tomcade

[tomcade]

13/10/21

RedvsBlue - Construction of the image

Inspiration

I was attacking this project from the wrong angle initially, thinking that creating something from scratch with nothing but my thoughts was going to be the best way of starting. After a lot of trial and error with my initial idea, I decided to scrap it.

Carl-Victor Norberg is a concept artist from Sweden, whom specializes in fantasy environments. I came across his work through Art Station & was drawn to it for its vibrant colours and balanced composition. This piece called “Off-World” was exactly what I was looking for & would serve as major inspiration.

“Off-World - Carl-Victor Norberg <https://www.artstation.com/artwork/rA0gmO>”

Breakdown

note:

First thing to mention is that I do not own any assets used in this project - I used Megascans for the environment art, free assets for the characters and I created to ship using a modular spaceship pack & adding pieces together.

I started with a simple block out - which is a fantastic way to quickly see perspectives. However, this became a major issue within this project, as the composition of the piece, size of assets and general feel was all affected by this initial decision.

Next I began to add some quick foliage details, again focusing around the perspective of the image. The blue 2x metre cube was simply added for scale. This is another mistake, because in the end, the character is not in that spot - in future, my planning needs to be much better than this & the final composition / depth of the image needs to be decided much earlier.

Here you can see me adding more detail to the piece, replacing the rest of the block out with assets - This was the beginning of the major problems with this project. Due to the scale of the planes, the assets had to be huge - as well as this, I was very foolish & used 4k megascans the first time, which crashed my computer several times. 

This was the last image I rendered before I had to redo a lot of this project - The file size of the 'blend.file’ was becoming ridiculous & was destroying the performance of my PC. 

This is just an example of me mixing the ground materials and getting rid of any tiling - I actually scrapped this plane in the final render, but I did use it as an overlay texture.

At this point of the project, the scene was so cluttered that it was literally taking 5 minutes for me to move a single asset. I decided to add some vines / ivy detail to the ship, taking inspiration from Norberg’s ‘Off World’ & further exploring the the “Aftermath” from the conflict of ‘RedvsBlue’. This was an extremely slow process & I placed every ivy vine individually - I need to research how to streamline this process, because although it looks good, it took hours.

Note:

At this point in the project, I was focusing more on getting finished as I was quickly running out of time - unfortunately I do not have any more images of the breakdown, but I can describe my process.

Challenges:

Within blender, I did not get the lighting exactly right & there was a real lack of depth to the image. At this point I couldn’t redo the lighting and then re-render, because every render was taking about 20 minutes, even when I broken up each layer and isolated them. Lighting is something I definitely need to practice & this project sums it up perfectly - similarly to the perspective and composition, lighting needs to be defined very early.

The only way I knew around this, (thanks to Alexandr Pronin) was to import all the renders into photoshop & artificially create depth, through layering. 

At this point, as you can see in this image, there are parts that work well & others that really don’t. The level of detail on the ship & some of the rocks is good, but there is far too much empty space on the left hand side of the image - Something I initially thought I could cover up with the character.

As well as this, there is so much fog, you can barely see what is happening in the image - this is another issue with artificially adding depth.

After several hours of editing, I was able to end up with something much better (see below for final image) - However, I am not happy with this project at all.

Take away

Time management - My time management in this project was awful & I left far too much editing to do toward the final days.

Setup - In the next project I will put a much higher priority on the initial perspective, composition & lighting. 

Assets - Creating my own assets & materials in future projects will be key, not only for artistic control, but also in terms of file size & processing power, which directly effects the speed at which I can work. 

Final Image

Final thoughts

I am not happy with this project. It was useful to see my shortcomings and to take away some really useful tips for future projects, but in terms of a piece of art, I think its poor & not a high enough standard. It looks better when the image is larger, but due to the artificial depth & the amount of editing, it just looks unrealistic and unprofessional - but I will use this to improve next time.

[tomcade]

06/10/21

Red vs Blue

Ideas Continued - Materials & Environment

I recently went to the lake district, one of my favourite places on earth, I love the harsh environment there & I take great inspiration from it.

The brief’s goal is set around Red vs Blue, so I therefore it must be the main focus - However, I feel that the environment will have a big part to play as well. Although I have created a block out, after looking through reference images and my inspiration again, I feel this harsh, natural environment will work well to  create a juxtaposition & contrast between the two, emphasizing the futuristic spaceship in the distance. 

[tomcade]

05/10/21

Red vs Blue

Idea generation

looking back through my previous posts gave me a lot of inspiration. I still like this idea of conflict, I feel it sums up ‘Red vs Blue’ pretty well and I’d like to base my first brief around this theme.

Moreover, I have also explored the meaning of these colours & what they personally mean to me. "I feel Red is angry, loud and dangerous, whereas I see blue as the opposite.” Using my past experience is something that will help to make this brief personal to me. Therefore, alongside this theme of conflict will be another theme of good and evil - I think this will be a great way of displaying the two colours and it will reinforce my overall theme of conflict. 

