Sci-Fi Scene

[system]

I posted this on the UDK forums as well, full post can be viewed here: http://forums.epicgames.com/threads/823302-Sci-Fi-Scene

I’m working on updating my portfolio (haven’t updated since about 2005). I have worked in advertising, product and arch viz, as well as providing CG training and instruction, but I’d now like to make a career change and join a AAA game studio (games are what got me into 3D in the first place). With that in mind I decided to create a reel centered around game art. My first portfolio piece is a SciFi scene/environment completely built for real time; I decided to use Unreal Engine 3 due to its very powerful realtime rendering capabilities, DX11, performance, etc.- it basically makes good work look better. I also decided I wanted to sculpt the entire environment in ZBrush and go all out; just give everything from major parts to minute details, give it all the ZBrush treatment, always a good thing.

Design wise, I was heavily influenced by Mass Effect, in particular Mass Effect 2, which is an epic game. I just love the environments, the lighting, the original style. I can only wonder how much fun it would have been to work on those games. I wanted to go with a similar style to my env., try to make it look like it could be a map included with some new DLC for the game.

So first up some ZBrush renders of the sculpts:

I used a lot of alpha brushes, some I downloaded from Pixologic’s resource area, others I got from this great forum, and some I made myself to get specific details done.

I took advantage of sculpting in layers, something I always do as I never like working linearly in any 3D program. I created many layers per object and did a lot of iteration. This workflow allowed me to try new things, change things up easily, and iterate my way to final sculpts I was happy with. ZBrush is such an amazing piece of software, without layered sculpting I don’t know what I would have done. Thanks Pixologic!

In order to not have a random look across the environment, it was important to give everything a cohesive style and keep everything following a set design. To achieve this and make it look more natural, I made sure to repeat specific patterns and details across most of the main structural pieces, like floors, walls, ceilings, doorways, etc.

I also made sure everything was modular so that working with the assets in Unreal would be easy, simple, efficient, and fast.

On average my sculpts were about 2 million polys, which allowed for sufficient detail to be achieved. In some cases, certain objects when well over 10 million polys. My new system was able to handle it, though I will probably add more memory so I can keep pushing ZBrush further. I still don’t understand the magic behind ZBrush or how it handles such hi-res models with ease, so I’m assuming it’s magic and leave it at that. Or maybe Pixologic comes from the future and they happen to love art as well? Hmmm…

So I would love to get feedback and crits from this great community. Again, my goal is to move somewhere new and work for a game studio working on games, preferably XBox, PS3 games, etc. games in general is where I want to focus my craft completely.

Attachments

[idlemind]

good stuff ! so I am guessing the name Jack Carver is from the original Farcry game. makes sense to me! I played that for years.

[system]

Here are the images of the environment setup in the Unreal 3 Engine, same engine used for Mass Effect 2, so I was really going for that ME2 feel in terms of just the feeling of the environment, the lighting, structure, etc.

Here is a shot of the window from the interior, the scene is primarily an interior and takes place on some kind of space station/facility in orbit around a planet located in a star system that is in close proximity to some massive nebulae and star clouds.

I added some volumetric effect to give the interior a bit more atmosphere. The volumetrics are animated, so when playing the environment in realtime you see a nice subtle movement of dust particles in the air, which makes the scene feel more natural and engrossing to the player. ME2 made good use of volumetrics, especially in the more important environments where the story unfolds for the main character. In particular, it was the environments of the Quarians that inspired me to add some moody volumetric effects, in my opinion, the Quarian environments are some of the most amazing looking ones in ME2- though there are so many amazing enviros in that game that it’s hard to choose.

Here’s that door from the Zbrush sculpt in-game. I added a slight bloom post process to add the nice glows around the lights. I always wanted to go for sleek, clean, futuristic machined look for the environment as a whole and not a terrifying horror env. like in Dead Space, though those enviros are awesome as well.

