This project will allow me to show off my strengths and specialties, weather they are more on the coding side of games or lean more towards game art (personally I am on the side of game art). I may pick my own theme. This assignment will be testing both my Unity C# coding abilities as well as how well I can create and apply textures, in Substance Painter. I MUST KEEP A CLEAR AND DETAIL BLOG of my processes and decisions. During this project I will mainly use these software: Unity, 3Ds MAX, Substance Painter, Photoshop & Teams.

This is an individual project, that I have to code and texture myself, all of this work will be brought together in Unity, both the Textures and Unity work will be marked separately. The pinball machine must include a basic UI, scoring and lives system. ADD SOUND. You will have the pinball table and coded flippers will be provided for you, which you will then add to. DON'T be to ambitious, there isn't much time. Always be blogging. I need to submit: a minimum of 2 final renders of my completed pinball machine, a screenshot of substance showing my texture layers and masks, etc... a recorded video of my pinball machine working, a word document of my code, INCLUDE COMMENTS + COLOUR CODING and finally make sure to submit the link to your blogs. 

Pinball Wizard (APP) Brief: Response

A pinball machine is a arcade entertainment system that uses two plungers to propel a ball up a slanted surface, with the aim of hitting pins and targets (although it varies depending on the theme of the machine), this scores you points. The aim of playing is to get higher than the highest recorded score, to win. If the ball falls out of the machine more than 3 times you lose, but you can re-launch the ball twice (after the initial launch) and keep you score, but any more and you lose and that is your score.

Pinball first appeared in the 1930's, although you could only find them at arcades. The pinball machine originated in the United States, but it soon became popular worldwide. The original pinball machines were different to the ones that we use today since the player had to physical move the table themselves to move the ball around, rather than using flippers (it wasn't until 1947 that the flippers were added to the machine). They also used to dispense small prices, otherwise it was a game of chance. In 1942, Mayor LaGuardia of New York city got the game banned (he had been attempting to ban the game since 1936) because he claimed that it was encouraging children to gamble, Milwaukee, Chicago, Los Angeles and Washington DC followed suit.

In New York the police would conduct raid, which would impound the machines and have them destroyed, if you were caught owning one you were sent to prison. During World War 2 all of the metal had been given to the war effort, so LaGuardia had the polices batons replaced with the legs of the pinball machines. Just like the alcohol ban the machines were now kept in secret. Finally in the 1976, a test was devised to show that pinball was a game that required skill and wasn't a gamble, so the Amusement and Music Association employed one of the best players in the states, this was Roger Sharpe. He was able to predict were the ball was going to go as a result of his actions so the ban was lifted. The other states that were still complying to the ban soon lifted it as a result.

“Look, there’s skill, because if I pull this plunger back just right… the ball will go down this particular lane.” (Roger Sharpe)

My pinball machine: The Idea!

My overall idea is ambitious. I want to challenge myself, because this will be the last time this year that I can practice fields within the games industry that I rarely ever use, as well as improve the ones that I am good at and the one I specialize in. I am not a good coder, I know what I need to use to make things work but am terrible at piecing it together, so at the bear minimum I want to be able to create a pinball machine with a working scoring and lives system. If I am able to get this done and I have completed everything else I may try and create a home screen and/or loading screen. 

My pinball machine: The Idea! - The theme and 3D creating (simplified)

The theme I have chosen is video games, because I is a nice, subtle way of showing how games have evolved over time, from being these massive machines that you had to go to an arcade to play, to now when anyone with a console, portable device or PC can download gaming software. I intend to create a range of models, from different game franchise, that will act as the obstacles in my pinball machine. To try an make the whole pinball machine have one theme I am going to try and make the characters from high poly games have roughly the same amount of polygons, because if I have hyper realistic characters and simple looking ones it will not look like one project, so I am going to decrease the count by using a trick that Joe's showed us. I will need to start modelling very soon, if I have any change at completing my idea, so I'm starting with the easiest models first, since they will take less time and may import a few assets, but not to many as this is a good way for me to practice my skills in 3D modelling and texturing.

My pinball machine: The Idea! - Feature set

The obstacles that I want to include are: bumpers (spring in unity), a launcher (also a spring that would be activated be a button, or by the ball re-spawning there once it is out of bounds), mushroom bumps (3D models), multiple flippers (just attach the object to the ready built code that Joe's is providing us with, so all of the flippers move at the same time), rails (3D models), bells (3D models with a hinge) and a hidden tunnel (model them underneath the table, since the surface slants downward, as long as they point downwards physics will cause it to travel on its own). I would also like to include a start menu and a way to save your high score, if it is within the top 5 (the high score recording system is more of an extension challenge, code is not my strong point).

My pinball machine: The Idea! - Hardware and software

I am going to use a range of hardware to help me with specific aspects of the process, this will shorten the time it take for me to complete tasks, so that I have more time at the end of my project to add stuff in and complete/check my process documentation. The software I am definitely going to use include: Unity (Puts everything together), Microsoft Visual Studios (for code), Substance painter (texturing), Google sites (documentation), 3Ds Max (modelling), Screen record & snipping tool (visual documentation), Word (code PDF) Photoshop (to create my concept art) and Procreate (procreate is another app exclusive to apple that I can use for concept art, it can be installed on portable devices unlike Photoshop, I usually travel a lot in the day so it is useful for me). I might use YouTube, I keep having issues when emailing video submissions for projects, if I create a YouTube account I can just send a WORKING link.

My pinball machine: Particle effects

The main partial effect used will be one that shows the amount of points you have scored in response to hitting pins. I will include others like a fire partial effect, possible, for the Ender Dragon, when the ball goes up the rail, I don't want it playing all the time because it would affect the players view. I may also include a small sort of derby partial effect for when the ball hits obstacles, this will show that there has been a collision.

My pinball machine: Mechanics

There are 4 mechanics required for me to be able to make my pinball machine, these are:

1. A scoring system. so that the player has a way of scoring and recording the points that they acquire, from hitting the pins, 

2. Ball respawn. The ball has to respawn in the launch channel, after it has entered a dead zone, this means that a player will have a maximum of 3 balls/2 respawns before their game ends and they are given their final score. This directly ties into the lives system,

3. A lives system. The lives system means that the player has a limited number of respawns, before the game ends, if there is no lives system the the game would never end. The 3 lives is the traditional amount for pinball machines.

My pinball machine: Gameplay mechanics

The player controls the flippers using the keys A and D, without the flippers their would be no player input and the game would solely be a game of chance, like a 2p machine, it would be boring. The player also controls the ball launcher. They can decided how much force is used to launch the ball by how long they hold down the button. You get 3 lives before your turn is over.

My pinball machine: Level design

There is only one level to this game. I am mainly focusing on the artistic side of this pinball machine not the code, so having more than one level is unnessicary.

