The Observatory

May 2016, No. 1
OFFICIAL NEWSLETTER OF
DEVELOPMENT
IN THIS ISSUE:
•
•
•
•
Update on the new studio!
N e w a l i e n b e a s t i e : t h e Ve r m i t e !
Check out the full Cliqist interview with Stacy Davidson!
G e t a p e e k a t e a r l y s t a g e s o f 1a w h o l e n e w s p a c e s h i p i n t e r i o r m o d e l !
( F U L L PA G E I M A G E )
2
Welcome to the first official newsletter of
Warbird Games
chronicling the development of
Jack Houston and the Necronauts!
I ’d l i k e t o g i v e a b i g t h a n k s t o m y s u p p o r t e r s o n P a t r e o n f o r
making this supplement possible! If you would like to show continued suppor t for the game, you can become a Patreon for as
l i t t l e a s $ 1 a m o n t h . T h i s n e w s l e t t e r, a s p r o m i s e d a m o n g t h e n e w
perks made possible by Patreon, is all par t of thank ing you, the
original backers as well as continuing supporters, for helping
m e t o b u i l d t h e wo r l d o f J a c k H o u s t o n . I ’m e s p e c i a l l y e xc i t e d
because it gives me yet another way to connect with you all
and share even more of my thoughts on the creative process in
c r a f t i n g J a c k ’s a d v e n t u r e , w h i c h h a s b e c o m e q u i t e a n a d v e n t u r e
of its own.
Thank you, everyone!
-Stacy Davidson, Lead Designer
@ s t a c y d a v i d s o n / w w w. w a r b i r d g a m e s . c o m
3
A
G r a p h i c
A d v e n t u r e
Coming Soon From
4
G a m e
INTERVIEW
S TA C Y D AV I D S O N
( The following inter view was originally conducted by Serena Nelson for a short blurb
in Cliqist, but I’ve decided to share the
complete interview with you guys. Enjoy!)
When did you start looking for a
new place to live/work? How long
did it take you to find something
that would suit all your needs?
This turned out to be a long process.
When it became apparent that my
living situation was totally unworkable, for personal reasons not
related to the project, I opted to
move in with relatives in Oklahoma,
who offered up their garage as a
new workshop. As it turned out,
there was actually quite a lot in
storage there that had no other
place to go. Af ter spending a great
deal of effort trying to setup a
workspace in what turned out to
be a much smaller area than I had
thought, and dealing with a lot of
unforeseen issues including large
dogs frequently running through
5
and destroying things, and mice
infestations, the weather began
to turn and before I knew it, the
entire garage was essentially frozen
to a point that my portable space
heater was useless. So I turned to
the work that I could do without
the use of a workshop while searching for work and a place to live
in Houston, which was always my
ultimate goal as I have a son who
lives here and traveling back and
forth was getting too expensive.
Nearly a year went by in Oklahoma
before I was able to make the move.
It then took another several months
to get things on track with a new
job and find a new apartment which
would give me the studio space I
needed to work. I had considered
a garage/office combo, but it was
just way outside my price range. In
the end, I ended up replacing some
of my louder tools and figuring out
a way to work from inside a small
apartment rather than the spacious
garage I thought I would have.
During
the
period
between
moving, how much work was done
on Jack Houston?
In the year I lived in Oklahoma,
there were several big things happening on Jack Houston. 1) I was in
serious talks with a potential publisher and putting together pitch
documents, schedules, asset lists,
etc. They ended up feeling like their
plate was too full to take the game
on, but I got an enormous amount
of very valuable design work done
in that process, including a huge
set of puzzle dependency charts
that helped organize everything in
a m o re p ro fe s s i o n a l w a y, b e c a u s e I
te n d to wo r k m o re o f f t h e c u f f, b u t
I really had to hammer down a lot
of details to get things in order for
those pitch documents. 2) For the
first time, I really dug deep into
the sculpting, getting the two main
characters created along with one
of the largest creatures. 3) Since I
had no studio to work in, I turned
to photography and digital matte
painting to continue work on the
backgrounds. It was slow going, but
I managed to knock out most of the
swampy areas, and the results were
probably a lot more stunning than
if I had just stuck to miniatures exc l u s i ve l y.
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N o w t h a t y o u ’r e m o r e - o r - l e s s s e t
u p, h ow l o n g b e fo re yo u s t a r t
modeling and capturing again?