After taking a step back & looking at my progress so far, I have decided on a route to take. I’d like to create a scene showing the aftermath of ‘Red vs Blue’ - continuing this theme of conflict and taking inspiration from Pronin and other artists, I’m playing with the idea of a massive landscape, a crashed Red ship in the distance & a blue soldier closer to the camera - a David and Goliath situation.

As previously mentioned Alexandr Pronin is a fantastic concept artist & key to my inspiration in this brief. Looking through the time lapses, I’d like to produce a similar work flow - by initially gathering sources as reference guides, sketching out some ideas and blocking out an initial scene in blender.

Reference images taken from google

I have a general idea in my head with regards to the layout of the scene. Taking inspiration from my first post, Jack McKelvie’s Blood Gultch, as well as the work of Alexandr Pronin, I want to show a feeling of scale and I’d like the message of conflict to be instantly recognizable. 

Landscape creation & Blockout

To create an effective block out and to initially visualize the scene, I decided to make the main mountain / landscape first - I created this using blender’s ANT landscape tool - I could have used another piece of software, like ‘WorldMachine’ to create a height map & import it in, but this is a much faster way to get a general idea of the scene. 

To really emphasize the sense of scale in this scene, I decided to add another large landscape, to act as the close / mid ground of the scene - this time, I chose a softer displacement, because I do not want the closer scenery to be too complicated and take away from the main image. To achieve this, I used the ANT tool again, but thoroughly reduced the settings, especially the Depth & Height.

Next, I added in a small 2 metre high cube to the blend, simply for scale to see the size of an average human compared to the landscape.

Here is an initial render - no materials have been added. I like the perspective here, it is using the rule of thirds.

Perhaps I should continue to experiment with the camera placement and scale of the piece - taking inspiration from previous artists maybe setting up the scene to reflect a ‘Fibonacci spiral’ will further accentuate the sense of scale.

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For this project, we were asked to use UE4, therefore, I will have to transfer my work from blender into the unreal engine. This will be a challenge for me, as I am better suited to Blender’s interface, but the real-time aspect of UE4 will be interesting to use.

[tomcade]

04/10/21

Red vs Blue

Artist study - Alexandr Pronin

Alexandr Pronin was randomly introduced to me via Youtube’s algorithm - I stumbled across Pronin on my homepage & was instantly drawn to his work. He is a relatively unknown artist, with just over 8,000 subs on his channel.

Cinematic Promo art - "Guardian 17" - Alexandr Pronin <https://www.artstation.com/artwork/aYnGOk>

The image above is called “Guardian 17″ and was made mainly using blender and photoshop - This was the first piece of work of Pronin’s that I saw & it is a fantastic introduction to his style. An incredible eye for composition, backed up with a great use of lighting, Pronin creates large scale, yet extremely detailed pieces of work. 

Pronin is a master when it comes to showing movement in still image - the blurring of the ship creates an obvious sense of speed, yet it does not take away from the intricacies and lighting in the centre of the piece.

Moreover, the use of empty space is important to point out - the sky above and the basic environment below frames the image & draws the eye to the centre. As well as this, the two people in the bottom left of the image are simply there for scale, accentuating the size of the ship, although they are a small detail, it creates a whole new perspective. 

Artillery- Alexandr Pronin                <https://www.artstation.com/artwork/aYnGOk>

This is my favourite piece of work so far from Alexandr. His skills in world building and environment design are clearly evident here - the image tells a sombre story, reflected by a saturated, yet balanced colour pallet.

The sky and foreground are weighted perfectly & compliment each other well, again, framing the image & drawing the viewers focus. Unlike his other pieces, Pronin focusses more on the environment here & the level of detail exhibited is kept consistent at all distances.

Workflow

Although I was drawn to Pronin’s work for his style, what was most inspiring to me was his workflow - On his Youtube channel, he shows his working through time lapses. 

Screenshots from “ Cinematic Promo Art - "Guardian 17" | Blender 2.9 | Photoshop | Humble” <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMUObGTBG_I>

I think what strikes me most within these time lapses are how simple Pronin makes it seem. The ship itself is actually crafted from modular pieces, allowing him to create something interesting and extremely detailed in a very short amount of time. 

Screenshots from “ Cinematic Promo Art - "Guardian 17" | Blender 2.9 | Photoshop | Humble” <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMUObGTBG_I>

Moreover, what surprised me the most about these time lapses, is that Pronin’s initial renders in blender are extremely basic - Most of the detail comes when he imports the renders into photoshop where Pronin creates so much depth to his images.

My work - inspired by the Witcher 3′s Trailer “A Night To Remember”

When I compare this workflow to my own, the difference is clear. It never occurred to me, how much depth you can add to images in post processing. Take this image for example (above) - in blender, I added several planes of mist - trying to get a higher level of detail and more depth to my image. However, this not only massively increased the processing power needed to run the file, it also looks a lot worse.

Although I was happy with what I made when I originally created this image, I can see so many issues and mistakes now. Moving forward, I will adopt a better workflow.