My pinball machine: Game-play

The aim is to hit as many objects as possible, rack up points and try and beat the high score, if you do you win. You get a maximum of 3 balls, before your turn is up.

My pinball machine: Lighting

I need my pinball machine to be well lit, this for 2 reasons: one is that i'm focusing on the artsy side of this project since my coding ability isn't very strong, art is my specialty so I am going to focus on that and reason two is for the players benefit because if the lighting is poor how is the player supposed to see where the ball is and all of the effort that I have put into the graphics/modelling of my pinball machine, whats the point of making it look good if you can see it.

My pinball machine: Camera

I want the camera of my pinball machine to show a birds eye view of the machine when it is being played because they need to have a view of the whole table so they can see where the ball has gone, also if the camera was constantly following the ball it would get confusing for the the player. I would like the camera to follow the ball when it is traversing obstacles that you can't see it in otherwise the player just has to sit there doing nothing for a minute.

My pinball machine: Sound

There are three different types of audio I need to think about including for my game, these are: background music, sound effects and voice acting. I am terrible at making music, but I am pretty good at applying music to video, so I am going to try and find something that already exists and use that or a combination of them. Sound effects are a pretty easy thing to do you just need to fit the sound to the action. Some of the sound effects I will need to include is for: the collisions between the ball and obstacles, the ball launching spring, point scoring sound, fail sound, etc... Voice acting is something that would be useful to include in my game, to announce things like your score, getting points and a loss of lives, this means that the player has to divert their eyes away from the game to look for these things and lose the game.

My pinball machine: Sounds - Background music

I'm not sure what my background music will be at the moment, since it is going to be very difficult to find a song that fits all of the different themes of the characters at once, so I am probably going to have to find something simple. I DEFINITELY WON@T be making MY OWN MUSIC, since I am terrible at it, so I will have to find some free sources/assets online, using websites like FreeSounds, etc...

My pinball machine: Sounds - Sound effects

The sound effect I would need for a pinball machine are:

1. The sound of the collision when the ball hits different objects, this will be different depending of the material of the object and what type of object it is,

2. Possibly a sound effect that lets you know you haver scored points,

3. A death sound effect,

4. A powering up sound effect for the launcher (something that would be funny is if it was a Dragonball pinball machine and the launcher sound effect was just Goku screaming like if he was powering up to Super Sayin),

5. The sound of the ball rolling.

My pinball machine: Sounds - Audio

I can't really think of any reason for a pinball machine to include audio typically, unless it was announcing the score, you could argue that it would help with accessability for someone with a disability like blindness, but I don't think that someone who can't see would have an easy time playing pinball and I don't see how audio would help that. Not to say that a blind person can't or shouldn't play pinball but I can't imagine it being easy for them, because you have to see where the ball is to be able to get the timing right to hit it with the flippers. I probably won't include audio in my own game, but if someone else finds a use for it, good for them.

My pinball machine: The theme - Video games

A video game is a game that can be electronically played, their are console, PC & mobile games. The reason I am basing the theme of my pinball machine on video game is because they are the evolution of the old arcade machines, like a pinball machine, it seemed like a nice way of Illustrating how games have evolved over time (explained in the history of pinball, minus the banning, the transfer to gaming software is pretty much the same). I am mainly going to focus on characters, although I don't know who or how many I am going to use yet. These are the franchises that I have thought of, so far:

1. Doom Eternal - Doom guy (Nintendo Switch) (I'll probably import this one since the model is to complex and will take to long to model),

2. Portal 2 - Glados (PS3, Nintendo Switch, Steam) (I'll probably import this one since the model is to complex and will take to long to model),

3. Horizon - Watcher (PS4 & PS5 & windows) (I'll probably import this one since the model is to complex and will take to long to model),

4. Sonic Frontiers - Sonic the Hedgehog (Nintendo Switch, PS4)

5. Super Mario Bros - Bowser (pretty much every Nintendo console of all time),

6. Minecraft - Ender dragon (PS4, PS5, Xbox 1, Xbox Series S, Xbox Series X, Nintendo Switch, Window 10/11, Andriod, 3DS & Oculus)

7. Stray - The cat & B-12 (PS4, PS5) (I may import the model of a cat and add B-12 travel pack to it myself, it depends on how much time I have, although I will be making B-12 my self)

8. Zelda Tears of the Kingdom - Link (Nintendo Switch) (I'll probably import this one since the model is to complex and will take to long to model),

9. Pokemon Scarlet - Pikachu (Nintendo Switch),

10. Borderlands - Claptrap

11. Animal crossing: New Horizons - Isabelle (Nintendo Switch)

12. God of War - Kratos, (PS4, PS5) (I'll probably import this one since the model is to complex and will take to long to model),

13. (Pixel) PAC-Man Ghost,

I am trying to work with the franchises I know already, since I will have a better understand of what they look like and key feature about their designs. I'm also trying to pick franchise that have been around for a long time and are well known, that way more people will understand the references. 

(P.s. Even though I may end up importing some of my models I am making all of main pin bodies that they stand on myself)

My pinball machine: Copyright/licensing issues (4.)

The general rule of copyright is that you can't use someone else's work, unless you obtain permission, ownership or come under copyright exemptions. Usually me making a pinball machine themed by other video game would be illegal and it is if I release the game, but since I don't intend to release thing game in any form outside of a purely educational or private study perspective I come under the exemptions. I am purely making this game to show off my artistic abilities that I will showcase in my portfolio. This is a non-commercial use, essentially making it fan art.

My pinball machine: Aesthetics/Art style

To try an keep a cohesive look I am going to make all of the characters from hyper realistic game more simplified, so that they all look like they have roughly used the same amount of polygons or a little less for the strongly stylized games, since their style is a part of the games identity I don't what to take that away, especially for games like Minecraft, known for its simple blocky, pixelated look. I'm probably going to go with more of a cartoonist style, since most of these games have comic book counter parts I can use this as a reference to simplify their design and use it as a base for the outlines of my models. I've never done character modeling before, so this will be a new experience for me. I will have to watch some YouTube tutorial videos to see how to do this. Personally I am more of a console gamer, but some of the games above cross over onto PC.

My pinball machine: Target audience

The target audience of my game would be anyone over the age of 3 (age rating 3+), since any younger would not be able to understand how to play the game. On the other hand different age groups might not be able to identify some of the references, for example it is highly unlikely that a 3 year old child is going to know who Doom guy is, so I need to include character from games of all age groups. Although the people most likely to find play this game are people who like retro games. Pinball is considered quite a retro game, by most people,  even if the theme of mine is more modern. 

Personally I like pinball, but to me playing the real, physical version of the game is better than playing it through gaming software, I think you just get a better feeling of the game and it is more immersive, but gaming software does have it's advantages. Gaming software allows for more players, the obstacles in them can be more surrealistic than they can be in reality and there is the are so many more choices for the games customization.

