25/1/13 - Supervisor Meet

Today was the first group meeting with my supervisor Robin. I spoke about The system I have in place that I mentioned in a post not too long ago, he Seemed happy with it so far which means I can continue to build upon it without worrying it's all wrong. The rest of the meeting looked at more broad subjects such as how to structure our time over the course of the semester and little Tasks we want to achieve this week. My tasks that I want to have done at least by next week are:

• Begin to form a critical framework based on case studies
• Improve knowledge of animation layers
• Survive this weekends game jam
• Pick a new (better proportioned rig)
• Begin work on Lit Review 2.0

e   Simple Right?

 

23/1/13 - Fight or Flight: Fight

Today I've been working on the first of the 7 fight or flight animations and very quickly I've stumbled across a pretty sizeable skill gap, using animation layers. I've never actually used them but considering I'm using cycle to infinity on the basic walk cycle it's become necessary.

Time to crack open the tutorial box on the interweb.

Here's what I have so far, as I've had so many teething problems with the animation layers its fairly safe to say this isn't the greatest example of how long it would take to create. To get to this point I've put in about 4 hours excluding breaks and including attempting to remedy animation layers.

As you can see I've roughed out the first basic poses of the 'NPC'. Currently i've been attempting to get the feet of the 'player' to stay still and ignore the cycle to infinity on the base animation layer. The body is responding to the layers but the feet seem to be ignoring it. I'm going to do a mini practice test using simpler meshes in the hopes that I'll get to grips with the animation layers a little better, maybe even solve my problem in the process.

Key points

Skill Gap: animation layers

• Practice using animation layer on simpler mesh

Timing: 4 hours so far

• Not entirely accurate due to problems with layers

22/1/13 - Base Walk FoF Test

I've spent today finishing off the base file for the 7 Fight or flight animations. 

The base file includes the initial bump as that wouldn't be animated by the animator it would be procedurally generated using Torsten Reil's program. For the purposes of this test i've focused on the bump from one direction. This file hasn't been timed because it isn't one of the animated responses, the next 7 tests will be.

18/1/13- NPC categories importance

I identified a fair while back before my project properly formed that there were different types of NPCs like there are different types of extras in films.

Background Characters
Background characters in games as in films are there to make a world feel more realistic, they generally have no sway in the main storyline and only in some games with a lot of side "quests" do they really have any direct influence on a character's decision. In most games the player has very few ways of interacting with the player.

GTA4 Background NPCs

Skyrim Background NPC

Minor NPC's

These are the character's which may have a part to play in a side quest and may be encountered multiple times in one game. They will need to have more personality than a background character because of the increased need for interactions. An example of a minor NPC is Ysolda in Skyrim. She asks you to get a mammoth tusk for her to help her enter the world of business. She has a name and you can perform more interactions than a background character and her mini storyline can result in the world changing slightly with her taking over one of the buildings but there is no influence on the main storyline and it wouldn't matter if you didn't finish her quest or even speak to her at all.

Ysolda, Skyrim Minor NPC.

Major or Pivotal NPC

The most important and most detailed characters in terms of backstory and level of interaction available, pivotal characters have direct sway on the main storyline. For example Walter in Fable 3, or Roman in GTA4

Walter ,Fable 3

Roman, GTA4

Why is this important to consider?

Bringing the categories up again now is vital. As in a previous post where I expressed the difficulties of creating one animation library for different builds and genders of the characters, the type of NPC I create the library for will affect the level of detail the library goes into. There would be no need for a background NPC to have an animation for greeting the player unless the background NPC specifically was required to like a waiter or doorman.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

To Do:

Game specific animations (animations that are only required for specific games)

17/1/13 - Fight or Flight part 6

Storyboards today, i'll add the fight storyboard from before so i can find them all in one place.

Likert 1: Fight

The NPC fight reaction is pretty much the most instinctual reaction. The character is angry possibly already wound up for some reason and so a slight brush past would cause an immediate burst of aggression in this instance resulting in pushing the player to the ground, the aggression continues with a threatening display leaning over the fallen player to express a dominance over them.

