[CE3] - ScottHomer's Destruction Dioramas
G'day everyone!
I have been putting together for the last few weeks a small diorama scene in my own time. Ive had the concept in my mind for the last few years, and finally I had some spare time to work on it. Ive spent the last few months doing non-3d stuff (magazine articles and talks!), so now thats out of the way ive been putting my non-work time into putting together a new scene based on a chunk literally torn from a stately home in a neo-classical style.
Where im currently at: A few weeks in, currently focussing on the walls, floors and ceilings and hero assets. Will be moving onto the rear brick walls and the ceiling next.
References:
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The blockout: (highpoly blockout..):
Highpoly work: (Built in max, sculpted and rendered in Zbrush)
Winged-back Chesterfield Sofa:
Baroque fireplace: (I added a rose in the center of the plaque)
Any critique would be most appreciated, ill try and keep the thread updated as often as possible as the project picks up steam. Ive got some strong ideas for the direction of the diorama, aslong as time allows.
Cheers all!
I have been putting together for the last few weeks a small diorama scene in my own time. Ive had the concept in my mind for the last few years, and finally I had some spare time to work on it. Ive spent the last few months doing non-3d stuff (magazine articles and talks!), so now thats out of the way ive been putting my non-work time into putting together a new scene based on a chunk literally torn from a stately home in a neo-classical style.
Where im currently at: A few weeks in, currently focussing on the walls, floors and ceilings and hero assets. Will be moving onto the rear brick walls and the ceiling next.
References:
----
The blockout: (highpoly blockout..):
Highpoly work: (Built in max, sculpted and rendered in Zbrush)
Winged-back Chesterfield Sofa:
Baroque fireplace: (I added a rose in the center of the plaque)
Any critique would be most appreciated, ill try and keep the thread updated as often as possible as the project picks up steam. Ive got some strong ideas for the direction of the diorama, aslong as time allows.
Cheers all!
Replies
No crits from me sir, The texture work is coming along nicely. Your logs don't look very 'log-like'....
Good to see your back to the 3D
It looks great so far,really cool wood textures/materials. Fireplace looks really nice with those details, however material or texture might be a bit noisy or it's just me (just the fireplace). I would add some more small detailed props near the fire place. Paper scraps? below some ref pics, hope that help.
Anyways, it's a minor nitpick but hey, all in the name of making sick art eh?
Looks good so far though!
How are you achieving the splintered wood effect on the wall pieces? Just alpha'ing it out? Might be good to give them a bit of thickness too.
If I had to offer any crits
- in the center of each wood panel inset into the wall, there is a very repetitive line/detail, and at the top of those insets, the wear is also repeated across each one and is quite noticeable. Maybe a variation?
- tile floor,the use of the white tile with two dark spots on it, you only see them focused near the edge, and the bottom left of the image there are two identical tiles side by side.
- two support beams on the right, have identical ends and are side by side.
Any plans to damage the chair at all? Really bad ass start sir! Subscribed.
Something that bugged me a bit is how the panels are teared up really nice with alphas but the beams aren't. It would ad great detail if you got that in, both for the planks and the beams.
Looking forward for some tasty updates!
One thing I noticed is the wood grain running vertical on all the panels. As per your wood panel design and where the seams/joins are I'd expect the horizontal panels to have the grain running horizontally not vertically across all the panel strips.
Texturing is awesome and really detailed.
I'd try to give the "planks" for the walls a slight variation in color as different orientations of the wood grain makes it change, just like in the image nathdevlin posted.
Also I was wondering if you could share some bits on how you setup CE3 for presentation shots like these?
I noticed that the planks under the floor, on the right side have some weird transparency issues on the caps. Hopefully I'm explaining that right. Great stuff though!
@LANKUS MAXIMUS - Thanks for the comments dude! I've actually sculpted and baked the logs out, they're in the screenshot above untextured. I used masks and the noisemaker in zbrush to give the base-mesh in the highpoly shot the effect of bark on the rounded sides and damaged the ends as though they have been cut down. Hopefully will update the thread within the next few days with progress! Once again, cheers for the crit.
