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The Bi-Monthly Environment Art Challenge | May - June (90)

ngon master
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Pinkfox ngon master
Hey everyone! Welcome to the 90th edition of the Bi-Monthly Environment Art Challenge for the months of May and June!

This challenge is a way for real-time 3D artists to test their skills and create a piece of work based on concepts provided. It's open to those of all skill levels and we do our best to provide meaningful feedback along the way so everyone can come away from the challenge with actionable points on which they can improve their craft!

Anyone is welcome in this challenge no matter your skill level! It's a test of your own ability not a competition between members. We're all here to improve as artists and learn from each other.

- ENVIRONMENTS -

HARD SURFACE ENVIRONMENT:

Not a Nice Walk by Giulia Gentilini


STYLIZED ENVIRONMENT:

Mask Shop Interior by Oleksandr Klakov
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/vDGkOO


- PROPS -

HARD SURFACE PROP:

Panopticon Headquarters - Survival by Richard PL
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/g0bVDZ


STYLIZED PROP:

Market Stalls by Haris Petritsopoulos
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/04Jl3w


- RULES -

Please read all the rules before starting:
  • Try to post at least one critique for every post that you make. This will make for a better learning environment and help us all grow as artists.
  • Try your best to finish as much as you can in the time frame provided, but remember even if you don't finish by the end of the challenge we encourage you to keep pushing and finish your piece!
  • Post what you are working on in this thread so that way it's a more centralized place for advice and critique. Please avoid creating a new thread as we don't want to spam out the forums.
  • It is recommended to use a game engine to present your work. Unreal Engine, Unity, and Godot are very common engines that can be used but feel free to use any alternatives that you want. (Marmoset Toolbag for example.)
  • Feel free to change up your chosen concept a bit if you want! Interpret these concepts to your liking, especially if your aim is to add storytelling elements.
  • If you finish your project and decide to post it to something like Artstation, make sure you give credit to the concept artist in the form of a link to their profile. Additionally, it is recommended to ask a concept artist for their permission to post a 3D piece based on their work before doing so.

- RECOMMENDATIONS -

  • When you are just starting out making a scene, it can seem complicated or imposing. Take your time planning and blocking out, it will set you up for success later on.
  • Think about how you can re-use assets, re-use textures, break it down as simple as possible and plan it out. A lot of people will break it down in their own way when they start out their challenge. Gather some reference images as well for different parts of the scene, don't be afraid to make it your own.
  • We strongly encourage you to go and look at other games and see how they make their assets as well as get concept art to give it your own feel.
The goal is to learn and grow both artistically and in your ability to both give and receive critique, but don't stress about it and remember to have fun!

Good luck everyone!

Replies

  • ZacD
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    ZacD ngon master



    Blocking out, setup some spline blueprints for the tunnel, lighting seems like it's going to be a bit tricky to get it right and a lot of faking things.
  • Pep_mepla
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    Pep_mepla polycounter lvl 3
    ZacD said:



    Blocking out, setup some spline blueprints for the tunnel, lighting seems like it's going to be a bit tricky to get it right and a lot of faking things.

    I think the proportions are really great, they do emphasize the size of the space. I am really looking forward to see how you tackle those mushrooms!


    This is the first time I am trying one of the Environments, so I'm kind of scared, but excited as well. Masks are my obsession, so this is the perfect project for me to begin with.

    This is a quick blockout made in Blender, just to throw in Unreal and have a feel for proportions. Im going more for a playable space, rather than a perfect duplicate of the concept.


  • miriuk
  • Fabi_G
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    Fabi_G high dynamic range
    Started a blockout of the market stand:

  • miriuk
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    miriuk polycounter lvl 3
    Started the blockout today
  • Its0urFate
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    Its0urFate polycounter lvl 3
    Blockout + Some light sculpting so far. Hoping to get acclimated with zbrush again for this project and really experiment with stylized texturing
  • zoeyw
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    zoeyw triangle
    The very first time to join the challenge! Here's my stylized prop blockout. I'll move to Zbrush and keep sculpting details.

  • stahlwart
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    stahlwart polygon
    First time taking part in one of these! Second time doing this blockout because I forgot to save >.<


  • klamante
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    klamante polygon
    This is the first time I am trying one of the Environments, so I'm kind of scared, but excited as well. Masks are my obsession, so this is the perfect project for me to begin with.

    This is a quick blockout made in Blender, just to throw in Unreal and have a feel for proportions. Im going more for a playable space, rather than a perfect duplicate of the concept.



    I love the atmosphere you're building here, though the light could be a little less intense, as the rest of the room seems pretty dark on the concept. But I'm not good at environments. :D Looking forward to seeing the progress!

    It's also my first time taking part in the challenge, so hello everyone. (: Good to see so many market stalls - I hope I can learn something from you, guys!

