Video Tutorials

Post by **Kjell** » Sat May 16, 2009 1:55 pm

So .. I've just recorded the first ZGE video tutorial covering how to create a basic Keyboard + Mouse based First Person camera, Floor and a Skybox. Haven't done the narration yet though, I'll try to do that tomorrow.

Nevertheless, I could use some feedback at this stage already ( before rendering out the whole thing again ). Am I going too fast / slow / is it too long / short? Let me know ( I'm aware that it's difficult without narration ).

Some notes:

- This is a beginner tutorial, not a newbie tutorial. Beginners have at least gone through the basic text tutorials on the wiki.
- I don't explain how to create the Cubemap textures in this tutorial .. I could, but it would be done in Softimage ( ZGE can't render to texture ).

http://drop.io/zgameeditor/asset/skybox-mp4 ( Download the original .mp4, the flash preview isn't very crisp )

Enjoy ~
K

Post by **VilleK** » Sat May 16, 2009 4:11 pm

I like it

You know this is probably the first time I've actually "seen" someone use ZGE and I find it fascinating.

This could be the first of a "Video tutorials" section on the wiki with accompanying zgeproj-downloads. The wiki as a whole could use a face-lift with a more attractive colorscheme and wiki-skin but that is a whole separate topic.

Looking forward to how this will progress.

y offs et · Post by **y offs et** » Sat May 16, 2009 4:54 pm

That is an amazing tutorial!
Thank you very much. I'm downloading it now, after watching it online.
I had been rolling around in my mind how to make a skybox, but it would have been agonizingly slow for me to put it together. I'm going to be studying this for a long time.
And that trick where you pivot the whole ZGameEditor window...probably can't do it...you must open
ZGameEditor inside some other application.
I could be wrong, I'm still downloading right now.
Anyway, thanks again!

Edit - OK...I see the appPivot signifies a timelapse.

Feedback - As you wrote, it is for beginners, not newbies.
When someone runs it through a player with pause, backup slider etc. and can zoom in on the fine print and study at their own speed, I don't think narration would be a necessity, but it could be a nice bonus.

A masterful display of a journeyman working with his tool. I can see a number of noob snail speed written tutorials coming from this. Keep it up. I can translate.

kattle87 · Post by **kattle87** » Sat May 16, 2009 5:29 pm

Can I ask... What program did you used for this?

Post by **Kjell** » Sat May 16, 2009 6:59 pm

Hi guys,

@kattle87: Camtasia Studio. For cheaper / open-source alternatives check osalt.com or wakoopa.com

@y offs et: Good to hear that the video is follow-able even without the narration. However, I show a couple of things in the video that you shouldn't do, so for that reason alone I think it will be helpful to record the narration. And the "3D pivot effect" is just a transition of the video recording software to illustrate that I cut away some video there ( the creation of the last 4 sides of the Skybox .. after showing the first two, people should be able to get the idea ).

K

kattle87 · Post by **kattle87** » Sat May 16, 2009 7:13 pm

I just discovered that I can use VirtualDub as well, it works like a charme and since I love that program every day more (even if I have been using it for let's say 6 years!) I'm going with that. It can also make the "follow the mouse" kind of recording. Just spent some time making a tutorial but it's far from being a real tutorial since without a speaking voice and with moving mouse it's some kind of PITA to be followed

However I was able to test all the programs I need to record a real tutorial ^^
Now I just need to win my shiness and record my own voice in English :/

y offs et · Post by **y offs et** » Sat May 16, 2009 9:59 pm

By the way, I've used Debut from NCH software for video tutorials before. It's a little hinky, but it does everything and the price is right.

jph_wacheski · Post by **jph_wacheski** » Sun May 17, 2009 4:07 am

Great video Kjell! It is cool to see you at work, you are meticulous and organized in ways that make me jealous.

I am pure;y hackadellic by comparison!