@MGE_PM - Thanks for the crit man! Ive been working on the fireplace textures this evening, Ive pulled the noise back and actually miss it now, I might try and find a happy medium in terms of noise without contrast as it is quite garish atm. As for small props? Absolutely! I will be littering the scene with this stuff once i've polished the crap out of the base. I tend to always work downwards in scale, starting with the base objects and focal points and then focus my attentions on the smaller assets at the end. I will definitely be doing the poker set for sure!
@lukepham101 - I agree 100% dude, I took a look a the design of the cushion tonight, will hopefully have that updated for the next image update. The cushion was a space-filler in terms of the chair's texture sheet and added in as an afterthought, it is mirrored down he middle which means that I may have some issues with the pattern I eventually use, but im sure I can work something out!
@Liam (PogoP) - I've been trying to avoid doing too much in the way of alpha edges on the wooden beams as they can cause alot more work than they're actually worth. With the limited time ive had to work on scene im trying to maximize visual impact and hopefully (fingers crossed) when the rest of the destruction comes in the floorboards wont look odd without alphas. The panelling is alpha'ed out, I sculpted the damage in zbrush and then baked it to really low geo and then cut around the alpha. I've left a bunch of space to do some back-face stuff for these, but I think you're right that the damage needs more volume, which should be achievable with POM.
@shabba - Thanks for the critique man! The best kind of fixes, easy, quick fixes. Ive fixed the majority of the issues tonight, so hopefully will get an update towards the end of the week.
@Alphavader - Thanks dude!
@sltrOlsson - Cheers for the critique dude! I'm wary at this stage of doing too much alpha edge damage, ive had bad experiences before of spending hours getting it to line up properly with little or no visual benefit. I felt that doing the damage the way I have so far is the "cleanest" way to convincingly create the edge damage. The cleaner damage in these areas will be explained as the project goes on, its going to take a pretty radical turn hopefully over the coming weeks.
@Micahel and Mats - Cheers guys, really appreciate the kind words. Keep checking in over the next few weeks, hopefully will get some progress in as the weeks go by.
@Nath - thanks for the critique dude! I cant believe I didn't notice that, ive fixed it for the most part tonight, the only major contributing factor was the fact that I had a 2x tiling wood detail map on the panels that all went in the same direction, I've removed this now and put all of the normal map detail in the main normal, it seems to hold up and looks a little less weird with the wood going in the direction you would expect. Good spot dude!
@Fnitrox - I've now fixed the wood, hopefully will have an update this week at some point! Ill also try and do a breakdown of the diorama once I've finished it, depending on how busy I am at the time, its really simple to set up!
@Kenny + Vema - Thanks guys! Really appreciate you stopping you by
@Sheckee - The transparency issues actually appear to by caused by the magic wand tool I used in Photoshop to remove the background on the screenshot, doh! Good spot though, I need to find a decent way around that.
Thanks for the critique guys, I really really appreciate it, after a few weeks of working on something it is sometimes really hard to see the wood for the trees!
Only thing I'm missing is a focal point, something to tell the story of the place. The fact that it's torn out at the edges implies some sort of symbolism, at least I think it would be cool to go that route, maybe have a bunch of letters strewn out, some turned to ashes in the fireplace even. Just a small thing really that evokes the viewers imagination.
I really like the Chandeliered lower floor in the blockout. Hope you can incorporate that with what you currently have without losing some of the effectiveness of those beams sticking out as silhouette information.
@Loomprix - Thanks man! I really appreciate the encouragement, sometimes can be hard to find motivation after a day at work
@Paul - Thank you so much dude, big fan of your work
I will definitely be including the floor below, ive done alot of the high-poly stuff for it now, ive just got to do some experimentation with the best way to map the broken edges whilst maintaining the integrity of the ceiling's coving. Any ideas? Cheers dude!
@Dazz3r - Thanks you dude! Really appreciate it
Will be watching this closely. :thumbup:
@S620ex1- Thanks man! I am definitely not badass...:D
@SamirDuran- Cheers man, its been a while but ive finally got updates. See below
Ive been working on and off on the scene for the last couple of weeks, Its been great to bust out a prop as and when time allows. Still a lot left to do but its getting there. Compositionally I'm thinking a few things will be moved around to make sense of the space.
Cheers dudes!
The whole scene is a bit desaturated/dull. It would be cool to see more saturation, Maybe in the painting and the chair. I hate to be stereotypical when it comes to this kind of furniture, But that read leather would add a lot of flavor.