Once I had the new studio room,
work began again almost immedia t e l y. Fi r s t t h i n g I d i d w a s l a y d o w n
a thick hotel carpet that would
protect the floor (this is an apartment, after all). Then I live streamed
the building of my first workbench,
which was a really exciting return to
Tw i t c h fo r t h e J a c k H o u s t o n p r o j e c t .
A lot of my old regulars came back
to hang out and chit chat. With the
floor protected and a couple of
work sur faces in place, I moved in
most of my tools and supplies and
began streaming work on a new
sculpt: a small possum-like creature
with a triceratops style frill. I’ve
also begun scratch modeling a new
ship interior using styrene and cannibalized model parts from several
dozen old airplane model kits. So
f a r, i t r e s e m b l e s t h e i n t e r i o r o f t h e
Nostromo from Alien, which has me
pretty excited, because this ship
will have a very different look than
the rocket interior I created at the
beginning of the project. Next up
will probably be a large flying beast
sculpture, and a lot more work on
t h e s h i p i n t e r i o r.
Will you be returning to doing
v i d e o s o n y o u r Yo u Tu b e c h a n n e l ?
Ye s ! T h e s t r u c t u r e I ’ v e f o u n d w o r k s
best for this is that I do most of my
w o r k l i v e o n Tw i t c h . t v , t h e n I t a k e
the hours of video and speed it up
for time lapse videos set to music
o n Yo u Tu b e . A n o t h e r t h i n g I w i l l b e
d o i n g h e r e a n d t h e r e a r e Yo u Tu b e
update videos along the lines of the
e a r l y s t u f f, w h i c h w i l l b e p o s te d to
Kickstarter first as backer updates
a n d t h e n r e l e a s e d t o t h e Yo u Tu b e
channel.
I ’m s u r e i t ’s s o m e t i m e o f f , b u t i s
there an estimated release date
of Jack Houston? Or are you not
ready to give at least a ballpark
figure?
Not ready to set a release date yet,
a s I ’m o n l y n o w r a m p i n g b a c k u p
to work. I will however say that
in the interest of avoiding unrealistic expectations at this point, a
release before Chrismas this year
i s p ro b a b l y u n l i k e l y. I t h i n k a 2 0 1 7
release is much more achievable.
Can you give some insight as to
why you chose stop-motion animation for an adventure game
for those that weren’t around
for the Kickstarter or those that
c a n’t re m e m b e r ? Al s o, wo u l d i t
be possible to give an example of
how it all works out?
S​u r e ! A n d t h a n k y o u f o r a s k i n g ,
because this is one of the most
exciting aspects of the project for
m e , a n d I t h i n k i t ’s o f t e n m i s u n d e r s t o o d . To m a n y p e o p l e , t h e t e r m s
“s to p - m o t i o n”
and
“c l a y m a t i o n ”
are interchangeable, so I’ve heard
many comparisons to games like
Clay Fighter and The Neverhood.
While these are exceptionally cool
Looking games, and claymation is a
great tradition of alternate cartoon
a n i m a t i o n , w h a t I ’m d o i n g w i t h J a c k
Houston is sort of a different animal
a l t o g e t h e r.
So, to back up to the beginning,
when I initially began to visualize
what Jack Houston would look like,
I explored cell animation, pixel ar t,
e ve n h i g h - p o l y 3 D, b u t i t fe l t a s
though I was somehow missing the
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m a r k w i t h t h e e s t h e t i c. Fi n a l l y, I s a t
d o w n t o w a t c h o n e o f H a r r y h a u s e n ’s
old Sinbad movies when something
hit me. Whenever a creature would
c o m e s l i t h e r i n g o u t o f i t s l a i r, t h e
film would always cut to a wide shot
that sort of featured an enclosed
“ p l a y s e t - l i k e ” e n v i r o n m e n t . Yo u ’d
s e e t h e h e r o , t h e m o n s t e r, a f e w
set pieces like a rock or a tree, and
a backdrop. I t felt as though you
were looking at an adventure game
s c r e e n ! T h a t ’s w h e n I r e a l l y p i n pointed that what I really wanted
out of this game was the feel that
you were actually stepping into a
classic sci-fi film. And what better
classic film style to emulate than
Harryhausen movies??