My pinball machine: Ethical considerations

The issue with pinball and most retro style arcade machines is that the original games have become collectors items and owning them has become a trend and status symbol. The demand is so high for them now, that only the wealthy can afford them. Gaming software has allowed people, all across the world, access to games, most people wouldn't be able to afford them otherwise or would have to travel to play them.

By creating this pinball I am contributing to the availability of game (but obviously, I am not saying that I am the first one to convert pinball to a gaming software) for people who can't afford the actual machine (i am included in this group). By basing my theme on video games, I am trying to subtly shed light on how games have evolved over the last few decades and the fact that trends (like buying retro video consoles and such) inflate the value of (sometimes) practical or fun, so much that no one can actually afford to buy it.

My pinball machine: Plan

Development process - Planning: Pinball machine layout - Part 1

This is the layout that I have come up with for my pinball machine, although it may change slightly depending on how Unity behaves. Most of what I want to say about this has already been said within my annotations, so I'm not going to repeat myself, but I would like to talk a little more about the trigger-activated spinners "cogs" and the mushroom humps. The "cogs" are going to be themed with the characters that are on them, since they will be the base that the character sits on, it makes sense that they would be theme. The bases will most likely look somewhat like the logo for the game that they are from, but it depends what I can do with the designs to make it work. I can't have the character models sat directly on the table because it will be easy for the ball to get stuck on them. I haven't yet decided on what all of the mushroom humps are going to look like, but I know that the biggest of the three is going to be themed as Bowsers shell and the spines on it will be the pins, some of these pins will have spring joints but not all of them, because the trajectory of the ball will end up a little to crazy.

Development process - Prototype: PAC-MAN pin - Part 2

The next thing I needed to do was test my machine layout, so I put in some very simple objects that I could use to represent the features of my pinball machine, minus the trigger activated spinners and the Ender dragon rail, since this would take to much time to add in for a simple layout test. Everything seems to work well together, except the pins need to be cylinders not rectangles, because the ball will sit on the top of them if it directly falls on top due to Unity's physics engine. My other issue is that I can't get the ball to go over the top of the mushroom humps, so I will have to figure out how to make that work to, other than that I am happy with my layout. The spinner is currently set to spin on the y axis, with motor and aceleration on, it also has a force of 10 and a maximum velociy of 500.

I will leave the parts of this layout in place until I have made the parts to replace them so that I know what still needs to be done and can just replace thing as I go. The other bonus of doing this is that I can write out the code that I need and apply in to my representative objects, until I've completed the final product, I will just have to attach the code to the new object. I need to do this since my coding ability is awful and I am going to need quite a bit of time to get it right and working.

After consulting Joe, I have to change the direction gravity acts in to get the ball to go over the mushroom lumps on the table. Gravity is preset to act as a (straight) downwards force, so I need to tilt it inline with the tables tilts (in this case the z) axis, I can make these changes by going to Edit ->  Project Settings.. -> Physics -> Gravity, but I will have to figure out if in need to change this to a positive or minus number with some experimenting, which I will do a little later into developments. Changing the gravity settings will effect how the ball interacts with everything else, so will need to make changes to accommodate for this. It will also make the ball move faster up and down the table.

Development process: PAC-MAN pin - Part 3

Development process - Planning: Blinky (PAC-MAN) pin - Part 3.1

This was my plan for my PAC-MAN pin, since it was quite a simple model I didn't need modelling profiles only a plan for what it should eventually look like. I used Procreate to create this plan, since I didn't need to use Photoshop's ruler tool for the modelling profiles. I wanted the main body of my pins to be made up of the games logo, so obviously for PAC-MAN the pin would just be PAC-MAN, with the ghost Blinky on the top. I would like to add an animation, but I may not have enough time. The animation I have in mind is that when the pin is hit it turns blue, then vanishes and respawns as a different colour of one of the other 3 most well known ghosts. First I decided to draw the characters 2D and then convert them to 3D as a 2D pillar in a group of 3D ones would make it look wrong compared to the others. I also wanted to make sure that all of the main bodies of my pins were curved because if they were flat the ball would not roll around them. Now that I have finished my plan I am going to move onto modelling

Development process - Modeling: Blinky (PAC-MAN) pin - Part 3.2

To make the main body of my plan I needed to create a cylinder because PAC-MAN is obviously a circle, so I won't have to do much work to it. The cylinder had 1 height segment and 1 cap segment with 12 sides, having any more height or cap segments would be worthless since they aren't needed and would just add unneeded polygons. I don't need more than 12 side because the player isn't going to be close enough to the object to be able to see the edges. Currently I am not worried about how large these pins are since the pinball machine I have been give is not to scale, so I'd have to alter the scale, in Unity anyway, I'm more concerned on getting the ratio of the proportions correct.

Development process - Modeling : Blinky (PAC-MAN) pin - Part 3.3

The only other thing I needed to do to this pillar is to cut out the mouth section of PAC-MAN, as a yellow cylinder could be anything. First, I used the vertex selection tool combined with the cut tool to cut out to the center of the shape then cut from the center over to 2nd vertex away. I chose to cut here because I thought that it had a good size ratio compared to the rest of PAC-MAN's body. I then deleted the two side faces between the cut and the two sections that I had cut into the top and bottom faces of the pin, I then used the edge selection tool and selected the cut in edges and used the bridge tool to fill in the two gaps, will a polygon each, otherwise you would be able to see inside of the shape and it would look terrible. The main body of the pin is now finished I just need to add in Blinky on top of the pin.

Development process - Modeling: Blinky (PAC-MAN) pin - Part 3.4

To make Blinky I started out with a thin rectangular object, it has 12 height segments, 2 width and 1 length segment. I chose 12 height segment because I counted how many pixels tall Blinky was (which was 12), so 12 segments made since, I used 2 width segments because I am going to delete half, and halving the shape now makes it easier to delete half when I use the symmetry modifier, this means I don't have to make both side I can just mirror it, this will save me a lot of time in the long run. I used 1 length segment because of the angle I had created this basic Blinky the length would actual be the width and Blinky isn't that thick.

Development process - Modeling: Blinky (PAC-MAN) pin - Part 3.5

After deleting half of Blinky (You can see the whole body of Blinky here because after this step I needed to apply the symmetry modifier and forgot to turn it off for the snip), I used the line selection tool combined with the connect tool (x7), because I also counted how many pixels wide Blinky is and they are 14 pixels wide altogether but as I am only making half this means I only need to use the connect tool 7 times. Once I had created a grid out of the polygons that I had created from using the connect tool, I deleted the faces that I didn't need, making the outline of Blinky. Finally I used the edge selection tool and the bridge tool to bridge the gaps with polygons that I had left by deleting the other polys. By making a grid, it allowed me to count the amount of square polygons across and use these to represent the amount of pixels I had counted beforehand, this allowed me to make Blinky as accurate as possible, not that there is much to mess up on, with a character this simple.

