[UE4] Environment: ¨The Ancient Ruins of Khala¨
polycounter lvl 4
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Hello dear polygonians!"The Ancient Ruins of Khala" is an environment piece I will be creating in the upcoming months, based in an awesome piece of art by the super talented Sergei Sarichev (more from Sergei: www.artstation.com/artist/sarichev).
The chosen artwork is this one:
Sarichev 2016
My main goal is to create a game ready AAA environment piece in Unreal Engine 4, that serves as a portfolio piece. I also want to include work in Substance Designer, and achieve nice lighting and an interesting composition. An awesome challenge! Sadly there are tons of environment art I cannot share in my portfolio at the time, so I`m dying to have a great piece in there!
For those who wonder I´ll be working with the following software: ZBrush, 3Ds Max, Blender, Topogun 2, Substance Painter, Substance Designer, Photoshop and UE4 to achieve this piece.
Sergei also took the time to detail the creative process behind this piece and gameplay plans, which I intend to keep.
Sarichev 2016
I will be doing weekly updates every Thursday from now on until it´s finished. I also may or may not post updates other days! I plan to take 3 months with this one, but you never know.
With Sergeis approval I´m ready to begin working on this right away! But first, a little about the lore of the temple. I wrote a small fragment of the story I imagined to guide me while working on it.
LORE
Since this is a practice piece, I really encourage all of you to criticize anything you may think it can be done better! I really want to learn a lot from this piece, so and C&C would be really awesome!
With no further ado, I´ll get right to it!
My main goal is to create a game ready AAA environment piece in Unreal Engine 4, that serves as a portfolio piece. I also want to include work in Substance Designer, and achieve nice lighting and an interesting composition. An awesome challenge! Sadly there are tons of environment art I cannot share in my portfolio at the time, so I`m dying to have a great piece in there!
For those who wonder I´ll be working with the following software: ZBrush, 3Ds Max, Blender, Topogun 2, Substance Painter, Substance Designer, Photoshop and UE4 to achieve this piece.
Sergei also took the time to detail the creative process behind this piece and gameplay plans, which I intend to keep.
Sarichev 2016
I will be doing weekly updates every Thursday from now on until it´s finished. I also may or may not post updates other days! I plan to take 3 months with this one, but you never know.
With Sergeis approval I´m ready to begin working on this right away! But first, a little about the lore of the temple. I wrote a small fragment of the story I imagined to guide me while working on it.
LORE
Khala was not mercenary barracks, like many Lords liked to think.
It used to be a Temple where hundreds of young people were educated in the arts
of calm, wisdom and the sword. It was an ancient order in charge
of maintaining peace between the 8 kingdoms of men, and for 1300 years it fulfilled its
duty. But neither the boldest warriors of the mortal realms could stand against
the ultimate challenge.
Nobody saw them coming, since they never crossed the gates at the foot of the mountain.
No one heard their approach for their footsteps made no sound.
The only one who noticed their arrival was the wind, who tried to alarm them throwing strong
gusts that shook the banners of the Holy Temple of Khala. Nobody could
anticipate the arrival of the Dragons.
Since this is a practice piece, I really encourage all of you to criticize anything you may think it can be done better! I really want to learn a lot from this piece, so and C&C would be really awesome!
With no further ado, I´ll get right to it!
Replies
Hey guys!
So I started out the blocking phase. Trying to get a nice playable level. Had a bit of a hard time figuring out some distances and sizes, and there´s still some work to do on this stage, but I´m getting somewhere! Also exploring options for some points of interest, and playing with the silouhettes a little. Quite fun!
I decided that the temple will be (besides on the hillside of a rocky mountain) on a cliff by the ocean... because why not!
I´m also still trying to figure out if the bell is a good idea, and how much more I want to extend the level beyond the concept art. Anyhow, this is tons of fun! And any suggestions are more than welcome!
Cheers!!
Hi guys!
The first Update Thursday is here! So I bring some more screenshots of the level, finally blocked out. Its all in UE4, and I was just trying to get the main forms in there. No detail, no destruction, nothing very cool to look at yet. But Its an important part of the process, and I really hope you all can see where I´m headed with this. Tomorrow things finally start getting real!
