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Author: s2415447

Submission1

Background
Death is unknown to people, and people are usually afraid of the unknown. In the eyes of most people, there is nothing when a person dies, but in this project we will interpret death from another angle. The Bible mentions ashes to ashes, and dust to dust. This sentence gives people hope to restored to eternal life. From a biological point of view to understand life loop, A series of biochemical events occur after death, the end result is a kind of “biological reincarnation” into millions of bacteria, insects, plants, and other living organisms. It is a kind of “rebirth”.Death is not really disappearance, death may be a new beginning.
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concept
The idea of ​​this project is to make the player one of the flowers. Participants experience the whole growth process from the perspective of flowers. We will enhance the audience’s immersive experience through changes in perspective, surrounding scenes and sounds. After flower’s life is over, we switch the perspective to a human through an animation, and then start the experience from the perspective of a human. Finally, when a person’s life comes to an end, and the player can only see darkness, the player will find that he has returned to the original beginning – a flower seed. It’s a life cycle.
Brainstorm
In the first meeting, we presented everyone’s ideas based on the theme of presence.
Final idea：
We combine two ideas (plant and death). I add the person’s perspective after the flower, and I put an animation to make the perspective change more smoothly. People pick the flowers to bring to the funeral. The vibrant flower actually died when it was plucked, but when it was put into the coffin, the perspective changed to that of the person lying in the coffin, experiencing a person’s life from the perspective of a person. When life comes to an end, when death is ushered in, and there is darkness in front of my eyes, I hear the sound of rain again, and then I find myself as a flower seed in the soil.
Storyboard

We made a storyboard of the entire project to make it easier to understand the entire game process.

more ideas…

Inspirations

Key words: Romantic, Colorful,Abstract, Emotional experience

Visual inspiration:
We are currently working on the first scene, the plant world, to experience the world as a flower. Here are some plant/floral inspirations we found.

more details….

Demo
This is a demo about project style.(xinyue Lin)
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SOUND DESIGN

The sound design in games： In terms of sound design we first looked at some VR game examples.

more details…

Visual Style and Sound Design: Part 1 – Philosophy (from s1850658)

I want to use an abstract soundscape that represents the visuals indirectly. For a realistic style, I use an immersive soundscape that approximates real-world sounds as closely as possible.

more details…

Visual Style and Sound Design: Part 2 – Approach (from s1850658)

When making the two examples, I decided to focus on two main aspects of each; the sound of the breeze, and a sound that indicates that the plant has grown.

more details…

Realistic sounds

I use the process of wind and plant growing sounds for a realistic example.

more details…

Some sound effects

Here are some sound resources we found

more effects…

Interactive Design (from s2165187)

here are the interactive parts

More details…..

Flower perspective animation design and render for demonstration (from Amber Zhang)

Here is the link for specific:

Flower perspective for final group project

Unity Scene(from s2412964)

Here are the scenes in Unity

Unity3D

 

Reflection and Future Plans

In the preparatory work, some problems were exposed in teamwork, such as low communication efficiency and delay in completing tasks. We found that offline meetings are more efficient, and we will use more offline meetings in the future to hold meetings with a purpose. Each meeting needs to provide everyone with practical thoughts and ideas, otherwise it will be a waste of time to talk ineffective. Secondly, it is necessary to formulate a timetable and a division of labor table to implement everyone’s work, complete it according to the plan, and increase the participation of everyone. Because we have a large group of people, we care too much about everyone’s ideas when discussing the direction, disagreement, stalemate, and low efficiency. Therefore, we will use the voting system more to advance tasks in the future.

Future plans for the project. First, we will set up narrative design to perfect the story. How to set the second project to be more representative of a person’s life, and what kind of items will be selected are issues we will discuss later, including how to design the jumps of these three scenes to make them switch naturally. Let the player not feel too abrupt and achieve a more experiential “presence” effect. Secondly, we will make an appointment for a VR workshop to help us learn VR equipment, how to connect VR to the helmet and handle, and realize the interactive effect on HTC and computer. We also need to build VR game equipment and choose a venue.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All ideas in disscussion

First meeting
Idea1: death
Key words: parallel world, memories, virtual friends and relatives
The brainstorming for this project is to meet friends or relatives who might have passed away but could be seen in the virtual space. The method displays this project that is main character opens windows or doors or rooms to encounter different space about their memories. Each door or window or room represent different pieces of memories and scenes. We also discussed using sound effects or abstract objects such as particle shapes to express the memories of scene and animation. And these ideas are not finalised.
Idea2: becoming plants
Key words: different viewing angles, experiences enhancement
The idea for this project is spectator to become to one of the natural plants such as tree, flower. Rather than exploring and experiencing from humans’ perspective, participator will see from the nature perspective to live and sense. For instance, spectators as the plant might could see wind, rain, sunlight, bees come for collecting honey. Birds flyover. Insects climb around to seek out foods. Besides, spectators also enable to explore the growth stages and life span such as the leaves lengthen. We consider the sound effects in this project as well, such as the birds’ flying sound will reduce after the birds flyaway the plant.
Idea3:online shopping exhibition
Idear4: VR game

 

Realistic sounds

The wind sounds heard in the realistic example are a combination of sounds I’d previously recorded myself. The main sound heard is a field recording of the coastline around BerwickUpon-Tweed on a windy day that I recorded last year. The low-frequency part of the wind sound was made using a close up recording of an air vent outside my hotel on the same trip. The final element that makes up the sound is a contact mic recording of my shower that I recorded in my old flat, and is one of about a dozen recordings I did over the course of a few days. All were EQ’d and had their volumes adjusted until I was happy with the result.

