Inspired by the procedurally generated fauna in No Man's Sky and in the spirit of all things Halloween, I decided to take a few days and jam on a procedural owl generator:
I didn't get as far as I'd hoped, but I'm pretty happy with the results. Technically, it was pretty simple to engineer. There is no bone animation, all of the deformation is done using blend shapes (aka morph targets). Normally used for facial animation, I knew it would allow me to set very exact limits on how the shape of the owl deforms, much more precise than trying to do it by scaling skinned bones.
I basically started with an average owl mesh, and decided on 23 different shape variables, each with an exaggeration in the positive and the negative direction. So I ended up with 46 different meshes to dial in, and randomized them all when the button is pressed. So that positive and negative versions of the same variable wouldn't cancel each other out, only one of the directions was used per variable, also decided randomly.
Maximum positive and negative extents for 6 of the variables.
I saw this project happening in four steps:
- Mesh deformation
- Procedural texture generation
- "Otherworldy" effects
- Polish
I was only able to get mesh deformation completed this time around, but I'm happy enough with it to move on to the next step. I think I might pick this back up before Halloween next October, and maybe every Halloween after that until it's finished. Next year, procedural textures!