So, one of the earliest films that
featured stop motion effects
was King Kong. Aside from
terrorizing the audience s o f N e w Yo r k w i t h
visions of their city
being
ransacked
by a gigantic ape, it also inspired
a young Ray Harryhausen to learn
and even master the art of stopmotion. After making a series of
fairytale short films in his garage,
and being recruited by the creator
of the original King Kong himself
to animate another giant ape in
M i g h t y J o e Yo u n g , R a y w e n t o n t o
make a slew of fantasy creatures for
films like Clash of the Titans, Jason
a n d t h e Arg o n a u t s a n d 7 t h Voya g e
of Sinbad, as well as some wicked
science fic tion aliens for First Men
I n T h e M o o n a n d 2 0 M i l l i o n M i l e s To
Earth. In fact, his stop motion techniques were employed for every
kind of creature and robot imaginable by Hollywood up until the early
9 0 ’s w h e n J u r a s s i c P a r k c h a n g e d
the whole visual effects landscape
instantly (from which point, ever ything was done using CGI.)
So that solidified it, for me.
Th e g a m e wo u l d n’t j u s t b e
a classic adventure game.
8
It would also be a window into a
classic science fiction film with
bubble helmets, rockets, ray-guns
and giant, slobbering, alien beasts.
The environment would be a classic
alien jungle, like those Gustave
Dore-inspired miniature jungles
seen in King Kong. The monsters
would crawl out of their cave and
slither in stop motion, and they
would be sculpted, built and shot
just like those that Harryhausen
brought us.
To c r e a t e o n e o f t h e s e s t o p - m o t i o n
beasties, you start with a sculpture in non-hardening, oil-based
clay like Roma Plastilina, Chavant,
o r n e we r o p t i o n s l i k e M o n s t e r C l a y.
That creature is then molded in a
50/50 cement and plaster material
called Ultracal. The resulting mold
is extremely durable and can withstand high temperatures, which is
a good thing, because soon we’ll
need to bake it. Next, you need to
construct a special armature, basically a skeleton which makes it
p o s s i b l e t o a n i m a t e t h e c h a r a c t e r.
Big Hollywood productions always
have ball & socket armatures made,
but if you have somewhat limited
funds (like me!), a popular option
is alumaloy wire. This is carefully
t w i s t e d t o g e t h e r, b o u n d a n d s o l i d i fied at key points using an epoxy
p u t t y, a n d p l a c e d i n t o t h e m o l d s o
that it ends up embedded at the
center of the creature. Then, after
whipping air into a careful blend
of foam latex ingredients using a
kitchen-aid, the mixture is poured
into the mold halves, which are then
strapped together and set into the
oven to bake the moisture out. Inc i d e n t a l l y , y o u A B S O L U T E LY d o n o t
want to re -use the mixer or oven to
prepare food ever again, because
nasty chemicals and horrible illness
9
and all that. Once the final puppet
is removed and allowed to cool, it
is painted and detailed with special
paints and inks made using either
rubber cement or a prosthetic
adhesive, which allows the coat of
color to stretch without cracking on
the latex sur face. When painted on
in layers using an airbrush, you can
achieve some really eye-popping
effects.
So, although the ac tual animation
process is pretty similar to claymation, attaching the puppet to a
sur face using screws to tie it down
by the feet and machine gauges
to keep track of its position as
you make minute movements, a
sculpted and molded foam latex
model can be made to look much
more realistic and highly detailed.
One method gives you Gumby and
the California Raisins, the other
gives you the Kraken and Medusa.
H o p e f u l l y, my wo r k w i l l f a l l s o m e where in between, leaning toward
the Kraken. ;)
SCULPTING
W ha t do you ge t w h e n
yo u c ross a p os s um a n d a
tr icera top s ?
S i m p l e , y o u g e t J a c k H o u s t o n ’s
n e we s t c re a t u re : t h e Ve r m i t e !
One of the best reasons anyone
could want to create a science
fiction world is the opportunity it
brings to imagine all the bizarre
life that might form on some undiscovered planet.
“ I k n e w I ’d n e e d s o m e s e r i o u s l y w e i r d
creatures for this, so before I even
b e g a n t h i n k i n g a b o u t t h e s t o r y, I
asked my friend and long time coll a b o r a t o r M i k e O l i v e r, a m u l t i m e d i a
artist with a deep love for science
fiction, to start coming up with
cool aliens. I knew he would come
up with stuff that was way outside
the usual aliens you see these days.
