POV: You need to create a big environment, where do you start?

the_dlearner

So you need to work on this gigantic, big space, where do you guys start at? You go with the flow, make a few props to fill some empty space, work on a trim sheet and move foward from there?

Man, by only looking at this picture below, it hurts. Blank page syndrom at its fullest.

I often find myself moving foward, thinking this is the last time i redesign a prop or whatever, then realizing it wasn't as good as i thought, moving backwards, make another one, moving foward..."now it's the last time, think something clicked this time"... all to find myself a couple of hours later second guessing myself again

Eric Chadwick

Motivation is Bull

zetheros

Motivation is Bull,
I sat in a lull,
waiting for inspiration

Then I thought to myself
if there was an elf
and a shelf,
and he was seated upon it

"That'd be silly", said me
"Context is key"
And thus, I was finally free

wee wee

Alex_J

It is similar to scultping or painting. First get in the biggest shapes. Focus on the composition. And, if it were a game, the gameplay.

Then you can refine that a bit by replacing the chunky block out models with higher resolution ones. But maybe not the final high detail models yet.

Then you can do a similar thing for your colors and lighting. Just block it in roughly.

Now you'll have a rough draft of your entire scene. Each element of it - the models, the textures, the lighting - is somewhere between 50%-70% finished. At this stage you can still make any big changes before putting in the long hours to finalize everything. Because the models and materials are simplified, it won't be too difficult to make big changes. This is the funnest part that is all creativity and pretty much don't have to think about anything technical, so dive in and have fun.

Once you are okay with the big things, then you can go through piece by piece and detail. You can do that in whatever order you like. Bounce around, or one thing at a time. Doesn't really matter.

Thiago Klafke (maybe I mispelled, just going on memory) has a good tutorial for this whole process. I am sure you can probably find some tutorials for free as well. And if you search through other environment artist threads here you will see some variation of this process. Some people might change up the steps slightly but for the most part I think you'll see that people do a rough block in both for shapes, colors, and lighting before they move into detailed modeling and texturing, and then finalize the lighting and post process.

The big principle to keep in mind is that you try to answer the most important parts about the artwork in a way that allows you maximum flexibility to make changes, and only once you are satisfied do you go into the time-consuming detailing.

It may help to get your favorite spreadsheet app out too and breakdown the entire project into task. You might list every model needed, every texture, and estimate time needed for things like lighting and figuring out shaders or trim sheets or whatever. Then you can organize all those task into the big phases.

• Blockout Shapes Rough
• Blockout Colors Rough
• Blockout Lighting Rough
• Blockout Shapes Refine
• Blockout Colors Refine
• Blockout Lighting Refine

and so on.

Having the checklist means that you don't have to try and load so much shit into your brain. You take care of that once, write it down, and then when it is time to work you can just focus on the task at hand with confidence. Ship is already on course, now you just have to do the work.

You can also log your time working and add that to the spreadsheet, and then after the project is done you can review it. Maybe you see that you spent like 50% more time in one task than another, but the effect of that task wasn't very important, and so for the next project you'll have a better idea how to prioritize things.

Ruz

@zetheros

@the_dlearner make a scene named revenge of the killer giant blocks, sorted. reminds me of duke nukem build editor :0

I seriously think though making a giant wall like that it not going to work out well, kind of setting barriers in your  way
best to find a topic that really interests you

the_dlearner

Alex_J said:

It is similar to scultping or painting. First get in the biggest shapes. Focus on the composition. And, if it were a game, the gameplay.

Then you can refine that a bit by replacing the chunky block out models with higher resolution ones. But maybe not the final high detail models yet.

Then you can do a similar thing for your colors and lighting. Just block it in roughly.

Now you'll have a rough draft of your entire scene. Each element of it - the models, the textures, the lighting - is somewhere between 50%-70% finished. At this stage you can still make any big changes before putting in the long hours to finalize everything. Because the models and materials are simplified, it won't be too difficult to make big changes. This is the funnest part that is all creativity and pretty much don't have to think about anything technical, so dive in and have fun.

Once you are okay with the big things, then you can go through piece by piece and detail. You can do that in whatever order you like. Bounce around, or one thing at a time. Doesn't really matter.

Thiago Klafke (maybe I mispelled, just going on memory) has a good tutorial for this whole process. I am sure you can probably find some tutorials for free as well. And if you search through other environment artist threads here you will see some variation of this process. Some people might change up the steps slightly but for the most part I think you'll see that people do a rough block in both for shapes, colors, and lighting before they move into detailed modeling and texturing, and then finalize the lighting and post process.