Development process - Modeling: Blinky (PAC-MAN) pin - Part 3.6

The final thing I needed to do for the modelling part of Blinky is to remove some of the other polygon that I didn't need, because I had a horrendous amount, that I didn't need. First, I collapsed the symmetry modifier since I no longer needed the mirror tool and the next step I needed to do couldn't be mirrored since it wasn't symmetrical. Once, I figured out where the eyes would sit on the model, I left it with more polys than they needed because it would allow me to better texture the eyes when I moved this model over to Substance Painter, since I could clearly see the size of the pupils compared to the whites of the eyes, I then deleted all of the other polys on the front and back of Blinky I used the line selection tool paired with the bridge tool and bridged the gaps, there was no way I could make the front or back out of one poly so bridging the edges straight down was the best that I could manage, it still reduced my poly count and it wasn't very high to begin with so I am not that bothered by this.

Development process - Unwrapping: Blinky (PAC-MAN) pin - Part 3.7

Next, I need to unwrap Blinky, so that I can transfer them over to Substance Painter texture them and put them into Unity, so I attached the PAC-MAN shaped pin to Blinky (so that they were classed as all one model, if I don't attach them the unwraps will be separate and will overlap when I export my model to Substance Painter and I won't be able to texture the pin at all), to make it all one object, then applied the Unwrap UVW modifier and opened the UV editor (the window on the left side of the screen). The UV Editor provided you with a basic Unwrap of any object you make they can be terrible when the object has curved edged but usable when the object is main made up of straight edges, luckily for me this model has only two curved polys (the top and bottom of the cylinder), so I selected the whole model and pressed Flatten by Polygon angle this flattens out any curved or circular polygons, then I used the Straighten selection tool on all of the polys (other than the top and bottom of the cylinder since they are curved not straight and using this tool on them would just mess the up), this fixed any twisted polygons and made them perfect rectangles, I then pressed Pack Normalize so the all of the polygons would be within the checkered square, anything out side of this will not appear for the unwrap in Substance Painter. I had to rescale and move some of the polys, as the checkers weren't appearing correctly on the model, so I positioned the polys perfectly within the checkers and correctly to the size of it (1 checker is 2 poly high and wide, since my poly are measured in perfect square, I can use this as a measuring system to get my Unwrap as perfect as possible). I am terrible at Unwrapping but I'm pretty happy with how this has turned out, plus it doesn't have to be perfect since the pin is pretty much just 2 colour, but I wanted to make it as detailed as possible to see if I could put some sort of pixel texture on Blinky, like in my ghost reference picture on my plan (if you look closely there is a sort of pixel effect on it, with ever so slightly varying tones of red, which I thought was pretty cool).

Development process: Animal Crossing Isabella pin - Part 4

Development process - Plan: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.1

I will need side, front and back outline profiles of this character, due to it's complexity, I won't actually be accurately make them without it since I struggle with proportions. Sometimes I can find modelling profiles online, but I could only find a side profile, so I need to trace the character from a few different angles so I can understand all of the features of their design, then begin drawing them correctly for a front and back profile, which I can then import into 3Ds Max and use them as modelling profiles. I added the colour onto these profile because it would make it easier for me to see the different sections of the design.

Development process - Profiles: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.2

I drew these profiles in Procreate, since I wasn't at home on my desktop at the time and Photoshop is only really any good on a desktop. Once I had completed the profiles I screenshot the canvas and emailed it to my college email, saved the image, then imported it to Photoshop and used the merge down tool to merge the profile layer with the background layer, if I don't do this, when I crop the image it will move away from the ruler markers. After my modeling profiles were in Photoshop I used the ruler tool (R) and drag markers, down from the top of the screen, to just above the head and just below the feet of my character models, then I dragged one down to the center of the profiles. Next I used the rectangular marquee tool to select the back profile and drag a ruler marker from the side of the screen to the center of the back profile, selecting this profile makes this marker snap into place, it just makes it a bit more accurate than doing it by hand. I then did this step for the other two profiles. 

Next, I had to add in a layer over the top of my profiles, used painter bucket to turn the whole canvas blue (I chose blue because it is easy on the eyes for a long period of time, like red or some of the other brighter colours would) and turned the opacity down to 50%, this is because the mesh in 3Ds Max is white and the background of my profiles is white, meaning I won't be able to see the mesh in 3Ds Max making it difficult to model. Once I had done this I used the rectangular marquee tool on the center of each profile (where the to two center markers cross), plus holding down Alt (holding down alt means that the selection tool select the same amount of canvas on every axis). I then went to the edit menu, clicked crop and saved the file as a JPEG (you have to save the whole file in the Adobe format before hand otherwise JPEG won't be an option as a file type), I did this for each profile individually, by pressing Ctrl + z to reverse the crop, so I could select the other profile, without altering the original file.

Development process - Profiles: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.3

Next I need to move my profiles over to 3Ds Max, so I created a plane converted it to an editable poly and cloned it 2 times. This meant that I wouldn’t need to recreate all of the plane presenters multiple times they would already be set. Now that I had created the planes I needed to attach the image profiles to it, so I pressed the M key to open up the Slate material editor, dragged and dropped 3 physical materials into the editor, then dragged and dropped the 3 image profile files that I needed into the Slate material editor and joined them to the physical material on the base colour map option, one profile to one physical material. Once I had hooked up all of the profiles to the physical materials I attached one physical material to one of the planes and repeated this for each.

Development process - Profiles: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.4

 Now I need to move rotate the profile into the vertical position, since when you first create the plane they are flat on the grid on the floor, so I used the rotate (e) key to move them into the right position. The front and back profiles face away from each other and the side profile is rotated so that it sits on the opposite axis to the front and back perspectives. , I turned on backface cull, this makes the back of the profile see-through, so that when you are modelling from a different perspective the perspective doesn’t get in the way.

Development process - Profiles: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.5

I then used the move tool (w) to move the perspectives into place. I line my perspective a little differently to how I’ve see most people do it online. I sort of make a 3D object out of 2D paper thin shapes.

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.6

To start creating Isabella I needed to create a cube in the center of all of the profiles, at coordinates (0,0,0). After converting it to an editable poly (by right clicking on the object -> convert to: -> editable poly), I started sectioning the shape so that I could make the major parts of Isabella’s design. In total there 6 sections I need to make, so I used the connect tool X5 to do this.

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.7

First I started by selection all of the horizontal lines and used the connect tool X1, then deleted one half of the object and added the symmetry modifier on the Y axis (mirrors everything on the other side of the axis once Collapse To has been used, object becomes one). Secondly, I used the line selection option to select each ring of horizontal lines around the shape, individually, and used the scale tool (r) to change the size of the profile so that they lined up with the edges of the profile.