Likert 2: Yell

Here you can see after the push the NPC becomes immediately enraged. He begins to turn, arms raised inviting the player to attack, in the fourth frame it shows the NPC is pursuing the player for a short while still with his arms raised and beckoning. The NPC would also make short sharp movements towards the player as if beginning an attack using the principle mentioned before about testing their opponents' reactions. The main difference between this and the Extreme Fight reaction is the lack of physical interaction, the NPC will likely yell and threaten the player but quickly give up chasing and return to their original position.

Likert 3: Comment

Again this one has a slight difference to the Yell storyboard. The initial reaction is the same but the cool down time is much quicker and instead of pursuing the player the NPC turns and remarks to who they're talking to. The only problem with this is what if the NPC isn't around any others, this would make it seem like they were gesturing to thin air, for that reason this storyboard is more appropriate.

The change to the arm being held closer to the body and the direction of the eyes pointing to the ground suggests that the secondary reaction is more of an internal question than an external one. As if the NPC is asking itself how someone can be so rude as opposed to someone else. The pose can maintain a sense of aggression with the other hand clenched slightly and held tightly to their side while the shoulders remain slightly hunched and stiff.

Likert 4: Neutral

The third frame of the neutral storyboard is mainly showing the NPC catching themselves, the fourth frame is not far different showing the NPC acknowledges the player showing the NPCs thought process the NPC would then default back to its starting position as if thinking no more about the incident.

Likert 5: SideStep

This reaction is the least extreme flight reaction, it shows that the NPC found the experience mildly alarming. The body language is that of someone whose cautious and wary of what just happened. The first pose similar to the more extreme is one of checking to see what just happened, not sensing too much danger they move to the second frame which displays the side of their body towards the player hiding vital organs from harm but still able to keep an eye on the possible threat. 

Likert 6: Brisk Walk

The main features of the brisk walk are the apparent nervous tells that the NPC displays.. They aren't frightened enough to properly run but they find the situation uncomfortable enough to want to leave the area. This could result in a brisk walk with frequent glances at the perceived threat. The fourth frame clearly displays the way a character could sidestep into a brisk walk to help distance themselves before walking checking that they won't be followed.

Likert 7: Flight

 The setting that this reaction would be likely in if the player had a particularly high notoriety possibly from behaving with extreme violence in the past here or has a reputation for it from elsewhere. The NPC just wants to get as far away as possible as quickly as possible. The main focus of the flight reaction would be the moment of recognition before the run. Here that is demonstrated by the fairly relaxed pose in the third frame, the NPC has relaxed hands and a stable footing to counteract being put off balance, whereas in the fourth frame the NPC is much more nervous, the shoulders become hunched protecting the neck area, the hands and legs start to buckle in the direction he's about to run and he's straining to look at the player as if to keep an eye on where he is. Throughout the run that follows the NPC should continue to look behind him from time to time to check if the player is following. 

Slightly alternative second pose stressing the wanting to keep an eye on the threat. Could easily lead into the second reaction frame above...

Facial expression practice

Main influence for trying to get the hang of facial expressions is this tutorial which i printed out a fair while back to have as a poster for ever and ever... i'll be paying closer attention to it when i practice.

16/1/13 - Fight or Flight part 5, practice

Continuing from yesterday today is mainly about collecting a little more reference footage and getting some more storyboards done.

Today's reference footage went a lot better, a lot more focused and the performances show that. Here's some stills.

1.1: (Likert Scale 2: Yelling)

1.2

1.3

1.4

2. (Likert scale 6: Run) Initial reaction

3. (Likert scale 2: Yelling)

The walk cycle from yesterday is finished enough for me to begin doing proper tests as soon as I've got the storyboards done.

I've spent some time sorting through my posts and labelling them ready for submission today so I haven't got round to making any more storyboards.



Personal development
Over the past semester when I've had a moment spare or needed a rest from the rest of my coursework I've been brushing up on my drawing skills. Here's an assortment of those practice sketches.

The first collection is when i was trying to improve on drawing faces, specifically facial expressions. When storyboarding it makes my life a lot easier if I can record the facial expression i first thought of and so being able to draw them well is a necessary skill. Below you can see an assortment of facial poses in Maya using photos as reference  practices of drawing expressive eyes, figuring out the structure of the lips and practices in the proportion of faces both realistic and stylized.

