Basement Darkroom Environment

praesidenter

Hey,
I want to do a small environment that's set in the basement of an ordinary house. A photographer lives there and has a darkroom built into his basement. I aim for a dark, cluttered and kind of unsettling look with a slight 80s touch.
I love the show Fargo so my reference for the room itself is loosely based on that. I threw together a quick moodboard and I hope I can bring these looks together somehow.



Here are the first props that I'll use:

enlarger:



some chemicals:


a few books:



cardboard box:


Any C&C would be greatly appreciated. 
Thank you  

The Rizzler

Props looking real nice, no real crits. Are you planning a blockout soon or are doing one now? I'd get that sorted before you do anything more

praesidenter

Yes, I made a rough one to see where things go. Don't know why I didn't show it in the first post. Here it is:

praesidenter

worked a bit on the basement and threw it into the engine to see what's going on and to get a sense for the space. C&C always welcome.

polytom

Really nice idea for an environment project. And it's off to a good start!

Only crit that I could make at this point is that your stairs appear to be quite 'shallow'. Basement stairs usually seem quite steep and dangerous.

Looking forward to seeing this develop...

 

praesidenter

polytom said:

Really nice idea for an environment project. And it's off to a good start!

Only crit that I could make at this point is that your stairs appear to be quite 'shallow'. Basement stairs usually seem quite steep and dangerous.

I see what you mean, but I made them a bit less steep so they'd be easier to navigate. I'll keep them for now, but I might revisit them later, as this doesn't necessarily have to be playable. Thanks for the input!

Here are screenshot of the current scene. Put some props into there and had a first pass of lighting. It's still empty, so I'm working on some things to fill the place. Crits always welcome! 

polytom said:

Looking forward to seeing this develop...

 

I see what you did there

gfelton

Really neat idea! Based on how the props you've shown look, I've got pretty high hopes for what's in store. Good luck

praesidenter

Here's another prop-drop:

old washing machine:


photopaper:


plastic box


tin can:


Still a lot to do, will probably do the photos on the wall next  
C&C always appreciated!

praesidenter

Some new shots from the current state.

Used an old rigged character for a virtual photosession and created almost 60 unique photos that will be used in the whole scene. Also made a few more props and filled the whole space a bit more.

C&C as always appreciated.

ericktjoe

Looking great there. Can't wait to see the result

gfelton

This is steady progress, keep it up!

qwedeath

Quality work here, really like the mood 

AFsoft

i enjoyed watching. nicely textured props. 

praesidenter

Thanks for the kind words everyone.
Here is a small update: a door and a cabinet/shelf. Decorated it with some of the other props. 

Benvox2

Really liking the lighting!

CodeferBlue

WOW your props. Mind stating what you use? 3ds Max? Maya? Substance?

praesidenter

CodeferBlue said:

WOW your props. Mind stating what you use? 3ds Max? Maya? Substance?

Thanks!
Sure, I'm using C4D for modeling and mostly Substance Painter for the unique textures and Substance Designer for the tiling textures.

The Rizzler

Congrats on making front page. Loving the subtle bend in the shelves as well as the texturing in general, great work

Will_M

this looks really great. I want to make my own interiors also, but am kinda stuck. How do you make the collisions in a way that an UE4 character could walk around without falling through the interior?

praesidenter

The Rizzler said:

Congrats on making front page. Loving the subtle bend in the shelves as well as the texturing in general, great work

 Thanks! I try to have more of those little subtle details. They almost always make a rather simple object look more realistic and plausible.

Will_M said:

this looks really great. I want to make my own interiors also, but am kinda stuck. How do you make the collisions in a way that an UE4 character could walk around without falling through the interior?

Well, this scene is done in Unity, so I'm afraid I can't help with any Unreal-related issues, as I haven't played with that engine so far. In Unity I simply added mesh or box colliders to all relevant objects (though I'm not sure if this is the most efficient way to do this), maybe there's something similar in Unreal?

gfelton

Why use Cinema for modelling? I switched from Cinema to Max a few months ago because I found 4D's modelling tools to be atrocious, what's your experience been?

Will_M

praesidenter said:

The Rizzler said:

Congrats on making front page. Loving the subtle bend in the shelves as well as the texturing in general, great work

 Thanks! I try to have more of those little subtle details. They almost always make a rather simple object look more realistic and plausible.

Will_M said:

this looks really great. I want to make my own interiors also, but am kinda stuck. How do you make the collisions in a way that an UE4 character could walk around without falling through the interior?

Well, this scene is done in Unity, so I'm afraid I can't help with any Unreal-related issues, as I haven't played with that engine so far. In Unity I simply added mesh or box colliders to all relevant objects (though I'm not sure if this is the most efficient way to do this), maybe there's something similar in Unreal?

I've been able to figure it out on Unity, when I try to generate colliders on Unreal I fall out of the box sadly. I guess I'll use Unity until I find out how to work Unreal.

praesidenter

gfelton said:

Why use Cinema for modelling? I switched from Cinema to Max a few months ago because I found 4D's modelling tools to be atrocious, what's your experience been?

