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Monthly Environment Art Challenge - November & December 2017 (51)

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greentooth
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kadeschui greentooth
Hello everyone and welcome to the Monthly Environment & Prop Challenge #51!

Incredible work by all - as always special thanks to everyone who participated in the voting process this time. 

Remember if you don't finish in the time allotted, just keep plugging away and post when your work is finished. There's always some good progress that falls off the radar - we want to see your work! So keep going and finish those pieces!

 Without further ado, here are our options for Challenge 51!


HARD SURFACE CATEGORY:

artist: studioqube


HAND PAINTED CATEGORY:


artist: Olga Orlova



HAND PAINTED CATEGORY:
Halloween trees by Nieris

artist: nieris

HARD SURFACE CATEGORY:



artist: Ruslan Safarov


If you want to change up either concept a bit, as some people wanted, then feel free. Interpret these concepts to your liking.


Please read all the rules before starting.

When you are just starting out making a scene, it can seem complicated or imposing, so take the time to break it down. 

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, maybe gather some refs and make it your own.

Take your time planning and blocking out, it will set you up for success later on.

Here are some specifics.
  • Try to post one critique for every post that you make. This will make for a better learning environment and help us all grow as artists.
  • You must use a game engine to present your work. Unreal Engine and CryEngine are very common engines that can be used but feel free to use any alternatives that you want. (Marmoset Toolbag is allowed as well)
  • You must try your best and finish as much as you can in the time frame provided.
  • Post what you are working on in this thread so that way it's a more centralized place for advice and critique. We don't need to have 1000 disjointed threads littering the forums. 
  • I would 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, but it must stay very close to the concept, if not super close. 
Well, that's about it. If you think that any rules should be changed, or there should be new additions to the rules, please let me know. As always, please feel free to provide feedback / suggestions in this thread or by messaging me directly.

All that matters is that you learn while being able to effectively critique others, as well as accept critiques on your own work. Remember to have fun. Cheers!

Replies

  • Larry
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    Larry interpolator
    I will try the TV concept, i think it will be a very nice addition to the scene i am currently working on, however i'm gonna make this as a radio, with a steampunk style...!Something like that! Also searched for some ref, for the body parts with a steampunk feel. The overall way this machine works will be as in the concept...!

    Man this is so nice, i wish i had time to make 3d all day T_T
  • Nathair23
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    Nathair23 polycounter lvl 2
    Such beautiful concepts! Despite loving both hardsurface and hand painted environments, I am gonna go with the hand painted one, love it so much! Plus, that way I will learn more about hand painted textures :) i will try to use maya for modeling for the first time.
  • Quibees
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    Quibees polycounter lvl 4
    I want to try robot from hard surf category, though i don`t have experince with hard surf and substance at all :(
  • jums
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    jums polycounter lvl 4
    New to the site, so figured I'd dive right in...

    Decided I'd tackle the hand-painted category - organic modelling is something I need to work on, especially trees. Roots and branches are a right headache  :s
    But anyway, started by playing around with the stump since it's fairly low investment:

    Using Maya, and going for something relatively low-poly but I wonder if what I've got currently is a bit too conservative? Next up is to start defining the roots.
  • apollo580
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    apollo580 polycounter lvl 9
    I'll be giving the hand painted tree a shot!
  • Jesse Walsh
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    Jesse Walsh polycounter lvl 7
    Cool concepts. I'm going to work on the little boat house diorama. The modelling/texturing seems pretty easy, so I will be sinking some time into water creation and little ambient animations.
  • Mason_Colderson


    Base mesh for the middle tree, gonna start sculpting tonight
  • mike_slot
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    mike_slot polycounter lvl 3
    Wow nice concepts, I'll try the television robot, it will help me on study more about Smart Materials on 3D Coat
    Lets Go!

  • Larry
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    Larry interpolator
    Went in pretty fast in this one, all my free time was devoted on this for now. I cannot begin to think about the texturing/baking part...I think i will try retopologising most of these.. Here's my progress for now.