I really like the motion effect, But the way the lamp is falling doesn't make sense. Unless it was falling past the scene from a floor above, it would likely "tip" off the level. It looks as if someone held it over the edge, and dropped it atm.
All and all, Looking awesome. Looking forward to seeing more.
Interesting choice with adding parts of the lower storey, risky for the composition but I'll watch with interest how it all will come together. Judging from the falling stuff you want to make the place look as if it's falling apart? Perhaps adding some heavy deformation to the structure would be cool. Anyway, you can use that effect as a compositional tool I think.
- I really like the idea of the motion blur but I think it could do with some more work. At first I thought it was a mistake because the chandelier looked so blurred
- I agree with @s620ex1 about introducing little splashes of colour around the scene
- The grey wall material looks like concrete due to its glossiness but I'm guessing it's meant to be plaster? Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong though
Keep up the good work, looking forward to seeing how this progresses
something subtle like the attached perhaps?
That could be achieved with a vis area in Sandbox, if my memory serves me correctly.
@s60 - I couldn't agree more actually, I actually dropped the saturation out of the scene in an effort to make it look more "realistic". It turns out that what was making it look unrealistic was more the break in the scaling of some of the assets which ive hopefully been able to address.
@Aimbiz- I made the chair leather originally, and again last night and for some reason it just really broke the composition, I think this stems from the fact that the chair and the fireplace really fought for attention. Ill post up some screenshots of this tonight.
@Neil (hows it going dude?!
Cheers for the critique man! I really appreciate it.
@Maz- I agree 100% hopefully ive been able to fix this below, ive pushed the orange light emitted from the fireplace to hopefully fight some of those blue-er tones.
@Pookhan - For screenshots I usually either place a background behind my scene in Cryengine, or use the magic wand tool to select the assets and delete the background in photoshop. In terms of lighting in game I tent to drop out all of the sky and sun values in the time of day, leaving me with a blank canvas to work from.
@RexM - See below! Thanks for the critique dude, Ive actually made a smashed lamp high poly and I thought against it..maybe ill bake it and pretend I was going to do it all along...
I had a bunch of awesome critique from you guys, Facebook and the guys at work did some big brush strokes on the scene to try and push it into a direction I am a little happier with. Ive changed the lighting, pushed the saturation slightly and dropped the idea of having a lower floor area. Ive dropped the falling lamp also as many people said that the blur was breaking it for them.
The only strange spot i see is on the wall, above the chair. There is a faint shadow about the size of the picture frame. Not sure if that is texture, Or in fact a shadow, But it looks a bit strange.
Otherwise, Killer work!
Edit:. Ah. My bad. Looked at the first page and saw that the picture used to be right there. So I'd probably take that out of the texture. personally. To someone who hasn't followed the making of the piece, They won't know it was were a picture sat before.
It's meant to look like dust buildup on the walls. While the picture was there, dust was accumulating on the walls and on the picture, so when you remove it, there's a clean spot.
I love the most recent update, Scott. I don't think I got to comment on the last one, but the blur was throwing me off as well. This new presentation is much better.
With the added brightness, one thing that's standing out even more now is the pure black fireplace. And I'm not sure what else you have in mind for this, but any thought on smaller decoration pieces? Specifically on the fireplace mantle or even one of those metal 'sticks' for poking the fire down on the floor :poly121:
I like the idea, I just think it looks strange right now. It may be because the value of the mark the picture created is too similar to that of the shadow behind the chair, Implying its a shadow.
not to mention, If you've ever moved homes, You will know that the portions of floor/wall/ceiling that are covered by something look like they did when you moved in and would be lighter, And everything else is darker, dirtier, and dingier. This spot is the opposite.
The mark just doesn't read right atm, IMO
Edit:. If you were to do the mark, This would make more sense. A bit too bright, But you get the point. I don't think it adds a lot to the room in either case....JMO
Including a picture hook on the discoloured part of the wall might make the back story more apparent?
Ah, yeah, when you put it like that, it makes a lot more sense! Paintover looks good too
One thing that caught my attention are the wood planks that are sticking out of the wall, they seem repetitive, like they are almost lined up. I would bring a few of them deeper into the wall and maybe reduce them, as dtschultz mentioned.