I went for a bit of contrast in the lighting, and purposely made the floor lighter in lighting and texturing, and made the ceiling dark in order to make a good contrast. Another reason I went with this design decision is for function and form of the space. If the ceiling is dark, it gives the player the illusion that the ceiling area has more volume and depth than there actually is, removing a sense of claustrophobia and inciting more a sense of space and comfort as you move around; you don’t feel like you may hit your head on something so much, which keeps the player from being distracted and they can enjoy and focus on the game more in a natural fashion. The floor is lighter which makes it easier and more natural to navigate the env. without thinking about it, guiding the player more fluidly; making it so the player never has to look down to focus on where to go and not trip or get stuck on anything.

Texturing wise everything has a clean look to it, which is what I wanted. In ME2 there are grimy enviros, like Omega, which is very industrial, rusty, grimy, desolate, and full of despair in the air. However, there are enviros like the Citadel, the Normandy interior, Illium, etc. which are beautiful, clean, sleek, etc. This is the look I wanted, something that could easily be used by the Alliance or a space occupied by Cerberus, etc. In order to balance things out more and not have cleanliness overwhelm the scene, I created dirty specular maps that break the surface up and balances things; in the end the space should be clean and technologically advanced looking, but should also show some wear, some signs that people use this place and it’s active.

Another shot, this time looking in from outside. These window compartments serve as a safety mechanism, if the window on the outside is damaged or compromised, the interior window is shielded by a large shutter that closes within that window compartment to seal the area off from further damage, allowing crew members to evacuate the specific area that has been compromised. Of course this does little against something like a collector attack, which would obliterate the entire station in a single shot

I wanted to make a nice space background for this env., I also wanted the player to see an overwhelming and surreal sight when looking outside. This happened to me (and I suspect most people) when playing ME2, I simply stopped and stared at the enviros for so long, simply gawking with my jaw dropped at the amazing backgrounds. I wanted to do something similar so I decided I wanted some surreal, sort of realistic, but at the same time it should have a matte painting feel and make the player go- “holy s***, that’s so cool”. I created this image as a comp from many actual NASA and JPL pictures using various telescopes and imagers. There are so many incredible star systems out there and nebulae that it boggles the mind and simply astonishes!

I used the image I finally composed to create my skybox around the scene, making sure to place the most interesting part where the windows are, for the player’s viewing pleasure

I created some slight animation for the background, so the gases in space and those amazing nebulae look like the gases are active and swirling around out there in the vast distances of space. It’s slow and subtle, but makes a huge difference as the env. comes to life and makes things look more natural. The material editor in Unreal is extremely powerful, allowing for designers to create whatever effect they can imagine.

I plan on working on this scene some more and adding some more details. I also plan on making a video later on, when I’m happily finished. I’d like to know what everyone thinks and any feedback or constructive crits you may have please share. If there is anyone here that worked on the Mass Effect games over at Bioware, thank you for the inspiration and creating such a work of interactive art, I can only hope and dream to be in your shoes one day (one day soon hopefully ) creating games like this for Xbox, PS3, PC, etc. Thanks again.

[tez]

Quality work, looks great, and thanks for the run down in your process. I would like to try somthing like this myself some day.

[system]

good stuff ! so I am guessing the name Jack Carver is from the original Farcry game. makes sense to me! I played that for years.

