Last September,Santa Monica Studio released the new trailer of God of War Ragnarök,making its fans Greatly anticipate this latest sequel.After another year of production,it was finally released for Playstation!
Original Force fully committed to support the production of this next-generation triple-A game. Seven of its studios formed a Joint team and delivered high-quality characters, environment, props, sculptures, level terrain, key-frame animation, and mocap animation for the game.
Today, Original Force is going to share with you the Behind-the-scenes for the production of God of War Ragnarök！
Original Force Interview Production Team
PART 01
Character Production
Zhengjing Studio: Zhang Haibo, Gao Yi
We were mainly responsible for the production of characters, hair, devices, weapons, and mobile entities.
Our biggest problem was to Produce and portray natural looking hair. For this, we put a hair expert in charge and used the Xgen plug-in for creation to ensure efficiency and quality. The results received Positive feedback from the client. Moreover, we reviewed and integrated some general feedback and new requirements into the specifications and followed them. When we ran into problems, we would first carry out discussions within the team. If we were not sure about the solutions, we would submit a scheme to the client Via images and texts and Communicate with the client proactively.
PART 02
Environment and Props
Yangfan Studios: Yang Xiaofan
We were mainly responsible for the creation of Environment, props,Sculpture assets and level terrain.
The client had high requirements for the realism of the high polygon model (HPM)’s details, and the texture of makefiles need to be interpreted at this stage. The traditional HPM method is not applicable for the project, so we adopted Megascan and height map to help with creation, which greatly improved the quality and efficiency of the production. During the whole process, we collected a large number of scanned assets as a reference and studied relevant creation processes to help ensure the consistency and efficiency of file asset quality.
PART 03
Level Terrain
Yangfan Studios: Wang Ruonan
Unlike previous engines, the terrain for the God of War requires a dedicated SONY engine. We needed to learn as we worked, and familiarize new members with the project requirements. This was a great challenge for us.
For example, when creating the igloo scene, we debugged the ice effect repeatedly, and tried new approaches together with the client to achieve what was wanted with the optimal resource allocation. To present The waterfall in a natural way,we screened huge amounts of references. The first version was created with particle effects, which worked well but Used too much space. Then we turned to the resource-saving approach of model plus flow map. At last, the client retained some of both after Assessing their performance.
Shanyou Studio: Ni Xigang, Nian Jing
We participated in most of the level building and scene optimization in the game.
In the Basic whitebox and concept map, scenes with a variety of landforms were built, including volcanoes, rainforests, ice, mountains, and dungeons. Route guides, integration of trigger points, scenes and story designs were very interesting to work on.
During the production, we used SONY engines. The real-time rendering provided by Maya and PS linkage allowed us to see what the final effect would be like so that we can make modifications while we went along, streamlining the debugging process. We received positive recognition from the client in terms of efficiency and art quality. We also gained experience from working on this project.
PART 04
animation production
Yaoguang Beidou Studio: Yin Kang
We were mainly responsible for animation production, including reaction animation, role interaction, cutscene animations， and keyframe characters and animals.
Our team was an early user of Motion Capture. Compared with keyframe animations, Motion Capture can help generate more realistic animations.
One of our biggest advantages is our experience in this field. Before this project,We participated in the production of God of War in 2016-2017,As well as many other large-scale Motion Capture projects such as Red Dead Redemption, Need for Speed, WWE, L.A. Noire, and Resident Evil. In addition, our team is made up of a group of senior artists that have been working together for a long time. We Were able to enhance the animation production efficiency due to the reduction of the run-in period and the smooth communication among our team members.
June Studio: Zhang Xu
We were mainly responsible for Mocap cleanup as well as some animation data cleanup of in-game and cutscene.Our previous plug-in helped us improve the efficiency of animation cleanup greatly.
During the post-production period, we faced a tight schedule, heavy tasks, Overlapping schedule of multiple projects and high-quality requirements. Each of us had to be familiar with the production specifications and adopt nified quality standards. Finally, with the concerted efforts of every team member, we completed the task within the schedule!
Xing Yun Studio: Cao Yuan
We were mainly responsible for Some of the motion capture cleanup and the creation of part of keyframe motions.
The keyframe Animation mainly included some motions that were not easy to capture, for example, the motions of tetrapods. In addition to engaging experienced animators , we also Researched many reference videos and analyzed them frame by frame. Thanks to our Animators’ control of animation style,accurate operation of Maya and the dedicated plug-in provided by the client, we finally delivered superb realistic graphics.
Liaoyuan Animation Studio: Wang Wei, Cao Weijian
We undertook the vast majority of keyframe animations as well as some unique wildlife animations, reaction animations,nimations in mocap that needed to be improved by keyframe animations, and also Participated in the design of some characters’ animation.
The client paid great attention to details,Even at a minute level. For animators Who were used to using a rough and exaggerated animation style for characters. how to balance realism and exaggeration and preserve the unique game style was a huge challenge at the beginning.
In the end, we persued a realistic style. We analyzed the movement law of characters based on various references, and communicated with the client on design ideas, delivering genuine, believable and distinctive animations. The client also expressed their trust and Positive recognition of our keyframe animation.
Summary Report
We Overcame many challenges during the project . The first one was that the project placed high demand on hardware.The capacity of memory needed to exceed 2 terabytes. We spent a lot of money to upgrade the equipment before we could officially start production.Higher production standards were another challenge. To ensure the quality, Santa Monica Studio sent us eight SONY engines. In order to get it right, we would submit files to the client every day for review, and hold video meetings with the client twice a week to discuss our problems efficiently.
Constant communication, feedback and modification Made the final result reach the client’s expectation.In the later stage, our deliverables were accepted immediately by the client, which required little modification.
The third challenge was the tight schedule. When the project was coming to.The end many new files were added and the amount of tasks increased by about four times but the schedule remained unchanged. With the help of other studios in Original Force, we were able to complete the tasks on time with quality guaranteed.
Game production is never an easy task. As a high-tech enterprise in the 3D digital content production industry, Original Force Has always been dedicated to providing clients with the best-quality,ost-efficient 3D digital content products and production services featuring technology and art integration!
The names of all our artists appear in the credits of this game.
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