[WIP] Spiritual Attic

Nick_Medukha

Hi all,

So I suppose every one has tried to do some spiritual / wizardy stuff when they were kids?
I started a new personal project where I will create an old country house attic where someone is doing spiritual rituals with ouija board, taro cards etc.

The attic always is a most mysterious place in house, but I wanted to spice it up with all that creepy attributes.

So for the moment very rough blockout is done, just to understand proportions and right maintain scale

Rough props list:

Chair

Table

Window

Door

Boxes - 3 type, opened and closed

Books - different sizes 5 types

Vinyls in paper cover - like 5-6 covers

Old paintings in frames - 3 types
Old chest
Suitcases - 3 sizes & types

Big mirror

Candles 3 types - big and small ones

Ouija board

Taro card - 5pcs
Salt box and ring of salt 

Lighting Idea:

Make a hole in a roof, so the cold moon light can break in and make an interesting light play with very warm candle light

Here are some screenshots of the blockout:

Would love to hear any advices & critique, will post updates regularly

Nick_Medukha

Hi everyone! Long time without updates, been busy with work. I have textured some of the assets and set up the scene in ue4. Check it out! C&c welcome

hublus

Looking cool so far . If I were you I would add some damage to floor and roof so scene can look more creepy.

Nick_Medukha

@hublus thanks a lot! I will definitely re-do the floor cause now it looks damn new I am considering using tillable planks like I used in the roof (4 different planks with bark on the edges) instead of just plane with normal maps just to achieve more height variety. 

Nick_Medukha

I have just realised that I had my OcclusionRoughnessMetallic map inputs messed up..

I am amazed with the difference and thought I need to share the results, also added a volumetric fog just for fun at this stage.

Nick_Medukha

Small update: Made an old leather chest / suitcase. Comments&critique welcomed

Nick_Medukha

Update:

Here I have added some of the complementary assets to create mess & clutter. I have also played a bit with lighting and fog to add a bit of dust in the air. I am pretty satisfied on how it looks, but one thing that bothers me is my assets are pretty  dirty&dusty, but the overall scene is missing something.. the dust. How to achieve "photorealistic" dust atmosphere? Now it is like somebody just cleaned the entire room and then bring the old and dusty furniture and boxes

Nick_Medukha

Hi all, 
I have updated the lighting and added some models (without textures for the moment, candles are missing flames too) what do you think? Isnt the floor too big?

Nick_Medukha

Hey everyone, i have added some dirt here and there, applied almost all materials and updated lighting. What do you think?

Alex_J

looking good to me. Perhaps some cobwebs, dust, and thicker atmosphere might help.

Nick_Medukha

Thanks! Yes, spiderwebs and dust around the objects on the floor is my next steps  

Alex_J

one thing about the floor planks texture is that it looks very fine. Like a real high quality and well-taken-care-of wood. In an old attic I might expect the grain to be splitting a lot more from age, like this :

and it would go along with a higher roughness value. Not too much shine coming off wood like this, I thinkn.

Nick_Medukha

Hmm, you might be right, ill add some horizontal creases it might add some extra realism to the floor

jStins

This is looking good so far and the props look solid. I'd consider a way to motivate some cool light coming into the space to add a little color variation in the lighting. Perhaps there's a small window in the attic that would let some moonlight in... Maybe the access point to the attic is left open to allow some cool bounce light from below. Looking forward to seeing this progress. 

Nick_Medukha

@jStins thanks for a reply! I actually did create a hole in the roof but the shadow was completely off, so I decided to go out of the realism here and made just a spotlight on top of the roof with a cold light temperature. It might be too "perfect" that moon is shining in the center of the attic, but I think that a lil bit of magic, especially in this "spiritual" scenario isn't that bad.

I've added flames to the candles and draw a spiritual circle. It is supposed to be drawn with a chalk, but it look more like it was a white paint, what do you think?

jStins

Nice! I'd consider making the moon light a touch cooler, maybe a little less intense and increase it's bounced light to the surrounding objects slightly. 

Alex_J

for the paint, imagine somebody doing that by hand with a brush -- probably wouldn't be quite so perfect. Especially at the edges of the wood boards, the bristles smacking over.

Maybe the sitting area wood is a little smoother looking because the dust has been swept back or picked up by peoples butts.

candle thats been burning shouldn't be making smoke, however little trails of smoke might be a nice touch and give reason for a slightly murkier atmosphere. Like the kind of smoke trail you see from an incense stick.

I think some small details like that can do a lot to sell the story you are trying to portray. just brainstorm ideas but i think you've got good handle on lighting and materials, just a matter of delivering the best presentation.

Nick_Medukha

Hey guys, thanks a lot for your feedback! I have a small update here, and seems like it is a final one, cause my UE4 editor is running at 10fps and higrescreenshot not working at all. Gonna pick up a stronger machine next month, otherwise it is just unpleasant to work. Here are many of screenshots i've made (reduced quality to post here), will choose the best ones, sketchfab some of the best looking models and this one will be finished. Despite of not having much feedback I really appreciated the input from you guys!

Nick_Medukha

Hi everyone, the scene is finished, many thanks to everyone participated: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/Dx2k3O

fu_films

Nice work. I like the way you textured the suitcase. The subtle bits of discolor give it a bit of character yet isn't overboard.

Nick_Medukha

Thank you!

Alex_J

great work.

I think overall the main weaknesses that I can see is just small attention to detail in... the details. haha.

For example, the paint on the ground. It looks like you started by projecting a perfect circle alpha, and then applying some grunge. But we still mostly see the perfect lines on the outside. If something like that would be painted by hand in real life, it may be worthwhile to go in by hand and manually paint in grunge to give it more realism.

But like, that's just my opinion. Seems like another great piece to me.

About not getting enough critiques -- yes, it's a shame, but I read in some archived thread here that most critiques go to the absolute beginners, as their work is easiest to spot errors, then when you  are okay but not great you kind of get ignored because there isn't really anything bad about your work, it's just not great yet, and then of course when you are the ultimate champion everybody wants your autograph.

So I think you are probably in the good but not great zone. Maybe for the next project trying something out of your comfort zone would be a good thing. Something big and expansive, vibrant colors, that sort of thing.