Quiver Crest: Ice Valley [UDK]
polycounter lvl 10
Hey again Polycounters!
So since I wrapped up my previous cryengine environment and the school semester that followed, I landed a gig at Insomniac Games! I've been there for about a year now, and it's been loads of fun! I'd like to double that fun with another personal gauntlet in UDK.
The Challenge:
Make an expansive environment in UDK that takes advantage of the material editor's features. Do something that really pushes the limit on surface definition / texturing to tell the story that needs to be told from concept. This is really a material focused challenge, but assets still need to tie into a cohesive narrative and drive some emotional impact from the viewer.
Concept Art / Flavor Text:
Once again, we enter the world of Galestorm, the setting of a high flying, hack-n-slash, Open-World RPG with a lot of platforming elements. The basic aesthetic theme of the world is that the sky is the ocean. Towns and cities are built on tall sky scrapers of rock and give off a coastal feel. The world's flora is derived from maritime shape language (coral reefs), and airships are the main form of transportation.
This region takes place in the far north where things get a little icy and cold. The Quiver Crests are home to all sorts of critters, but most notably ice dragons. While intelligent and keen with magic, they live primitively in hallowed ice dens beneath tall shelves of ice cut from the wind that blows there.
Here are some of the crags I visited before selecting the anvil type shape that I mostly ran with.
...And here are the composition thumbnails. It's crunch time over at Insomniac so I gotta say I did a pretty lazy job with these. In the end I think I ended up with something compositionally interesting enough to be a jumping off point for 3D, but I'll let you guys decide that. Please crit everything!.
Last but not least (or maybe it is least) some first steps in udk with a pass at an ice material. Normal map is from a filter from filter forge, i'm working on creating my own based on it.
I figure the best thing to do when starting this environment is to get the materials down first on planes and basic shapes... THEN get into the modeling and sculpting of assets.
Modularizing this thing will be interesting as I'm not sure how to break this concept down yet. If anyone has advice or ideas out there, don't hesitate!
So since I wrapped up my previous cryengine environment and the school semester that followed, I landed a gig at Insomniac Games! I've been there for about a year now, and it's been loads of fun! I'd like to double that fun with another personal gauntlet in UDK.
The Challenge:
Make an expansive environment in UDK that takes advantage of the material editor's features. Do something that really pushes the limit on surface definition / texturing to tell the story that needs to be told from concept. This is really a material focused challenge, but assets still need to tie into a cohesive narrative and drive some emotional impact from the viewer.
Concept Art / Flavor Text:
Once again, we enter the world of Galestorm, the setting of a high flying, hack-n-slash, Open-World RPG with a lot of platforming elements. The basic aesthetic theme of the world is that the sky is the ocean. Towns and cities are built on tall sky scrapers of rock and give off a coastal feel. The world's flora is derived from maritime shape language (coral reefs), and airships are the main form of transportation.
This region takes place in the far north where things get a little icy and cold. The Quiver Crests are home to all sorts of critters, but most notably ice dragons. While intelligent and keen with magic, they live primitively in hallowed ice dens beneath tall shelves of ice cut from the wind that blows there.
Here are some of the crags I visited before selecting the anvil type shape that I mostly ran with.
...And here are the composition thumbnails. It's crunch time over at Insomniac so I gotta say I did a pretty lazy job with these. In the end I think I ended up with something compositionally interesting enough to be a jumping off point for 3D, but I'll let you guys decide that. Please crit everything!.
Last but not least (or maybe it is least) some first steps in udk with a pass at an ice material. Normal map is from a filter from filter forge, i'm working on creating my own based on it.
I figure the best thing to do when starting this environment is to get the materials down first on planes and basic shapes... THEN get into the modeling and sculpting of assets.
Modularizing this thing will be interesting as I'm not sure how to break this concept down yet. If anyone has advice or ideas out there, don't hesitate!
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