For the sounds of the plant growing, I used a combination of sounds from Audio Crafting; two of mine and four made by others on the module. On top of this, I recorded me crushing a paper bag and crushing a box of pills. These were EQ’d, blended together and placed until I had something I was happy with.

 

 

Visual Style and Sound Design: Part 1 – Philosophy (s1850658)

Visual Style and Sound Design: Part 1 – Philosophy (s1850658)

At the time of writing, there is still a decision to be made on what the visual style of the project will be. When discussing this in the previous meeting (Thursday 2nd February), it got me thinking. Different visual styles would necessitate very different things in terms of the soundscape and sound effects.

The main two styles that came up in this meeting were LowPoly and something more realistic. Upon hearing this, it made me want to create some prototypes/mock-ups of what the world could sound when presented visually in these two styles. When considering what to specifically try and represent to get my ideas across, I settled on the flower: the soundscape surrounding it and the sound effects that accompany its growth. This setting would require sound design that is quite atmospheric, by virtue of the fact that the player is unable to move.

To represent the Low-Poly style, I felt as though the soundscape shouldn’t be a realistic representation of what these things would sound like in the real world. Instead, the soundscape and sound effects should aim to represent the visuals in a more indirect manner. I felt as though the soundscape should be an underlying drone, like a pleasant chord. The wind could be represented by some high notes, synthesized or otherwise (or perhaps even created using white noise), that fill the highs (that the sound of a realistic breeze would usually occupy). These sounds could whoosh in and out in response to the flower and its surroundings moving with the wind. This opened the possibility to have the stages of plant growth be represented by fluttering notes playing an arpeggio that fits with the chord of the underlying drone that accompanies the scene. I believe that the use of a low-poly visual style requires sound design that aims not to faithfully re-create sounds from the real world, but instead create something that represents the visuals in a more abstract manner.

When working with a more realistic visual style however, I felt as though an almost opposite approach was appropriate. The soundscape of the scene should reflect what a person would hear if they were standing in the scene as if it were a real place. Every sound in the scene would need to approximate its real-world counterpart. I say “approximate” because for example, plants don’t make any sound (audibly at least) when growing. Any sound effects for the plant growing would instead have to be a semi-realistic representation of what we would expect it to sound like if it did exist. When choosing a realistic style instead of low poly, many aspects of what we are trying to get across through the experience change. When working in low poly, I feel as though the aim is not necessarily to fully immerse the player in a realistic world, whereas in a more realistic visual style I feel as though the aim is to try and fully immerse the player in a believable reality close to our own. Low poly allows for more flexibility when it comes to representing what’s on screen. A realistic visual style however, demands much greater attention to detail in order to create a convincing world. Realistic requires emulation of the real world; low poly allows for the creation of a new one.

A question this discussion raises is “once a visual style is chosen, what happens to the audio work for the other”. I would argue that there could perhaps be a mix of these two sound design philosophies in the finished product. This could be because the visual style ends up being some blend of the two (such as a cel-shaded style), or perhaps more abstract sounds could be used to represent things that don’t have a real-world equivalent, even if the visual style is aiming to be more realistic.

Audio Player

 

lowpoly

 

 

FLOWER Video

The first one called FLOWER. Each petal flies with a mission, they control the wind and wake up each unawakened bud. Then they pick up the petal pups sent by the waking flower and together they make the next journey. Each petal is a musical note and their chord can be heard.

The second one called FUJII.

This is a game that mixes outdoor adventure with creative gardening. Here players will explore three unique and magical biomes. Unlock new paths, collect seeds of novel plants, pots, magic stones and more to run your own magical garden. Based on VR technology and beautifully drawn settings, this game creates a fantastical mystery beyond reality. Players will experience a meditation-like immersive spiritual world from this musical garden adventure.

Highlights.

The game has no hard story line or strong sense of purpose and is generally very flexible.

The player’s hands can be elongated and can also suck and spray water The player will get realistic vibration feedback from the handle when touching the flowers and plants and crisp music will come to their ears.

The music is everywhere in this enchanted garden, a very immersive experience combining visual, auditory and VR-based human-computer interaction, FUJII manages to take the player out of the world, allowing them to relax and enjoy a sense of peace in this virtual reality and harmony.

