[UE4] Florence street scene
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Hey guys, I've been working on this Florence street scene as a personal side project on the weekends to practice more Substance Designer/Painter/Zbrush. I've been a long time lurker of Polycount over the years but figured it was time to jump in and finally post something!
It's still WIP but I wanted to start sharing it to get any feedback and crits as I try to wrap it up. I have a few props that I want to make to fill out the street a bit more, especially in the foreground (a bike, signs, maybe a scooter or something) but I feel like it's getting to a point where I should start sharing my progress.
A few quick wip shots of some of the props so far.
A few quick wip shots of some of the props so far.
Replies
@FreneticPonies @Erwannd2d I agree, it's always felt "off" to me too. The lighting setup there has definitely got some faking going on which has made it muddy and not very easy to read. I need to use a little less of the UE3 lighting tricks and just let UE4 do its thing haha.
@JLeeD I've actually been trying to go off a bunch of different reference from the internet as well as my personal photos from when I visited there. Florence has so many variants of cobble stones with some that are really over scaled (same with some of the brick buildings). I think what might be hurting it as well is just not having props and other things to help sell the scale in the street maybe? I think I need to take another pass on this material as it's also looking a bit flat and could use some love.
@Maximum-Dev I'm actually using a Precomputed AO mask function I made on a bunch of the master materials for some of the AO Grime/Dirt on the walls in conjunction with some subtle vert painting. I think I might need to push that a little bit more though with some actual color/material variation like you said! The buildings are all looking a little similar and could use a bit more separation.
I've been super busy lately at work so I didn't get to mess with this much but I tried a new day lighting setup to see how it would look. It loses some atmosphere but I think with some tweaks, more color variation on the buildings, and getting some pops of color through signs and props, it might work!
Here's an example
Street is reflecting the environment/sky way too uniformly. It would look a lot better if you modify the specular there to break up the reflectivity also some dirt along the street sides with higher roughness would help making it more convincing.
And generally you might want to add trims on the bottom parts of the buildings so you can have some dirt building up towards the ground surface.
Also breaks on this side of the building are going the wrong direction.
I'm watching the progress.
Appreciate the feedback @Maximum-Dev!
I spent some more time on lighting as well as remaking the floor stone from scratch after getting some more practice with Substance Designer. The old one just wasn't working and was too plain, especially the roughness as you mentioned. I'm about to take another pass on some of the other materials too, like the brick and concrete to try and improve on them again as I become more comfortable in designer. I feel like I want to get them to a better spot with the lighting before I continue filling out all of the props and stuff.
I also started expanding the street so that I can play with the light direction and try to get some different camera angles of the street as the scene progress.
Here's some updated WIP shots of the street as well as a shot of the new ground cobble stone.
New angle looks way better. Overall really cool progress.
The only thing annoying me (only me) is the background tower. I'm really not sure why but I feel my eyes would've had a better time if it wasn't there. But again, that's just me. You're awesome either way!
Edit: Btw may I ask what chamfer size you have used on the wall corners?
@Maximum-Dev Thanks! I might try and play with the scale and distance of the tower, see if I can get a bit more of the sky in there. I agree it kind of blurs the read a bit like you said. I like having it in there though as it's one of the iconic "Florence" parts of the scene.
I actually don't have a chamfer on the corners yet, although I was definitely planning on having a small one on them to smooth out the lighting and add a bit of warp to the edge, especially on the ones that stick out.
I focused the last few days on knocking out the bike prop and got it baked out and first pass texture. Need to tweak the edge wear/dirt some more etc. I also setup the material in UE4 so I can use any color for the frame to add a bit of variety when I throw some of these around in the scene.
Quick Render:
In Engine:
Different color for variety
Also started making a new brick for some of the buildings in Substance Designer:
If anyone has any standout things they would change before I finish it up, let me know!