Bite Club 2: The Elk Kicks Back

Refining the elk bite holds for WolfQuest 3

I thought that last week’s video might have been too long and technical and boring, but we got some enthusiastic comments, so here you go — part two!

This week we’ve been working on the interactions with the elk during the final phase of the hunt — what we call the Showdown. At this point, you’ve worn down an elk by chasing and biting it, finally separating it from the herd. The elk turns to defend itself from your attacks (though it may still seize an opportunity to run away from you). Now you (and your mate or packmates) can circle the elk and choose where to bite your prey. As with the wolf fights, these attacks involve tight contact and interaction between wolf and elk, using a combination of animations and our inverse kinematics system, tied together with a lot of clever coding. (Read more about that in last week’s blog post: Bite Club: Refining the wolf fight https://youtu.be/B0PNQDS48_I)

These were complicated enough before we made matters worse by adding a “collapse to knees” state for the elk, as its energy drops even lower. This created a new batch of visual glitches, since the normal bitepoints were now too close to the ground for the wolf’s animations and IK to deal with nicely. That’s the focus of today’s video (but there are a number of other rough spots that we’re also refining, even if they’re not mentioned in this video.) (And the gorgeous elk model was made by GIM (Games in Motion) in Slovakia, who we've partnered with for many of our new animal models.)

_____

This weekend, I (Dave/loboLoco) and my partner Susan/Pepper are very excited to be attending the International Wolf Symposium hosted here in Minnesota by the International Wolf Center.  There will be lots of speakers and sessions featuring some of our favorite topics! Can’t wait to hear Dave Mech’s talk about “How Much and How Often do Wolves Eat?” or Dan Stahler present “Rise of the Black Wolf: Evolutionary History and Selection for the Black Coat Color Gene in North American Wolves.” And we know you all want to know “Where and How Are Wolves Ambushing Beavers?” We will share what we learn on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

- Dave Schaller (loboLoco), WolfQuest Producer

Related links:
* FAQ’s http://www.wolfquest.org/bb/viewtopic.php?f=97&t=83157
* Ride of the Wapiti: https://youtu.be/roTLFyRGfkY

Видео Bite Club 2: The Elk Kicks Back канала WolfQuest