    Here's my attempt - it's already a bit more than just a block out, as I can't stop myself from going into details. Right now I'm thinking of how can I tackle the veggies - I would like to omit sculpting and go full hand-paint right away.
  • Its0urFate
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    Its0urFate polycounter lvl 3
    Got most of the sculpting done and wanted to move onto implenting textures. Tried to stick to a more stylized texturing style within Painter and keeping the roughness pretty high. Not too stoked on the wooden boxes (need to add more sculpt detail and silhouette changes) and maybe some more color variation on the cloth tarp. But I like where I ended up today :)  The ground I'm keeping separate for now (wanna work with designer on that one)

  • yashar98
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    yashar98 polycounter lvl 9
    Hi there. this is my fast blockout! ;)

  • archie_garcia_27
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    archie_garcia_27 polycounter lvl 5
    Excited to work on this Vinyl Player prop. I think I could turn into a great portfolio piece. Here's my blockout starting out so far. For scale I used a standard 12" vinyl disc and the AA batteries real world dimensions as scale reference for the whole case.

  • Michele
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    Michele triangle
    Hi, i'm a casual blender user, never made anything crazy. Now i'm trying to learn how to use it properly, i'm trying to pay more attention to the topology, i'm learning how to reroute and contain geometry were it's needed. This would be the first complex project foe me. Can I ask some question here while I work on it? Should I ask in other sections of the forum?
  • miriuk
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    miriuk polycounter lvl 3
    Small progress from my side 

  • klamante
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    klamante polygon
    miriuk said:
    Small progress from my side 


    Looks great! Love the details. (:
  • klamante
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    klamante polygon
    Well, I managed to model all the veggies and started preparing the UVs. Each color is going to be a different UDIM - don't know if I approach this the right way. I mean the groups or texel density. If you guys have any tips on how to do it correctly, I'll be grateful! In the meantime, I'm gonna watch some tutorials on YT before moving forward. =)


  • Fabi_G
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    Fabi_G high dynamic range
    Nice progresses :-B

    @Its0urFate I agree, some large to medium details would help to give the wood some directionality and break up the now empty areas.

    I got around to continue with the market stand. I chose to just model away and then map the faces to flat colors, a workflow I recently picked up from Alex_J's project. Also added some subtle gradients into vertex color. Rendered in Toolbag with a cell shader by almighty_gir. Unfortunately can't export a viewer with the shader.


    Edit: "Finished" it:

    Created an Artstation project with a short turntable clip.
  • stahlwart
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    stahlwart polygon
    Almost done with the texture painting...! Kind of sad that stage is over because now I have to arrange everything else lol
    Edit: done! Just gotta whack it into Unreal now.


  • klamante
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    klamante polygon
    @Fabi_G Love the atmosphere and shadows! I can almost feel the warmth of the sun. Beautiful. (:

    I have added base colors and shadows to mine - time to finally paint the details.


  • PastyPict
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    PastyPict polycounter lvl 5
    Bit late, but want to get back into some 3D art from a big hiatus. Didn't have a lot of time since it late at night after working on this. So here is a quick and dirty grey box for start.


  • Fabi_G
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    Fabi_G high dynamic range
    @Stahlberg Cool to see it lit :+1: I think the Ropes could be tied a bit tighter, as currently they look a bit floaty/loose. Perhaps have them intersect some with the wood. And perhaps the pumpkins could be pushed a little more inside the box. Keep it up!

    @klamante Thanks, much appreciated! Looking forward to see what details you'll add.

  • yashar98
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    yashar98 polycounter lvl 9
    It still needs a lot of work and it's exhausting me :/

  • Fabi_G
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    Fabi_G high dynamic range
    @yashar98 looking great, keep it up!

    I know the struggle of loosing steam over the course of a project all too well. Personally these measures help me to counter that:

    - Breaking down the design into repeating elements beforehand. Sure, this might make it look less unique than the concept, but reusing meshes and textures can speed up the process immensely. Some simple transform variation of reused elements, or deformers, can help to hide repetition. At a later point, one can still go in and give elements a unique touch if required. Even if you started texturing all unique, at any time you can jump in an image editor and reuse pixels you aready polished for other areas. For me this process is never one directional.

    - Go from big to small. Blocking everything in at first and then refining gradually, helps me to not lose sight of the big picture and spend the time where it has the most impact. There might be elements that are sort of highlights/high priority and need more polish (vegetables, wood edges, cloth edges), while other things are more rest area/backdrop and work with less definition. Ideally you would  always have something to fall back on, with less time it's just less defined.

    - Rescope. I think pushing the execution of an element is cool to define a target, but when you're feeling like burning yourself out applying this level to across the scene, reduce the scope. Finish something smaller with more fun and quality. In this case maybe just one box with vegetables? Sometimes just doing it this way internally, helps me chew through more complex subjects.