    @Mason_Colderson
    Your right branch seems kind of blocky for now, otherwise the proportions seem fine..Good luck on sculpting!
  • Mason_Colderson
    Here's some sculpting progress:



    A LOT more work to do..

    @Larry Looking nice! Are you doing your own version of the TV robot?
  • Zerogun
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    Zerogun polycounter lvl 9
    My goal is to hit that sci fi base environment scene. I have some ideas planned out on how to tackle it. At the moment I did a UE4 layout.


    I also followed up with a bit of a paint over to the image to get some better measurements on what it can look like.

    I'll readjust and keep this back and forth going before moving on to Max.
  • Cheungygirl
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    Cheungygirl polycounter lvl 8
    Hi all, haven't done one of these monthly challenges before so I'd love to join in this time! I'll be going for the hand painted boat house - I love little diorama scenes!

    Here's my blockout so far:

  • Nathair23
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    Nathair23 polycounter lvl 2
    @Cheungygirl looks good already :) I'm doing the same scene, it is so cute, I couldn't resist!
  • a.tunnard
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    a.tunnard polycounter lvl 4
    I've never tried hand drawing an environment hopefully i'll be able to show something by the end! 
    Have fun everyone.

    Block-out:

  • oshima
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    oshima polycounter lvl 8
    Ok, first try, i'm still playing with the blocking. Some props mismatch like the boat and the house architecture.
  • JFROSTBYTE
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    JFROSTBYTE polycounter lvl 4
    Hey everyone! All the blockouts look great. It has been a while since I have done one of these challenges. @Nathair23 I agree, the boathouse concept is beautiful and stood out to me. I will attempt it and create the hand painted look with substance designer. Not sure if this is allowed? if not i'll do it in substance painter.

    Here is my quick blockout. nothing like @oshima great work. This may be backwards but I am going to work on the textures before I model the final assets.


  • Mason_Colderson
    Finished the sculpt for the middle tree, gonna start texturing soon



    great blockouts all around on the other hand painted environment piece!
  • Nathair23
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    Nathair23 polycounter lvl 2
    All blockouts looks really good! There are more people with respect to the previous hand painted environment challenge, that's nice, I love to see how people work and progress :) Here's my blockout:

    I have to say I feel better with Blender's workflow, but I'm getting used to Maya as well.
  • LowerclassRiot
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    LowerclassRiot triangle
    Is it to late to enter i am new here i recently got out of school  and i am trying to get ter with my artwork.
  • GhostDetector
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    GhostDetector polycounter lvl 10
    Hello, I'll model the hand painted environment and finshed the blockout.



  • Mason_Colderson
    Is it to late to enter i am new here i recently got out of school  and i am trying to get ter with my artwork.
    Nope never too late! Join the fun
  • oshima
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    oshima polycounter lvl 8
    Props Breakdown. Maybe the house includes two or three elements too, we'll see
  • Betaknight
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    Betaknight triangle
    What is the deadline for this? Kinda new :)
  • Nathair23
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    Nathair23 polycounter lvl 2
    @Betaknight it runs until the end of december, you can find all the info in the first post of this topic :) I just recently started with those challenges and I find they are a very good way to build a portfolio and push yourself :)
  • Klawd
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    Klawd polycounter lvl 7
    It's a bi-monthly challenge (used to be monthly but has been expanded to give more people the chance to partecipate, especially those with little free time). The months are specified in the thread title. This is November-December. Sometimes people finish and post it even after the end of the two months, so don't worry, it's a pretty relaxed kind of challenge, the important is to finish and learn something new every time!
  • Cheeky_Pickle
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    Cheeky_Pickle polycounter lvl 9
    Hey guys, I was working on a previous challenge, the chinese town but it was just too big for me to take on. I've decided to give the little boathouse a go. Block out below from Unity

    Now that i've got my block stages down, i'm not really sure what the next step is. I never know if I should be taking things into Z brush or not? What is a good factor to decide if something should go to z or not? 


  • Larry
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    Larry interpolator
    Hey guys, I was working on a previousprevious challenge, the chinese town but it was just too big for me to take on. I've decided to give the little boathouse a go. Block out below from Unity

    Now that i've got my block stages down, i'm not really sure what the next step is. I never know if I should be taking things into Z brush or not? What is a good factor to decide if something should go to z or not? 