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.8

To refine the shape of the front and back profile I started by selecting all of the horizontal lines again and used the connect tool combined with the scale tool (r) to match up all of the lines on the side with the edges of the front and back profile. This is probably the longest step so far but it wasn’t particularly hard to do.

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.9

Next, I moved onto the side profile. I selected all of the horizontal lines with the same rotation as the front and back perspectives and used the move tool (w), to move all of these lines so that they lined up with the outline of the side profile. Isabella currently looks like they are in the game Minecraft.

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.10

The next logical step is to make the character model more curved so that it actually looks like Isabella and not Steve from Minecraft as a furry. To make is model curved I need to add in more geometry (I can’t make a sphere shape out of a cube), to do this I needed I used line selection to select all of horizontal line and used the connect tool X2. Now that I have the geometry I need wrapping around the object, I used the move tool (w) to select the lines I added and changed the scale using the R key to make the faces look more curved. You will notice that the character is curved but you can still see the edges on it, this is because it will be so small and far away when it is completed that you won’t be able to see this so it ‘t need to be hyper-realistic.

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.11

Now that the main body is made I only need to add in this characters feature, these are: the arms, hair, ears and tail. I started with the arms. I used polygon selection and take extrude tool, to select two polys at the top of the side of the character and pulled the face away from the body to create the sleeves of Isabella’s shirt. Once I hade created the shape of the sleeve I selected the faces on the bottom of the sleeve cuff and used the extrude tool again to push the faces into the sleeve to make it look separate to the body. I then used the inset tool (0.2) and used the extrude tool again to pull the polys outwards and create the upper half of the arm, then used the extrude tool again on the upper arm to create the lower arm. A straight arm doesn’t look natural so I use the poly selection tool to select the bottom of the are and used the rotate tool (e) to add a bend to it and make an elbow. The bottom of the arm is flat so I used the inset tool on this twice and used line selection and the move tool (w) to pull the polys out and make it curved like I did for the body.

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.12

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.13

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.14

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.15

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.16

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.17

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.18

Development process - Modeling: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.19

Development process - Unwrapping: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.20

Development process - Unwrapping: Isabella (Animal Crossing) pin - Part 4.21

Development process: Doom Eternal Crucible blade pin - Part 5

Originally I was going to make the character most associated with the DOOM, Zelda, God of War, Horizon and Portal 2 franchises, but since these characters are hyper realistic compared to some of my other more cartoon influenced style , they are going to take way to long to model, so I'm going to make their most recognized weapons instead, in this case: The crucible blade (Doom Eternal), The Master Sword (The Legend of Zelda) Blades of Chaos (God of War), Alloy's spear (Horizon) and the Portal Gun (Portal 2). This decision has two other benefits compared other than just saving time, these are that, since they are just weapons and not characters, I can tweek their style more easily so that the have a more of a cartoonist appearance making the overall aesthetics of my pinball machine have more in common than just all being from video games, the style will look more cohesive. The other benefit is that the handles of these weapons already make the perfect pin bases so I don't need to make the main body of the pin the weapons handle will be it.

Development process - Profiles: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.1

To import the profile into 3Ds Max I had to create a place, open the Slate material editor (m), drag and drop a physical material into the material editor window and the profile from my files. I then attached the profile to the base colour map and the physical material to the plane. Finally, I used the rotate tool (e) to rotate the plane to the vertical position. Then I turned on backface cull.

Development process - Modeling: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.3

Next, I created a thin quadrilateral, that was 100cm high, the average height of the pins. I intend to make the handle and the blade separately then attach them together as this will be easier than trying to make a cylinder shaped handle from a rectangle. I added one width segment, so that I could delete half of the shape and add the symmetry modifier, so I only needed to make half of the blade.

Development process - Modeling: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.4

I used line selection and the connect tool, to select all of the vertical line and used the connect tool X15, so that I can roughly match up the shapes outline with the outline of the profile. I then used edge selection and combined the scale (r) and move (w) tools to make the features of the blade.

Development process - Modeling: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.5

The main thing I need to do now is refine the blade, then it is pretty much finished. This time I used edge selection on the horizontal lines and the connect tool, multiple times and used the move tool (w) to move the lines into the places that I needed them. The top crescent shape of the blade was the area that needed the most refinement, I also needed to add a line down the center of the blade to make the bottom of it triangular for when I slot the blade into the handle.

Development process - Modeling: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.6

I now need to make the cutting, sharp edge of the blade. To create the sharp edge I selected all of the polys that made up the blade, using poly selection and used the inset tool at 2 cm. Then I used edge selection tool to select all of the edges around the shape of the blade and used the move tool to pull the edges backwards away from the blade, to angle the polys.

Development process - Modeling: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.7

I'm creating the handle seperate to the balde, because it is easier to edit, sicne any change I could make if they were one object could mess up the blade. The other reason is that the actual bit of the handle that you hold is round and it will be incredibly hard to make a perfect cylinder out of a rectangular object, thinking about it now it probably would have been easier to make the handle first then make the blade since, I could actually make it from one object then without the difficulty I mentioned before, it's something to learn from. The cylinder I made had a radius of 3.0 cm and a height of 45.0 cm this was as close as I could get the size by eyeballing it. This cylinder also has 5 height segments, since I concluded that there were 5 major parts to the blade handle, it had 1 cap segment, since I wouldn't need any more and 18 height segments. I gave this blade 18 height segments instead of 12 because the handle is the part of this blade that the ball will hit and I don't want any reason for Unity's physics to go mad and think that the ball can sit on the polys of the handle instead of rolling around it, because it isn't angled enough. I then deleted the back half of the cylinder and added the symmetry modifier, so I only need to create one half of the cylinder then attach the two half’s together.

Development process - Modeling: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.8

Now I have to move the five sections into position referring to the outline of the profile. To do this I used edge selection combined with the scale toll (r) to select each of the rings of edges separately and edits them to how I need them. I also used the move tool (w) to move the lines further up the cylinder to where the sections start and end.

Development process - Modeling: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.9

Next, I added use edge selection, to select all of the vertical lines in the section I am working in and the connect tool to add in more geometry to get the shape of the handle right. I used connect for the top part of the handle (the bit in the profile where there is that Japanese looking red letter), this looks like more of a cube shape on the profile, but for now I only need it to have the right circumference for the very top part of the handle (the bit with wings). The reason I needed 7 times the geometry is because I needed to create a clear distinction between the actual handle part of the hilt (where you hold the blade) and this section, as well as a distinction from the rune and the rings at the top. I used the move (w) and scale (r) tools to get the rings into the correct position and make sure that they had the right, so it looked a bit like a bludgeon, then moved on to the wing like shapes at the top. I used poly selection and the extrude tool to pull one poly on each side of the handle and pulled them out and away from the hilt. To turn these two new wings into something other than just two boxes stick out of the body, I needed to use the connect tool X 7 and edge selection, by selecting the top and bottom edges, individually and moving them I could change the shape of the wings and angle these new ringed edges to conform to the shape of the outline of the blade. The final major thing I had to do for this layer was to refine the part of the handle that will attach to the blade, so I started by cutting the top face of the handle into 3 and using poly selection combined with extrude to pull the two outside face upwards (I need these to be symmetrical) and use extrude on the middle section after to pull it up further than the two spikes on the side. Then I used vertex selection and tangent weld to remove some of the geometry and make these spikes more squared like the big wings on the side (in the blades profile these parts are squared as well), giving them a triangular shape, with a point on the end.

