Space Scene. Unity.

I started building the Space scene for my MV video by thinking of how to implement the actual black space with all the stars. It wasn’t that difficult to find a perfect Skybox in the Unity Asset Store. And it was a free asset. I had it downloaded and imported to my project. 

The next step was to place the ground level for the scene. I created a plane and then assigned a new, transparent material to it. I wanted to achieve the effect of walking in the aiR (in the space to be precise). I then added 3D objects (customized cubes) around the scene, along the four sides of the plane. I assigned the transparent material to them and added box colliders, so the characters won’t be able to leave the scene and walk off into the unknown. I also un-ticked the mesh render component, so the actual mesh is invisible. 

Doing that required going back to my lecture notes and pre-recorded content from the Introduction to VR unit. All of them are invaluable sources of knowledge I often reach to.  

Next, I added the audio file to the scene (mp3 “Iris” file I bought and downloaded to my computer). Even though it was a straightforward process, I had some issues there. I have done all the steps correctly, but it didn’t work in my scene. I had repeated the process again, but it still didn’t work. Only after going through the scene elements and Unity options, I discovered that I had my scene muted. Such a silly mistake! It came out that the audio was working fine from the beginning. I just wasn’t able to hear it. 

Then I looked for the characters matching my idea of them. I managed to download the right models from Mixamo. I first had all three characters in the desired space. Then was working on animating them. Animations I used were also from Mixamo. I searched for the right moves and downloaded them one by one to Unity. Next, I created animation controllers, assigned them all to the right models and made transitions between certain moves, to have each model moving in a looped sequence of moves.  

It was crucial for all the characters in this scene not to go through the walls, as well as, to walk on the ground level only – without any odd turns and vertical walk offs. I added a Rigidbody component to each character and froze the rotation on X and Z axis and position on the Y.  

Almost everything worked well when I played the scene on my computer. It was just a bit too dark. I decided to add two directional lights in two different colours, blue and pink. I needed some source of light, but at the same time, I didn’t want it to be too disruptive.  

I played the scene many times and tweaked animations, positions and other elements. When I was happy with it, I built and run it on my Quest 2. It was fine, but the floor level wasn’t quite right. It came out that the issue wasn’t with the actual plane, but with the camera position. I corrected it and the scene was almost ready. 

The further work that must be done requires locomotion component so the user can move in the scene. For now, the person in my experience can only move her head, to see what is happening around (each side), above and underneath.  

Working on this scene was extremely time-consuming, but at the same time very satisfying. I have learnt a lot and I am pleased with what I built. I can’t wait to have all the project completed!