Lair’s Matthias Worch at GDC: Visuals, normal maps

If game developer Factor 5‘s Lair for the Sony PlayStation 3 (PS3) will look something like its stunning visuals come the video game’s launch, then it will indeed be a sight to behold.

For the aspiring game developers who would have loved to know how this was pulled off, Lair Art Director Matthias Worch set up shop at the ongoing Game Developers Conference (GDC) 2007 for his lecture “More Than Just A Pretty Map – Creating Next-Generation Materials for LAIR”.

This lecture was meant for texture artists and art department managers, and was intended to give its audience a how-to guide to creating realistic visuals and graphics for next-generation games.

Matthias gave a presentation of Lair‘s normal maps to discuss his design points, as well as show off Lair‘s highly detailed textures – some of you may have already seen this aspect based on your previous game screenshot viewings. And just how essential are normal maps to Lair‘s gameplay? Matthias jokingly quirked that “Lair looked really crappy until we used normal maps. Now it looks really good.”

And as it was a lecture on game textures and visuals, Matthias concluded his 60-minute segment with a Lair footage to showcase the video game’s visuals. According to reports, while the video clips were just as good as some of us have hoped for, there were still signs of slowdowns. Let’s hope Factor 5 gets the bugs ironed out before Lair‘s release. Matthias Worch’s lecture ran on March 7,  9 a.m. to 10 a.m. at the San Francisco’s Moscone Convention Center, room 3007, West Hall.

If game developer Factor 5‘s Lair for the Sony PlayStation 3 (PS3) will look something like its stunning visuals come the video game’s launch, then it will indeed be a sight to behold.

For the aspiring game developers who would have loved to know how this was pulled off, Lair Art Director Matthias Worch set up shop at the ongoing Game Developers Conference (GDC) 2007 for his lecture “More Than Just A Pretty Map – Creating Next-Generation Materials for LAIR”.

This lecture was meant for texture artists and art department managers, and was intended to give its audience a how-to guide to creating realistic visuals and graphics for next-generation games.

Matthias gave a presentation of Lair‘s normal maps to discuss his design points, as well as show off Lair‘s highly detailed textures – some of you may have already seen this aspect based on your previous game screenshot viewings. And just how essential are normal maps to Lair‘s gameplay? Matthias jokingly quirked that “Lair looked really crappy until we used normal maps. Now it looks really good.”

And as it was a lecture on game textures and visuals, Matthias concluded his 60-minute segment with a Lair footage to showcase the video game’s visuals. According to reports, while the video clips were just as good as some of us have hoped for, there were still signs of slowdowns. Let’s hope Factor 5 gets the bugs ironed out before Lair‘s release. Matthias Worch’s lecture ran on March 7,  9 a.m. to 10 a.m. at the San Francisco’s Moscone Convention Center, room 3007, West Hall.