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SCAD: VSFX 408 | CONCEPT DEVELOP VSFX
PROJECT BRIEF
“We have made our mark on the world, but we have really done nothing that the trees and creeping plants, ice and erosion, cannot remove in a fairly short time.”
― John Steinbeck, The Log from the Sea of Cortez
Through the foundations of the concrete and the stone we lay, Nature will find its way back through the cracks of our material world. Create a 3D game environment addressing nature's beauty and power in an abandoned train station– one of man's revolutionary inventions.
PERSONAL GOALS/ STATEMENT OF PURPOSE
With this ambitious project working with VSFX Look Dev artist, Michael DeLisi, I plan to enhance my skills in 3D modeling low-poly game assets, create realism with mostly self-made textures and materials with optimized tiling textures, as well as explore applying particle effects using Niagara within Unreal Engine.
REFERENCE
STEAM LOCOMOTIVE
STATION ARCHITECTURE & NATURE GROWTH
ENVIRONMENT BLOCKING
APRIL 8, 2021
A quick rough environment blocking for the general look of the station. The columns I am unsure of being at the base of the first set of stairs. One side of the station contains several windows possibly stained glass or iron bar designs while the opposite has 2 entryways but will have the large wooden doors closed with rock debris blocking the way.
When considering fantastical places, it's best to draw references from historical architecture and their construction materials to achieve believability. Material choice for the foundation of the building itself might be limestone instead of the initial idea of marble. With limestone as the foundation, the top arches of the roof would be made of wood similar to how medieval construction of grand castles in Britain.
APRIL 13, 2021
For this checkpoint, I haven't been able to progress as much as I would've liked, but aim to complete more modular assets within the next 2 days.
I began to model some of the interior architecture pieces of the station and I may continue with the marble material idea and change the layout of the initial environment blocking in accordance to what I have here. These pieces allow me to make the station longer as what I first envisioned.
APRIL 15, 2021
The modular pieces of the train station are almost complete. I drifted away from the initial blocking concept as I started to make the detailed pieces. What needs to be completed are the back interior wall and a couple of more walls. Each piece has been UV unwrapped already. Each color stands for a UV layout group (left) that will share a texture map. In the UV layout (right), each piece is blue within Maya to show that normals are correct and no UV shells are flipped. If they were flipped, the shell would be red and the overlap would be a magenta. There are some overlapping UVs indicated in a darker blue which is the column pieces. These darker blues mean that the shells are sharing the same UV map space. So when putting in a square texture, they will share the same pixels in the same location. This is to make things a bit easier to integrate into a game engine instead of making individual texture maps for each column. However, during the texturing process, this may be subject to change.
The UV unwrapping process along with the texturing process go hand-in-hand as decisions will be made if these UVs are final during the texturing process.
Next steps:
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Model the last Modular pieces
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UV unwrap last pieces
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Model train engine
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Sample plant textures using photography (Sampling plant textures first and showing the texture in Maya will be easier to determine plant modeling. I will not be modeling plants and foliage by stem and leaf. I will use a plane geometry and alpha method instead to reduce polygons in the scene.)
APRIL 20, 2021
The train station environment modeling is complete minus decorations. Each piece has been exported to go to Substance in OBJ format with the lambert shader information. I first assembled what the train station would look like in Maya then deconstructed the scene into the modular parts I would need. There are a couple of duplicates in here because the next step is to set up the meshes to be exported into Unreal Engine 4. This will need careful deliberation as to where the pivot point is located in order to snap pieces in Unreal and reconstruct the train station in the engine. (You can change the pivot point in Unreal, but unable to snap the pivot point at this time, so editing it in Maya is the best solution)
Next steps:
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Model and UV Unwrap the Train Engine
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Match Train Engine to Train cars styles
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Begin preliminary realistic tileable textures in Substance Designer
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Speed Tree Exploration towards the end.
APRIL 20, 2021
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Currently in process of modeling the train engine based on the No.8 Fenella (1894). Above are reference images of the train in multiple angles. The main focus this week is to get the train modeled and finished and get everything including the environment ready to export to Substance Painter. Proportions are going to be slightly tricky to match between the train engine I have and the train cars that Michael is modeling but should not be a problem. Texturing should be started in Substance Designer by the end of this week.
Next steps:
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Finish modeling and UV Unwrap the Train Engine
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Match Train Engine to Train cars styles
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Begin preliminary realistic tileable textures in Substance Designer
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Speed Tree Exploration towards the end.