Sci-fi is kind of oversaturated with
10
bugs and reptilian creatures. Mike
d o e s n’t te n d to g e t d raw n i nto m a i n stream design. When he puts pencil
t o p a p e r, h e l e a d s w i t h h i s i m a g i n a t i o n , a n d t h a t ’s w h a t I w a n t e d . O n e
of the first things he sent me was
this totally bizarre creature that
almost seemed to have a frill, but
was it soft or bony? Its head almost
looked like a skull. I just ran with
that, and the idea of horns and
bony growths is something I’ve now
carried over to most of the creatures I’ve come up with since.
“ I h a d n’t a c t u a l l y t h o u g ht m u c h
about where I might use this actual
creature for quite a while, but I
guess it was sometime last year that
I realized I had this lizard creature
playing a role in the game, and I
h a d n’t e ve n gi ve n m u c h t h o u g ht to
what it would look like yet. It hit me
that I really should just put lizard
creatures out of my mind and use
t h i s g u y i n s te a d, a n d t h e Ve r m i te
e a r n e d a s p o t i n J a c k H o u s t o n .” S D
So, as the creatures began to take
shape with sketches like this, more
beasts began to borrow from the
l o o k o f t h e Ve r m i te.
Th e c re at u re s o f Ve n u s b e g a n t h e i r
lives vaguely inspired by the various
monsters of early Holly wood. From
the dinosaurs of Skull Island in King
Kong to the more imaginative beasts
of Ray Harryhausen. The Ymir from
2 0 M i l l i o n M i l e s To E a r t h , t h e H y d r a
from Jason and the Argonauts, even
the truly bizarre alien-things that
crawled their way onto drive-in
s c r e e n s i n t h e 1 9 5 0 ’s . M o v i e s l i k e I t !
T h e Te r r o r F r o m B e y o n d S p a c e , T h e
Giant Claw and Angry Red Planet.
B u t n o w, a n e w a n g l e h a d wo r k e d
its way into the designs.
“What I loved was that this was a
mammalian sort of creature, it felt
less dinosaur-inspired, more like
some prehistoric ancestor of the
p o s s u m f r o m t h e L o w e r Te r t i a r y
period. That really got me thinking.
The holy grail of alien design is
to create something you instantly
know does not exist anywhere on
earth, yet you almost suspect that it
MIGHT have. If people are tempted
to consult paleontology websites to
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co n f i r m i t wa s n’t e ve r a re a l a n i m a l,
I k n o w I ’m i n g o o d s h a p e. B e l i e v a b l y
b i z a r r e , t h a t ’s w h a t I w a n t .
“When I started to sculpt the twoheaded swamp beast, I carried over
the bony face and gave it horns
similar to
an Embolotherium or
Megacerops. He also has these
f re a k y, b o ny e ye s o c k e t s a n d s n o u t ,
but otherwise he appears to be sort
o f r e p t i l i a n , H y d r a - l i k e . S o i t ’s m i x i n g
q u a l i t i e s . L i k e , t h e r e ’s n o r e a s o n
a h a i r y, w i n g e d s p e c i e s c o u l d n’t
have stumbled on compound eyes
o r e xo s k e l e t o n s. I ’m a l w a y s l o o k i n g
for believably strange ways to set
these creatures apart from earthbound animals while keeping them
grounded and appearing, at the ver y
l e a s t , p l a u s i b l e .” S D
ARE
YO U
READY
JAM?
TO
The second annual AdventureJam will begin May 6th and end
precisely 14 days later on May 20th!
Our 2016 panel of judges include
Patrick Ewing (Firewatch)
Natalia Figueroa (Fran Bow)
Joseph Humfrey (80 Days)
and
Jay Tholen (Dropsy).
S o G E T L A M P. . . G E T S W O R D . . . a n d G E T R E A D Y. . .
for
AdventureJam!
Join us today at adventurejam.org!
#advjam2016
3 years ago, Kaleb Lechowski created a short film that has
generated over 20 million views worldwide. Now, he wants
to make a feature film, and he wants your help.
Check out the original short film on Kickstarter:
R’ha 2 - The continuation of the sci-fi-epic
MODELING
At the beginning of development, Jack Houston designer Stacy
Davidson constructed and photog r a p h e d t h e r o c k e t i n t e r i o r. T h e
struts were designed and fabricated
using CAD software, a Silhouette
Cameo cutter and a hotwire foam
c u t t e r. O t h e r t h a n t h a t , c o n s t r u c tion was a fairly basic process involving hot glue, foam core, random
bits and pieces, an air brush and a
lot of finger crossing.
