Major Project Choice

After undertaking the actions I said I would make previously for the “3D model and render of an old sailing ship” from the mood board idea I have decided to used that as my major project and have decided to formally name this project as “The Water Mirror”. The reason for my choice in this name is because I wanted it to hint the background story behind it with water due to the setting and reason for the ship. Whilst mirror reflects the protagonist sleeping through space and time like a gateway to another world like “Alice through the looking glass”.

Background Story

The protagonist of the story will be traveling on a holiday cruise ship with his/her family near the Bermuda Triangle when an unusual storm causes the protagonist to be knocked unconscious overboard into the ocean. The protagonist will then be rescued by a passing vessel where upon boarding the ship realizes that the ship and crew of the vessel mysteriously vanished into the Bermuda Triangle centuries ago. The protagonist will then have to explore the mysteries of the Bermuda Triangle with his/her new comrades in order to escape the dimension rift he/she is trapped in to return to his/her own world.

Idea

The idea for the project is to create a 3D model of a ship to be used as a ghost ship. This will include a 3D ship model and its environment. I will first model a ship based on plans from an already existing naval sailing ship the USS Constitution, texture it and then import it into UDK where I will create an environment for it which will feature moving water, mist, night sky and some moody lighting such ghostly, creepy and mysterious. Additionally in UDK I will paint extra details onto the ship to create a realistic aging effect over the already texture model such as tears on sails, moss, seaweed, rust, cracks and much more before creating collision mesh where I will the damage parts and areas of the ship to make it look like a shipwrecked ship.

Before Starting

In order to save time on the project and allow me to start working on the ship model immediately I will use plans from an existing sail ship as I mentioned before the USS Constitution. Therefore in the future posts I make on this blog I will use plans from a book called “Anatomy of the ship – The 44-gun frigate USS Constitution” by Karl Heinz Marquardt frequently as guides for my project.

Also the key focus of the project will be the 3D model therefore it will take priority over everything else so based on time other things in the project will be put aside or omitted in the future in favor of creating a realistic 3D model of the USS Constitution.

Also the model will primarily be modeled on one side where upon completion mirrored onto the other side to complete the model on both sides. This will both save time and ensure the details on both side of the ship remain consistent whilst also prevent the file to become to big whilst working early on the project.