3D Modeling & Animation

2025-26

Planning & Storyboard

Concept and Story Development

The title of my original game with this cutscene is "The Forbidden Sphere", and the concept is that you're a wizard trying to figure out the magical world. This cutscene serves as an intro to the game that shows the player just how much they don't know about the magical world, and how mysterious it is. The "character" in this animation is the magic crystal ball that the wizard doesn't know anything about. My cutscene tells this story without dialogue because the mysteriousness of the crystal ball serves as a hook to make the player want to know more.

Asset & Prop Design

The props I need to model for this animation include:

the bookshelf and the books on it
- glass vials
the magic crystal ball
the desk with the crystal ball on it
the wizard's papers on the desk
the candles on the desk
the door into the wizard's room

None of these models require rigging or detailed modeling for them to work because I don't have a humanoid, moving character. The design of the magic crystal ball will reflect its personality because I'll make it a dark blue, which signifies its mystery.

Environment and Layout

The layout of my scene is pretty simple, with the desk in the middle of the room, and the bookshelf in the back. I will have three cameras placed around the room, with the first one showing the whole room from in front of the desk, the second one zoomed in to the crystal ball, and the third one showing the bookshelf. My layout supports the flow of the cutscene because the first camera will show where everything is, so that the viewers know where they're looking when the camera switches.

Artifact 1: Character

Design and Planning

The concept for my main character is a magical crystal ball and it fits into my wizard's study because it is a magical item. Sketching my design helped guide my modeling process because it gave me what I wanted the end result to look like which significantly helped. The texture that I was going for was a metallic but also kind of glassy blue, and I think I did it pretty well.

Modeling

I did not use many in depth modeling tools because my base object is just a sphere. I just sized the sphere to what I wanted, and I didn't have to use edit poly or anything to edit the overall shape of the sphere. To unwrap my model, I applied the unwrap UVW modifier to make a flat render of my object, but I didn't have to use this because I could just apply a single material to the whole object.

Texturing and Materials

I did not create any texture maps for my object, as I just used the premade physical material, and this turned out reasonably well. Using physical materials helped a lot, as these are already made to look like real life materials that you would see every day.

Reflection

I faced the challenge of having to tweak all the parameters of the material for my crystal ball a whole lot to make it look how I wanted it to look. This was very time consuming, but the outcome is good. I am most proud of the reflection on the surface of the ball because I feel like that is a big part of how it looks. This character will be used in my animation as a magical ball that lights up and disrupts the previously peaceful wizard's room.

Artifact 2

Planning and Concept

I chose to create the bookshelf, table, candles, and flowerpot myself because they were mostly made of simple shapes without much polygon editing needed. I chose to find the chest, slug, books, wand, dragon, bottles, cauldron, crystal ball stand, and the papers online because they are much more complex and would be much harder to make, especially the dragon. I tried to make an environment seem almost like a normal working space, but if you look closer you will start to notice more magical things like the cauldron and wand. I chose to do this because the wizard who owns this study tried to make it not stand out too much as compared to normal homes.

Modeling Process

The main modeling tool I used to make my assets was the edit poly modifier, which I used to smooth out the table, bookshelf, and candles to make them see more realistic and lifelike. I am most proud of the candles that I made because they took a lot of polygon editing to make them look right. I also like how they look next to each other, where they are all different sizes and don't look the same.

Workflow and Organization

I organized my scene files by grouping different parts of the scene together, (left bookshelf, right bookshelf, chest, table, etc.), which really helped me to quickly find the asset that I needed to work on. The asset list that I made prior to beginning the modeling process really helped me to stay on track because it basically was a checklist, so I could easily check off what I had done, and quickly see what I needed to do next.

Reflection and Evaluation

I learned that asset design and laying out the scene takes a very long time and lots of modifying to make it look how you want it to. I am most excited to work on the lighting next because that will really bring the whole scene together and give it a more eerie magical vibe.

Artifact 3

Lighting Goals

I want to make the room a dark blue/purple color that conveys mystery and magic. This would really match the magical wizard's study vibe that I want, and I also want to make the candles without visible flames so it seems even more magical. I also want to light up the cauldron with a soft green light so it also looks magical, and adds a little bit of a different color to the room.

Reflection

The main type of light that I used was the omni light, which gives off light in all directions. This was really useful to make the candles, cauldron, and crystal ball light up. I also used targeted spotlights to give off the dark blue light for the rest of the room, and they worked together pretty well to make the whole room look mysterious. One of the challenges that I faced when lighting up the scene was that the candles and the cauldron didn't originally light up the way that I wanted, with the candles casting really weird shadows, and the cauldron lighting up the whole area around it with a strong lime green color.

Artifact 4

Reflection

I animated the chest, wand, books, crystal ball, and candles in my scene. I chose the chest because I wanted something to give off more light, and the corner was pretty empty without it. I chose the wand because I needed something to put everything back in its place so it could be a seamless loop. I chose the books so that there would be some background motion behind the main characters to make it more interesting. I chose the crystal ball because it's the main character in my scene and it's what made everything go haywire. I am most proud of the wand movement in the final animation because of how smooth it looks. The camera movement makes the wand look less smooth, but it's still pretty smooth. Overall, I'm really happy with how the wand motion turned out and how the scene and animation as a whole turned out.

Final Artifact 4 Animation.avi

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