Good eye! There is a pretty significant reason I chose that name. Before Farcry came out, I used to make maps for Rainbow Six Rogue Spear using the RSE Editor (was super hard to use and there was no docs!) and then I made maps for Raven Shield using Unreal Engine. Mind you I did this all as a hobby, I was going to go into law enforcement/criminal justice at the time, or so I thought. It was really fun and I loved it, but never thought it could ever be a job for me or anything, never crossed my mind. When I read about this new company called Crytek releasing the CryEngine with Farcry I got really excited about the features and power behind it. Once it released I immediately purchased the game, beat the main story in a couple of days and jumped into the CryEngine. At that point I started learning some scripting (for making mods for CryEngine) and learned the editor. I wanted to make my own characters, weapons, etc. for the game and spent countless hours learning 3dsMax, Photoshop, CryEngine, etc. Eventually I learned how to model, texture, rig, animate, script (a little), and how to implement all of that into an efficient pipeline for the CryEngine. I got recruited by some mod teams and stuff. One day a startup company in Canada saw my work and contacted me out of the blue asking me if I’d be interested in a job. I got completely blindsided, as I had never anticipated that, I did this all for fun as a hobby on the side. I turned it down, just wasn’t something for me and I felt I had no idea what I was doing, at least from a pro standpoint. I eventually got in contact with an animation professor at a college here, we became friends eventually, but he introduced me to the 3D industry, how to make portfolios, animation in general, etc.- pretty much opened the world of CG to me. I was floored by it and that’s when it hit me that this could be a career. To skip ahead, I continued my self taught route and learned a bunch of 3d programs, like 3dsMax, Maya, Softimage, Zbrush (back when 2 was getting ready to launch), etc. I eventually switched career completely and went to work in 3D, working for product viz and arch viz companies, working in advertising for as firms, freelancing, and eventually teaching and giving private instruction at corporate firms, a college, and through my own company. I chose the nick name Jak Carver as respect and in homage to Crytek and CryEngine; if it wasn’t for Farcry, Crytek, and the CryEngine, I wouldn’t have forced myself to learn advanced game development, 3dsMax, modeling, rigging, animation, etc. and I would have never gone into 3D at all. A lot of 3D artists start off as modders for games, and then one day make it a career. That’s what happened to me, but I’m bored of working on ad, visualization projects and teaching; I want to just work fulltime and a half on games for Xbox, PS3, etc. being a part of the dev teams working on games like Mass Effect, Uncharted, Call of Duty, Assassin’s Creed, etc. I’m working on my new reel now and planning on leaving my business and everything to do this and join a big AAA studio.

[idlemind]

yah I think you will easily be picked up. I also was in the cryengine I made a few maps and mods the only proof remains of that time is a video of a planecrash scene I once did on monkey bay. So in a small way also got a start there. I also have done maps and campaign for cryengine 2 and dunia. Thats a pretty cool story of how you took that skill and poured into the 3d industry because I can sort of picture this. Wish I had taken it to the next level like that I just played around way too much :).
about your project here. WOW jaw dropping I dont think its only because I LOVE mass effect 2. thats ALOT of detail. how long you been working on this ?

[Dragon]

Hi Jak_Carver. Ran across your post and man, just great. I always love to see other ‘things’ i.e. hard surface modeling, being made with ZBrush. Your work is SO clean. Everything reminds me of when I was a teenager building plastic model kits like ‘Space 1999’ rocket ships (the panels on the ships etc). Great work.
I also found your ‘history’ wonderful. How some folks have made it into the 3D industry etc. I love your honesty… “One day a startup company in Canada saw my work and contacted me out of the blue asking me if I’d be interested in a job. I got completely blindsided, as I had never anticipated that, I did this all for fun as a hobby on the side. I turned it down, just wasn’t something for me and I felt I had no idea what I was doing, at least from a pro standpoint.” Most folks would have probably JUMPED at that opportunity. One truely has to look inside themselves and be true, great decision Jak!

[system]

yah I think you will easily be picked up. I also was in the cryengine I made a few maps and mods the only proof remains of that time is a video of a planecrash scene I once did on monkey bay. So in a small way also got a start there. I also have done maps and campaign for cryengine 2 and dunia. Thats a pretty cool story of how you took that skill and poured into the 3d industry because I can sort of picture this. Wish I had taken it to the next level like that I just played around way too much :).
about your project here. WOW jaw dropping I dont think its only because I LOVE mass effect 2. thats ALOT of detail. how long you been working on this ?

Thanks for the kind words. Good to see someone else who started with modding. In total I have spent about 3-4 weeks working on this from start to it’s present state, almost finished. I started out by collecting lots of reference images, well before opening any 3D program. I collected tons of images online in relation to sci-fi stuff, interiors, etc. I also knew I wanted to try my best to capture the Mass Effect feeling, so I created a separate folder with only reference images and art from Mass Effect; it also helped to look at all the behind the scenes interviews with the creators and developers at Bioware which were included in the platinum edition of Mass Effect for XBox. After that I started using my imagination to come up with some ideas based on the reference I analyzed and after doing some sketches on paper. I also popped in ME2 on my 360 and played through it again (have beat it twice, working on my third run on the insane difficulty) and I spent a lot of time just walking around staring at the different enviros and analyzing the detailed normal maps (this clues you in on the sculpting involved) and also analyzing the topology (staring at the in-game low res models and imagining the wireframes over them gives you insight as to how they modeled and put everything together). But yeah, I’d say in total I spent like one week concepting, analyzing reference material (hundreds of images in total), and blocking out volumes/working on previz. Another week or two I spent creating base meshes, taking them to ZBrush and sculpting them, baking normal and occlusion maps, creating cavity maps, textures (diffuse, specular, emissive, etc.), and about a week working in Unreal engine, importing everything, setting up my static meshes, custom materials, lighting, FX, etc.