I ended up refining the bottom part of the handle more than I intended to for this step, since I forgot to take a screen shot. I ended up using edge selection (on all of the vertical lines in this section) and the connect tool X 24 to create rings of edges I could edit into the ridge for the bottom of the handle. I used the move (w) and scale tool (r) to edit the wrap around edges into the ridges I needed, I did this by making the inside part of the ring smaller than the wrap around edges that make up the outside of the ridge, then making the one underneath that slightly smaller even and finally making the ring around that bigger than the two rings above it but smaller than the 3rd ring up, so that this part kept its overall shape and didn’t just become a cube with indents (that’s what would have happened if I didn’t make the next outer ridge smaller than the last. This does look pretty good, I just need to do the final touches to the rest of the blade now.

Development process - Modeling: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.10

There isn’t much for me to actually refine for this part as I have already done the hard part, I only need to finish the bit with the rune on it, since I sort of forgot about it till this part. I had to use edge selection plus connect one more time to add a ring of edges around the bottom of the bit with the rune on, this will allow me to make it into a sort of rounded cube. I used vertex selection and the move tool (w) to move the vertices so that the edges they were attached to became almost straight. Once I had done this I started making the ring that will in case the rune on the cube, I used poly selection and the cut tool to do this, then used the extrude tool to pull it out of the cube. I also used poly selection, inset and extrude tools on the big side wings on the hilt, because in the profile there are indents here where there are these swirly looking details. Now I need to make the rune, which I did by bringing the profile forwards so that it was just in front of the runes position, selected the polys behind it and cut the shape of the runes out onto the polys. Once I had done this I added some cuts into the background to reduce and remove any engons in my scene. Lastly, I decided to add the spikes on the side of the rune, I selected the 2 polys on each side of the rune cube then used the extrude tool on the individually to pull the outwards, then I used the scale (r) tool to shrink the size of the poly at the end of the spike to make the end appear sharper like a spike should be. I left the square poly on the end so I don’t end up with engons.

Development process - Modeling: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.11

The handle is now completed, so I just applied the symmetry modifier, by right clicking on it and selecting collapse to: now that I have the whole handle I just need to attach it together. To attach the two halves together I used vertex selection and tangent weld to get rid of the gaps. Once I had a attached the two p]arts together I used poly selection to delete and excess polys I didn’t need and change it to just one poly using edge selection and the bridge tool.

Development process - Modeling: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.12

Before I joined the blade to the handle I wanted to make attaching the object easier by using deleting and editing anything I don’t need or needs to be changes for the blade to be attached. This was mainly the  top part of  , I had to delete all of the back faces between the the 4 side spike at the very top of handle as they touch the blade and won’t join it there is a poly there, plus it lowers my poly count. Another thing I needed to do was to edit the indents in the side wings (closest to the handles main body), since the blade is made of energy it shows over the top of the engravings, so I cut the poly in-half and used the extrude tool to pull it to halfway between the indent and the normal part of the wing (I did this twice with each side of , doing both parts on the same side at once, since they should be the same depth and I can’t do both sides of the handle at once since the ones on the back would be pulled into the shape, not what I want it to do). Next, I used the attach tool to attach the blade layer and handle layers together, deleted the bottom face on the sharp edge of the blade and joined it to the , using vertex selection and target weld. Finally I removed any unnecessary polys, and used the bridge tool plus edge selection to fill in the gaps.

Development process - Unwrapping: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.13

The last thing I needed to do in 3Ds Max for this blade was to unwrap it so that I can texture it in substance painter later. To unwrap I had to select the Unwrap UVW modifier, open the UV Editor and select the whole object and apply the checker pattern. To start unwrapping I used poly selection to select all of the sections I want to break apart in the unwrap. When selected I used the break and the flatten by polygon angle tool to perfect the shapes in the editor. Finally I used pack normalise to arrange all of the shapes within the unwrap editor to scale.

Development process - Texturing: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.14

Development process - Texturing: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.15

Development process - Texturing: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.16

Development process - Texturing: Crucible blade (Doom Eternal) pin - Part 5.17

To start making the blade I started with a quadrilateral with 8 height segments (since there are 8 main sections to the blade), 2 length segment (this will make it easier to delete the back half of the blade, when I attach the symetrry modifier) and 1 width segment (don't need anymore than that). I had to eyeball the length and width of the blade since I don't know the exact measurements, but I made the object the average height of the pins (I can always scale it down later if I need to, this way the ration of the blade length to the handle should look ok).

Development process - Modeling: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.4

This blade doesn't require much editing to get it to looking accurate, so I started by selecting all of 8 rows of vertices on each side of the blade (individually) and moving these vertices so that they line up with the profile outline (black). I had to add in more geometry using edge selection and the connect tool (green), since the outline of the object didn't look curved enough and you could see the edges that made up the point of the blade. Now that I have made the sharp part of the blade, I need to make the part where the handle and the blade meet, plus the section where the blades case would attach (if it had one, I didn't make the case since I wasn't going to use it on the table so there was no point). I started by using polygon selection to grab the bottom poly in the top 8th of the blade and used the extrude tool on each of them to pull them out and away from the blade, due to these bits curving around the blade I needed to use the move tool (w) to tidy this part up a bit (red). Next, I need to add the triforce symbol to the top of the blade, but just below the where the case would lock onto the blade. To make the symbol, I used poly selection and the cut tool, this allowed me to cut the shapes I needed onto the poly, the shapes themself weren't perticularly hard to cut, dince they are quite simple but I still pulled the profile forward, so that I could use it as a guide to get the scale right. To complete the Triforce symbol I needed to pull it out from the blade, I did this by using poly selection and the extrude tool (dark blue). I didn't pull the symbol out of the sword to much otherwise it would look to thick for the blade. The last thing I needed to do now was to apply the symmetry modifier and tangent weld the two parts of the blade together around the sides (yellow & purple). I have been using it up and till now so that the blade looked the same on both sides, but thinking about it now I didn't really need to use this modifier, the only benefit I really got from using the symmetry modifier is that I didn't have to cut the Triforce into both sides, as it would look different, a thought for next time.

