Table of Contents

Development - Standard practicies

This is a standards document that should be followed when developing a film.

Workflow

Commit to svn based on the model/animation/etc being at a presentable state.

Development share - this stores the reference content that is for 3d work

Wiki - contains the concept art for the given project and all of the documentation for the project.

Dotproject - contains all of the tasking for the project.

File system

This is the directory hierarchy that will be used on all film projects.

Base Folder – Project Name

  1. downloads = This folder contains items downloaded from the internet
  2. export = This folder contains items exported by the given modeling application
  3. import = This folder contains items that need to be imported into a modeling application, these most likely will be items downloaded from the internet
  4. materiallibraries = These are the material libraries for the modeling application
  5. express
  6. previews = This is akin to a test render, or any single frame render, also can be for daylies.
  7. proxies
  8. renderoutput = this contains all the renders
    1. animatic = this is a progression of the build from blocks/stick figures to full models with simple textures. This does not contain proper lighting or shadows, anything that slows down render time. Once the animations are complete then we move onto the final.
      1. scene_name = this contains the render animatic scenes
        1. shot# = this contains the shots for a given scene
          1. layer# = this contains the layers for a given shot. In the animatic this would most likely be the background layer, foreground, etc…
            1. Frame#.tga = this is the file name for the actual rendered frames
    2. final = this is a final render containing all lighting animation textures, bump maps, FX, everything
      1. scene_name = this contains the render final scenes
        1. shot# = this contains the shots for a given scene
          1. layer# = this contains the layers for a given shot
            1. Frame#.tga = this is the file name for the actual rendered frames
  9. renderpresets
  10. sceneassets = this contains auxilary items for a scene
    1. animations = this is saved animations. Group items under a folder named after the file that they are used with.
    2. images = these are background images, textures, etc. Group items under a folder named after the file that they are used with.
    3. photometric = Group items under a folder named after the file that they are used with.
    4. renderassets = Group items under a folder named after the file that they are used with.
    5. sounds = Group items under a folder named after the file that they are used with.
  11. scenes = this is all the scenes
    1. scene_name = contains all the potential individual saves of a scene
      1. scene_name = the file of the scene, this file contains all the actors, props, and the set along with the animation.
      2. scene_name_cams = this contains the animation for the cameras with the main scene xrefd
      3. scene_name_lights = all the lights in the right position with the animations with the main scene xrefd
      4. scene_name_FX = all the special effects with the main scene xrefd
      5. shot# = an xref of the given shot and an xref of the given scene. This file is to setup the render settings.
    2. actors = the characters in the film
      1. name_of_char = this is to keep the multiple variations of the files for a given actor separate
    3. props = the props
      1. name_of_prop = the same as character
    4. sets = the sets that need to be created
      1. name_of_set = the same as character
    5. misc = other items needed for a film, set dressing, FX, etc.
  12. finalcut = this is the continually changing final cut of the film

Naming conventions

This is a list of the way things should be named for models and scenes. The names of any part of the models should be descriptive. They should be camel cased. Underscores should be used to separate between type and name. All names should contain the type. Abbreviations are ok if they can be understood by more than one person.