Learning Environment Art - What are some tutorials you would like to see?

YF_Sticks

Hello everyone!

There are already a lot of environment art tutorials out there, but I am curious if there is anything that you would like to see?
Can be every step for making a 3D Environment Scene, props, specific technical things, workflows....you name it! 

It's a good time to share some knowledge and help each other out. Curious to see your answers!

Eric Chadwick

Are you volunteering to make tutorials? If so, it would help to share your portfolio, work experience, etc. If you have experience, that will be a draw.

poopipe

How about a tutorial on building decent lods and UVs?  That seems to be a lost art

(*grumpy old bastard) 

Alex_J

poopipe said:

How about a tutorial on building decent lods and UVs?  That seems to be a lost art

(*grumpy old bastard) 

I could use an overview on making LOD for environment props. specifically for export to unity engine. of course the documentation covers it, but always easier for me to watch a video demonstration to get fast overview

Eric Chadwick

that's what tech artists are for

Taylor Brown

Alex Javor said:

I could use an overview on making LOD for environment props. specifically for export to unity engine. of course the documentation covers it, but always easier for me to watch a video demonstration to get fast overview

Pop them into Unreal and export. The Auto LOD tool they have is pretty effective and its easy enough to fix any awful ones

Alex_J

Taylor Brown said:

Alex Javor said:

I could use an overview on making LOD for environment props. specifically for export to unity engine. of course the documentation covers it, but always easier for me to watch a video demonstration to get fast overview

Pop them into Unreal and export. The Auto LOD tool they have is pretty effective and its easy enough to fix any awful ones

thats an idea, but i think it would be more efficient if i was already working in unreal. Problem is, unreal engine takes forever to boot up, and I am already working with several resource intensive programs open at a time. I am designing my props to be pretty low poly and easily adjustable, so making the actual LODs manually isn't much time. Just the process of how to set them up in groups and export/import. Simple stuff but watching a 2 minute tutorial is nicer than digging through documentation.

TBH, I don't really need the tutorial, it's just something I am about to do but haven't really done before, and guy was asking for what we need tut's for. Isn't usually tuts for this sort of thing, so I throw it out there.

poopipe

Taylor Brown said:

Alex Javor said:

I could use an overview on making LOD for environment props. specifically for export to unity engine. of course the documentation covers it, but always easier for me to watch a video demonstration to get fast overview

Pop them into Unreal and export. The Auto LOD tool they have is pretty effective and its easy enough to fix any awful ones

That is the direct opposite of what I meant.

Auto lodding tools are only effective in the hands of someone who knows how to do it properly by hand. 
This is fact BTW,  not  opinion  

sacboi

YF_Sticks  said: There are already a lot of environment art tutorials out there, but I am curious if there is anything that you would like to see?

Can be every step for making a 3D Environment Scene, props, specific technical things, workflows....you name it!

Are you offering too author 'on demand' applicable learning material?

If that's the case?! well, quite a broad scope of expertise spread across a wide variety of disciplines. I'm just a hobbyist these days, intent on concentrating leveling up in both traditional and digital knowledge content creation for my own benefit.

Although I'd previously worked remotely in product viz which in turn when faced with a particular issue would often leverage recognised quality tute libraries such as Digital Tutors, Gumroad, Udemy, Gnomon Workshop or more recently I'd found Cubebrush to be likewise as useful.

Helping to effect a viable solution and accordingly most are authored by work experienced professionals because needless to point out that their collective 'coalface' exposure within a production environment in my opinion is a more effective self-taught route to take than the bulk of YT rubbish floating about the ether nowadays.

So that said, I'd be interested in seeing your channel/library of tutorials, that's if you've a current account, be it Artstation , Gumroad, YT, Udemy...whatever?

edit:

One of my personal interests is ingame FX simulation (physics, particles, fluids, volumetrics) if you've any further insight, then I'm all ears

Alex_J

Taylor Brown said:

Pop them into Unreal and export. The Auto LOD tool they have is pretty effective and its easy enough to fix any awful ones

Hey, this is a little off topic but OP never came back anyway so...

Turns out maya has an auto-lodder too. I am not using it to verify it's usefulness, but it's also got a one button group setup too, so if you are doing manual LOD's you can still easily set it up for export to unity.

Eric Chadwick

OP seems remarkably silent. I was looking forward to some tuts.

Taylor Brown

@Alex Javor

Yeah i've played around with the maya one a bit too. It's worth experimenting with the Unreal tool just to get an idea, you never know when having that in your toolkit could be useful. I've recently had to do some work in Unity and I'm absolutely gobsmacked by how barebones it can be at times... like having to add in custom code to change a Lightmap Index is bonkers to me. I guess that's why it's so much zippier compared to Unreal, there's nothing in it!

@poopipe

No debate there In my limited experience I've found the Auto LOD tool in Unreal is pretty a-ok most of the time but it definitely produces some wacky results if you aren't paying attention. 