    Well, just my thoughts on the matter. Curious to read how others deal with this. I think the initial post of these challenges also gives some good pointers.

    Great, I made a wall of text :-B
  • Its0urFate
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    Its0urFate polycounter lvl 3
    @yashar98 Great job so far! Honestly everything @Fabi_G said is spot on, but also remember to take breaks! Walk away from the project for a little while and come back to it with a fresher mind!

    @PastyPict Better late than never! Keep going at it! Once you get more detail and form in there it'll come together for you.

    @klamante Loving the colors so far! Giving me a cel shaded look which I absolutely love

    @stahlwart Love the details on the wood! I would sink those pumpkins down a bit more and shrink in those ropes around the ends of the supports. The one on the left top looks like it's floating above the wood

    @Fabi_G Killing it as always Fabi! :) Also gave you a follow over on artstation. I'm a sucker for cel shaded work so it's a thumbs up from me! Especially love the floor!
    Here's what I ended up with. The flooring is something I struggled with a bit but just managed to put something simple to give more focus to the actual stand. I threw in more details for the wooden boxes and adjust some values here and there. The lighting was another struggle but figured out a basic trick to just blur the hdri I was using to give softer shadows. Stoked with how everyone has been doing so far!

    Looking forward to updates on those mask shops, vinyl players and interior tunnels :)
  • stahlwart
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    stahlwart polygon
    Here it is in an Unreal render- I've definitely learnt a lot from this whole process. Thank you to everyone for the feedback! I look forward to taking part in more of these challenges :]
    (53k triangles in total!)

  • yashar98
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    yashar98 polycounter lvl 9

    Hello Mr.  @Fabi_G,

    I appreciate your opinion and thank you for your time. I did stack the UVs, but initially, I decided to make all the objects look unique. In hindsight, I think I overdid it for my first hand-painted experience. For example, half of the boxes are UVed, or the upper part of the table is UVed at 1/2 scale and the lower part at 1/4 scale. However, the workload ended up being too much for me.

    Mr. @Its0urFate, your positive opinion about my work makes me happy. Thank you. I really enjoy your work and that of other friends. Your efforts are truly appreciated.

  • klamante
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    klamante polygon
    Guess I'm gonna call it done - at least for now, as I want to participate in another challenge that started two days ago and I have to hurry. :D That's why I was so lazy with the pavement.

    There were many materials I found challenging to render like the sack or... pumpkins. I learned a lot in this field!

    Hope you like it! And Thanks for the opportunity!


  • Staddy
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    Staddy polycounter lvl 4
    Thought I'd join the challenge, so thats what I came up after starting yesterday. Quite fun, interesting shapes. I still see a few things I can improve on so lets see how it will look in a few days :) 




  • miriuk
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    miriuk polycounter lvl 3
    What you guys thinking? I will start the texture tomorrow.


  • Staddy
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    Staddy polycounter lvl 4
    I didnt have much time but I managed to finish my high poly and do some unwrapping for my low poly. 
  • miriuk
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    miriuk polycounter lvl 3
    I think maybe I've done this one, next one I will dedicate more time. More images on my artstation
    https://www.artstation.com/artwork/29AEqK



    Thanks
  • Staddy
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    Staddy polycounter lvl 4
    This is my take on it. This concludes my part. For me the most challenging part was fitting everything onto the UV map and still making the textures look good. Quite glad how it turned out :) 

  • Pinkfox
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    Pinkfox ngon master
    Hey everyone!
    There has been some absolutely incredible work and it's been wonderful to see all the progress made across the different concepts. Excellent work everyone, including those who may still be working on their pieces. :)

    With the month of July comes a new challenge for those interested! Even if you're not planning to participate you're always welcome to come provide compliments and critiques to those who are. Either way, I hope to see you over there. <3
  • zoeyw
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    zoeyw triangle
    It's so nice to see lots of amazing works! Great job everyone!
    Although there are tons of things I could and should improve or adjust, I decided to wrap up my work for now and move on for now. At first I planned to make a low poly model with hand paint texture. Then I was struggling with UV cutting and hand paint technique. After some searching and learning, I found out more efficiently workflow but ran out of time. I am looking for the next challenge and keep improving my craft!

  • Torch
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    Torch polycounter
    @klamante My absolute favourite here, great finish and awesome work. Other market stall entries were still brilliant here though!
  • klamante
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    klamante polygon
    Torch said:
    @klamante My absolute favourite here, great finish and awesome work. Other market stall entries were still brilliant here though!

    Thank you so much! (:
  • Hymil
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    Hymil triangle
    Hi everyone, I'm posting here a bit late since I was a bit shy to share on here. All the work people have been sharing have been amazing and great to see the progress on. So, I'd like to contribute to the challenge! Hope to see you all in future challenges!
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