    What kind of quality do youyou want it to have? I mean, you can get away with everything by making realistic materials for it. You can also sculpt 2-3 wood planks and use them mixed in your scene. The boat's sun protection is cloth so it definately needs folds. Try to be creative by adding aspects to each material. The cloth can be torn a little bit, the wood planks can have some scratches and damage, the wallscould show some bricks on the inside,the roof could have tiles. It is a rather simple yet interesting diorama that you can incorporate some details yourself. Dont stick exactly to the picture, give the coloring you like and add some minor details to make it unique
  • Klawd
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    Klawd polycounter lvl 7
    ...
    What is a good factor to decide if something should go to z or not? 

    A good factor, as you put it, would be your personal experience. There are no obligatory rules. If you don't try you can't learn, just go for it!
  • jewski-bot
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    jewski-bot polycounter lvl 4
    Wowee!  I didn't expect to see so much progress made in such a short amount of time!  There's some very nice work being done with the Hand Painted Environment so far with a special nod to both @Holly Mellor and @oshima.  I had considered working on this prop, with the idea of using it at an exercise in material creation with Substance Designer, but I think I'm going to stick with what's familiar at the moment and tackle the tv robot prop for the hard surface category.

    Speaking of which, @Larry, that's an excellent reference sheet that you have of real world objects.  I think that I'll do something similar for my own since there are quite a few design hurdles with the legs to overcome with the legs.  As for your model, it's off to a great start and I'm very much digging the mechanical details for the leg mounts.  I look forward to seeing when you get to the textures for material breakup!

    Lastly, I must give nods to @Mason_Colderson and @Zerogun for their respective work in progress models.  I'm very much digging the tree stump prop and you've managed to turn a seemingly simple model into a very interesting piece, Mason.  Zerogun, I think that you're off to a good start by doing a quick paintover of your model and making sure everything is proportioned just right before going into detailing.

     
  • LowerclassRiot
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    LowerclassRiot triangle
    Decided to try the hand painted trees started  with the stump and decided to use Maya.Been few years since Ive used it so hoping to  get better at it.

    Just blocking it out  at this stage still have a ways to go.
  • jewski-bot
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    jewski-bot polycounter lvl 4


    First foray into the challenge thus far.  I have a general idea on how to put this guy together, though by no means is the above image an exhaustive compilation on the various parts, and most of it is for inspirational purposes for design problem solving rather than a rigid reference.  Most of everything I looked at came from either 1970's era technology or auto parts.

    Of course some things that don't need to withstand close scrutiny will be fudged (for example, U-joints probably won't be modeled).

    I envision this TV-bot being roughly about half the height of a human (at best) so that will help with proportions and scaling of parts.  
  • jewski-bot
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    jewski-bot polycounter lvl 4


    Quick 'n dirty UV guide for identifying shared / mirrored UVs vs unique UVs.
  • Larry
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    Larry interpolator
    @Mason_Colderson Yes, i am making a radio with steampunk feeling.
    @jewski-bot I think if you make it sci-fi it's gonna be easier having to deal with "realistic" working, since you can just make a cable/pipe coming out of a panel, and get away with the engineering difficulties.

    I wanted to make a robot with pipes, gear etc. So i thought "hey lets make some kitbashing objects for steampunk."
    And ended up doing these modular pipes with helpers on them for quick snaping

    I Uv'ed them as well and in the end i was quite happy with that so i also made a turbosquid account and sold them there. I was amazed with what i can do with these pipes.. A quick example from what could possibly be my room to place the robot

    And here is what i  made, using all the modular parts. The gear is "realistically" working. So now i only have to make the unique large pieces for the legs and the fingers/toes!
  • oshima
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    oshima polycounter lvl 8
    High Basemesh; call me crazy but I change a bit the dock architecture because I don't see consistent  :D
  • jewski-bot
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    jewski-bot polycounter lvl 4

    First WIP shot of the TV-bot Hi-Poly model!  I've been trying to keep track on modeling time, and thus far, it's taken about 10 hours or so to get to this point.  I think that I may have goofed and modeled a bunch of excessive details and playing around too much with weighting edges / faces to get the desired hardness, forgetting that the edges needed to be a bit more rounded then on a real world object  and also that things like bolt holes don't need to be modeled if covered up.