Now that he is all setup in a new
studio, Stac y is embark ing on a
much broader ship interior build,
for a space craft of a much later
technological era.
“I had this certain look in mind for
the original rocket interiors. I knew
I w a n t e d t h e m t o fe e l b u l k y, l o t s
14
of dirty steel sur faces and wood
t r i m . I t ’s b a s i c a l l y a p u r e p r o d u c t
of hard-boiled science fiction. I
wanted to create the feeling this
thing was built in some bygone/
never-was era where the esthetics of
the 1940s through the 1960s meets
an age of space exploration where
this pioneer space program is constantly building bigger and better
rockets and sending them out to
aid burgeoning space stations and
explore farther out into our solar
system.
“ This new ship is something differe n t . I t ’s a s m a l l f r e i g h t e r f r o m a n
e r a o f s p a c e i n d u s t r y w h e re we’re
already basically everywhere, but
for the most part, space is still the
sticks. Freighters like this one travel
between the colonies and remote
stations to transport supplies, basically like interplanetary truckers.
Rather than the more old fashi o n e d , h a n d - c r a f t e d f e e l o f J a c k ’s
rocket, this one should feel mass
p ro d u c e d. I t s h o u l d b e o i l y, b u l k y,
functional, but also streamlined
and efficient. Old war ships were
like this, everything was stripped
15
down to the bare essentials necessary to
function and that was
it. I went on a tour
of some old vessels
in the local shipyard
recently and took a lot
of mental notes. Pipes
and bare wires were
left exposed so that
you could access and
re p a i r t h e m e a s i l y. I f
something needed a
c o v e r, a h a n d l e , o r a
safety piece of some kind, it would just be a shaped hunk of metal that
would be welded in place. A seat in a gun turret would be a tiny metal
plate, just enough to prop up your butt. Space was also a consideration. If
something needed 5 feet, it would take 5 feet. If it could be 3 feet, it would
be. There was little or no consideration given to beautification or style.
F o r m e , t h i s i s e x a c t l y w h a t ’s w r o n g w i t h m o s t s h i p d e s i g n i n H o l l y w o o d
a n d v i d e o g a m e s. Wh at h a p p e n s i s, t h e f i l m m a k e r s c a n’t s h o o t w i t h o u t
s e t s, a n d t h e co n s t r u c t i o n h e a d c a n’t b u i l d w i t h o u t d e i gn s, s o t h e j o b
of visualizing what these things look like is given to a graphic designer/
c o n c e p t a r t i s t w h o ’s w h o l e j o b , m o s t o f t h e t i m e , i s c r e a t i n g s t y l e . S t y l i z i n g i d e a s . T h a t ’s t h e i r b r e a d a n d b u t t e r, i t ’s w h a t t h e y d o . N o w , t h e r e
16
are great concept artists out there
capable of crafting grounded, realistic ideas, but many less experienced artists are often inclined to
just try to show off their imaginat i o n a n d s k i l l. Th at i s n’t h ow re a l
s h i p s a re m a d e, a n d i t wo n’t g e t yo u
the same result. I think the really
successful environments in sci-fi
are the ones that feel like someone
just grabbed a camera and stepped
i n t o a t i m e m a c h i n e . T h a t ’s w h a t
I ’ m g o i n g f o r. H o w w o u l d t h i s t h i n g
R E A L LY l o o k ?
I k n e w I co u l d n’t d o t h i s a s o f f - t h e cuff as before. This time it would
take some planning and research
into how highly detailed scratch
models are made. I started by stripping all the parts out of a huge pile
of airplane models and sorting the
parts into bins. I then used grid
paper to design the angles and cut
17
the pieces I needed from styrene.
T h e m o d e l b i t s ( o r “g r e e b l e s ” )
were then used to create panels of
details that will be lined up along
the walls, with pipes created from
dowels, brass tubing, and fish tank
tubing for bends. This is only the
beginning, but there will be lots
of areas where much of this will be
re -arranged to create details. Of
co u r s e, i t wo n’t l o o k l i k e m u c h u nt i l
i t ’s p a i n t e d , b u t s o f a r. . . s o g o o d ! .”
SD
That’s it for this issue, folks!
Thanks for your suppor t, and
remember to check back on the
Patreon for fur ther updates. Also,
remember to follow the Warbird
Games Twitch.tv channel for
more gamedev fun!
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