Monday, September 19, 2011

Session#2 Additional Pictures and Info:


Here are some additional pics taken with Brian's camera from last night's session;

First up is a pic of Brian standing with one of the sections. This is a good pic, good lighting and you can see the size and some detail of how it is built underneath. You can also see how one of the "GM Wings" are shaped as part of the table.



Next some more shots of the projector rig, because people keep asking about it. The projector is mounted vertically on the only piece of the rig that doesn't move.


The projector is pointing up at the first mirror, which is angled and adjustable. You can adjust the height of the first mirror and the angle. If you look close in the above image you can see the horizontal hinge where the mirror frame is attached. 

Below is a couple of side shots of the projector rig. On each side is a knob that you can loosen to adjust the angle of the first mirror;


 

Next up is a picture of the back of the rig. You can see the two knobs that adjust the height of the first mirror



Next pic is of the main mirror, notice that it's angle is adjustable also;



So, why all the adjustable mirrors? Because with this setup you can get an effective 5ft throw, much longer than you can with a projector hanging from a standard sized ceiling, which means a bigger and more detailed image on the screen. Also, this makes the projector rig portable, meaning that you don't have to do a permanent install somewhere, which is a big plus with The Wife and also we play at my apartment but the rig is owned by Brian, so he can easily(somewhat) take it home after a game session. And he wants to take it to the game conventions that we have here in town. We have three throughout the year, GameCom Memphis(at the end of Sept), ShadowCon(early Jan) and MidSouthCon(end of March) and I'm hoping to see Brian take it to all three for years to come. 


Here's another pic from last night's session. We had already slain a bunch of monsters, victims of the BattleMage's fireballs are in the foreground and then the Fighters went to work on the ones in the room with the small pools. At this point we are about to face a bunch of others in a room with a Big Pool. The fighters are slugging it out and the battle mage(one of the mini's on the far right) is about to fire off his Wand of Lightning to fry them, the Cleric is watching our backs and my Gnomling Ill/Thief is trying to stay out of the way. We use mini's for the PCs and MapTool tokens on the screen for the bad guys. There are also onscreen tokens for each of our characters. When we want to move our characters, we move the mini where we want to go and the GM moves that Character's Token, which reveals more of the map(we are using the Fog of War and Vision Blocking features of MapTool). All the tokens with a Red X are monsters that were slain. And yes, we've already looted their bodies. :) 




The next pic is later on as the party swims through a water filled tunnel while using Potions of Waterbreathing. We are tracking down the BBG(Big Bad Guy), aka The Boss of this dungeon so we can kill him/it. We have moved the mini's out of the way for a clear shot. We swam by and the fighter(Rocky) in the lead didn't see the Giant Crayfish in the side room. Look at the lower right and you'll see some dots with what looks like shadows that angle off. That is a portcullis that is blocking the passage way. This is a good view of the Fog of War that has been cleared but the bars are blocking some vision, thus the Shadows(if you've used MapTool vision blocking and FoW you know what I'm talking about). After this combat we opened the gate and moved on through the passage that was revealed as we moved along. That was where we finished the session. 



I probably won't be posting any more pics until after our next session(Next Sunday). However, depending on the questions that I get, I may make another couple of posts this week. I'm thinking a FAQ and a History(or how did this thing come about) are due. 

More later... 

8 comments:

  1. Hey nice setup! I have a few questions. :-)

    Got any videos?
    Is the projection easy on the eyes?
    What software are you using to represent the game? (e.g. RPTools, etc.)

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  2. Sorry, no videos yet.
    Yes, the projection is very easy on the eyes. In person it looks great.
    We use MapTool. The GM has a computer running the MapTool server and a second computer signed in as the Player computer which is running the projector.

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  3. Store bought cookies on a table like that... SHAME ON YOU! :-)

    Great rig you have there! How stable is the beneath table setup? Is it badly susceptible to being kicked or wrestled into (by dogs of course)?

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  4. Last couple of weeks we've been light on snacks. We usually have a bunch of stuff, combo store bought and homemade.

    You have to remember that this is still in the prototype stage. The undertable setup wouldn't bee good for animals and/or children. We used to have cats, but right now we are pet-less and our "child" just turned 14 so we don't have those worries. I've already recommended to Brian that he build something around the projector area for protection, but we'll have to see what he comes up with. Right now the size of the table means that you can belly up to the table and unless you have really long legs you won't bump it. The back of the rig faces the GM so it can't be kicked from that side. He was mostly interested in getting it done so we could playtest it before we take it to GameCon Memphis. I'm sure that it will develop more and I'll try to post pics of every time we use it, at least one or two.

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  5. This is great! This is exactly the kind of table I'm looking for. Could you give some more detailed measurements?
    Table height x length x width?
    Player area width.
    Mirror size/type/cost?
    Projector specs?
    Projection surface size and material?
    Cost?
    Things you'd change with the current setup?

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  6. I would be incredibly interested in the specs as well. I'm not "handy" when it comes to building stuff, but I can follow directions/measurements/etc. I'd really love to incorporate this into a table my friends and I are about to start.

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  7. Seems like this is a really old post, but I'm very interested in what material you are projecting onto. We've been using a projector from the ceiling for years, but would love to mount it underneath instead...

    ReplyDelete
  8. Seems like this is a really old post, but I'm very interested in what material you are projecting onto. We've been using a projector from the ceiling for years, but would love to mount it underneath instead...

    ReplyDelete