[tomcade]

01/10/21

Red vs Blue 

- Note

In my last post, I mentioned that the first thing that came to mind when hearing the theme of ‘Red vs Blue’ was ‘conflict’. I gave the example of Halo 3′s multiplayer, because it was the first thing that came to mind, as well as real world examples, like Olympic boxing - However, in regards to ‘Red vs Blue’ in sports, perhaps the word to use is ‘Competition’ rather than ‘conflict’.

In any case, this theme was something that I wanted to explore further.

- The meaning behind colour

Blue, is often associated with tranquility and peace. As the shade becomes deeper and darker however, it starts to covey security and integrity as well. Other words that you may hear people associate with the color are trust, loyalty, conservatism, and frigidity.

The color red oozes with passion and action, as evidenced by its brightness and the immediate surge of energy that one feels when seeing it. It is also the color used to describe ambition, determination, anger, and sexual passion.

“Is There a Science to Picking Colors?” - Igor Ovsyannykov March 31, 2021. <https://creativemarket.com/blog/is-there-a-science-to-picking-colors>

The information above was taken from an article, written earlier this year by the talented artist Igor Ovsyannykov & I’d have to agree & commend his perception of the two colours. 

Moreover, as the article above states, there are many ways to interpret colour - Red and blue have distinct meanings, which vary from person to person, day to day. But with regards to our emotions, we generally see Red and Blue as polar opposites.

However, I think it is important to point out, as DeLong & Martinson write, our perception of colour is specific to us, influenced not only by our subconscious, but also the environment we are in & the experiences we have.

At the core level, categorical perception is based on preconditions shared by all humans and includes perception of space, light, and shadow. On a second level is our direct experience of the surrounding world, things that we learn through living, such as our experience of nature. A third level is our indirect experience that includes culture, which varies with time and place. At this level we have agreed upon symbols such as internationally accepted traffic lights.

DeLong, M, & Martinson, B (eds) 2013, Color and Design, Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, London. Available from: ProQuest Ebook Central. [1 October 2021].

- Good vs Evil 

When hearing ‘Red vs Blue’, alongside the theme of conflict, I feel myself pulled toward this idea of Good vs Evil. I see red as angry, loud and dangerous, whereas I see blue as the opposite.

When I further explore this theme of ‘Good vs Evil’, I instantly think to the original Tron movie. Written and directed by Steven Lisberger, it is a classic Sci-Fi film from the 1980′s - & clearly, even after all this time, what still stands out to me, are visuals in this film & the use of colour. 

Screenshots <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYDVXWJf-_k&t=1s>

Tron (1982) -  © Disney 

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Within the brief of ‘Red vs Blue’, this theme of conflict is interesting to explore & taking inspiration from past experiences is always a powerful tool in regards to idea generation.

[tomcade]

30/09/21

Red vs Blue 

- Overview 

The first brief of the MA games art course is centered around the topic of “Red vs Blue”.

When hearing this brief, first thing that comes to mind for me is conflict.

These two contrasting colours are so clearly opposite that they cannot be mistaken. It is something that has been universally adopted within entertainment to represent two different sides - from the Light Sabers in star wars to Olympic boxing, Red vs Blue is a recurring theme throughout sports and entertainment.

When I apply this topic to games, my mind is instantly drawn to Halo 3. This was the first game I got with my XBOX 360 and was what got me into competitive online multiplayer games. It was unlike anything I had played before, because it had the best visuals I had seen in a game at that time, with well balanced gun play, good movement mechanics and fantastic map designs - A long with a great campaign and one of the best sound tracks to ever be made for a game, this was something I spent so many hours of my childhood playing. 

A game of Team Slayer on the map Boardwalk: <https://halo.fandom.com/wiki/Team_Slayer>

- Initial ideas

My first ideas when hearing the brief were very basic - as previously mentioned, I was instantly drawn to Halo, so I thought perhaps I could remake one of the maps in UE4. However, after a quick google search, it  would seem, (like most initial ideas) it’s already been done. 

Jack McKelvie at Quixel has made an in-depth re-creation of ‘Blood Gulch’, one of the Halo series’ most famous and recognizable maps.

Screenshot from Quixel’s Youtube video:           <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-4VmN18Nkc&t=1s>

I think McKelvie’s work is very impressive. Created in UE4′s real time engine, the balance of light and colour are fantastic - the lighting creates soft shadows & an ambient occlusion which really accentuates the level of detail, especially in the rocks. 

Moreover, I take inspiration, not only from the lighting, but also the composition of the scene - I feel that its use of spacing works extremely well & reflects the ‘Fibonacci Sequence’, specifically crafted to draw your eye to the famous Halo ring and further details in the distance, whilst not taking any attention away from the closer assets.

Jack McKelvie ArtStation - <https://www.artstation.com/jackm/albums/all>

McKelvie’s other works follow the same impressive level of detail across different art styles with different lighting techniques. 

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- I think I need to look into the meaning behind the colours & explore this ongoing theme of conflict further.