YF_Sticks

Those are some interesting points, thanks guys!
I haven't thought about any format yet and where/how to publish it. I was just curious about what topics people are interested in learning to give me a few ideas to get started. Also, sometimes it's good to freshen up on some basic things. TrimSheets, texturing etc. There are already lots of tuts out there, maybe people just want to see a different format. I am not very informed when it comes to LODs etc since we have tech artists who take care of it. Or, there are more qualified people who know way more about that stuff than I do so..

Eric Chadwick

If you do a video, please show the end result first, 8x speed, grab the viewer but also to inform why we should invest the time. And don't preamble, get right to it. 

I prefer blog-style tuts, easier to skim, and hit the meat of what I don't already have experience with.

But I know many prefer video.

sacboi

Personally I've a preference for narrated video with quality audio plus overall, instruction is straightforward informative however imparted in a succinct casual paced flowing dialogue. Basically for hard surface props something like a Tim Bergholz or Tor Frick presentation which I think is especially relevant in terms of duration whether comprehensive and/or a specific half hour walkthrough because you've an available option to scrub back and forth if while following along you'd missed or quickly want to confirm some workflow aspect. Fairly useful when you're on the clock with a client deadline looming.

zachagreg

I think one of the biggest things if you decide to do video is to be concise. There is absolute value in showcasing mistakes but doing them tactfully is important. I do not want to see you noodle with a shape for 30 plus minutes and then throw it away because you found a better way to do it in the process. What is better to understand and easier to follow is doing a small segment of what the mistake  you had was and an immediate remedy to it and an explanation of how it works. Then get back to the process and the rest of the video.

Its even better IMO to do a quick sidebar with this information which is recorded afterwards a small mini-tutorial fashion that way the knowledge is concise, meaningful, and relevant to what your viewer is watching at the current time. Also just include a txt file or a description with time stamps please. A lot of times I don't watch entire tutorials I watch bits and pieces at a time unless I am learning an entirely new concept or software. Having a quick time stamp is awesome to get my knowledge and get back to work.

Eric Chadwick

poopipe said:

Auto lodding tools are only effective in the hands of someone who knows how to do it properly by hand. 
This is fact BTW,  not  opinion  

I would gladly pay for a @poopipe LOD tutorial!

Larry

I believe there are many tutorials on the technical stuff like LODs etc. There are, however, no videos on how to approach creating big environments, as this is what most people struggle with, speaking from personal experience. I can sculpt a rock i can model whatever you want,i can make materials but i get lost on how to approach the creation of big environments.

I personally want to see how to approach damage and debris,like, how many rocks or broken planks should i be sculpting to avoid my scene being repetitive? how much time to spend on things, like what should i be beveling? How much functionality should they have like, should i be making holes to electronics for cables or should they just intersect with polygons?Should all wood beams have nails everywhere they connect? And last but not least, how to properly integrate dust or snow or rust to my scene? Which materials should have it already and which shouldn't?

So basically a good environment tutorial for me would focus more on showing many concepts,breaking down each concept how to approach it,the list of things you have to model, and how much detail to put in each piece, with a few modeled examples of the final quality for demonstration(e.g. "i will sculpt 2 rocks for these scene" and then demonstrate the final quality of said examples) and then how you model an environment with short clips on key decisions made throughout all the phases like the following

"I am currently making this for my scene and
- I will bevel those edges because i'm gonna bake this individually
- This will have a tiling material, so no need for bevels
- I will make this trim sheet that will be used in these assets, in total i will make 3 trim sheets for x y reasons
- UV's in this model will be like this, for x y reasons
- I will sculpt 2 broken planks and use them like this 
- I will make this material without dirt and blend it in engine
- I will make this metal material and 3 more variations with rust and dirt and blend them for x y reasons
- I could make this old barn with trim sheet and modular parts, or model/texture it all at once, etc. but will chose this method
- Set dressing and planning for that


The reason I'd like to see this kind of tutorials is because I believe many environment artists (including myself) are familiar with many of the techniques used to create these environments, but they lack the experience for decision making and get lost with all the possible things you could do with all the assets. Hence it becomes overwhelming just after some greyboxing and eventually do not go forward with it. I want to see more the "how and why" of the decisions in the process rather than the techniques

Eric Chadwick

@Larry have you seen Jason Stokes' YouTube channel? https://m.youtube.com/user/Futurepoly/videos

See also our wiki
http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Modular_environments

YF_Sticks

@Larry Great points man. It's something I observed through the community as well and is what I actually want to dive deeper into to help people get more of an understanding for it. Thanks for the reply

Larry

@Eric Chadwick
 ooh thanks 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwZyGoxqh2Y
we need more like this series.....

Eric Chadwick

See the links on that wiki.page. Lots of detailed breakdowns of decision points, etc.