IMG_4725 IMG_4726

 

 

 

 

Update last part

We have some update about the last part: Here are three funeral objects that mark the three stages of person, When the palyer click one object, the player can enter the room. These room about three stage of person.
Ideas about last part
From Amber Zhang
My brainstorming suggestions for the three stages of life span: my brainstorming idea would base on the group discussion result yesterday(Wednesday): the group project would only focus on one of the life span about the young age to explore, and pick up objects only for rest of ages(infant and old) , I think for the young age could represent via one scenario: the main character could display in lecture space: the scene exploration design could be: the sunlight could be warm outside and flash light shining from window, the leaves could drop from the tree, it could be the Autumn season. The main character would start the view from setting on the chair and books and notes on the table (the view angle displays the book pages on table). The main character enables to stand up and walk around the lecture room. There could be notes on whiteboard, but no other people would be in the lectures. The lecture might be a biology class; the whiteboard could display sketches drawing of flowers with key points and learning knowledge, and one reminder on whiteboard could display: a test on Thursday. The main character enables to walk towards whiteboard to check the contents of knowledge on whiteboard and explore the entire lecture room. The lecture room could be big with basic devices: computer, projector, big window, desks and chairs, whiteboard. The background voice: the main character could hear other people’s talking from outside of lecture room, the ring bell sound, the background noise sound.When the time duration approaches to time limits (for instance: 3 mins), the scene transection trigger would display. And the voice might appear as well to tell main character the guidance to move to next scene.
From Qiandai Sun
I think the classroom scene that Amber mentioned is pretty good, I was thinking about the transition, it could be like this, the bell rings, and then the broadcast says, “all of the students should sit in your seat and prepare to start the exam”, maybe add some inner monologues of the characters will be much better, for example, the inner monologue says”The alarm is ringing, it seems that the exam is about to start again, I should go back to my seat” to guide the player to the next step. When the player sits on the seat and looks down at the test paper, his inner monologue will say: “This question looks very familiar, but I can’t remember how to solve it.” Then he falls into a coma and time travels to middle age (next scene).
From Runyao Li
I was thinking about the scene of the baby stage. I think the perspective at this stage can be lying in a stroller. Your movement will be limited and you can only see things around you like the wind chimes above your head or the teddy bear around you. To move to another scene, I think we can use the sound of wind chimes and the character will see a cloud of white lights, then it can move to the next stage. For the young age stage, I also like the idea of exploring in the classroom. I am now trying to make some sound effects like the seed growing from the soil and some scenes ambience sound.
From Kunkun Wang
I think everyone’s proposal is very good. In the middle age stage, we can use the scenes of classrooms, work and some entertainment venues to match the sound of the corresponding venues. In these places, what we need to consider is whether to restore the authenticity of the scene or create a new sound to be used in this scene, so that players can have an innovative experience when exploring.In the old age stage, we can set up different scenes in China and the West. For example, we can set up square dances based on Chinese scenes. Then the west can set up some small pubs, because I can always see many old people here drinking beer and chatting in the pubs. There are some commonalities, such as crutches, children and grandchildren around their knees, accompanied by their children, and they often shuttle in the kitchen to make delicious food to enjoy their old age. Then you can set up a scene full of testing instruments around the hospital, implying that life is dying.
From Xinyue Lin
I think that if every scene is explored, the volume of the whole project will be too large, and I think that at the stage of children and the elderly, just changing the surrounding scenes can make the players feel present. Child stage: I think Runyao’s idea is very good, but I think we can have a smoother scene transition. For example, when a child is in a crib, his parents come in and turn off the light, the sound of turning off the light appears, and the perspective switches to adult view when the light is turned on again. Adult stage: The moment the light is turned on, this person is working in front of the computer, and the moment he turns off the computer behind him, the player’s perspective switches to the old man. Elderly stage: The moment you switch from adulthood to old age, you see the ceiling, the infusion tube, and then gradually fall into a coma and enter the darkness. Eventually back to the stage of a seed.

 

 

 

inspiration board

Hi guys! This is an inspiration board about the scene, If you find good examples, plz put pictures on this board! Thank you sooooo much!

Xinyue Lin:

Qiandai Sun:

The classroom could be like this but change into the first perspective.(From game Life Is Strange: Episode1)

classroom

We can use diary to help the player to remind those memories, like this:

 

Amber Zhang:

The design inspiration for the plants part:

inspiration1

inspiration2:

Inspiration3:

The design inspiration for the classroom part:

 

inspirations references:

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/g8m3Gx

https://www.peakpx.com/en/hd-wallpaper-desktop-guomx

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/OBmGb

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/yk0dm5

Jiayao Wang

 

The soundscape in the background

Low Poly and Sounds

The wind sounds heard in the low-poly example were created in a Max MSP patch, using a series of noise~ objects going through resonant bandpass filters. Over time, the cutoff frequency of each noise oscillator’s filter would gradually shift, along with the resonance, and the volume. The stereo split between left and right for each would also shift over time. I let the patch run and recorded around two minutes of it, then picked a section that I liked and used that in the example.

The soundscape in the background was made using a combination of a Serum patch and a free box violin VST for kontakt. The Serum patch arpeggiated maj7 chords, while the box violin sustained the notes. Both were fed into Michael Norris’ spectral averaging plugin, with a little reverb added as well.

For the ascending sound that indicates that the plant has grown, I again used a Kontakt instrument – this time a music box. I filtered out some of the highs, added some tape warble using SketchCassette and then some reverb.

 

 

 

 

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