UDK-Tomb Raider Based Environment
polycounter lvl 15
Been working on a new environment for my port, so i thought i would show what i have so far. Its based off a Tomb Raider concept that I found and thought would be a good challenge to do. Right I'm working on the textures and adding more foliage, and will post them when I get it to a farther point. Any and all Critiques are more than welcomed so feel free to tear it apart along the way:\
Replies
What's lacking right now is contrast. Everything is white. The other color you do have is ok, but it should be saturated more. Give it more of that orange fire you're looking for. You can make parts of the palm leaves green, the bark brown, with the snow more scattered. Not everything has to be 100% covered in snow/ice.
The textures are looking blurry as well. Specifically the 8 bases at the bottom of these sculptures running down the middle. You might be better off making the top of those solid white, or having fire/lava flowing on top.
The proportions seem off. Look on the left side where the stairs lead up to the brick texture and then lead up to the palm tree. I'm thinking the stairs are too big and the palm trees are too small. The plants on the ground compared to the step size of the stairs may be too big as well.
With concern to the trees, they are very specifically and evenly placed throughout the scene. Place them more sporadically and with different variation. Each tree is the same size and looks like the same angle. Scale one down, scale another one up, rotate one left, rotate one right. You will get a more natural look that way.
I like that you have your focal point locked down. You want the player to head down into the mouth entrance there so keep making sure to draw their attention to it. The scene may benefit by darkeing the sky as well to allow the orange glow to be more dramatic.
Keep it up, it's a good start. Post some updates after you fix a few issues here.
also the treeline in the back is a little too lined up. make an interesting silhouette out of those trees.
i know its still early, so i hope these tips will help you in the long run before its the point of no return.
good luck!
You can't make a jungle feel like jungle if you don't make sure that the background feels lush and awesome too. Mountains and big cliffs with low to medium sized bushes and palmtrees together with really high jungle trees with vines.
Like the others said, think and plan for this now before you hit the point-of-no-return. Good work and Good luck!
Hey man, its looking pretty good. I agree with Chimp that you should work on some more dramatic lighting. I was looking at the concept and your WIP, your lighting seems a little washed out right now. Its really coming along though, can't wait to see it finished.
Regards,
Alex
I would darken up the area that are not in the focus and add some warm lighting in the focus area. Added some cool rays and fog also to give a a bit more atmospheric setting.
I am really enjoying the concept, the scene its building really nicely.
My only criticism that isn't too nit picky, is the entirety of the temple piece feels squashed compared to the concept.
In the concept its much more dominating and impressive in its relation to the character especially in its length from the characters position on the piece to the opening. Yours feels short and squashed to my eyes. But thats not saying I dont find it beautiful
Something like this would be better:
2 second paint-over
What I basically did was to smash it together more in photoshop, then added a little bit more on the right side (which you can do by just moving the camera
FOV 90
FOV 45
I'm not sure how closely you are trying to stick to the concept though:
The original image is more of a daytime, grim and overcast shot, making the scene more green, white and yellow than the deep blues and oranges you currently have.
I'd suggest trying to closely mimic the exact camera angle and FOV in the concept too.
Taking your existing camera up a little higher and moving it forwards, maybe making the FOV about 70 too?
This way, you'll find everything else like scaling and texturing a helluva lot easier.
does anyone know how to change the fov in the actual editor not just in game.
Alright. It looks wrong for four reasons:
1) Your perspective is off; raise the camera and tilt it down [in yellow]
2) Your "valley" is too narrow; bring in the walls. Part of what makes a great jungle is the claustrophobia effect. [in orange]
3) Your skyline is too visible. Compare to the original, and you'll see you have way too much sky. [in purple]
4) You're missing a wall; the unfinished pyramid on the right is built into the rocky walls of the valley. [in red]
Hope that helps. - Louis
Louis has done a fantastic paintover and it might be an idea to actually recreate those lines with some in-editor unlit geometry (maybe with nice bright, plain emmissive maps).
That way you can screengrab from UDK and overlay that to the concept paintover above to try and get it to match perfectly - jumping back into UDK to make adjustments.