    I would say that I'm mostly happy with where I am; there are a few things that need to be fixed like the upper arm and too much negative space in the shoulder socket, so some re-sizing will need to be done there, and also the lower leg plating might need to be redone to better mimic the concept art.  The feet too may be subject to being redone as well (they should be smooth and round).

    All in all, this seems to be going relatively fast, the upper leg mechanism is nearly finished, and I want to say that the most tedious pieces will be those that aren't really clear.  I hope to be in full retopo mode for the low poly soon enough! :smile:


    Now for some feedback! :wink:

    @Larry, your model is coming along very well and if your progress is any indication, I suspect that you may indeed have the better model by challenge's end.  That crazy bit of piping would've driven me nuts, but it seems like you've got a good handle on it.  I look forward to seeing your normal map bakes!

    @oshima, Good job with the high resolution dock layout.  The variation in the high poly planks, help to sell this.  I'm not sure if your intention is to take this into ZBrush, but I do think it would be nice to sculpt some small chunks taken out of the wood to give it a little bit of history.
  • Mason_Colderson
    Textures (polypaint) done. Gonna retopo and unwrap later on.



    @oshima
    Good blockout of the wooden porch! Looking forward to the rest of the props

    @Larry
    Really interesting choice to go modular! That looks like a lot of fun and very intricate.

    @jewski-bot
    I feel like you are being very loyal to the concept art, which is good because the point in this challenge is to create a model as close as you can to the concept art. Don't get too hung up on worrying if it looks off since the angle being used in the concept art can only give you some direction on how it actually would look in a 3D interpretation. I'd say that you shoulder mechanism looks alright, just a little too much on the skinny side. Also for the leg plate, near the knee, I feel like it should pop out a little more rather than it being curved inwards. Otherwise, great progress so far!
  • Larry
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    Larry interpolator
    @jewski-bot

    Thanks! I like your progress as well, dont stick too much to the angles, that just takes up your time. Take as much time as it needs, even with experimentation. It will help you grow.  For my progress this has taken up more than 20 hours already, counting all the conceptijng as well.

    I will only bake maps for some basic parts. TheI pipes and the gear will not get baked. I might just use vertex paint to paint some rust on those. Never tried that before. Problem with modular parts is that they have quite bita of geometry but for next gen games character and a portfolio piece, I can easily spend 200-250k right now itand sits at 130k.

    @Mason_Colderson for a moment I thought your picture was the reference haha. Good job on that prop, it looks so nice even if its not done yet. The reason I made these modular parts is because I am building a whole steampunk interior, so they will be useful there as well. All the time is worth it so iI take it slow and do this correctly
  • Fizzly
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    Fizzly polycounter lvl 8


    Hi everyone :smile: I'm going for the TV-Bot as well. This is where I'm at so far, couple of lunch breaks at work.

  • LowerclassRiot
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    LowerclassRiot triangle

    @jewski-@JewellKem

    Thanks! I like your progress as well, dont stick too much to the angles, that just takes up your time. Take as much time as it needs, even with experimentation. It will help you grow.  For my progress this has taken up more than 20 hours already, counting all the conceptijng as well.

    I will only bake maps for some basic parts. TheI pipes and the gear will not get baked. I might just use vertex paint to paint some rust on those. Never tried that before. Problem with modular parts is that they have quite bita of geometry but for next gen games character and a portfolio piece, I can easily spend 200-250k right now itand sits at 130k.

    @Mason_Colderson for a moment I thought your picture was the reference haha. Good job on that prop, it looks so nice even if its not done yet. The reason I made these modular parts is because I am building a whole steampunk interior, so they will be useful there as well. All the time is worth it so iI take it slow and do this correctly

  • LowerclassRiot
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    LowerclassRiot triangle
    Really nice job color matching with the reference image
  • Zerogun
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    Zerogun polycounter lvl 9
    I think I got my 3D Max layout enough for now. I believe I'll start dismantling it and getting all those details into my buildings. I'll be bouncing around them for a while, which is why it took so long for this update. Still had a bit of adjusting to get this right-ish for now.