So guys, any C&C is really more than welcome at this point, it would really help me!
Thanks for checking this out!
Sorry if there are any image duplicates! Had a rough time with my internet conection
It´s just a default Sky Sphere with some parameters tweaked by me. Nothing too fancy.
Here, take a look
Hope it helps!
Hi guys!
So, I had some time to get back to Khala. I´m currently trying out some materials for the columns and steps. Thus far, I like the columns, but maybe I should go with something a little more refined for the steps, more like the column maybe. We´ll see
Here´s a screenshot from the engine
Cheers!
Cheers!
Hello guys!
So, update Thursday is here :awesome: So, I kept on working on the modular pieces for the Temple. I made some steps and changed a bit the color scheme on the rock itself. Once I´m happy with the material (smart) maybe I`ll upload it so Substance Share
Usually I´d begin by blocking the floor and walls with procedural generated textures, but I´m having an issue with my SDesigner license. So I´m working that out, hopefully I´ll be able to get to it soon.
So, that´s it for today. Tomorrow I´ll have some free time, so expect a small update ^^
Cheers!
Hello guys!
I´ve been working on the modular pieces a bit, and I have a few new ones to show. I plan to make a few more to reuse across the whole level. I also retextured the column and steps I had. Hope to get critics on this ones
So I included some closeups and an unlit screenshots from UE
Cheers!
Keep up the steady progress!
Yes, I agree. I think the procedurality look in the textures is happening due to the designer material I created for this. I`m absolutely going to review that, specially the edges. I intend to make this PBR, and thus far those albedos just wont do it.
Thank you for the feedback! Hope you can stick around to give me extra C&C in the future
Cheers man!
Hi guys!
Nothing to fancy today to share. I had some free time today at work and decided to get a hero prop done, since I dont have any other project files here. I received some feedback from a fellow artist who said that the normal should be inverted, with the details popping out, but this is a floor piece, so I think maybe this makes sense? Maybe? Any thoughts on this guys?
This is the floor piece you can see in the center of the concept, just at the begining. I was confused at first, since it looks a bit like a mayan calendar, which wouldn´t make much sense, since everything else is chinese looking.
Mayan Calendar:
http://www.astronomiaenchile.cl/media/k2/items/cache/e9c724eeb5636d1c1c1a2c2e85d40377_XL.jpg
I´m also creating a new version of the main stone texture I´ll be using to texture (and retexture) every stone prop. So, this albedo is just a placeholder.
I found the original concept of the Dragon fighting the Phoenix in Google, didn´t do any backsearch to find the original artist yet
Cheers buds!
Hi guys!
Finally started the main textures for the environment in Substance Designer. I did the base Mud Texture which will cover all the surface under the broken floor.
In these areas mainly. I went for something a little more wet, since I figured everything would be super moisty and covered in pebbles and dead leaves.
Here´s the texture made in Substance Designer
Here are some tests in Unreal
Already started working on the main floor tiles textures, will be uploading them soon.Hope you can give me C&C guys!
Cheers!
Lately (luckily) I´ve been having tons of work between the studio and freelance, so sadly this will get delayed.
I will update the thread, but it will happen lot less frequently now.
Cheers buds!
Hi guys!
Update Thursday is here! I had this epiphany where I realized I want to aproach this environment diferently, so I created this cobblestone texture in designer for the main floor. The idea is to have a shader with a linear interpolation based on high between this texture and the mud texture above, to have some cool effects.
Please leave feedback or any comments ^^
If you guys want to check other renders or the graph for this one just check this link https://www.artstation.com/artwork/Y45kq
Cheers!
Hi guys!
I made a rather quick iteration of the last material I made (the cobblestone) to get bigger tiles for the floor. Still will use the cobblestones somewhere.
And I ran some tests to try something out. Made a vertex paint with a linear interpolation based on the tiles height map to blend the newest tiles with my mud texture. Here are some results
Here you can see the materials by themselves and then blended. It was a quick n dirty test, but I feel I can do some very cool effects with this.
Anyhow
See you guys!
Hi guys!
Some massive progress here to show to you today. So, basically almost all the geometry of the background area was done. I created some modular pieces that I used to create almost the entire back buildings and a lot of areas I will be showing when I`m done.
