[WIP] The Witcher 3 inspired Tower Environment (UE5)

JSazarart

Hello there! I'm recently working on a portfolio project inspired by TW3. It is supposed to be walkeable in a certain area so I'm not only focusing on one camera angle alone. 
Here you can see the main camera view:


The player will be able to walk up to the tower and enter it so I will create an interieur too. Everything is still pretty much in the blockout phase and feedback is absolutely welcome, but I also have a specific problem I need help with:

This entrance area just looks really off to me regarding the composition. Plus, it's super boring environment wise. Feedback for the comp would be absolutely awesome!!! And maybe you have some ideas or concepts for me so I can make this area more interesting. Thanks in advance!!

Eric Chadwick

https://www.google.com/search?q=hilltop+tower+fantasy&tbm=isch
Whenever I'm stalling on ideas, I just start tweaking search params, and digging around. 

Yandex is also nice with their "Similar" button underneath each image.
https://yandex.com/images/search?cbir_id=915372/Qqd52kE5BVIGxaQy9lUlzA6211&cbir_page=similar&from=tabbar&lr=223&rpt=imageview&source-serpid=aC6smRmTdBPAXVXz6gQQbg&url=https://avatars.mds.yandex.net/get-images-cbir/915372/Qqd52kE5BVIGxaQy9lUlzA6211/orig

Alex_J

you can also try running around the level and screen record. then watch it later after a break and you might see some specific angles that speak to you, and you can do a quick 2d overpaint of a screengrab to test out some ideas what you could do there.

since it is a vertical environment I think there may be opporunity to obscure some stuff and then have interesting reveals as you come over a ridge or around a corner.

maybe you have been a tourist to some places like this and taken some photos and you tried to frame it in interesting way. Or have seen some such photos. could look out for things like that as well.

maybe the switch back stairs could be elongated for a sense of a more epic climb. Maybe have a ramp in the middle that they use to bring up supplies on a cart with. Maybe the place is under construction so some mechnical hauling equipment is left along the path going up.

JSazarart

Thanks for the feedback!! here is my reference board btw just to show you what the general idea was: 

Even though I love the high fantasy tower ideas I wanted to stick with a more basic design for it because the witcher 3 architecture is more on the realistic side. So I need to make the surrounding of the tower the interesting part. The idea with the walkthrough is great, will try that asap.
Really want to capture the Kaer Morhen atmosphere in my final scene

ThisisVictoriaZ

The comments above are great! Id like to add that because you added the screenshot from The Witcher its easy to compare your vs theirs, especially with composition. As you can see in my draw over they used the terrain, color (light blue vs the dark green of the trees), and tall dense trees to guide your eye to the caste/tower where your goal is. Right now your scene is missing a strong composition, so I would probably play around with that more if you want your walk up to the tower to feel more interesting! The Witcher is pretty realistic, but its still based in a fantasy world, so i think its fine to exaggerate certain thing in the terrain especially to nail that look