    @jewski-bot and @Larry: you two have some really cool work going on the TV bot. I can't wait to see how you guys handle the final product.

    I'm really impressed by all the boat houses that are popping up in this thread. I think we can blame @oshima for making it look easy. And to @Holly Mellor I'm really liking your design. I am excited for the hand painted works everyone will be putting out. I'm curious how everyone will make it their own. 

  • Lukitscherie
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    Lukitscherie polycounter lvl 8
    The concepts have a 2 months time is that right? I already feel like I won't have enough time...

    Here's my blockout of the house with almost all elements: The stairs made me feel really stupid and I think they're going to stay that way. : p

    Going with a low poly approach as always x )


  • PraxisPixels
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    PraxisPixels polycounter lvl 6
    @Mason_Colderson wow that looks fantastic! I'm excited to see the retopo. Keep it up :)

    @Lukitscherie nice block out! 
  • GuanAndOnly
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    GuanAndOnly polycounter lvl 6
    Ahh probably as far as I'm gonna take it for this challenge haha!
  • Larry
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    Larry interpolator
    Ahh probably as far as I'm gonna take it for this challenge haha!

    Why not continue?? The way you presented it made me laugh a little with those point lights it looks like its on stage,and the posture kind of makes it look like its in a freak show xD
  • IDCrisis0
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    IDCrisis0 polycounter lvl 6
    Hey all, I'm going to try out the hard surface environment. I was already working in Substance Designer, so I started with the Snow material. Mud coming soon. I plan on using this in a landscape blend material with a muddy water as well.

    https://www.artstation.com/artwork/dwRXK 
  • Bostvic
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    Bostvic polycounter lvl 5
    Ahh probably as far as I'm gonna take it for this challenge haha!
    No, you should certainly continue! It looks really good so far!


    Anyway, here is my initial blockout of the snowbase. I really struggled to get the perspective on point with some parts, particularly the semi-circular part on the right.

  • AndySC
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    AndySC polycounter lvl 5

    I caught the opening of this contest soon as it was posted up and thought it would be a good opportunity for my first real project. I've been following a range of tutorials but haven't made anything complex on my own, as yet. It's certainly a learning experience, getting caught in some of the details. It's taking longer than it should, but most of that time is spent thinking about, and working out, how to do something which will improve with practice.
    This is as far as I've got so far. It's tempting to pull parts of the model into Substance Painter to see how it looks so far, but I want to hold off until I have the model finished and UV's finalised.

    I was thinking the hoses needed to connect to something so I added the canisters and brackets, which lead onto the belt straps and buckle, just to see if I could.  It still needs a little work and repositioning but the hard part is done. The front has the standard screen and dials from the reference.

    I'm having trouble working out the 'hip' area and how the legs connect to the body as the reference isn't clear in that area. I'll probably go with a couple of struts each side and pivot attached to the 'hips'.

    s

    @IDCrisisOGood work with the snow, I like how it reacts to the light, the subtle glint and texture add a lot of interest.

  • Larry
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    Larry interpolator
    Can soneone enlighten me as to what is the most efficient method of texturing the robot? In the past what I have done is just give all the objects a material id and assign, 4-5 materials from ue4 on it. How can I use 1 texture for all the mesh? I understand I just unwrap all the unique parts to save space but how to make one texture out of 4-5 different materials?
  • Nathair23
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    Nathair23 polycounter lvl 2
    @Larry you can either texture paint the whole model on a single texture, or you can texture the various parts separately on their own texture map, then you combine all the uv maps in a single one and you bake the diffuse map, the specular map, occlusion map and so on. I'm not sure I've explained myself very well XD But you can find plenty of good tutorials on youtube :) also keep in mind you don't have necessarily to make a single texture, it all depends on the detail of your textures, you might need more than one in some cases.
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