The big principle to keep in mind is that you try to answer the most important parts about the artwork in a way that allows you maximum flexibility to make changes, and only once you are satisfied do you go into the time-consuming detailing.

It may help to get your favorite spreadsheet app out too and breakdown the entire project into task. You might list every model needed, every texture, and estimate time needed for things like lighting and figuring out shaders or trim sheets or whatever. Then you can organize all those task into the big phases.

• Blockout Shapes Rough
• Blockout Colors Rough
• Blockout Lighting Rough
• Blockout Shapes Refine
• Blockout Colors Refine
• Blockout Lighting Refine

and so on.

Having the checklist means that you don't have to try and load so much shit into your brain. You take care of that once, write it down, and then when it is time to work you can just focus on the task at hand with confidence. Ship is already on course, now you just have to do the work.

You can also log your time working and add that to the spreadsheet, and then after the project is done you can review it. Maybe you see that you spent like 50% more time in one task than another, but the effect of that task wasn't very important, and so for the next project you'll have a better idea how to prioritize things.

Really great advice. I was keeping my personal notion DB to keep track but never thought of keeping this level of accountability of time. Will try it, thanks
And by the way, Thiago Klafke has been great influence on this area. Really love this talk from him (1133) DD2018: Thiago Klafke - El poder de la simplicidad - YouTube . Main takeaway: take the path of least resistance aka KISS

the_dlearner

Ruz said:

@zetheros

@the_dlearner make a scene named revenge of the killer giant blocks, sorted. reminds me of duke nukem build editor :0

I seriously think though making a giant wall like that it not going to work out well, kind of setting barriers in your  way
best to find a topic that really interests you

Haha agree, and the picture was to set the tone of the question. It's the visual representation of how the start of a project feels to me.

kanga

Why start from scratch?

 You are on the super info highway!

the_dlearner

the_dlearner said:

Alex_J said:

It is similar to scultping or painting. First get in the biggest shapes. Focus on the composition. And, if it were a game, the gameplay.

Then you can refine that a bit by replacing the chunky block out models with higher resolution ones. But maybe not the final high detail models yet.

Then you can do a similar thing for your colors and lighting. Just block it in roughly.

Now you'll have a rough draft of your entire scene. Each element of it - the models, the textures, the lighting - is somewhere between 50%-70% finished. At this stage you can still make any big changes before putting in the long hours to finalize everything. Because the models and materials are simplified, it won't be too difficult to make big changes. This is the funnest part that is all creativity and pretty much don't have to think about anything technical, so dive in and have fun.

Once you are okay with the big things, then you can go through piece by piece and detail. You can do that in whatever order you like. Bounce around, or one thing at a time. Doesn't really matter.

Thiago Klafke (maybe I mispelled, just going on memory) has a good tutorial for this whole process. I am sure you can probably find some tutorials for free as well. And if you search through other environment artist threads here you will see some variation of this process. Some people might change up the steps slightly but for the most part I think you'll see that people do a rough block in both for shapes, colors, and lighting before they move into detailed modeling and texturing, and then finalize the lighting and post process.

The big principle to keep in mind is that you try to answer the most important parts about the artwork in a way that allows you maximum flexibility to make changes, and only once you are satisfied do you go into the time-consuming detailing.

It may help to get your favorite spreadsheet app out too and breakdown the entire project into task. You might list every model needed, every texture, and estimate time needed for things like lighting and figuring out shaders or trim sheets or whatever. Then you can organize all those task into the big phases.

• Blockout Shapes Rough
• Blockout Colors Rough
• Blockout Lighting Rough
• Blockout Shapes Refine
• Blockout Colors Refine
• Blockout Lighting Refine

and so on.

Having the checklist means that you don't have to try and load so much shit into your brain. You take care of that once, write it down, and then when it is time to work you can just focus on the task at hand with confidence. Ship is already on course, now you just have to do the work.

You can also log your time working and add that to the spreadsheet, and then after the project is done you can review it. Maybe you see that you spent like 50% more time in one task than another, but the effect of that task wasn't very important, and so for the next project you'll have a better idea how to prioritize things.

Really great advice. I was keeping my personal notion DB to keep track but never thought of keeping this level of accountability of time. Will try it, thanks
And by the way, Thiago Klafke has been great influence on this area. Really love this talk from him (1133) DD2018: Thiago Klafke - El poder de la simplicidad - YouTube . Main takeaway: take the path of least resistance aka KISS

This advice really helping me a lot thanks! Been a weeek trying this and I think is the best approach i could had taken!