I may try to do some of these as well,. but thay will be quite a bit different,. . not sure my system is up to capturing the video,. but I will give it a try when i find some time. skyboxes are a good subject as they are super cool looking in the end.., I was most interested in your input coding as I am impressed with how you do this,. it is nicely shown here. I am looking forward to hearing the nerration,. could be informative as well,. although yeah, this is quite follow-able, to a ZGE user, as is. I do also enjoy hearing the mouse and keys! nicely done.

kattle87 · Post by **kattle87** » Sun May 17, 2009 7:31 am

Since you got a 7600 as video card, I would expect your system to be fine if you are going to record a 15 FPS video with virtual dub and some specific "desktop-codec". You will probably need 1 GB free space if you do it my way. Maybe less if you don't record audio (or compress it! I forgot about this and well this could save up to 300 MB!)
If anyone is interested in how to do this in VirtualDub, I can write a tutorial (or a video tutorial, too!)

Post by **VilleK** » Mon Aug 10, 2009 3:54 pm

I'd like to open this discussion again. It would be great if we can add a couple of video tutorials on the ZGE-wiki in time for next full release.

For instance:
- sky box
- mesh creation
- bitmap creation
- sound effects

They do not need to have recorded voice as long as they are easy to follow with text-overlays when needed to explain what's happening. Any volunteers? I'm sure jph would make a great mesh tutorial

. And Kattle maybe it is easier for you to find time for a tutorial instead of programming now that you're busy with studies? Kjell, do you have time to finish the sky box tutorial?

Post by **Kjell** » Mon Aug 10, 2009 6:41 pm

Hmm,

I don't think people vere away from ZGE due to any of the topics you mention. Although ... it is ( pretty much ) all you need when creating screensavers

Anyway, I'd be happy to create a video tutorial ( series ) on creating a game in ZGE, but the problem is that you don't want to "teach" anything that requires work still* So it would either have to be 2D ( which I like to play, but not to make ), or something simple like Wii Sports or Wii Resort. Any other idea's?

*Of course you can always use Libraries to hack your way around any limitation, but the Library component should be there for basic global functions, not to re-write the whole object management / inheritance / collision / etc system.

K

Post by **VilleK** » Mon Aug 10, 2009 6:58 pm

I picked those topics as suggestions because they are quite basic and can be covered in rather short tutorials. I agree that a "how to write a game" tutorial is not a good idea yet because of feature limitations. But I think a couple of short tutorials can be helpful when people arrive at the ZGE homepage for the first time and want to know what's it all about without having to read the written tutorials. ZGE is not yet ready for the wide audience that need a full feature-set for game development, but at this stage at least we want to reach out to people like ourselves who like to experiment with small games and graphics techniques. I'm sure there are more than us out there

jph_wacheski · Post by **jph_wacheski** » Tue Aug 11, 2009 12:17 am

Ok I downloaded camStudio and it is very simple to use,. nice actualy. I did a very simple tut. video just to test the system,. find that here; http://drop.io/ZGE_tut1

This just shows me starting a new project, and adding the simplest start to a 2d game,. no audio, or descriptive text. this could be helpfull to a first time user,. perhaps. I can try adding voice or text to the next one. is it needed?

So how would you like these to look Ville? 800x600 is do-able but a tad restrictive to work with,. 1024x768 may be better for a good size tree etc. however file size may get silly.., I would love to include the tunes I am listening to as I do these but it is just extra data,. . this seems to compress ok. I used TechSmith Screen Capture Codec with Quality at 55 is there a better codex settings?

For the uploads is this ok drop.io is very cool on the surface,. provided they don't just disapear, as net services can sometimes do,. suppose keeping backups is advisable. any other considerations,. as I would like to do some more just want to make them as usable as possible.

Post by **VilleK** » Tue Aug 11, 2009 2:31 pm

Thanks jph, this looks good on my screen. We need to find a format that is easily streamable in peoples browsers (without downloading a codec first), and still good enough resolution to be clearly visible. I need to see what other sites are using.

There are lots of unused bandwidth on the zge-site so I can host the files there, at least in the beginning.

kattle87 · Post by **kattle87** » Wed Aug 12, 2009 11:04 am

If you look for options, there should be something to let you follow the mouse. It could be nice if you are able to use it properly. And it keeps the global resolution lower while allowing you to still understand what is going on.