WIP - Montréal Metro Station(Laurier)
node
Hello!
My name is Justin(nice to meet you too).
While still in school last winter, I decided that a piece I wanted to do for my portfolio was something out of my ''comfort zone'': a place in the real world.
As an artist, I always gravitated towards sci-fi and fantasy: it's in my blood! But challenges are what makes us grow and can show versatility...
Inspired by the Montreal's Laurier metro station, I began blocking this out in early January 2019. However, I just started working on it for real this past week. Of course, it's a good thing I didn't get too far into the process back then because I would have gotten lost in it or done it totally wrong. At least now, I have a much better grasp on how to organize myself.
RULES: The setup
It's important when starting a project to set ground rules. No matter where you look, which tutorial you follow or whatnot, a good approach that is usually spoken of and that I agree with is: Set your limits and deadlines. If you want to work in games or any other creative discipline: this is inescapable. You have to learn what makes it in and what gets cut. For example, in this case, I MIGHT not end up modeling the mice that you can sometimes see running on the platform on an early Sunday morning.
Also, by limits, I mean: ''How far am I willing to go in terms of detail with the time that I impose upon myself?"
I have given myself between 2 and 4 weeks to complete the project.
My goals in order of priority(ideally):
-Improve my Designer skills(The metro stations have wonderful substances to recreate!)
-Deepen my understanding of modular thinking gin a real world.
-Recreate the environment from reference so that it is immediately recognizable. Not everything can make it into the final version(there are so many unique, little devices. Especially in the tunnel!)
-Add touches of underlying narrative to the environment to give it a life of it's own rather than condemn it to being a lifeless copy of reality.
INITIAL REFERENCES: Never enough...
-First step: I went to photograph the area of the station that I wanted to replicate, concentrating mainly on textures, the objects and scale. Also, observing and trying to soak up as much as I could. I would later go back to the station because I'd be missing a particular angle and feel a peculiar connection to it that I never had before(dawwwww).
Here a few of the bazillion shots I took. Of course, I just wanted to reproduce a small portion of the station with the staircase and one side of the platform(i could then mirror it over if I wanted to)
Tomorrow I'll start uploading Blocking stages as well as where I'm at with designing materials and building the Unreal scene
Thanks for reading!
My name is Justin(nice to meet you too).
While still in school last winter, I decided that a piece I wanted to do for my portfolio was something out of my ''comfort zone'': a place in the real world.
As an artist, I always gravitated towards sci-fi and fantasy: it's in my blood! But challenges are what makes us grow and can show versatility...
Inspired by the Montreal's Laurier metro station, I began blocking this out in early January 2019. However, I just started working on it for real this past week. Of course, it's a good thing I didn't get too far into the process back then because I would have gotten lost in it or done it totally wrong. At least now, I have a much better grasp on how to organize myself.
RULES: The setup
It's important when starting a project to set ground rules. No matter where you look, which tutorial you follow or whatnot, a good approach that is usually spoken of and that I agree with is: Set your limits and deadlines. If you want to work in games or any other creative discipline: this is inescapable. You have to learn what makes it in and what gets cut. For example, in this case, I MIGHT not end up modeling the mice that you can sometimes see running on the platform on an early Sunday morning.
Also, by limits, I mean: ''How far am I willing to go in terms of detail with the time that I impose upon myself?"
I have given myself between 2 and 4 weeks to complete the project.
My goals in order of priority(ideally):
-Improve my Designer skills(The metro stations have wonderful substances to recreate!)
-Deepen my understanding of modular thinking gin a real world.
-Recreate the environment from reference so that it is immediately recognizable. Not everything can make it into the final version(there are so many unique, little devices. Especially in the tunnel!)
-Add touches of underlying narrative to the environment to give it a life of it's own rather than condemn it to being a lifeless copy of reality.
INITIAL REFERENCES: Never enough...
-First step: I went to photograph the area of the station that I wanted to replicate, concentrating mainly on textures, the objects and scale. Also, observing and trying to soak up as much as I could. I would later go back to the station because I'd be missing a particular angle and feel a peculiar connection to it that I never had before(dawwwww).
Here a few of the bazillion shots I took. Of course, I just wanted to reproduce a small portion of the station with the staircase and one side of the platform(i could then mirror it over if I wanted to)
Tomorrow I'll start uploading Blocking stages as well as where I'm at with designing materials and building the Unreal scene
Thanks for reading!