There's no doubt that there are certain limitations to Cinema. Personally I don't think, their modelling tools are that bad, but their UV tools definitely are. Right now it's just that I am used to using it somehow. I like their clean interface, I know how it works and how I can work around (most) limitations. However, they clearly do not focus on game or realtime art, I think – which is a shame.
And I always want to learn new software, but... one at a time. I'm still figuring out some things in Substance

So how was switching to Max for you? Have you used it before or did you jump into it without any pre-existing knowledge of the software?

MsFortuna

How many tris do these models have? For example this enlarger?

praesidenter

MsFortuna said:

How many tris do these models have? For example this enlarger?

The enlarger had 1807 Tris when I made the first post, but I added a few support loops since then to get a better normal map. Now it has 3704 Tris. I think I could have solved this otherwise, but this was the faster way.
Any particular other asset that you are interested in?

gfelton

praesidenter said:

So how was switching to Max for you? Have you used it before or did you jump into it without any pre-existing knowledge of the software?

It was certainly frustrating, the only other Autodesk software package I had used previously was Maya and Max felt much more challenging to get used to. While the learning curve was certainly higher for the interface, It was really rewarding to learn max because the modelling tools work very well without any real problems. But I must admit, I do certainly miss how friendly 4D's UI was, and while it isn't the best tool for modelling, the layers system makes environments a lot of fun.

G3L

This is awesome! I'm loving the textures. Any chance we can see a flat of one of the smaller props? Digging the history on some of them, feels very grounded.

praesidenter

G3L said:

This is awesome! I'm loving the textures. Any chance we can see a flat of one of the smaller props? Digging the history on some of them, feels very grounded.

Sure, here's one for the books. I wasted some space at the bottom, though it could be used for another small prop if this had to be an optimized scene :chuffed:



And sorry for the lack of updates. Life got in the way, so I had to take a break from it for some time. Hope to find some hours this weekend to work towards wrapping this up.

praesidenter

as this is a darkroom, there has to be a camera of course. So here's what I've been doing today.
(modeled by eye, so it's not a 100% representation of a Leica M2, but I think it'll do)

Earthyn

Ok that camera is impressive! loving the detail for such small props really brings the scene to life!

The one thing that sticks out to me is the stair case being too perfect? Perhaps angle a few steps or add a slight bend in the center on a couple?

gfelton

Camera looks really nice! I think you nailed it doing it bye eye, great work. 

praesidenter

Earthyn said:

Ok that camera is impressive! loving the detail for such small props really brings the scene to life!

The one thing that sticks out to me is the stair case being too perfect? Perhaps angle a few steps or add a slight bend in the center on a couple?

Thanks! You are right about the staircase, I will probably do another pass. Thanks for pointing that out

gfelton said:

Camera looks really nice! I think you nailed it doing it bye eye, great work. 

Thanks!

We also have a working clock now:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIecweH_KWI

praesidenter

Quick update with the camera now in engine and a few new small props

anMori

praesidenter said:

Quick update with the camera now in engine and a few new small props

Perfekt use of DOF! Really like the setup of the screen

praesidenter

Found some time to work on the scene & lighting. Maybe I overdid the volumetric lighting, tried to go for a bit of a hazy look. Your opinion on this is very welcomed!

gfelton

Looks very good, I like the contrasting lighting in that picture with all of the photos on the wall. Keep pushing it dude, it looks fantastic!

vertex_

What kind of GI are you using?

praesidenter

gfelton said:

Looks very good, I like the contrasting lighting in that picture with all of the photos on the wall. Keep pushing it dude, it looks fantastic!

Thanks for the feedback! I'm currently figuring out what the end "product" of this little project will be. Maybe I'll do a short flythrough video or something like this.

vertex_ said:

What kind of GI are you using?

I'm using Unity's precomputed realtime GI, but with very low bounce values to get it quite dark in the shadows (probably will tweak it further in the future).  Besides that, all the lights are realtime lights.

leleuxart

I like the volumetric look and it works well in some of the shots, but I would attribute the feeling of it being too intense to the light sources being all very similar in intensities(or at least appearing that way), especially the red and blue lights. I'd try breaking those up a little more and localizing the haze to the stronger light sources. Keep it subtle on the softer lights

cyberkho

well done man you nailed the atmosphere...and the assets are well textured to match the hole environment...

Nicorepe

Loving the mood of the scene man. I feel it like a killer's room or something with that lighting.

haffy

This is an old thread I know, but I want to add to it as it is a great idea of a scene. Would love to se a remake of this with current technology.

The scene looks very promessing, great job especially on the details. I had a darkroom a few years ago and was very active (nerdy) about how to develop and such. I would recoment you to add a ventilation system to protect from the chemicals, a dustcovering solution like a plastic curtains around the wet area and be carefull about using the red light at the same time as white light. Maby a switch in the scene that switches between them, that is close to the wet area where the user of the darkroom will work.
I would use the transparent plastic, not the dark one for the environment feel. Google seach:


Just my thoughts, hope it helps.