This collection of hands I started last night after yesterdays post highlighted how badly I needed to improve. I haven't left any images out so that i can see where i'm going wrong more clearly. I'm going wrong a lot for now.

15/1/13 - fight or flight part 4

In yesterdays post I used a 7 point Likert Scale when assessing the degree of fight or flight for a reaction as opposed to a 5 point scale previously mentioned in the post. This was because when thinking back to past situations I recorded the reactions I had down were still too extreme for the more gentle interactions, imagine if you brushed past someone lightly and immediately they either started yelling at you or nervously walking away at a brisk speed. Although initially this would be quite entertaining in a game it would annoy the player soon after. Because of this, the expanded 7 point scale makes more sense.

As you can probably tell I've fallen behind my schedule quite rapidly due to needing to explain the new system and certain tasks such as editing and analysing game footage taking much longer than I anticipated.  Today I will be creating and uploading live motion footage for reference material and producing storyboards based on them and the body language explored. If there's time I'll start animating today as well.

Live motion reference
Short example as to why this sort of reference is hard to capture...

The main challenge encountered has been how to capture a natural reaction the amount of times, I needed to stress that I didn't want them to act like an NPC pretty often and many of the attempts they would react before being hit. We attempted a few strategies to help them react more realistically like closing their eyes or being bumped into from behind so they weren't expecting it and on a couple of occasions this paid off.
 I think there might be some footage I can use but i'd like to film more with new tactics to try and get some more reference.

I won't be uploading the reference footage to the blog as there's a ridiculous amount of it and editing the footage to upload wouldn't be the best use of my time.

Storyboards
First pass storyboards which may change with the new reference footage. Only one for now. More tomorrow

1. Fight

This demonstrates a possible fight animation. The most extreme fight reaction would cause the NPc to immediately lose their temper and behave aggressively, possibly violently push the player and then proceed to taunt them until they steady themselves with the gestures indicating "here i am, come get me."

Side note: Comparing this storyboard to the previous ones I've made is making it obvious that the life drawing classes are paying off. The poses I can now record are becoming more complicated and I'm finding I don't need anywhere near as much in the way of reference photos. Things I still need to work on however are hands, feet and faces.

I had some time before filming reference footage so I started to animate the base walk of the "player" towards the NPC. I don't need to time myself making this animation as it's the player's character not the NPC plus it means I have a base file to work with and practice at a walk cycle.

This is a work in progress play blast  I have yet to fix the left arm (it's twitching oddly), properly animate the right arm, both of the legs, feet and hands. I'm happy enough with the main body movement but I may fix the slight lean it has at a later stage.

Side note: Interesting dishonored point.. more dialogue than animation but it shows your actions are having an effect. After coming back from a mission where we decided to go for the violent approach as opposed to the stealthy one, Emily (the young girl) commented on how many people we'd killed and said "I'm tired of being afraid, when i'm empress i'll make everyone else afraid, just like you." And she's drawing a picture of herself, shadowed and holding a bloody knife. The actions we've chosen are directly reflected by her attitude and actions.

14/1/13 - Possible NPC response system

In this post I will try to explain the core idea behind my prospective final piece.

In my proposal I outlined the method of getting to the quality each individual animation would need and figuring out what animations would be needed but I didn't say what would be the framework for my final character because it's quite hard to come up with something solid. It's all very well me saying I'm going to come up with a system of animating a more credible NPC but unless I actually manage to think of one, the idea isn't all that great.

Fortunately I have come up with a possible idea that I will hopefully outline as clearly as I can here so that I can refer back to it also I hope in actually writing it in a blog post I'll be able to explain the whole idea a little more clearly when I talk to my supervisor about it.

Here we go...

The whole system has sprung loosely from the concept of a character sheet that you might use during a  table top role playing game like the one here...

Table top role-play character sheet

A players character sheet changes as the game develops, new traits and skills are added based on the players experiences until at the end of the game the character will have evolved into a fully formed character.

