[UE4] Columbia Scene - (Based on Hitman 2)

garcellano

Alright, so I've decided to make a thread on a scene that caught my interest. This is a concept art piece by Carlos NCT for the Hitman 2 game: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/8lbWPm (This is for the Columbia map in the game) 

I only played Hitman (2016) and not the sequel (I might, though, it's tempting). This scene will get me at least to focus on  foliage and on areas that I normally don't focus on. I'll be dissecting the concept, and will move forward from there, with the block out phase.

I've added a few other concepts on my reference board that were also part of the Columbia map.



Here are some references from Columbia that I grabbed off of online. Most of them were from the Lost City (Ciudad Perdida), the Darién Gap (swampland by Panama & Columbia), La Ciudad Perdida - Santa Marta, and any jungle or swamp images I could find that's in or nearby Columbia.


The reference board, as far as the art quality I'm aiming for, is inspired by Tim Simpson (Pixelmasher), from his ArtStation Challenge video blogs. For the art quality, early on, I was going to dig up images from games like For Honor and Tomb Raider, but just came across more images from the Columbia map, from the game.

These were from Elite 3D, IO Interactive, and Sumo Digital.
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/xzYWxR
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/rRJG4L (Mary-Sue Challinor)
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/58vnk8 (Álvaro Carreras)
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/KaRVNr (I may go over this article, too, from 80lvl and Álvaro Carreras)


Going to go bit-by-bit on this, and hopefully won't get too overwhelmed

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9/16/19 Update:
Alright, it was overwhelming. Didn't get all of what I wanted to do, but mainly the majority of it. The main focus of this scene was the foliage. If I could, I would add Agent 47 in the scene, but it's fine.

garcellano

Here's a quick block out on just the thought process I have for this.
I was just adding a bunch of boxes around on what I was thinking it would look like, just from the first image, and then built around it (which probably isn't as necessary). I plan on re-using assets that I would make to fill in the areas around the main spot. Just for the sake of paths and what leads to where, I've added point lights on areas where it'll almost serve as an exit or entrance to somewhere else (these will eventually be replaced).

As far as what I'll be making next, I most likely will give the ground and water a first pass, with some temporary meshes along the way, like some rock-type meshes and a bridge mesh.

Alex_J

you're going to need tons of vegetation variety no doubt. What's your plan for that? Speedtree? Do it manually? 

garcellano

Yeah, in the game (in the Columbia stage), it's just scattered with plants, rocks, and trees lol. I'll want to make some manually, just for the sake of trying them out, but I may use SpeedTree at some point (it's been a while since I used it). 

garcellano

I went through the mud ground material I made before, from the mentorship w/ Josh Lynch, & just went over a bit of Daniel Thiger's mud ground tutorial, just to try out different workflows for this material. Not sure if I'll use everything I watched through Thiger's tutorial, but probably will use some practices that I've never done before.

It's still a wip. I don't want to make a replica of what Thiger made on his tutorial, so I most likely will change it up.

I'm planning to split this up, compared to the game. I'll be making the mud ground material first, then the shoe prints, tire tracks, puddles, and a few others after.

garcellano

Mud ground WIP, part deux. Might make another variation with the mud ground.
Mud
Mud (slightly different form) + grass
Grass + some mud I'll eventually play around with these, blending the materials in the scene. Still refining this one, but don't want to get too stuck on it.

garcellano

In between all the stuff's that's been going on, work and non-work related stuff, I've been making these for the Columbia scene. Some slow pickings. These will be for the ground in the scene, to blend. I was aiming for a mud base material, mud + grass, and grass. The grass might be over-kill, as far as the height, so I'll adjust that a bit.

I hung out with some indie devs earlier today to try and focus on the albedo/roughness for the first material, before bolting out for the Superbowl. I haven't placed all of them in the scene yet. Just thought I'd post a WIP for the sake of posting a WIP. I'll get back on this whenever I'll squeeze in the time.

garcellano

Here's another update on the material. Placed them on material balls. I'm open for critiques on these. I'll eventually add them in the scene. The next thing I'll be working on are the ground meshes for these.

garcellano

The trees & foliage meshes are from the UE4 Marketplace. Wanted to get a better feel on what it'll look like. I'll eventually replace them. Placed a chunk of rocks & cliffs around the scene. Water's temp for now. Blended the mud/grass materials. For the rocks, I plan on making some more to break the shapes. So far, I have mainly 3, w/ one being a big chunk. I may want to blend them with moss. Vines, trees, and more plants are definitely on the my bucket list. Most likely will work on the greybox meshes next.

garcellano

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/1nrL1X

I just noticed I haven't used this thread much for my scene. I've been putting most of my posts on my ArtStation blog.
https://garcellano.com/blog

Since my last post, back in April 2019, I've been occupied with materials, separate from this scene, and was slowly diving in on SpeedTree. I ended up getting boggled down with art tests and interviews for potential places, and was able to land some freelance gigs, one for a small indie team, and another for Airborn Studios, which was fun. That all ended around early July, and I was back on this scene, and again, some interviews and art tests. I was able to land something, and it sounds promising. I passed their art test, and their phone interview. All that's left is just the offer letter. This was all just a few days ago, so I thought I'd just wrap this up. I know there's more to it that I could do to spice this up, but for now, I'd like to call this done. Most of this was to practice on making foliage, without the use of MegaScans or GameTextures.

If I were to ever make another outdoor, landscape scene, chances are I'll use MegaScans or GameTextures, but for this scene, I wanted to create most of the assets from scratch. With that, I'll be posting these around here, if I haven't already. Also, imposter syndrome. I think I knew what I was doing, but for the sake of all this time working on this, I will say that I believe I did what was suppose to be done, in a way.