For the theme of the tree model given in class today, I decided that because the style of our environment is supposed to be realistic, that I’d experiment with using real textures. Before I did the modelling itself though, I did some research on other relevant styles in order to serve as inspiration to what I was going to create. First of all, I watched a few animations on Youtube and this allowed me to get a visualization of the form and textures needed to make this model seem realistic in the render view. Below, I have linked the videos that I looked at.
CGI Sci-Fi Short Film: “The Pantheon” by Han Yang | CGMeetup – YouTube
The first one that I looked at was a short animation that had a strong theme of action and fantasy elements. Although the story, animation and the characters weren’t a strong influence in why I chose this as an inspiration, I did find that a lot of the background assets, the lighting and the textures are definitely something that I want to achieve to a similar level. They hold a realistic style to them, however, they are also not too complicated so it might be something that I can reference back to with my own modelling & texturing process. Overall, I would say that this one is definitely something that our group can take influence from.
125 Artists Create Unique Renders From a Simple Prompt | PARALLEL DIMENSIONS – YouTube
This video features many different art styles in animation, given from one prompt. I really like the diversity in these animations and a lot seem to have features that I wish to carry on in this project. By this, I am referencing the models used for foliage, the realistic textures and also, some of the themes themselves link into the vibe that our project is leaning towards. I will use this video and specific favoured animations in order to inspire the model/textures I will create for this task.
“Lantern” Lumion Realistic 3D Cinematic Animation – YouTube
This animation is vastly different to the others, but not in style. It is a cinematic animation that instead is focused around a story, is solely environment based. Moreover, as this is very similar to what we will be doing, I thought that having it as a reference would be extremely beneficial towards our finalised film. The assets themselves are also very similar to the ones I aim to create, however they are slightly more of low quality in comparison to what I aim for. Ultimately, this is a great video to take inspiration on and I will further utilise it in order to get a rough idea of how I should make my models, textures and also what type of camera angles to use- perhaps even the music too.
In-class practice
In class today, we were shown more about the different features in substance painter through an exercise involving texturing a tree. This involved using real-life imagery and manipulating it to use as a texture. We were also taught how to bake light into a model’s textures. I found this class to be really informative and useful towards my progression of improving my style of texturing. Moreover, as a result of this, below are some of the work I did today for this session.
Sketches
Here are some sketches that I did of trees for inspiration. Not just for that, but I wanted to educate myself more in the visualization and structure of trees/foliage and I felt the best way to do this was to study them through drawing. I really like how these turned out especially since they were really quickly drawn. Ultimately, I didn’t just learn how to draw trees, but by doing this activity, it let me explore the range of brushes I have in my inventory and made me realise that they are more useful than initially thought. In future, I will try to evaluate my options more as using the right brush for the job makes a huge difference.
Styles I was inspired by for this model
During the process of doing this task, I was really inspired by the pixel-art type of style commonly used in role-playing games. The main one that I was most inspired by was Undertale, specifically the backgrounds from the game. The style of this game relies solely on pixels and it utilises it in a way that is very successful. It gives it a homely, charming aesthetic, almost nostalgic in a way which I really like. Moreover, I decided to experiment in 3D whilst using textures that retained this type of style. Although this isn’t my primary focus of style for this assignment, I thought that it would be useful to utilise the model in a style that it would suit the most- cartoon-like. Even though it doesn’t help with my environment project, it definitely has taught me a lot about what kind of art I would like to make in future, as well as giving me practical knowledge and practice in the software itself.
Below are some screenshot examples of the style of the game
Model outcome
I feel as though I captured the pixel-art type of vibe pretty well considering this is a 3D model. The texture I used was one from Freestocktextures.com and further edited in Krita to become pixelated. Moreover, I like how the gradient feeds into the style of this tree as it makes it more fantasy-like and cartoonish. Ultimately, this is a style that I would love to improve on after I finish this assignment. It is something I am definitely passionate about pursuing and will look into more and improve on in my spare time.
Image References