An NPC, especially one who is seen repeatedly throughout a game is usually expected to already be a fully formed character so that they can be used to drive the main plot. This would most likely be in the shape of a character bio.

What I would propose for the animations of an NPC would be, in affect, like adding an extra couple of sections to its character sheet which deal specifically with its relationship with the player. 

  The first would be a section dedicated to the character's opinion of the player (positive to negative) possibly resulting in some sort of score that would influence the second part.

This would be decided by a series of factors which is based off of research done in the past semester. But according to my blog I never wrote them down digitally, so here they are. (with a brief example indicating why they are important to consider)

• NPC personality

The personality of a character is the most obvious factor to consider. A character who is generally untrusting will take a longer time to act in a positive manner towards a player alternatively a character who has a loyal personality trait might be able to put up with more negative interactions from the player before their reactions turn negative. Also prejudices that the NPC may have will be included into this category.

• Past experience

This is past experience that the NPC has of the player not the players character. An example of this would be if the player stole or destroyed a shop, the NPC would have a completely negative opinion of the player the next time they encountered one another. 

• Relationship

An example of this is Roman in GTA 4, Roman is the main characters cousin and so in theory the family ties should make him forgive negative behaviour from the player much more easily making it much harder to gain negative responses. Another example could be the NPCs you can marry in Skyrim, you have to work to get them to agree and so the bond you build up in the process should make it more difficult for them to react badly towards you... with a limit.

• Reputation

This applies mainly to characters you've never met before in the game world. This is best demonstrated by Fable's approach, your actions in the game world as a whole begin to give you a reputation. So if you destroy a town maybe all NPCs in nearby towns would have a more negative attitude towards you meaning you as the player would need to work harder to gain their trust and towns a little further away might be wary of you to a lesser extent . If you destroy many towns maybe your reputation would spread to an even larger area. Reputation of the race of the character could be taken into account here.

• Environmental Context

The environment could make a massive difference to how an NPC should react. For example if a guard sees you draw a sword outside a castle this might not affect their reactions whereas inside a city they may become more wary and inside a palace cause an even stronger negative reaction in defence of their monarchy.

Maybe to begin with this section could start out with a rating of 0 then positive points give a +1 and negative a -1.

 Baring this in mind, the second would be how that character would react to certain types of interactions. A list of common interactions would be drawn up such as minor (brushing past) and major (punching or kicking) physical reactions as is being tested at the moment. These would have a Likert scale next to them and using the characters personality and the factors discussed above one of these animations would be chosen to be most appropriate.

Example
NPC: Ulfric Stormcloak, Skyrim (character bio http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Ulfric_Stormcloak)
Player Character: Khajiit
Setting: Ulfric's palace
Action: Brush past

NPC personality

• He has a history of being quite racist against non nords -1

Past Experiences

• None

Relationship 

• None

Reputation

• Khajiit are thought to be thieves and untrustworthy -1

Environment

• could be taken more negatively as done within his own palace -1
• could feel more relaxed due to heavily guarded surroundings +1

After the first section there is a score of -2 which i can only assume is a relatively mild negative.

Brushing past could be considered a minor physical interaction so it could start as a neutral response of 4 on a likert scale of 7

I will have to look further into what number will influence the change in category but for now it seems like in this situation it would probably be taken fairly negatively but not too badly so could only result in a rating of 3
Meaning Ulfric would comment negatively.

Note: I'll have to mention why I've chosen 7 options for this instead of 5 when i continue with the Fight or Flight posts. There is a reason.

Pros and Cons so far discovered 

Pros

• A single library for all characters of that type.
• More credible performance.
• Useable on many different characters.

Cons

• would need a separate library for women, larger characters male and female, children would need an entirely different set of rules.

12/1/13 - Fight or Flight part 3

To start todays post i'll be continuing to look at existing research into body language that applies to this test.

Fight or Flight

"When we experience excessive stress-whether from internal worry or external circumstance-a bodily reaction is triggered, called the "fight or flight" response. Originally discovered by the great Harvard physiologist Walter Cannon, this response is hard-wired into our brains and represents a genetic wisdom designed to protect us from bodily harm. This response actually corresponds to an area of our brain called the hypothalamus, which-when stimulated-initiates a sequence of nerve cell firing and chemical release that prepares our body for running or fighting."

