There have been a lot of bears stuck in the valley bottoms thanks to a rather unforgiving and persistent snow pack, and this has brought up lots of thoughts about bear safety and the decision processes we do (or at least should) go through when we recreate in and around grizzly and black bear habitat (not to mention all the other wildlife we share this place with. Initially, this little project started as a way to practice using bear spray in a safe yet realistic environment (with a virtual bear coming at you), but over the last week, I have decided I want it to me educational in a more expansive way, asking us both to take the necessary precautions to keep ourselves safe (i.e. make noise, take bear spray and know how to use it); but also to reflect on the impacts of our choices to inhabit these spaces with these magnificent creatures. I haven’t got time to compose a detailed written post (it’s my birthday weekend and I have to prep for some visitors, so this is really just a photo dump of the progress so far (the final video of the first prototype is in the portfolio section for now).
I modelled the bear spray canister in Blender and had a lot of fun with perfecting materials (even though they don’t transfer across to Unity perfectly and I had to redo a couple of them). I made the label image in Inkscape (loosely based on the label of the bear spray I have at home) and the bear model is courtesy of Profactor Inc., via the Unity Asset Store.
