WIP - Eastern Orthdox Byzantine Church

ZombieDawgs

Final output:
Artstation Link: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/1xYkKK



First Post:
Hey y'all

I'm currently attempting to level up my skills and push my environment art standard up another level as I'm trying to land a job at a studio on the west coast.

I'm going to create Byazntine/Eastern Orthodox church. I'm taking on board this project by myself, and am creating every element singlehandedly. I've noticed that my original postings on my portfolio were usually a mixture of work from people at my studio, which muddied what was mine and what wasn't. This project aims to showcase that I'm an absolute powerhouse of an environment artist and try to demonstrate I'm capable of many things, as well as push my skillset in areas I'm less confident.

So far I've been trying to nail down which kind of church I'd like to do, and I'm focusing on a smaller more contained church with a grand presence. Ideally I would also like to do the exterior in the process as well.

So far I've just been taking my time gathering reference and and piecing together the blockout in a way that makes sense for both the interior and exterior to connect seamlessly. After that I'll start to create textures and modular pieces for me to lay down the structure.


My reference board. I'm heading towards a more Turkish/Greek/North Macedonian temple though I really do enjoy the Eastern/Russian designs. I'm not going for 100% historical accuracy but something that feels 'right'.

This is the layout for the church at the minute, the Nave + Narthex will be banked by Isles that will create a more compact/cosy element to each side of the church before flowing into the dome + apse areas which let in the majority of light, I'd also like to try and place some smaller exits/spiral staircases for the cellars towards either side of the altar/templon.


Close ups of some of the keystone references I want to fill the scene.

I know it always sucks to open an early WIP thread, I know you want those juicy images and they're coming - all I can give you for now is the blockout from today.

Joopson

I'm excited for updates! I love a good church.

ZombieDawgs

Hey! It's been a minute, I've been spending the last two weeks trying to learn how to sculpt textures from scratch in Zbrush, unfortunately I'm losing a lot of time to it and I'm just going to resort to photogrammetry instead. Luckily the skills I picked up in Zbrush have translated to some pretty powerful gains in my scanning workflow so it's been a secret net gain. I'm not able to find the bricks I need for this project in the UK so I'm having to get a bit crafty with how I produce these scans. Currently have two materials down, but I'm happy with where its going after changing directions slightly.

After working on the bricks for a minute I started putting them in the situation they'll be used in. All of a sudden everything clicked. I've noticed that it's started to look more like an Eastern European Byzantine church more than a Southeastern European one, which is actually a welcome change. Again - not going for supreme accuracy just whatever looks better and this is a nice pivot in those regards, I think a mixture of the two is going to end up in a good spot - especially on the exterior.

Blue fresco is a temporary texture I'm using to lookdev how the fresco will look, going to spend a lot more time texturing a nice set of fresco decals later on.

Current texture layout is very WIP, hopefully going to adjust the textures to have some POM and add a third material in the process as well.

Other things I'm looking forward to is spending a good chunk of time making some really nicely detailed censers and chandeliers

zetheros

dang this looks amazing

ZombieDawgs

So another 2 weeks has passed. I think I owe it to y'all for a minor update. I've mostly been celebrating my birthday and having FUN because it's the SUMMER and I value my life over whatever this project is lmfao.

Anyway recently I've figured out the three way blend and replaced the lower section of wall with a large brick form. Below is an old image from when I had a temporary megascans texture in place.



More to come this week, hopefully. Lots of scans to help

ZombieDawgs

Been creating some edge pieces to make the corners less straight and integrated the third brick material properly. Currently working on some window meshes to place. Can start the floor textures soon  

ZombieDawgs

Working on some structural changes for windows + also starting developing some more frescos.

ZombieDawgs

Spent today working on some frescos and really pleased with how much they help the ceiling just flourish

teodar23

Definitely an improvement.
Now the most obvious issue for me is how neat everything is. Maybe insert some edge wear here and there and some 'wobblyness' to the whole thing so that it doesnt look so new

ZombieDawgs

Been a minute since I updated this thread but I've been busy with a few things here and there. I'll just drop them with little notes for each one


This is the overview of the scene at the minute. There's still a lot of issues with Lumen and I need to go through the main structure's mesh and divide it up so Lumen can deal with it better. The above image is just trying out a non flat lighting setup and a directional light to get a feel for what I'll be working with when that's all set up.


Some leaves 'scans' I did for the floor breakup details.



A bench I made by hand. Byzantine churches don't have seating in their churches but I wanted to add them because they're visually interesting and break up the lines a bit.


A door scan I grabbed from a nearby church. Nothing fancy but I think it does the job well.


 
Pillars I modelled for the interior. Handmade this time unlike the usual scann stuff. Base modelled in maya and dinged up in zbrush with some final details in painter.



Floor modelled in maya before completely texturing it painter - no  designer involved cause I do not like that program lol.

So yeah, been busy - much more to come and it's so much fun to work on this scene.

ZombieDawgs

Window panes need remaking but I really liked this shot

ZombieDawgs

ZombieDawgs

A big challenge if been running into through this is just how to make the floor more interesting. I spent a lot of time on the roof (players don't look up, lol) but not really enough populating the ground. That's been my focus these last few weeks and I've gotta say these candles really help it come to life in my opinion.

ZombieDawgs

Reaching a point now where the scene doesn't feel too bare when I move from one area to another. There's still a laundry list of assets I need to track down, which I think are incredibly key to making some of the areas pop really hard. The next steps will be the chandelier (finally) and the Templon at the front, which I think will be brick based.

Anyway some more misc updates:

ZombieDawgs

Been spending the last week making the chandelier. It was very quickly in place, and the rest of it was spent making it a lowpoly.



Moving onto some smaller assets next.

ZombieDawgs

I would really love to hear people's feedback at this stage, as I think I'm coming towards the end of the asset list

ZombieDawgs

Finished this up yesterday, more on Artstation



https://www.artstation.com/artwork/1xYkKK

ZombieDawgs

I've posted a breakdown of this project on GitBook:

https://docs.switchboard.studio/environment-breakdowns/byzantine-church

Some examples:






https://docs.switchboard.studio/environment-breakdowns/byzantine-church