"We may overreact to the slightest comment. Our fear is exaggerated. Our thinking is distorted.""Our respiratory rate increases.... Our pupils dilate. Our awareness intensifies. Our rational mind is disengaged."

I've pulled these quotes from the website:

http://www.thebodysoulconnection.com/EducationCenter/fight.html

Points to consider when animating

• Movements may be slightly more exaggerated than normal to mimic overreactions
• the release of adrenaline means if the character is injured they might not be affected by it as much alternatively it could result in the character not appearing to experience fatigue quite as quickly.
• Pupils dilate
• Breathing increases
• The time allowed for character thought might be reduced as rationality decreases leading to faster movements.

Aggressive body language

Face

Body

Movement

The instances shown above are a couple of examples of aggressive behavior  the first is an extension of invading personal space the second is wielding an object as a weapon poised and ready to swing. Other aggressive movements include short movements as if beginning to attack which serve as a way of testing their opponents reaction speed and things like waving fingers, mimicking a baton of some sort, shaking fists, head-butts, leg-swinging and so on. This is saying 'Here is what I will do to you!'

11/1/13 - Fight or Flight Part 2, proposal feedback

Proposal feedback
Just to get this somewhere a little more easily accessible to me i thought i'd record the main points of my feedback for my proposal. I got a good grade but i was still disappointed with it due to much of my feedback being things which i'd originally put in and then taken out in a later draft usually out of fear i wasn't going into enough detail on anything making it feel like i wasn't saying anything at all. Despite this i feel positive for the coming semester as long as i listen to my feedback.


Premise
"Note that it is advisable to introduce and critique quotes/sources rather than just inserting a quote."

Context
"In particular it would be good to see more breadth in the literature cited and discussed in your review. Given that your research takes into account several domains (acting/performance, artificial intelligence, and animation systems) the review should draw on a wider range of sources. It is especially important that the lit review identifies, explains, and discusses the criteria that are vital to your methodology. What are pivotal, supporting and background NPCs? What do we know about body language, and how do we study it? These notions are discussed in the methodology section but are not fully explained in the lit review."

Appropriateness of Methodology 
"The approach of combining case study and practice is apt. Be careful not to overlap literature review and case study - the latter is a research method, the form is the first phase of a research project. In your context review, there are examples drawn from games. Ensure that your case studies are sufficiently deep and detailed analyses of chosen games."

Clarity of Methodology
You should aim to present and discuss your critical framework with more clarity. A list of terms are provided, but the strategy for analyzing characters in games is not clear.

Predicted Outcomes
N/A

References
Minor errors found.. double check accuracy in future

Presentation
"In particular, pay attention to sentence structure and length. A lot of the text is lengthy which harms the clarity and precision of your writing. Shorter sentences will help to improve the quality of the writing."

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Fight or Flight Part 2

So as planned last night i spent a good deal of time irritating NPCs in GTA 4 again. This time i was assessing the fight or flight reactions. In yesterdays post i said i would use two NPCs from each NPC category (pivotal, minor, background) but when it came to filming i realized choosing two background NPCs wouldn't be enough to properly assess their behavior so the first set of animations focuses on Background NPCs. 

In total i tested and filmed 38 separate background NPCs trying to select a varied group i.e. gender, stereotypes, age. etc.. 22 were male and 15 female (they were harder to find varieties of) 

Here's the footage i took (well i condensed it a little as there was so much of it)

Main points of interest

• As with the previous GTA 4 test, they seemed to react in the wrong direction a lot of the time, they would look past you or not look at you at all.
• The reactions were often either understated or a little too extreme, would someone run away screaming after being bumped into a couple of times.. or would you be more likely to walk away quicker checking behind you every now and then. And one NPC (which could be a glitch) never fought back after being punched repeatedly.. even acted as if nothing had happened.

I know that the way an NPC falls is generated using the software developed by Torstein Reil  in 2003 (see this Ted Talk http://www.ted.com/talks/torsten_reil_studies_biology_to_make_animation.html) but would that stop an NPC that has been punched or pushed to the ground reacting in the direction of the player once they had fell?

