Gloom Bloom
Lots of things have changed this year. Changing jobs, moving across the midwest back home, transitioning to my first place to call my own. I don’t want to give some sappy post-mortem on my time spent at Neo-Pangea, but I think it’d be disrespectful to not mention my Reading family when they were all I really had for the past two and a half years. I had a blast in PA, worked on just about the coolest projects I could ever fathom being a part of (one of which recently earned a Webby Award for the animation!!), and in addition, I met amazing, respectable people that helped me grow into the artist I am today. They’re pretty sweet folks, and I still communicate with them today. I chose to leave Neo-Pangea in order to start a new chapter in my life. Being away from Cincinnati for nearly 8 years straight just made me appreciate everyone from back home that much more. By golly, it’s been an adventure. A thrilling one at that. I’ll miss you, PA~
With this transition it has also brought a lot of sweet going-ons that aren’t typically reported on here. Mourou as a team is still together, and we’re making a lot of headway on our horror RPG epic, Shaded Chasm. There isn’t a whole lot we can show right now, but I wanted to make this post to draw attention to the other locations that you can find us on the interwebs. Consider this somewhat of a shameless plug. We are trying to gain support for the game on Patreon. Basically it’s just a monthly donation that will award spectator access to our development as it happens. We don’t have any patrons yet, but hopefully that will change. Any money donated will go towards keeping us accountable on our development and show us that there’s an interest for this project! You can find our Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/mourou
Lastly, if you want to stay up to date with the day-by-day life that I broadcast on twitter, feel free to follow. It is mostly artwork, Shaded Chasm plugs, and casual conversation with the folks I enjoy communicating with. There’s no shortage of indie game development talk, anime references, and butchered Japanese (I’m studying every day!). To follow, simply click any of these images to follow their respective links. That’s all for now!
Doomsday Castle Defender
It feels like ages since I worked on this game, but alas, I’m finally making a post about it! Really cool seeing the commercials on TV about the game, gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling inside. Neo-Pangea was in charge of creating this video game for the new Doomsday Castle show on National Geographic. While other team members took care of the programming, UI, music, and more, I was able to have a large role creating all of the in-game animations, matte painting, and isometric sprites. Very fun. The game is an isometric tower defense game where you build your own castle, defend against the hordes of the apocalypse while getting the Doomsday Castle family members to work together the best they can! The more bandits you defeat, the more weapons you unlock.
Give it a whirl here! Even Machinima had a good time playing it:
Ultimate Survivor Alaska’s Interactive Maps
Recently, I had the tremendous opportunity at Neo-Pangea to refresh my hands at 3D sculpting and pseudo-realistic illustration. My poison of choice? Mudbox and Photoshop. I sculpted Alaska’s terrain for a new series on the National Geographic Channel – Ultimate Survivor Alaska. There are eleven maps in total and they live on their interactive website located here: http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/channel/ultimate-survival-alaska/interactives/interactive-map/
They upload a new map each week when a new episode airs (Sunday night) so stay tuned to see them all!
HTML5 Animation in Edge Animate
Hey all! Been working really hard this past month and boy do I have something to finally show! (cue the “woops” from the crowd) Working at Neo-Pangea has opened up the opportunity to get my hands on some HTML5 animation. The entire concept of animating with code is all pretty foreign, yet slowly, and surely, winning me over. Because of Adobe Edge Animate’s familiar interface (looks/feels pretty similar to After Effects), I was able to do some HTML5 animation for a pretty darn cool interactive for Statoil / National Geographic Maps. Knowing that there are some limitations to what this still primitive program can do, I made sure to design the illustrations as simple as possible while still getting the point across. Click the image to check out the final result:
SXSW Finalist: Intern Abuser
So, if you haven’t been up in the news with Neo-Pangea via their Facebook or Twitter, INTERN ABUSER is a finalist for South x Southwest! SXSW will be held later this year in Austin and until then there is time for you to vote for Intern Abuser as SXSW’s People’s Choice. Please head on over to here: http://sxsw.com/interactive/news/sxsw-interactive-awards-peoples-choice-voting-now-open The more votes the merrier! It’s pretty crazy that this project is going up against big namers like Contre Jour. If you do not know what the Intern Abuser was because you missed it, check out the video below. It’s a wrap-up video that I worked on showcasing what the event was about and just what all went down on those two crazy days.
もうろう 