[MaxPeterson]

My opinion…

I think its overloaded with repeating details.
the details seem to be in an array, not interconnecting with each other, like some sort of tilable tapestry. The technical linework make no sense at all.
For the floor as example you should think of 3 things which are needed to work:

1. Its dark, what leads me to where? Especially when electricity isn’t working. Answer: lights with signs. Emergency solutions and so on.
2. Gravity, synthetic gravity, it must look like something which can produce it. Something which is tiled in logical distance to each other which is responsible for that
3. Fresh air, where is the air supply? What happens if the air supply is broken, evacuation roots?

Details like fire lishers or emergency supplies bring not only detai but also realism.

You must think of what is needed for what, to reach a believable design.

Down hanging tubes would look good on some crashed ship ruins but not on a perfectly intact one. They are covering those displayes or LEDs on the roof, how are ppl supposed to read those and why so many of them, only a tiled texture? Try some vents there and rails, coverings and so on.

Maybe this inspired you a bit!

best regards.

[system]

My opinion…

I think its overloaded with repeating details.
the details seem to be in an array, not interconnecting with each other, like some sort of tilable tapestry. The technical linework make no sense at all.
For the floor as example you should think of 3 things which are needed to work:

1. Its dark, what leads me to where? Especially when electricity isn’t working. Answer: lights with signs. Emergency solutions and so on.
2. Gravity, synthetic gravity, it must look like something which can produce it. Something which is tiled in logical distance to each other which is responsible for that
3. Fresh air, where is the air supply? What happens if the air supply is broken, evacuation roots?

Details like fire lishers or emergency supplies bring not only detai but also realism.

You must think of what is needed for what, to reach a believable design.

Down hanging tubes would look good on some crashed ship ruins but not on a perfectly intact one. They are covering those displayes or LEDs on the roof, how are ppl supposed to read those and why so many of them, only a tiled texture? Try some vents there and rails, coverings and so on.

Maybe this inspired you a bit!

best regards.

wow, great feedback. I’ll definitely take those things into consideration. Concerning comment #2, dont know it I understand correctly. how would I add something that represents gravity? I like what you’re on to, but I really want to understand and I’m kind of confused about it. Could you elaborate a bit more please?

Thanks again for the great crits- please keep them coming!

[system]

Hey everyone, back with another update. Nearing completion of this first portfolio scene.

Made some changes, including:

• balanced lighting some more, created a bit more contrast which looks better

• created hologram panels for doors and some for the central window

• created custom lens flare effect using the Lens Flare editor, achieved that iconic lens flare that Mass Effect is known for

• added more detail to the door textures, just a bit more

You can see the contrast looks a little better compared to before, where the lighting level was too uniform across the enviro

Updated textures for the door and new holographic control panels have been installed by that marvelous galactic janitorial crew.

The cool lens flare inspired by Mass Effect.

The lens flare editor in Unreal is amazing. I’ve worked with lens flares in other engines, but Unreal’s dedicated lens flare editor gives you ridiculous amount of control and power over the artistic control of any and all individual lens flares in your game. It is simply sick, and addicting playing with it.

The holographic control panel for the window. This isn’t the bridge of a ship, but instead a small hub, one of many located throughout the station. The window itself doubles as the screen, and this control panel gives you access to various pieces of information and allows you to directly communicate with other locations on the station. You can check the status of the different systems, including for example the climate control system and safety of the life support system within this specific compartment, so if a harmful toxin or anything was present and detected, occupants of this compartment would be notified, warned, etc. It works like a touch screen, similar to an intergalactic iPad-1000

I want to make a note that I created some animated effects in the materials for all the holo panels. Obviously you can’t see it in the screenies, but when I make a video you’ll be able to see it. One of the animated effects is pretty simply, but makes a big difference. Hard to describe, but it’s that sort of digital fluctuation effect you see on displays as the image refreshes. It makes the displays look more realistic and natural. Best of all, it looks great but was rather easy to achieve the effect using the material editor, one of my favorite features if Unreal 3. I simply added some panners and rotators to my shading networks, and when plugged into the rest of the nodes composting the effect, it looks fantastic. There’s so much you can do with the material editor in Unreal that it boggles the mind- and it’s fun as hell to use.

