with the number of visits (I monitor Google analytics constantly), the fact that the web site and sales of packs supports the reason for 3td to exist amazes me. Garage Games is really the only site I contribute to,(and YouTube) so I owe you all a very heartfelt thanks for supporting this concept. I have tried to provide and pass along general concept information, useful art related information, and general input to a group of people that I admire. I promise that I will continue doing that. Thanks for not shooting down "The Conifer Guy" who is just a modeler. I don't have all the answers, but I can tell you I won't stop trying.

Lastly, Keep a close eye on T3D, you will see some amazing stuff coming soon. Dave Wyand and Mike Hall and myself meet weekly and try to put together a version of T3D that can compete or beat anything out there. I want to put a really positive shout out to both of these guys! Thanks for allowing me to be a part of this endeavor! You guys have taught me more in the last few months then I ever learned since joining this community.(when have I ever sent out HLSL scripts or anything like that in the past?) These guys know T3D in a way I can only hope too. Keep an eye on the dev stuff, some good stuff coming, this I can promise.

This will be my last commercial pack for a while. I need to focus on Steering Committee issues as well as general help and tutorials for all the users of T3D. I also need to do some serious updates to both the Conifer and Tropical Packs (I learned a HUGE amount of stuff making this 3rd pack and I need to get the others on par with this one).

The tutorials and other resources of course will be free to the general public (excluding the updates to the commercial packs). I believe in T3D and I believe in the Garage Games community.

That is were I need to be now.

Ron