Scarab-Based Character and World

The attached as is isn’t going to win any contests, but might give some of the people interested in models and gaming a few project ideas that avoid having to create your own 3D meshes. You can instead practice moving your character using OOP type commands – Alice is much easier to learn than even Action Script for Flash animation (although the latter is actually more rigorously object oriented). The scripting languages for the major 3D graphics tools are even more complex.

The original idea came I was looking at some on-line 3D-model art (http://www.angelfire.com/wa2/xia/indexthumb.html ) and came across the first image. It reminded me of the scarab model in Alice – and the rest are very quick texture and shape modes to the scarab to turn it into a bit more of a fantasy caracter. (To get the original texture to work with, I unzipped the original .a2c file with 7-zip.)

Note particularly the effect of using transparent alpha-layer texture regions. This gives a more fantasy effect – with a bit more effort one could give the scarab the mean looking mouth of the original.

[madden]

Good Job!
Hey DrJim, I was wondering if I could use this model in one of my games?

P.s huh? I can't think of anything right now...

Originally Posted by madden

Hey DrJim, I was wondering if I could use this model in one of my games?

Feel free to use this and anything else I post. In this particular case, you can have a lot of fun making different areas of the texture transparent.

[ottosparks]

Shouldn't this be in the "Share Models" catagory??????? Just asking...

Originally Posted by ottosparks

Shouldn't this be in the "Share Models" catagory??????? Just asking...

Interesting question. I put it in the world category because:

(1) It used an existing mesh from the gallery.
(2) While the mesh was retextured, that was done from within Alice.
(3) Many of the model "features" were obtained by adjusting the " seldom used properties" from within Alice.
(4) The "eye" was added to the model using a simple Alice shape and making the bug it's vehicle - again an Alice-level task.

Still, it is a new model, so ---?? I think the real point is that you don't have to go through a full (and usually challenging) model development process in Anim8or, Blender, 3D Max etc. to get a really new looking object for your world.