Hey gang!
I like fountains ! Always had. Actually now that I think about it, that was the one thing that got me interested in 3D, more than 15 years ago. I've been thinking about making a UE4 scene over the last few weeks, so here we go!
The scene : An old tree (kind of a giant old ficus, I love their roots) sits at the center of an old fountain. Its roots dive into the water, and overflow all around. Its branches lay low and form a canopy that will blend with a pitch black sky with stars. These stars will also blend into the scene as some sorts of floating light particles. The main light source will be the glowing water. Steps lead to the core of the fountain, which is shaped like a +. You need to swim until you get under the tree if you want to reap the benefits of this enchanted place. I see it as a health or mana regeneration level.
I would like that bio luminescence mood (I'm a sucker for the world of Avatar..).
Here are the main challenges I see ahead : 1st, let's keep it somewhat stylized. Not cartoony, but in-between.
2nd, let's keep it a small (=doable in less than one lifetime
)
3rd, complex shaders and materials, even though I know my way around and I have some professional experience in UE, this will take some fiddling around.
Anyway ! I'm currently in the concept and block-out phase, obviously I'll take all of your critics and suggestions please
Quick 1st layout just to figure out what modular pieces I need + developing the style of the hero asset, the tree. Fun times in Zbrush ahead
Pillars exploration. I like the F, D,E and B ones. Feel free to let me know which one you'd pick.
Arches exploration. I used pillar D as a base.
Still not sure about the pillars...
OR
Replies
I can't choose a pillar myself either because I love them all. I would like to see both B or D with indents like E/F or H for B.
1st vizdev pass for the vegetation. Starting to develop the color palette, and the style.
I'll need to push the fantasy further, it's a bit too generic.
And thanks guys for the kind words updates soon
Your color palate looks absolutely gorgeous.
As for Pillar concepts, I think the flaring in and out on D and F look really nice, and much more stylized than some of the others. You could exaggerate that flaring a bit more in your 3D mock-up that you have started, if that is indeed the direction you want to go.
Keep up the great work! I am so excited to see where this goes.
Cheers
Can't wait to see this one finished!
I will need to rethink some of the modular pieces though.
Were you inspired by Abzu by chance? If not, I suggest you take a look at some of the shots of the underwater city!
You can make vegetation ignore time or grow on it, or even, loop!
Now that I've baked a 1st iteration of my architectural elements, I've started to rebuild the scene. Made a few last minor changes to the layout.
Modeled a 1st version of the hero asset (the tree) to see how it could sit in the scene. The answer was, meh, still needs some work. Then I did a dirty overpaint and added some vegetation. Will definitely develop this image further, I just wanted to post some updates.
going great! always eager for the notif on this thread
What kind of post process are you suggesting ? FX or color grading ? I was planning on tinting shadows in purple. But I will take care of pp much later on, when most of the base colors and values are on point.
fx bubbles, vignetting, DOF, Color Grade, Caustics for that water like this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_DODQms0ZCU, etc;
Also I almost died when the project got corrupt after an autosave crash. Fixed it after a while, but was not a fun night.