[WIP] The Slaughter Dock - Stylized Fantasy Whaling Station - Honours Project

Ignas

Hello Polycount.

I am 3rd and final year student of Game Design and for my honours project I am doing a stylized environment in UE4 . The deadline for this project is at the end of April, so I have a just over a month left. Inspired by Bilgewater Slaughter Docks from League of Legends.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=beKIcHOVhLY&feature=youtu.be
Water Material

Wire frame View

Here are some of the pages from my development journal:


the UV's here very hastily done I'll admit:

I plan on adding extra blood, barnacles, dripping seaweed, goo and other "crap" to make the scene look more dirty, murky. I feel like the scene looks too clean for what it is.

I am also planning to add variation to the materials of the structure - right now I feel like it feels a bit bland and and monotone as all of it is just wood - maybe stone for the ramp? Stone for the lower level walls?

Lastly would like to add more story telling into the scene; thinking of what happens in there? What kind of tools are used to gut the fish? How is it preserved? - Maybe it is salted, or maybe it is sold fresh.

JohannesAg

Looks really promising, I like it.  Aside from the stuff you´ve already said you´re gonna work on I think the fish could use some more texture/material work since he´s the main thing you look at and he feels a little bit plastic right now. 

Ignas

JohannesAg said:

Looks really promising, I like it.  Aside from the stuff you´ve already said you´re gonna work on I think the fish could use some more texture/material work since he´s the main thing you look at and he feels a little bit plastic right now. 

I'll see what I can do about it

wirrexx

take a look at the whale from dishonoured

Ignas

wirrexx said:

take a look at the whale from dishonoured

Had a look at it, great example. After that I feel like my one definitely lacks a lot more blood and dirt on it. That should also help with the fact with what JohannesAg pointed out about my piece looking plastic. I had similar remarks from my peers so I am starting to see the pattern here...

m00k

i agree with the boys the fish is your centerpiece so it could use some work. Also you've got these nice lights so maybe make it night outside since now the fish is low contrast framed by outside are that is very exposed. Or if you want to keep it day put something to block the outside light a little bit. Overall picture is cool!

gastrop0d

I feel like the fish could look more "dead". Maybe slackening the jaw so it hangs limp and rolling the eyes?

Have you  considered some stylised scales? I think the surface of the skin needs some more detail/description.

The palette of the wooden interior feels very warm and saturated. I think it might be the wood material - too monotone brown. Maybe some lighter, desaturated weathering on the edges could help? Also variation in the tone across the scene with grime I'm sure will make a big difference, I know you have that planned, maybe that will be enough. 

Looking really cool so far, though!

Ignas

Thank you for all the wonderful feedback!
I've made some adjustments base on what everyone said.

I've added a lot more runny blood to the material, plus to not have the fish skin texture not look "plastic" I've tweaked the roughness and metallic values to try and give it more of a fish / seal skin sheen look.


I've also tried to make it look more "dead" by having the eyes slightly rolled up as well as having the upper eyelid be more droopy

The fish always had scales but they were just really small and with very flat normal maps and I didn't think much of it until gastrop0d said that I should ADD scales which made me realize that the scales should be a lot more visible and bigger. So I did.

I am not sure if I am going overboard with some of this stuff like the blood or the scales I might have to tone it down, but right now I am happy and feel like it looks a lot better than before thanks to everyone's advice.

jStins

Seems to me the highlights on the fish are too intense and too uniform and still looking plastic-y. May try increasing roughness and adding more variation in your roughness map. Would you mind posting a version of your roughness map that isn't channel packed?

Ignas

jStins said:

Seems to me the highlights on the fish are too intense and too uniform and still looking plastic-y. May try increasing roughness and adding more variation in your roughness map. Would you mind posting a version of your roughness map that isn't channel packed? 

No I don't mind at all. Here it is:

As you can see there IS no roughness variation right now (apart from the blood)
I will experiment with adding more variation.

jStins

Yeah! Some high frequency detail in the roughness map will break up the shape of the highlights and make it feel less like plastic IMO. Cool scene, looking forward to seeing more. 

Nuclear Angel

I love the idea of adding blood, but I think you could add it in with more purpose. Right now the blood pretty much just looks like you have taken a particle brush in Substance and gone over it and then painted some. I would recommend to try to add the blood more purposefully, from wounds, and tension points when the fish got pulled out of the sea. And also its stomach should have some smushed out blood on it as it have been dragged probably across some shitty floors and stuff. It is a big fish after all. 

So TLDR, cool scene, but maybe redo the blood with more thought behind of how it got there and tell a story through the texture to elevate the centerpiece. 

Ignas

Hi guys, thank you all for the feedback you gave me, I am very grateful. I've submitted my project now and hoping to get a good grade
Here it is on Artstation https://www.artstation.com/artwork/mqrmqE