Replies
SCALE and MODULARITY
I spent so much time thinking about how to do this and I have much to improve on my method but for now, I think it will be solid. My goal is to keep a certain global consistence of the texcel density as well even though I just know I'm not getting the most resolution at the moment. I have to improve my UV logic...But! if I know that this is a "weakness" of the scene, I'll make sure to try to make the rest of the scene follow suit and keep a regularity all over so that it looks good and the scene is not higher res here, lower res there. All res shall be equal in the eyes of the engine. So speaketh the Creator
So to continue, it's important to speak of scale. When starting the project, right off the bat, you have to start thinking about how you will split everything and therefore, what your golden scale rule will be. Will your biggest piece be 100cm large, for example?
In my case, I tried to key in on which elements of the scene seemed to define the area's scale. I noticed that the platform walls are composed of a series of "marble slabs" that are roughly 50cm large. these same segments are form the entire wall when you go up the stairs, making them a good reference point to establish my modular sizing. I then decided that my platform floor and track segment would be 200cm large, therefore fitting 4 of these marble slab segments per track module.
The first of the 4 segments(Blue) is part of the platform wall module(blue), which will remain mostly hidden by the marble segments themselves. The three other marble segments(green) are separated, giving me the eventual freedom to destroy them a bit or break up the pattern. Im starting off with a "perfect" feel. Once everything is more advanced, I'll have fun modifying, destroying or making new textures for the marble segments.
The modular segments.
In Max, I used my boy Luke as reference at a height of 1.81m, the size of the UE4 character.
Perhaps my favorite part of all this: the materials. Substance designer and Painter are true gems! I mean, I could draw the substances pretty well but seeing a material come to life in 3D, building it up from scratch, creatively using black/white height values...so happy to have incorporated this into my life.
There's no shortage of materials to make in these metro stations so I started with what I think is the station's most iconic material: the thin, warm speckled tiles. There are many tile tutorials and explanations out there so I won't go into huge detail regarding the creation process in Designer.
Approach
If I may however mention a thing or two about method.
The tile has to be recognizable and for that, we have to break down what MAKES up the tile or material we are trying to reproduce. I try to break things down in shapes and view objects or textures in layers within my mind. Start by considering what the lower element is in the 0 to 1 height value. Then, what's the next...and the next...Strategically blending these height elements one on top of another is what will ensure an interesting material while refining and smoothing(blurrrr) and masking things properly will practically ensure a successful end result. In the same way I taught myself to instinctively know what exposure to dial in to my camera just by considering the light in any given place at all times while just walking around, we can estimate roughness and metallic values or height values by practicing in our daily lives. Sitting at the bar having a beer? Just look at how the used area shines so much less than the part where no one leans on and so on!
Geez, what have I become?
Keep it clean
And like ALL things: Keep it clean, keep it tidy. Whether it's Blueprints in Unreal or Designer, comment boxes with concise explanations and properly aligned nodes not only helps you when you have to backtrack on something but is also of prime importance when working with a team. Emphasis on this! In my experience, working well plays an important part in how you can guarantee more work for yourself down the road.
There's some wonky AO in the areas where the tile Luminance is low...i have to fix that. I'll be adding an edge highlight to the tiles that the real ones have as well. I'm aiming for a station that is somewhat in the near but semi-distant future and slightly abandoned. Still working on the narrative a bit...
Slowly but surely...
Dear Polycount,
Today I exported my first (Not my FIRST FIRST!)custom material for this scene I've been working on.
I have toadmit, I was pretty stressed out and feeling pressured to do so. Sometimes I feel very alone if there are no materials on the meshes and it bothers me. Mr. Unreal(Doug says he isn't real. DOUG, YOU aren't real! haha!) by the way, says that I shouldn't listen to what others say and concentrate on what I REALLY want to do. Anyways. I'm happy now that overcame my fears and exported this material that I worked pretty hard on. I hope everyone will feel the same way. My mom says everyone will see the hard work I've put into it and they'll relate to me. I'm not so sure. Last week, Ashley showed everybody her jelly bean lava pizza shader and everyone laughed at her. I don't want that to happen to me but at the same time...I think...I shouldn't care about these kinds of things if I'm aware of my own faults and points that I can improve upon. Excelsior! (I'm such a geek, sorry.)
I'm really looking forward to Friday's dance. I heard that all the lights are fully dynamic(nothing baked!) and the theme is modular sci-fi steampunk low poly forest. Lots of budget! I'm not supposed to know this. Jim told me. He's on the committee. I told Mr.Unreal: he found it funny and made me some tea. I told him I was getting too old for tea parties and I think I made him cry.