Development process - Modeling: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.5

Once I had finished the majority of the blade I noticed that I forgot the crystal at the top of the blade (dark blue), so I used poly selection and the cut tool to cut the shape of the crystal into the very top of the blade (black). I had to cut the gem in both side of the blade. Once I cut the shape of the gem into the blade I needed to use he bridge tool to fix some of the geometery as it had become distorted due to the cuts, this wasn't much trouble to fix I just used edge selection and the bridge tool (green). Another issue i had is that the cut tool can be a pain and add in more vertices than I need, which it did here, so I used the tangent weld tool to get rid of these (red). Finally, I used vertex selection and the extrude tool to pull the center of the gem outwards, to create that typical diamond shape. The blade is now finished.

Development process - Modeling: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.6

Now I need to make the handle of the blade. I started of with a cylinder. It is 100 cm tall (I can always scale it back later) and has a radius of 2, there are 5 height segments (5 sections to the handle), 1 cap segment and 18 sides (this bit needs to be curved because this part of the blade will be the first part of the model that you see. I then deleted the back half of the shape and added the symmetry modifier (saves time, everything is the same on both sides).

Development process - Modeling: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.7

Next, I used edge selection and a combination of the move (w) and scale (r) tools (green) to make the basic shape of the handle. After creating the basic shape of the handle I used poly selection to select the two side faces (individually) at the bottom of the handle, I then used the Extrude tool (red) to pull these out of the handle. This made two sticking out boxes, which didn't look quite right so i used poly selection and the connect tool to add in two rings of edges, that I used edge selection, scale (r) and move (w) tool to shape it. This created the top part of the wings for the hand guard.

Development process - Modeling: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.8

Next, I started refining the shapes of the handle, by adding the end of the handle and fixing the wing shape. The process for making the top of the handle is the same as what I have been doing through out making this handle, Poly selection, connect, scale (r) and move (w) (red). To fix the shape of the wings I used poly selection and the extrude tool to pull the last bottom face out, on the wing I had created previously. Once, I had created this extruded cube shape, I used poly selection and the connect tool X2, and then used edge selection and the move tool (w) to shape this part of the wing shaped hand gaurd (black).

Development process - Modeling: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.9

Now I need to add detail to the hand guard. I did this by using edge selection and connect to split the second part of the winged hand guard into 3, using edge selection and the scale tool (r) to shrink every other row of edges, this creates the ridges needed to represent feathers (black). Now that the design of the blade is pretty much complete I right clicked on the symmetry modifier and selected Collapse To:, this applies the symetry and completes the object. To fix any gaps left by applying the symmetry modifiers, I used the tangent weld tool and verte selection to fuse them togther (red).

Development process - Modeling: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.10

Before I can attach the handle to the blade I need to do some prep, I started by deleting the top polygon on the sharp edge of the blade that will slot into the handle (purple). I then did the same to the polys on the handle that will interfere with attaching the blade (blue). I then used the attach tool to combine the handle and blade layers, so I could make them one object (red). I then used tangent weld to attach the handle to the blade (black). After attaching the blade to the handle I wasn't happy with how the diamond looked, so I used the inset tool at 0.2 (green), I then used poly selection and the etrude tool to pull the gem further out from the handle, once I was happy with it I moved onto removing any geometry I didn't need. After deleting the geometry I didn't need using poly selection and the delete key, to delete them and the bridge tool (switched to edge selection here) to remove the gaps (teal). I'm really happy with how this blade looks so far, I don't think that there is anything I would change on this currently.

Development process - Unwrapping: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.11

I now need to unwrap the blade ready for texturing. To start I selected the Unwrap UVW modifier, opened the UV Editor and applied the checker pattern. Next, I used poly selection to select the part of the object I want to seperate, then used the break and flatten by polygon angle tools to seperate the sections and flatten out the curved edges so that I can apply textures properly (red). Finally, I pressed pack normalise tool to arrange the sections into the editor to scale.

Development process - Texturing: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.12

After exporting the file from 3Ds MAX I need to import it to Substance painter, I did this by selecting file, new, PBR Metallic Alpha Roughness blend (starter set), file - Master Sword, resolution 2048 and finally Ok. Now that I have imported the file I started texturing the blade. First, I started by selecting the smart material Aluminium ionised (white), but I changed the base colour to dark blue, using the colour dropper tool (blue) to select the handle part of the blade in the picture. I then added a black mask to the layer and used the paint brush tool to paint the texture only on the handle part of the blade (red).

Development process - Texturing: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.13

The base texture for the blade is glass visor, this blade is of a magical crystal like texture instead of metal, so I thought that a glass like texture would look better (white). I then changed the colour, to the light blue of the blade in the picture, using colour dropper (red). I then added a black mask to texture layer (blue) and used the paint tool to add the texture to the blade. As you can see in the image you can sort of see through the blade.

Development process - Texturing: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.14

Next, I added a metal smart material to the blade, this one is a bit more glittery looking than the aluminium used for the handle. I then changed the base colour again and used the same black mask as the previous layer. I think that the sword so far looks pretty good, the metal makes the blade seem less fragile and causes it to look more crystallised and rock like material. It also causes the sharp edge of the blade to glow which makes it seem more magical.

Development process - Texturing: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.15

In the reference picture you can see that the blade isn't completely blue, it has green, pink and dark blue in it as well. To create this coloured mist like effect on the blade, I started by selecting the crystal smart material brush, but changed the base colour of the layer to a light pink (red), added a black mask to the layer and used the physical paint tool to paint on the effect (white). From what i can tell the physical paint tool follows the shape of the stroke you make but randomly spreads out the effect. I then used the eraser tool (2) to get rid of any of the material paint that spread to far up the blade and onto the handle. I then did the exact same thing again but changed the base colour to a light green and did a different stroke pattern with the material paint tool (1). So far this looks really good and pretty similar to the reference picture.

Development process - Texturing: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.16

I thought that using a texture for the leather handle grips would look better than adding it to the model, plus it would add more geometry than I need. To make this grip I used the Leather Weathered smart material, used the colour dropper to change the base colour of the material, to the same one as in the picture and reversed the height so that it was 1, so it isn't set into the object, but projects out of it (red). Finally, I added a black mask and the paint tool (1) to paint the material onto the handle in the shape of a double helix. I would like to tidy up the edges of the leather if I have time, but for now this looks good enough.

Development process - Texturing: The master sword (The Legend of Zelda) pin - Part 6.17

To create the dark blue marble effect I added a layer, added a black mask and the generator Dirt 1, then used the paint tool (1) to paint the generator onto the blade. Next, I did the exact same thing again but changed the generator to more of a mist type one. Then turned down the tiling (on both), so that it didn't cover the whole blade. Finally, I turned the opacity down on both to 80, since it looked to dark compared to the rest of the blade. I don't think that I need to add anymore textures now since the blade looks almost exactly the same as the origonal, except the effect placement is slightly different. I'm really happy with how this turned out.

