UE4 Environment (Dark Alley) - Would love some feedback!
polycounter lvl 3
Hello! This is a project I've been working on in UE4 for the past few weeks. I was wondering if anyone has any feedback I could use for my next projects. Also let me know if I've posted this in the right place. This is my first polycount post so I'm a bit of a newb =0
Thanks guys!
Replies
Lighting needs a ton of work.
Your scene currently doesn't really feel like it's an actual place, feels more like a game version of an alley. This is the visual target for an alley in 2020.
Watch the VIDEO HERE: https://youtu.be/8Vb-vby9IxQ
I don't know if you're working from reference or not, but you always should!!! Even if stylized. Make a mood board and figure out the assets you'll need to pull off the visual target. What items will give you the most bang for your buck? Focus on those, and focus on one hero asset for the scene. A car, the dumpster, or the door being lit by a different colored light? Or maybe it's just the sky is the focal point? The moon in the distance, and that is what is tying the whole scene together? Your current scene has no focal point or point of interest. It's just the same level of detail, mostly uniformly lit, and props are evenly spaced out across the scene with no one element having more importance than the other. Not to mention mixed quality of assets and materials. (brick pattern repeating/tiling way too much).
Did some googling, (*See image below).....see all these details? Might be a little over the top, and too cluttered, but there are different sizes and shapes, there is dry and wet, there are stains, there is metal, rusted metal, visual parallels, and a few options for focal point (the car or the door with the square window if lit properly).
Here's another shot....
There are different types of wall surfaces, painted, brick, block concrete, asphalt, the metal door, the garage sliding door, the gutter in the middle, the power lines, the parking guards around transformers and gas shutoff valves.
A lot of the items I called out above are not presently a part of your current scene. You need to keep pushing the scene in all these areas.
Some of the assets work well, and some look a little too uniform, most of them lack character and are not visually where the industry is at right now. I'll show ya what I mean. For example here is your dumpster...not bad, yet it's not what I'd expect from a "here look at my work!!! I'm an amazing environment/prop artist!!! Hire me!"
The images below represent what your competition offers. You got part of the way there, so don't get discouraged...but you need to go further.
Study these assets from Dekogon. If you are not at least matching these...you need to keep pushing and working....http://www.dekogon.com/
You're not done with this scene. Reset and go back and finish this.
Good luck.