Technical Talk & Time Constraints

For my Carousal I wasn't sure weather to continue the Carousal as if it was normal/ still in good condition or to make it more like the abandoned fairs from my post 'Abandoned Circuses and Fairgrounds'. We agreed that to have it more dilapidated would be more interesting and tie in better with my overall theme of memories. We went on to talk about the Technical side of things, and how that the varnished wooden floor of the Carousal would have been worn down over time though use, and would have most shine wear feet could not go e.g. under the horses. Also wear the varnish wears the wood will have become more susceptible to outside conditions such as moss and rot, perhaps even warping in places due to damp. The varying of the varnish could be shown with specularity/ gloss map, and the deterioration through lack of and use of textures. The lighting from the carousal will still be on despite it's dilapidation as they are the main sources of the atmosphere I am trying to create, although many will be broken or off to support the suggestion of its abandonment.

Given time constraints I may be unable to model four complete different horses all with different textures. With this in mind, I discussed with Nigel what to do and settled on doing multiple textures for the single model I already have, I plan on making these textures to give a more worn down look than to what I previously had. I would have preferably had signs of deterioration within the sculpt (normals) to accompany the textures and make them stronger however I think I may have left that to late. I plan on making at least four sets of textures, one for each coloured horse. The horses will then be arranged in a formation within the carousal where the outer circle has the most and the smallest the least (e.g. 10, 7, 4), there will be only three layers. This will hopefully give the illusion of density, so the viewer perceives more than there are.

Viewpoint
I decided with Nigel partly as it was originally intended to be from a child's viewpoint and because it makes the carousal horse more imposing to have the viewpoint from a lower angle. This would allows us only to see the inner part of the carousal so the horses, ceiling, floor and steps. This gives me less to worry about modelling wise allowing me to concentrate on getting all the texturing and lighting right.