FOLDERS AND YOU

"How not to lose time and get to everyone's nerves by asking where the file is"
So, you want to be a tech artist? Well, the first thing a good tech artist MUST master is the location of all the files he/she/it will be using during the game production. As a tech artist, you WILL get in touch with absolutely EVERY aspect of game creation, and make no mistake about it. This is why it is important not to lose time searching for files and having second thoughts about where they are located. Your job starts with getting the PSD file from the illustrator/painter, which is hopefully, but not necessarily, arranged by layers.... at least to some extent. Next you open the file in Photoshop, review the layers, check naming, bounding boxes, groups, special symbols (this will all be covered in detail later), plan for the new layer, if any are needed (use item animations, props, visual anchors, or whatever else may need to make the scene beautiful and functional). ONLY when these steps are finished, and you are SURE that everything is as it should be, you export the layers to MAX. Important: While you may work in any Photoshop you choose to suit you (as long as the scripts will work in it), it is IMPERATIVE that you work in 3D Studio MAX 2009. Not 2012, not 9, not any backwards compatible bull***t. MAX 2009! In MAX you will sync the layers from Photoshop and start the creative part of your work. All layers will be arranged as they were in Photoshop, creating a plane object for every layer you had in Photoshop. In MAX you will be making animations, particle effects, and selection sets that will ultimately create a beautiful scene for the game, out of a static illustration. This is where the fun starts. But enough about fun, this part of the documentation covers the meticulous and tedious work with folders and file locations. So, basically, what you will need to master first, as mentioned before, is where are the necessary files for all this. Again as a tech art you will need to browse all over the game folders, and not just one specific, as is the case for most of the painter artists. Those folders are: Art Data Docs Work Files

1. ART FOLDER
Art folder is the cooking dough folder for the game. Everything that is supposed to go to the game should be placed in this folder, and NOTHING else. Art folder contains subfolders for every scene that will appear in game (pic 1. - left). This does not only mean the scenes which the player will visit, but also the interface. Each subfolder further contains .psd files for every zoom zone, puzzle or zoom scene that appears in that scene (pic 1. - right).

Pic 1. art folder with subfolders and contents

Important: these folders should contain ONLY the .psd files for the scenes, zoom zones and puzzle which correspond the current scene, and no "work in progress" files such as "autumn street_first_try.psd or similarly named files. In general every scene will have its own folder, and all other assets, such as main menu, inventory items and such, will be placed in _interface folder. Your work will always stat in ART folder, where you fill find the correct file, you are to work on. After you have done all this, and made sure everything in .psd file is as you wanted it/as it should be, you will export the layers to MAX file. The export will basically create a bunch of .dds files, cropped according to bounding boxes in the .psd file, and stored in the respective subfolders in DATA folder.

2. DATA FOLDER
So now your .psd file is dismembered to a lot of .dds files, and you need to switch to the max file to import and work with them in MAX file. In order to do this, you need to switch to DATA folder. The easiest way to do this is to create art/data shortcuts, and use them to switch between art and data folder. I strongly urge you to do this. The process is as easy: just move to P:\tools\bin folder and start make_art_data_shortcuts.bat. This will create shortcuts between ART folders and their respective folders in DATA. If for any insane reason you actually do not wish to do this, you then need to go back to P:\ and enter DATA folder and find dthe correct folder for the scene you have exported. The concept of DATA folder is quite the same as art, with the exceptions that sub scenes are now contained in their own subfolders which should contain four basic types of files, that will always be present in this folder: .dds files - your layers from photoshop, cropped according to the bounding box, and exported with alpha channel .max file - the file you will be working in to create the scene .script file - the file that contains script commands for the action in the scene .scene file - the,... um,.... the.... erm,... whadayacallit thingamabobs file.

The two most visited subfolders within the data folder for tech artists are PARTICLES and INVENTORY folders. This is where you will find inventory icons and particle files, should you happen to access them for any reason. Important: As is the rule for the ART folder, such is also for the DATA - you need have ONLY the files used for scenes here, and NOTHING else.

3. DOCS FOLDER
This is the folder which will contain all the documentation for the development of the game. This includes, but is not limited to GDD, Locations in game, story, feedbacks etc. For those tech artists that like to be organized, it is recommended to keep documentation in subfolders by game chapters. Also, all documents that you might find beneficial to others that work on the project, and you wish to share, you can put in this folder, such as: journal entries, chapter progress files, time management tables etc etc.

4. WORK FILES FOLDER

The oh, crap! folder. If you go here, this means something is not where it should be, and you need to improvise. This is good! It means you used your brain instead of whining, and decided to take matters into your own hands and make something. Work files contains folders according to scenes, and usually has 3d models, wip files, renders, textures as similar files needed to initially build the scene BEFORE it goes to the artist. HAve fun searching for things in it. There are always many unexpected things you can find here.