APRIL 29, 2021
Very behind in this project being mid-term/post-midterm due to another intensive project ("Viking Mystery", located in CG Projects). I was in the process of modeling the train however I am having second thoughts about including the train itself as I want to get to exploring Speedtree and start texturing the environment. The main focus of this project should be the environment and lighting rather than the train itself. I have optimized the UV sets further to have fewer textures in Unreal Engine but I still worry about texture streaming pool over budget. This means in the engine there is only a certain amount of texture file size information a scene can handle.
Next steps:
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Begin preliminary realistic tileable textures in Substance Designer
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Speed Tree Exploration towards the end.
MAY 6, 2021
The moss procedural material is completed in Substance Designer. I made two versions with one chaotic and one more uniform. The next step for the Moss material is to export it as a Smart Material and upload it to Substance Painter. I did decide to go back to marble instead of limestone. After creating several marble materials, then it would be time to texture according to the UV maps with the meshes. When exporting a smart material from Designer, you can export parameters from each node seen above. So if the colors that Michael chooses do not match with the materials I make, then it is okay because the Color parameters can be adjusted in Painter.
Next steps:
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Create various train track and marble materials
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Export Meshes to work in Substance Painter
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Speed Tree Exploration towards the end
MAY 6, 2021
I created a procedural marble variation with a lot more noise and cracks similar to the Venetino Marble reference but with more veins and crack depressions in the normal map. I have also adjusted the meshes needed to be exported into Substance Painter to begin applying them to the UV information and painting in the moss. The procedural train tracks are in progress. The normal information is complete and now needs color, roughness, and metallic. Because this is week 8, I am thinking of using some Quixel megascans for rocks and some of the environment. I will be starting to explore Speed Tree this week. Because of the time, may not be able to get to the Unreal Engine stage.
Next steps:
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Finish train tracks
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Speed Tree Exploration
MAY 6, 2021
Currently trying to learn Speedtree. Like every new program, it requires practice and trial and error so I'm slowly making my way with the exploration. Most of the tutorials by Speedtree have a monotone and quiet guy who sounds unenthusiastic about the program. I haven't figured out how to import a mesh and do more advanced and custom vegetation. I also finished the train tracks but I am considering keeping it with an opacity map and add rocks later underneath in Painter.
Next steps:
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Continue Speed Tree Exploration
MAY 18, 2021
With it being week 9 and time running out, I have decided to downsize the project even further to these 2 main objects: the entrance and the Gazebo. Speedtree has been a fun exploration so far. I have been using Quixel scans of vines and plants in order to focus entirely on Speedtree modeling instead of creating/sampling my own plant textures. In Speedtree, I have been using my meshes from Maya as a "Mesh Force." This means the vines or the "Trunk" and "Bifrucated Branches" geometry attach to the mesh's force. The vine leaves are made using leaf cards. When exporting, the mesh should export from Speedtree as a .STL file with the maps included of the UVs. In the meantime, Michael will be tasked to paint the entrance piece this week with marble and moss while I paint the Gazebo and the floor. I will be creating some flower and tree meshes to go into Unreal and populate the scene there. Expecting to have a piece constructed in Unreal by next week for presentation.
Next steps:
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Continue Speed Tree Exploration
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Paint Gazebo and floor in Substance Painter
MAY 18, 2021
I contructed a Lupine wild flower in Speedtree using the trunk as the base and Trunk Tubes to construct the leaves and flowers. I extracted the flower and the leaf maps from these photos (above) found online and created the maps within Photoshop. I normally would extract photos that I know are free for use or photograph my own.
Next steps:
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Continue Speed Tree foliage
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Continue to paint Gazebo and floor in Substance Painter
MAY 18, 2021
QUIXEL ASSETS USED
NIAGARA PARTICLE FIREFLIES
All assets and maps have been implemented into Unreal. I created a procedural tile material in Designer as an easy material to create myself than trying to find the right maps to edit in Photoshop from online. The material has an alpha map to extract the tiles and in Painter I layered in tileable grass and rock textures from Quixel. I created a Lupine flower, 2 vine variations, and 1 variation of a tree. I then created 2 variations of this scene which I renamed as the final title: "Overtaken." One scene is a day time scene and the other is of a fog scene with fireflies. The fireflies were created using the Niagara particles system in Unreal Engine. I ran out of time to include wind forces from Speedtree but I think it could enhance the realism even further.
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