[WIP] Numenor Inspired Environment UE5

ThisisVictoriaZ

Hello! Ive been working on this little alley environment based off of concept art I found for Rings of Power season 1! Numenor was one of the coolest places showcased in the show, and I felt like this concept was not only visually interesting, but it looks like it can help me to reach a few goals ive been wanting to practice in my free time, outside of work. 

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/NyQXyD?collection_id=2050873 Here is the original art by Julien Gauthier



Here is the block out and my most recent progress on this!
There's quite a few things that i know I want to change about my environment right now, including:

• Need to change the shade of green on right wall
• Replace brown stone wall on left side, its too noisy and not reading well
• Fix metal window frame on left wall
• Some things still feel too blocky, need to fix
• Add displacement to my brick wall materials?
• Replace all block mesh with real models 
• Replace water material
• Help models fit together better by messing with AO and adding some decals where edges meet
• Get started on foliage 
  
• Create custom decals to match the paint brush strokes on the concept

Here are my references and goals

I am working on this pretty slowly, I do work full time in the games industry but I would like to push through and finish this soon!
Looking forward to hearing your feedback and posting more updates on this

PeterGatchev

Hey nice start! First thing is to focus more on the blockout in graybox state and amtch the feeling of narrowness and depth. Allso focus more on the modularity and defining more modular elements before moving to colors and textures. Check for ref the art in Plague tale requieme, Mafia Old cunntry. ACK Mirrage, indiana jones great circle. 

ThisisVictoriaZ

@PeterGatchev Thanks for the feedback! I will check those out and add them to my board I moved onto the texturing partially to motivate myself to work on this more often, since that's my favorite part of the environment building process, but I will spend some more time on planning and composition 

PeterGatchev

Thats fine but focus on geeting every proportions right and the same feeling of the concept - for example the stairs - they are 2 inclimbs going up with flat walkway between where the arch is. the staris are not that steep so you can have the nice depth and view  of the second arch and builings down the strteet. the street curves to the left so the arch is also on angle in the concept. And i recomment to push back the camera to have the same point of view in the concept when you are doing the blockout

PeterGatchev

ofcource also check if the concept sacle is realistic 

ThisisVictoriaZ

@PeterGatchev Thank you for the sketch thats actually super helpful! I actually didnt notice there was a second set of stairs there haha ill add those details next time I work on this!

Peyd3d

This is a great start so far. As Peter suggested, I highly recommend you to revisit the blockout stage mainly when it comes to scale. It's the first thing I noticed when looking at your images.

The characters feel a bit big for the alley or it feels cramped. Feel free to change the layout a bit of course as you don't have to stick 100% to the concept. 
Scale is the most important because no matter how beautiful your texturing & lighting will be, it will just feel off a bit. Some slight adjustments that were pointed out can already make a difference. 

Keep at it, looking forward to the updates!

ThisisVictoriaZ

@Peyd3d Thank you! I appreciate your feedback, and I will absolutely revisit my block out.

I'm not sure if, in the blockout stage, its better to have a already defined "kit" to build with or to have more freedom and worry about the "kit" after. In this project I tried creating cubes that are 1M, 2M, and 4M wide for the walls, as I thought it would help me later on. I ended up feeling kind of stuck and scaling some of these shapes to fit my needs, but that kind of defeats the purpose of creating them in the first place. I might go back and create the correct composition with the correct scale first, and then worry more about modifying what i have to make a kit that fits this environment after.

Peyd3d

Yes that is the best approach I'd say. Blockout is very important and you shouldn't feel limited too much by a kit. 
Once you've nailed the blockout and the proportions, you can then still proceed with thinking about how to make a kit for this (if you even need one). 

PeterGatchev

ThisisVictoriaZ said:

@PeterGatchev Thank you for the sketch thats actually super helpful! I actually didnt notice there was a second set of stairs there haha ill add those details next time I work on this!

You are welcome

PeterGatchev

Peyd3d said:

Yes that is the best approach I'd say. Blockout is very important and you shouldn't feel limited too much by a kit. 
Once you've nailed the blockout and the proportions, you can then still proceed with thinking about how to make a kit for this (if you even need one). 

I agree with that. Modularity can done in some makey ways so dont limit yourself with the blockout. Explore how the do it in other games.