Insert Title Here – A scalable and recyclable OELVN (aka VN)

OHIO GO SAY MUST everyone… it is me UNCLE MUGEN… it’s been a while…

Allow me to introduce to you what Uncle Mugen has been cooking lately… Today, I present you the OELVN “INSERT TITLE HERE”… yes… I’m not kidding… that is the name of the OELVN (aka EVN or English Visual Novel)

Yes, that is the name of the game… not even joking…

It can trace its beginnings to the original Project Gakuen whose goal is to produce a recyclable and scalable generic school themed OELVN where you can insert any story you wanted but on a more grander scale (click here to learn more) … Fast forward a few months later… after doing a really thorough feasibility study… I found out that it was next to impossible to finish it in any reasonable amount of time with only me doing everything so I have scaled down the project from a large multi acre International School into a generic 300,000 sqm High School OELVN titled  “INSERT TITLE HERE”.

So what makes a good BG Scenery good looking… Loaded Electrical Distribution Poles?

OK so I have made a previous thread a while ago tackling this elusive subject of what makes a background scenery look pleasant in the eye?… While having a good artist to draw them is obviously a factor… we are not here to draw backgrounds… we don’t want to draw backgrounds because not anyone can draw backgrounds and even if someone can draw awesome backgrounds… chances are he/she will not be as enthusiastic about it compared to drawing sprites and that’s where Sketchup comes in (oh boy here I go again singing Sketchup praises and so forth… please bear with me for a bit)…

…

Old Kitchen BG for Sepia Tears

So let’s see… I got a chance to skim back to the previous BG’s I’ve made before I’ve used those renderers and Jeepers!… they actually look uh… horrible…

New and Improved Kitchen BG for Sepia Tears

I now feel bad for making them… I shall now do corrective measures and remake them starting with this kitchen…

Finally! An updated tutorial on how to create beautiful background graphics for use in Visual Novels or OELVN using Google Sketchup and Photoshop

Finally! An updated tutorial on how to create beautiful background graphics for use in Visual Novels or OELVN using Sketchup and Photoshop! Perfect for people like me who are untalented in drawing backgrounds. I finally managed to streamline the process enough to create a tutorial so I can share my technique. With this, it is now one step closer to that quick, cheap and beautiful background graphics that are inaccessible for us mere mortals…

Or you can view the video tutorial [HERE] in fullscreen. I recommend viewing it in 720p for maximum clarity.

With this now all of our backgrounds will look the same… Lol!

Note:

• This tutorial is perfect for outdoor shots but not applicable for inside shots especially rooms with limited light. I’ll do a tutorial on that soon…
• While I used SU Podium Renderer on this tutorial… it is expensive and can be replaced by any other renderer ( there are several freeware renderers available) as long as it has the option to render in clay mode (textureless). One good example is Kerkythea [ www.kerkythea.net/joomla/ ] and IDX Renditioner Free Edition [ www.imsidesign.com/Products/Renditioner/RenditionerExpressv2/tabid/1904/Default.aspx ]
• Sketchup is a 32 bit application (Seriously why?) so even if you have monster memory you’ll still hit the ceiling sooner or later so be careful and not to put too much load on the scene.

Thanks to Sake-Chan (Sake Bento) for lending her beautiful voice and little_misere for the Lucy sprite…

“POOF” (Disappears)