I worked on the mood and added Fog and some particle effects (some mist and a sparkly dust to the urn). Also focused on fixing the POV on the camera and right angle to get it as close to the concept as possible.
I created again from scrath the basestone in the floor (no longer has the dragon drawing). But all the foreground area still has a long way to go.
I plan to get all geo and props (including de urn) by the end of the week, so I can spend all the next weekend with vegetation and adjusting light. Hopefully it will be done by then.
Would love to get some feedback from you guys at this stage!
Cheers!!
To begin with Designer I would recommend the Allegorithmic YouTube channel. Very nice material. If you can get Rogelio Olguin`s tutorial tho, in the Gnomon Workshop, you should definitely go for it. Pure gold
Hi guys!
Some more improvement. I finished the placeholder pieces, like the ones in the floor, and added extra assets for beauty and vegetation. I also did the Urn prop, but the lightmap its still a WIP, I´m still trying to figure out the way to make it look good.
I used Speedtree to make the vegetation.
Still have to fix many things, specially lighting and composition wise, but I´m getting there!
Please leave any C&C
Cheers! ^^
Hi guys!
Its finally done! After a few months working on my spare time, I´ve finished this piece. Here it is!
Thanks to everyone who helped and gave me constructive C&C!
Cheers!
Otto
The light is a bit inconsistant, If the scene is light only by natural light some of the colors and intensity of light is hard to understand.
For example the intensity on the vase vs the back pillar to the left of it. And the wall behind the vase the color and directions of that.
The composition from the original could be improved with overlapping the vase on the left with the roof behind it. It kills the depth with them that close to each other and not overlapping.
Nice seeing some substance designer. I like to use that as well (:
@Ootrick Sure thing! Will share a breakdown of all that soon enough as I have some spare time! And thank you
@rgbeard Thanks man. And cool nickname btw lol! Yes, I agree. Had to take some measures to force composition a bit without going totally away from the concept art. Will remember this for the next environment! Regarding the Urn and the roof behind it, I had a hard time figuring if I wanted it to overlap or not. Finally decided to go with this option, since I really liked the idea letting the roof visible. But I see your point and I think you are right! Thanks a lot for the C&C man, helps a lot!
Cheers!
Very nice work! My only addition to this would be to work on the cliff boulders a little bit more. But overall very good. Nice color palette and composition, thumbs up!
@amirabd2130 Tanks for following man
I will be starting a new environment today, so I will leave the link late today so you can check the new process if you want
Cheers!
Your models seem to be disconnected from their natural setting, marrying these together with more vegetation will make this piece stronger. You've got hints of it in places currently, and yet the scene feels incomplete to me in others. (mainly the shot with the gong pedestal....those rocks are screaming for some form of vegetation treatment).
A bit over the top shot...but illustrates how green the tops of these ruins are in contrast to the sides.
Good luck.
In case you are interested, this is the link to the new environment I`m currently creating. Please go check it out and leave some C&C! ^^
http://polycount.com/discussion/180116/ue4-environment-police-station
Cheers!
Otto
Hi guys!
So, I decided to make a final pass on this piece to apply all the feedback you guys gave me. You all helped a lot in the process, so I felt I had to go back to fix some stuff. Here is the final results. Hope you guys like it!
And hopefully you will go check my other WIP piece
Cheers!
Otto
Hi guys!
So, I´ve received so many cool feedback I just couldn´t let it slide. I had to come back to this one last time.
Here´s the final. final. final. Update!
Cheers!
The only thing you might want to look for now is the roughness of your materials on the exposed areas to the rain, I think they are too rough right now. Maybe even add a puddle at the base of the staircase
Thanks for the kind words, @daniellooartist . And yes, @Tzur_H, I noticed that maybe a bit too late. Sadly I have to call this done right now. To many times coming back really took me out of my other project (one month to be exactly haha) and it`s getting contraproductive
Anyways, thank you a lot for your input and hopefully you can go by my new project thread too leave feedback there aswell!
http://polycount.com/discussion/180116/ue4-environment-police-station
Cheers guys, have a great new year!
Otto