SOE Environment Team

After graduating with a BA in Fine Arts in Animation I was accepted back at SOE in the summer of 2010.  When my internship was over, my work was extended and I became a contract artist.  I continued to work with the Character Team but also had a more active role with the Environment Team.  I was given many different tasks depending on where I was needed most.  Since the game was so close to launch I was given the task to help with performance and memory optimizations.

Below are a few of the assets that I was given to down-res.

(All models and textures were made by various SOE team members)

Below are some examples of texture optimization I helped with for the Environment Team.  Normal maps were apparently eating up way too much memory in the game.  The team leads had decided to bake the normals right into the diffuse maps to cut down on memory.  To get the desired quality and effect I took the RGB channels, duplicated them & used various layer effects such as overlay and multiply to help make the textures pop giving it the appearance that they still had actual normal maps applied.

Shown are the before & after the normal texture bake process.




I was also assigned to make a few of the mini maps for a few of the playrooms,
monthly content & seasonal content.