Otherwise, your presentations are great, especially the high poly renders, I love them
Going to follow this thread!
@dtschultz - Heya dude! Im not sure if I can remove half of them due to the nature of the way ive mapped the texture, but I can try and create some variation, perhaps by adding some extra details in these spots.
@leleuxart - Yep, its supposed to be dust build up, im going to try and explain it (visually) this weekend, I haven't had a good extended period to work on it for some time so im going to focus on finishing this bad boy off now ive had some time pick up a wealth of critique.
@shinobix - Thank you dude! I really appreciate it
@ZeroBigSis - A picture hook would be perfect dude, I'm definitely going to add that. Cheers!
@Wingednosering - Thank you dude, I really appreciate the encouragement, its not always easy to do personal work after a long day at work! Hopefully I can do it justice over the weekend.
@SeveredSon - Thank you Severed!
@riot - Im going to see what I can do this weekend, maybe I can bend a few of them away from the camera to add alittle more depth. I definitely planned to do some pipe work over the weekend. Cheers for the input dude!
@serriffe - Thank you
Updatez!
So, I haven't managed to do much work on this scene for a while. I put it down for a couple of weeks to let the dust settle so I didn't overwork it. In that time I did some work on the wall paper, and also started a second diorama. Im going to go back to the scene this weekend and fix a number of awesome critique ive had plus add the finishing touches.
Critique to fix:
- Dust mark on wall, resolve it.
- Add more depth to the planks at the sides.
- Add ash buildup around the fireplace
- Add pokers and brushes
- Add glowing embers to the logs in the fireplace
- Dust around the scene, on the floor at the edges, on assets. Full dust pass.
- Cobwebs
- Dust sheets
- Pipework in walls + running water.
- Coal bin
- Books on floor
- Polish up all textures (some are very..very...work in progress)
- Soot on fireplace
And...ive started on a Diner Diorama, with the focal point, a jukebox! What diner would be complete without one eh?
The plan will be to create another diorama of a similar level of destruction as the stately home, but this one in a Airstream diner, and work this into a set of around 4 similar ones.
Im still to do a full Zbrush pass, a damage pass etc. Then I plan on baking it all out and getting stuck into texturing.
Generally it looks really slick , I think the webs'd be a great addition but I think when you do then don't stick to the thin spindley webs that won't really read and go for those nasty thick matted webs that build up in corners and stuff, A couple of thick ones between peeling wall paper and the wall and on the ceiling light could look really nice I think. Though getting them to read like webs may be difficult... food for though ;P
http://s151.photobucket.com/user/twosmokingit/media/web073.jpg.html
Also the transition between the floor tiles and the edging around the front of the fireplace is a bit sudden if you know what I mean? I'm not sure how it's been textured but maybe you could add some dark sort of dust build up graduating towards the floor or maybe even a cheeky faked poly with some faux AO on it.
Anyways, it looks really nice man. Be proud
Good work. Can't wait to see the finished shots
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@S6 - Thank you man! Ive got a final shot to post shortly
Nice man, can't wait to see the webs
Its finished! I've worked round the clock this weekend, hopefully addressing the majority of the critique I've received over the past few months.
- Dust mark on wall, resolve it. - Added hook
- Add more depth to the planks at the sides. - Bent boards backwards in places, semi happy with the result.
- Add ash buildup around the fireplace - Did a full zbrush sculpt of the ash buildup under the fire.
- Add pokers and brushes - I didnt get enough time to add these.
- Add glowing embers to the logs in the fireplace - Added the embers as an emissive decal on the logs.
- Dust around the scene, on the floor at the edges, on assets. Full dust pass. - Added dust in key places around the scene.
- Cobwebs - Added in key areas around the scene.
- Dust sheets - I didnt manage to add these, I figured they would only hide the detail.
- Pipework in walls + running water. - Added a modular pipe set with some decals.
- Coal bin - I didnt get time to add this either.. I added a mouse with the help of Matt Waggle!
- Books on floor - Added around the base of the chair.
- Polish up all textures (some are very..very...work in progress) - Done
- Soot on fireplace - Added soot around the fire
So yeah, I'm going to call this one done and move onto the next diorama this week. Thanks for the help folks.