The Matrix - Nebuchadnezzar main deck interior environment

Mikevshero

Hey guys. After finishing University last year and starting a new job in the games industry I thought it would be very benifical to continue work on my portfolio in my spare time. With this project I want to apply a lot of the information I have gained while working and hopefully showcase a big jump in quality from my University projects.

As for the chosen project I'm a massive fan of The Matrix univerise, and I noticed no on has tried recreating the interior of the Nebuchadnezzar yet.  This was something I was temped to tackle whilst at University, but due to the time constraints of deadlines and my skill level I thought it best to go for something else at the time.

The software I will be using is 3DS Max, Substance Painter and Unreal engine 4. I have not used UE4 in around a year and a half as we use a different engine at work, so I am pretty out of touch with not only the general use but also what has been added in the new updates, so as far as i'm concerened I will pretty much learning UE4 from scratch for the most part. I may also try out Substance Designer for the first time,but thats a decision I will leave until later on.

I will also be using a workflow I didn't use at University, one that I am not completely familiar with, which will obviously slow down my progress but inturn make me a better artist.

I greatly appreciate any and all feedback! thanks

Mikevshero

I want to try and recreate the main deck as best as I can, but I realise that that some things I will have to change. For instance a lot of the set photos and film screenshots are low quality, and some things cant really be seen well, so I will have to design a few things myself, in which case I will look for some real world inspiration instead, like submarines, as I beielive they would have used them for inspration when designing the hovercraft set.

Here are a couple of screenshots of my moodboard. At the moment it includes pretty much every screenshot you can find of the main deck as well as some screenshots of some of the other areas of the ship which I can use for inspiration and reference. Eventually I will look into some other references like submarines when i need to fill in some blanks.

Mikevshero

I am hoping that with creatiing this thread I can get into more of a routine with working on this project. Since I started it I have found it very hard to find the motivation to work on it considering I am already creating 3D art full time at work, but I know it will be worth it once it is finished.

So I have made a start on this project already, here are a couple of screenshots of my progress so far.

As you can see it is still in its early stages/white box. I am pretty happy with the shape and scale of the assets so far. I have most of the lights in the correct places in accordance to the set however they are just placeholder/point lights at the moment and eventualy will have ies profiles, different brightness values, colours e.t.c.

At the moment I an currently working on the centre of the room (specifically the chairs) and taking the assets to grey box. I an finding the chairs very hard to create as there are no clear images of them in the films, so I am forced to make up the chair mechanisms underneath as I go along.

Mikevshero

Quick update.I'm currently working on the chair asset. Considering this is in the centre of the room and part of the main focal point of the environment I want to spent a lot of time on it to get it right. As mentioned before it's proving difficult to see the design of parts of the environement from the limited/blurry screenshots I have, but I'm slowly putting it together piece by piece. At the moment I'm just blocking out the main shapes, getting the proportions and placment correct. I will then move on to putting more detail in the models when i'm happy with everything.

Cody

Get it buddy.  Should be a fun one!  I feel ya on the full time job.  Makes it hard to do stuff in the freetime.  Push through it!!! (Need to take my own advice)