The holographic panels can display all kinds of information, from the levels of radiation bombarding the stations exterior, solar flare activity in this star system, the magnetic field of the planet, location of the station, speed, orbit, etc.

One last shot of the cool lens flare. This was a lot of fun to create with the Lens Flare Editor in Unreal, I ended up spending hours on it trying to make it look as Mass Effect-y as possible. I like the way it ended up looking in the end, and looks even more awesome when walking around the enviro.

[system]

really great work, I appreciate you taking the time to post this. I especially like your high poly work in ZBrush. Is their a possibility you could upload screenshots of your low-res wireframe for these assets?

[system]

really great work, I appreciate you taking the time to post this. I especially like your high poly work in ZBrush. Is their a possibility you could upload screenshots of your low-res wireframe for these assets?

Hi, thanks for the kind words!

Yes, I plan on putting up some wires of the in-game assets when I get a chance, and I will definitely do that for the final version of this reel/portfolio.

[system]

Back with another small, but subtle round of changes to the scene. Namely I made the following changes:

• added custom flares to the interior; tried to limit them so as to not overwhelm the scene with too many flares- can get annoying to the player/viewer

• created higher quality lightmaps

• postFX: did some color correction and minor tweaks, including enabling full antialiasing, MSAA, etc. (DX11 is awesome)

the interior lens flares I think make it look more cinematic and interesting; Unreal’s lens flare editor is simply unmatched

I added more contrast with some post FX color correction and changes to the lighting levels. This wasn’t really a problem; it was easy thanks to my experience working with renderers like mental ray, which have equivalents when it comes to tone mapping and color correction. If you’re familiar working with post ware like AfterEffects, Nuke, etc. this is very familiar, as the way it works is almost identical in theory. Lots of fun, those post FX nodes.

That planet in the background is similar to Mars; cold, desolate, and potentially full of unknown minerals and ore that can be mined and collected. Also like Mars, this planet appears to have inconclusive signs that there once was life…but what happened to it?..

I’m pretty happy with it so far. I already have about 12 cameras setup and animated in the scene. The idea now is to render out a sequence through Matinee, a very awesome animation tool built into Unreal; the possibilities with it are simply staggering. You can use it for anything from animating a door opening for your level, to creating beautiful cinematic sequences that so many games use. I’ll be rendering out a cinematic of my own and add music in post for the final reel.

[system]

Hey everyone,

It’s been a few weeks since I last posted updates. I was caught up working on some freelance animation work for a new client. I found some time however, and I managed to wrap this project up. This piece is meant more to be part of my new demo reel, but I decided to make a separate video with just this piece, as well as a breakdown. I’m glad to finally be getting it out there and it was a lot of fun to work on. In the end I made one more change, following some critique from a friend, I added realtime reflections to the glass of the windows; it is very subtle as I didn’t want mirror reflections that made it difficult to view the background of space outside.

The final video is 1080p and I uploaded it to Vimeo. Enjoy and if anyone has any questions, feel free to ask. I also added some detailed information about the project in the Vimeo description. Here is the link to the video; I suggest watching it in HD, but that’s just me

http://vimeo.com/31193419

Thanks to everyone that provided feedback and constructive criticism.

[system]

Update:

Hi everyone,

I just wanted to thank everyone who contributed feedback to my work. It really did help me improve my work and publish the best demo reel I possibly could. My efforts paid off, as I have acquired a great job and will continue a new chapter in my career. I’ve moved to Los Angeles to work at a great AAA studio with a new great game that will be announced soon at E3. Thanks again for all the great feedback, this is a great community of artists and I’m happy to be a part of it. Looking forward to a great new year 2012.