Scrolling room problem

Started by Yitcomics, Thu 08/09/2016 21:17:14

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Yitcomics

Currently i'm drawing a background that scroll in one-point perspective and that can cause some distortion problem.The common fix to this is have more than one vanishing point.Since the screen wont show the whole room,I could show a vanishing point,hide perspective and show the other one.


My problem right now is that I need to draw the room like this


Since I will need to show the chairs perspective,I cant do a transition to the next vanishing point.So is there a trick/way to fix this?
I know that I can just change my camera angle or maybe instead of scrolling I can just separate it into two backgrounds like this:


But I want to know,is there a fix to this problem if I want it at that angle and a scrolling room.

Snarky

You'll have to fake it. Choose a different vanishing point for the chairs, probably around the center of the room. Maybe make it so that the perspective lines of the first/last ones are roughly parallel with the wall, that way you might trick the eye into accepting it as a parallel projection.

There's no absolute correct way to do it since the perspective is broken in the first place. It's all about essentially creating an optical illusion.

Mandle

Another way, but far too much trouble probably, would be to animate the chairs to adapt to the new vanishing point as the player scrolls along the room...It could be a very nice effect, but also a pain in the butt to make it work...

Danvzare

Another idea, is that you could have them as two separate rooms, and play a cutscene (movie) when you go from one room to another, showing it scrolling.
Personally though, I think Mandle's idea is the best.

Babar

Simply have a vanishing line (the horizon, essentially) instead of 2 discrete points. Stuff in the middle would be relative to that.
It might look slightly odd if you are in one extreme corner, but as long as it looks correct (even if it isn't perspectively correct), people don't notice.
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Yitcomics

#5
So do you guys think this works?




If you're wondering whats at the back of the far end seat,its a popcorn machine.Its for a puzzle :P

Kumpel

The room itself looks accurate perspective-wise. You ignored it at the machine and the rows of seats though. But I am pretty sure these are just placeholders ;)
Also I noticed, the length of the seats and there position give the impression they are placed on the right side of the screen. So in this perspective there definitely have to be the left side visible as foreground art.

Yitcomics

Quote from: Kumpel on Sun 11/09/2016 22:05:59
The room itself looks accurate perspective-wise. You ignored it at the machine and the rows of seats though. But I am pretty sure these are just placeholders ;)

Actually I was trying to see if I could make it work by making the chairs lines almost parallel to stop the perspective and continue it at the end of the seats.The machine actually is following the perspective on the right wall.I tried to do what Snarky suggest,but I just couldn't make it work.

Snarky

#8
Quote from: Yitcomics on Sun 11/09/2016 20:00:12
So do you guys think this works?

Not really. The perspective on the seats seems to diverge rather than converge â€" I think it would look better if you simply reversed their order.

Quote from: Kumpel on Sun 11/09/2016 22:05:59
The room itself looks accurate perspective-wise.

Well, it's not "accurate" since two presumedly parallel walls have entirely different vanishing points, but it looks acceptable.

I tend to think the obsession with constructing everything in strict perspective is hard to reconcile with the decision to not use a consistent vanishing point, but that's just me.

Quote from: Yitcomics on Mon 12/09/2016 00:38:44
I tried to do what Snarky suggest,but I just couldn't make it work.

Maybe I didn't explain it clearly. I'll try with a figure:



Now this is also not consistent (as you get closer to the horizon line, it becomes more and more obvious that the convergence point is not on the horizon), but it might work better as a fake. Or not. Here's another alternative:


selmiak

you could also lengthen the room so the walls are farther apart and no way seen at the same time when it would destroy the illusion and fake some parallaxing and change in point of view with some more moving layers on the chairs (some kind of z-coordinate) and some 2-3 wall variations. But it's probably easier to play around with different vanishing points and separating the elements with different VPs far enough to make the illusion work and still make it seem like not separated but in one perpective flow.

Danvzare

Or you could go the completely lazy route, and ignore perspective altogether.
As long as it looks somewhat alright, then people like me won't notice it looking wrong.

Mandle

Quote from: Danvzare on Mon 12/09/2016 10:40:42
Or you could go the completely lazy route, and ignore perspective altogether.
As long as it looks somewhat alright, then people like me won't notice it looking wrong.

This is a very good point actually:

Some of the best AGS games I have played have totally out-of-whack perspective:

Ben There Dan That being an example that pops to mind... Nanobots being another (drawing the scrolling desktop surface for that tiny scale: proper perspective is impossible!)

But it did not matter in the end as the games were AWESOME!!!

Maybe don't get too hooked up on one aspect of one screen as the passion to work on a project can fade faster than you expect it to...Getting the game done is more important than achieving total technical perfection...

Of course: a learning experience is also valuable....DAMN! So many things to balance out! This is why MAGS is awesome as, at some point, you have to force yourself to say "AH, SCREW IT!!!" and just release the freakin' thing...

Kumpel

Hm. Actually I don't understand, why you didn't consider or neglected the one point perspective for this room

Here is what I came up with in a hasty paint job:



What is it you don't like about this way? Or did you even consider this?

Yitcomics

#13
Quote from: Kumpel on Mon 12/09/2016 20:31:23
What is it you don't like about this way? Or did you even consider this?

Yes,its just that i'm trying to avoid making the horizon line that high.Truth be told as I said in the beginning,I know that I can just move my camera but this is mostly just for learning experience.I wanted to see if I can pull off perspective tricks to make it look believable.

WHAM

#14
My own two cents.

While working on my games that have scrolling rooms, I quickly decided that there was no way to get the perspective looking satisfactory in my taste. My solution was two distinct vanishing points, with everything outside said vanishing points obeying perspective, while everything in between was displayed as directly head-on. In my case I found that this helped keep workload to a minimum, as in the case of massive rooms it allows for simple copy/paste rather than having to draw each individual object to a strict perspective. The player gets to see the sides with the perspective and can quite easily mentally fill in the missing bits that are hidden by the wonky perspective.


Vanishing points used in this quick mock-up circled in pink.

When looking at the image like this, the error in perspective is quite noticeable, but when you consider that the player only sees a segment of the room at a time (this room mock-up was for a 320x200 game and the background is 640x200) the error becomes far less pronounced.

This approach works best when the vanishing point is very close to the ceiling or right on it. My personal preference is to keep them precisely at the ceiling level so that I don't have to draw a ceiling, but that's just me being lazy. :)

-W

EDIT: looking back at my work, I seem to have done some very minor tricks so that things to the right of the center line are draws just a tiny bit slanted towards the center, and opposite for the left side. You can sort of see the effect in this old image I did way back when:


Notice how the billiards table does not seem to have any perspective. The booze cabinet also falls between the vanishing points, but has been given just a single pixel's worth of slant to add in on the illusion. Majority of the floorboards are also faked in this regard, having fallen between the two vanishing points.
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Yitcomics

I tried to improve using the same technique as my previous image,only this time I cheat by curving top of the seats a bit.This helps the
seats to look converging and show the sides too.


Also I want you guys to know that I appreciate all of the tips and advice given.Thanks :)

Kumpel

Okay, wow! Now you got me! This looks amazing. And as Danvzare said, suddenly I don't care about the perspective flaws anymore at all!
And that is mostly because of this carpet! It's crazy cool like a picasso painting! Maybe the stage like area on the left needs more shadow though to seperate it better from the floor.

Yitcomics

#17
My last update on the background,its not finished yet but I'm moving on to the next background.If you guys have any last criticism or tips and advice,that would be helpful.8-)

selmiak

This looks cool. Maybe add some more texture to the red box on the right end.

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