Play Nice Short Go Kart - Vehicle
The Go Kart is a modified vehicle asset that was originally created for a colleague's short film, ‘Play Nice’, for a VR sequence.
This asset is an excellent example of recycling the same asset and applying multiple textures for different variants.
In the short film, a character always sits in the Kart. To make this piece more visually appealing when showcased by itself, I modelled a chair once the show was delivered.
If you would like to show your support, you can watch Play Nice on Youtube here!
The brief for this sequence was a playful spin on the beloved Mario Kart series, combining it with the Director's love of F1 racing. The design itself was a merge of multiple Formula One cars
This piece was modelled with a Sub-D workflow in mind. As this was being reused for multiple karts, the UVs are on a single tile to simplify the texturing process.
Software used:
Autodesk Maya (Modelling & UVs)
Redshift Plugin (For Rendering Clay/Ambient Occlusion/Wireframe passes)
Affinity Designer (For compositing final stills)
What’s a vehicle asset?
For the most part, vehicles are easy to distinguish as assets that a character can use as a method of transportation! In some cases, the line begins to blur when the vehicle also doubles as a set piece. For example, trains are a widespread grey area when scenes are shot inside the carriages! or boats if it’s on or below deck! This is where the distinction between productions and who’s running the show can differ.
However, in this instance, this asset is small enough not to be considered an environment. Questions that can be used to establish if it is a vehicle can be:
Is the asset going to be rigged to be animated in motion?
Does a character interact with it to drive the asset?
A YES to both of these will make the asset considered a vehicle. Additional examples where it may not be are if the asset is used for set dressing purposes only rather than functionality. I.e., it’s a broken vehicle from events off camera and is never interacted with by the characters.
Would you like advice on how to model something that’s suited for a Animation show?
As someone with an active, private FB community group, 3DMC (Join here), I’m happy to answer questions for anyone looking to grow their skills as an artist.
You can message me HERE or on my socials at the top or bottom of the website.
Alternatively, if you want to take your skills to the next level… I also offer one-on-one sessions where we can dive deep into areas you’re currently struggling with and work together to improve your skillset!