What do i need to create reference footage for.

Using the Liket Scale from previous tests i will need to create animations of varying intensity for minor and major physical interactions. Things like brushing past or knocking someone and things like punching or kicking someone respectively.

On second thought, i would only need one set of animations for both these responses. I would however need them both as an option in the final character set up (see important notice for slight explanation)

Minor and Major responses to physical interactions

1. Extreme Flight - Running screaming

2. Flight -walking away at a slightly increased speed

3. Neutral -Ignores

4.Fight - Yelling, aggressive body language

5. Extreme Fight - Punches, physical aggression

Body language to include

Fight or Flight
The most obvious to include, there are tell tail signs documented by those that study body language directly relating to the fight or flight theory, first noted by Dr. Walter Cannon at Harvard Medical School in the early 20th century.

• Heavy breathing due to increased oxygen intake

produce more research on this in tomorrows post
Defensive

I already have some research into defensive body language that i may be able to apply to this test unfortunately it is all based on someone who doesn't run.

Aggressive
produce research on this in tomorrows post

IMPORTANT NOTICE
I haven't actually explained my system i'm considering for my final piece so to speak so i will dedicate a post to doing just that. It is a little confusing to explain so i'm hoping writing it will make it more clear. I'll also need to run it by Robin...

10/01/13 - Fight or Flight Inspired Test

While writing the proposal just before Christmas I referenced a point i'd noticed as part of the GTA 4 analysis back in October about fight or flight reactions. When attacked the background NPCs reacted in different ways. In the original footage i took the "older lady" was the only one who seemed to take offense to being pushed and looked like she was telling me off almost in a "respect your elders" stereotypical manner where as many of the other younger NPCs just acted as if it was nothing and carried on. the stereotype point might be more of an interesting side note than something i should really include as it would be better to point out the behavior of different types of NPCs than different types of one NPC. The NPC i chose to stalk later in the footage demonstrated that despite continuously being bumped into there was still no reaction until being hit lightly by a passing car.. multiple minors equal a major?

Over the next couple of days i'd like to use this as the basis for a test.

Things to consider

• Particular stereotypes of character help dictate reaction - grumpy old lady who will tell someone off but will run past a certain point of danger, gangster type who reacts badly to the smallest of aggression intentional or not. average citizen who will just brush off attacks no matter how continuous. do all members of a stereotype act the same way? film game play.
• Levels of danger taken into account. Small push has the same reaction as a big push, being punched, having a gun aimed at them.

Proposed outcome.

If an NPC had a list of reaction points that ranked the intensity of their response on a scale of 1-5 to commonly occurring interactions from the player. that could be a good final outcome to consider..

This test would look at the effectiveness of including a characters reactions to minor and major physical interactions. like being bumped into and being hit.

It could be done in more detail involving accidental and intentional interactions but that seems like it would be too complicated for a game company to include. 

Plan of attack

Tomorrow's post

• Pick  two of each NPC type, one female one male, minor interaction (push past), multiple minor (repeatedly push),  major interaction (punch) 
• Edit video together.
• Observational analysis
• Identify areas for improvement

Saturdays post

• Live motion reference
• Storyboards
• Begin tests

Monday's Post

• More tests
• Analysis of tests - self critique
• Analysis of tests - peer review
• Outcome, would it be needed for credible performance to include this. 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Side note: I noted a point where the NPCs in dishonoured didn't react to each others presences resulting in one killing the other and acting as if nothing happened. this video has recently been brought to my attention displaying a similar NPC interaction that seems to have gone wrong.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Things to do.

• Different sorts of NPC and their implications? will i only focus on one sort of NPC to improve? would limit research (needed). surprisingly don't think I've done a post on the different types and level of detail each would need.
• Finish Likert "initial reaction" test. 
• Explore the idea of a static reaction and one that can change over time. explore the idea of a selection of reaction guidelines in general. has anyone done it previously? How do they judge how an NPC will react already? Have i already looked at this briefly? Who knows... this post will tell me.