[WIP][UE4] Sometimes they Come Back
greentooth
Good day fellow artists of the 3D! Life has been a bit of an uneasy rollercoaster this past year-and-a-half, and thus I have not been very active around these here parts, but I'm finally back to doing what I love and would be overjoyous to hear from some of you and get some solid feedback and critique on my latest concoction.
I still need to add a few more assets, mostly to the interior, to make it feel less empty and more like a "livable" environment. And the lighting...oh god the lighting. I still need to spend more time playing with it and getting it to a place that puts a smile on my scruffy old face, but I'll do *backflips around the globe for anyone who can offer proper feedback/advice and lead me down the path of lighting masterhood.
Hope everyone here is doing well and surviving these crazy 2020 shenanigans. Thank you for taking the time to help and guide this poor soul!
*I can't do a backflip, but we'll figure it out.
I still need to add a few more assets, mostly to the interior, to make it feel less empty and more like a "livable" environment. And the lighting...oh god the lighting. I still need to spend more time playing with it and getting it to a place that puts a smile on my scruffy old face, but I'll do *backflips around the globe for anyone who can offer proper feedback/advice and lead me down the path of lighting masterhood.
Hope everyone here is doing well and surviving these crazy 2020 shenanigans. Thank you for taking the time to help and guide this poor soul!
*I can't do a backflip, but we'll figure it out.
Replies
I think you could get rid of the directional light, or it's shadows. The directional light is casting really weird unnatural-looking shadows on the buildings, but with this kind of overcast sky, the sunlight should be completely diffused and only cast ambient occlusion type shadows.
Unless the unnatural shadows are part of your story, like the homestead is being attacked by a shadow monster or something. That could be cool, if it were exaggerated a bit more for clarity.
Inversely, try turning shadows on for the fireplace and the two lanterns. They feel a little unnatural right now because they're not casting shadows. The light of the fireplace in particular, can even be seen from the outside of the building, despite the layers of wood cloth and iron.
If the shadows of the fireplace are too sharp, they can be softened up by increasing the 'source radius' if you are using a point light. A rectangular light might work there as well.
The lantern outside could have it's effect on the fog increased by turning up it's 'volumetric scattering' setting (if you're using a stationary/dynamic point light and volumetric fog) All three lights could use some bloom from a post process volume as well.
Find and study some good lighting reference. Screenshots of your favorite horror movie would work, or "The Last of Us Part II" had some sections with fantastic overcast lighting.
For the lighting here's what i would try:
1. Gather lots of references from games like red dead redemption and (for some reason it reminds me of) battlefield last 2 games. Also, real life refs should be studied.
2. Take @JamesBrisnehan's advice and either commit to a overcast scenario or to a sunlit one.
3. Increase the AO intensity and radius and turn on world scale in the AO settings.
4. Lower the exposure so that the whitest parts of your scene (probably the sky) gets to a mid grey.
5. Use a LUT to alter the colors but maybe half-way (0.5 intensity)
6. Tweak all of the above until satisfied
The material definition could get some attention as well. That white door looks like it was being opened by Edward Scissorhands. The scratches are too much and looks very procedural.
The wood looks a bit like rubber for some reason. What i would do is to give the houses a height gradient that drives roughness and color so that the wooden beams closer to the ground are more dark and damp (mid roughness) and the upper beams are slightly brighter in color and very rough indicating that they are not as damp and wet. Just a thought.
Also, adding some moss here and there wouldnt hurt.
And thanks for noticing the wood. I decided last minute at 2am that I was going to try and give it a damper look (It looked too dry before) instead of going to bed, which I probably should've done instead, and the result clearly wasn't great. Now it just looks like wet clay. Oops. Adding moss is a fantastic idea!
Appreciate ya!
Here's the latest update. I've added the last of my props and am generally just working on tweaking the lighting and mood. Achieving proper overcast lighting is proving to be a bigger challenge than I was initially expecting, but with the above feedback and suggestions, I think I am getting this thing closer to looking pretty okie dokie and how I originally envisioned it being. So thank you!
Feel free and add any further feedback. I'm pretty sure I've been staring at this thing for too long now and am always welcome to a pair of fresh eyes (or just one eye, if that is your case. I don't discriminate). I'm getting pretty close to calling this little bugger done and can safely say that it has been an overall fun challenge, and great learning experience!
And thank you for pointing out the roughness issues. I'd been starting this thing for so long, I guess I didn't even notice. I had uploaded this thing to my ArtStation a week ago and had called it done, but now I'm noticing things that I want to change with the interior lighting, so I think I'm gonna go back and make those tweaks. May as well go back and improve some of my materials while I'm at it. Appreciate the feedback!