Development process: Pokémon GO Pokéstop pin - Part 7

For my pin based on Pokemon I was going to do Pikachu, since they are one of the most recognized mascots of all time, but for some reason I really struggled to draw their front, back and side profiles right, I'm not sure what did it, I think it is because I'm subconsciously trying to correct the anatomy, when it is supposed to be unrealistic, in the end I had had enough and the idea came to me to make a Pokestop instead. The pokestop was a good idea in my opinion, since it is pretty much already the perfectly shape for a pin and won't need me to edit it the design. The other reason is that Pokemon GO is probably one of the most played Pokemon games of all time because you don't have to go out and buy a console to play it and pretty much everyone had a smartphone, so this logo is easily recognizable. If the person playing my pinball machine has never played Pokemon they should recognize the shape of a pokeball since they are probably the second most recognizable thing about Pokemon other than Pikachu, the pokestop has the shape of a pokeball in the center of it's logo.

Development process -Modelling: Pokéstop (Pokémon GO) pin - Part 7.1

I started by making the stem of the pin with a radius of 1 cm and a height of 75 cm, this is the average size of the pins that I have been making so far, except the pin is thinner, I did this as a stylized choice since the base of the Pokéstop stem is thinner than what the pins are, it won’t impact it, so I don’t see an issue with it. I don’t need any more geometry for the shape other that the 12 sides, top and bottom polys, since I am going to have to make the rest of the pin from separate objects.

Development process -Modelling: Pokéstop (Pokémon GO) pin - Part 7.2

I had to make the platform (that the logo sits on) out of a separate object since it would be very hard to create a quadrilateral out of a cylinder, so I started by creating a cube, converting it to an editable poly and used the move (w) tool to move the object so that it was inline with the top of a pole. Originally I tried doing this with a plane but a plane only has one face so there was no way to attach the two. To combine the shapes I deleted the top face of the cylinder and used the attach tool to attach the two layers tighter and used poly select and the cut tool to cut the shape of the cylinder into the bottom of the quadrilateral. I then used vertex select and the tangent weld tool to fuse the vertices together and make the two objects one.

Development process -Modelling: Pokéstop (Pokémon GO) pin - Part 7.3

Next, I created the cylinder that will make the logo at the top of the pin. The cylinder had a radius of 15 cm and a width of 2 cm, this cylinder had 18 sides as it is a bigger object then the pin and closer to the players eyes it’s edges will be more noticeable so it needs to be more curved. Finally I used the move tool (w) to move the shape to the top of the pin, so that it was hovering like the ones in Pokémon GO.

Development process (3Ds MAX) - Modelling: Pokéstop (Pokémon GO) pin - Part 7.4

Next, I used poly selection and the inset tool X 9 at (1.0), (0.5), (0.5), (0.1), (2.0), (0.5), (1.0), (0.5) and (6.0), these created the rings that I needed to create for the logo. I then deleted all of the alternate ring faces, create gaps between the rings, giving them the illusion of the room to move.

Development process (3Ds MAX) - Modelling: Pokéstop (Pokémon GO) pin - Part 7.5

The next small step was to check the reference image I was using to model this and figure out what to delete to make these comma sort of shapes between the rings and create the Pokéball shape in the center. I used poly selection and delete to delete all of the excess polys around the comma like shapes, I used edge selection and moved the edges so that they were straight so the logo looked more like the actual Pokéball logo and then deleted these four faces using poly selection. Finally using the edge selection tool I selected all of the edges around the rings and used the bridge tool to make them 3D shapes instead of just two 2D shapes back to back.

Development process (3Ds MAX) - Modelling: Pokéstop (Pokémon GO) pin - Part 7.6

Finally, I used poly selection and the rotate tool (e) to select all alternating rings and the bottom of the Pokéball and rotated it by about 15 degrees. Then attached the logo to the main body of the pin.

Development process (3Ds MAX) - Unwrapping: Pokéstop (Pokémon GO) pin - Part 7.7

The final thing I had to do was unwrap this pin, although it is one colour I thought that I should still do it well incase I wanted to change the colours and more stuff to it if I wanted to. To unwrap I needed to select the Unwrap UVW modifier, opened the UV Editor, selected the whole shape and applied the checkered pattern. The checker pattern shows me how a texture will look on the shape, the checkers on it should always be square otherwise the texture won’t look right on it. I used poly selection to select the shapes that I wanted to break apart from the rest of the shape and unwrap separately (I can’t unwrap the whole shape in one go it needs to be broken up into a few different nets) I did this by using the break and the flatten by polygon angle tools. When breaking apart the shape I moved the bits that I hadn’t unwrapped to the bottom half of the window and the ones that I had finished to the top part of the window. Once I had broken all of the section apart how I wanted them I used the pack normalise (moves everything into the checkered window and resizes them to scale, without letting anything touch) tool to get all of the unwrapped nets into the center of the window on the checker board, anything not on it will not show up in Substance painter.

Development process (Unity) - Adding a material: Pokéstop (Pokémon GO) pin - Part 7.8

Development process: The pinball table - Part 8

Development process - Texturing: Pinball table - Part 8.1

As previously mentioned the cabinet was pre-modelled for me, so I had to go to the student portal and import the file onto my drive and then into Substance Painter. I imported it by opening Substance Painter, file, new, PBR Metalic Alpha Roughness (Starter Set), file - Pinball cabinet, Ok. Once, the file was in Substance Painter I selected a metal smart material that had uite a bit of wear and tear on it. The ball bouncing around in a pinball table can get quite violent, so there is going to be quite a bit of wear and tear on it, but not only this pinball machines are retro game, so this also adds age to the machine. I changed the base colour to black, because of the amount of different colours in my Unity scene I needed a neutral colour that would work with every other colour not clash with them. The cabinets colour will tie all of the others together. I don't need to put loads of graphics on the side of the cabinet because the main focus is the tings on the table so why would i texture the side of a cabinet you are never going to see.

Development process - Texturing: Pinball table - Part 8.2

To create a base for the scoreboard in unity, I used a smart material called worn plastic, I added a black mask and used the paint tool (1) to paint a white box on the cabinet. I had to change the base colour to white, so that it stood out against the black colour of the cabinet and reversed the height so that it was 1 and came out of the cabinet instead of in it. A scoreboard on a real pinball machine would be attached on the outside of the machine because it is attached later and they aren't created one object.

Pinball Wizard - Final outcomes: Renders

Pinball Wizard - Final outcomes: Render 1

I used a close up side perspective for this snip because it shows off all of the key feature of my table, and it is a good way to get a close up of the pins.

Write about coded launcher

unity materials

Pinball Wizard - Final outcomes: Render 2

Pinball Wizard - Final outcomes: Coding PDF

Pinball Wizard - Final outcomes: Coding PDF - Flippers