Since the last update I ended up doing a couple of art tests and wasn't able to dedicate much time towards this project. Since finishing those up however, I've been jumping around in the scene and I'm officially calling the blockout stage done.

I ended up creating three rough textures to get a feel for how they'll work in the scene, since they're tileable and pretty prominent, but I really just wanted to play around in Substance Designer! I also got caught up in adding too much detail to some of the meshes and wanted a break from modeling.

Aside from a bit of scaling out the area with the linoleum tile, the scale is working well overall in comparison to  the concept.

The next stage is to plan out where to start diving in and adding more mesh detail, as well as potentially creating a temporary metal texture that I can slap on stuff as I go. I'd like to make a very detailed plan of action so that I can keep on track with this and have more interesting stages of development to show, rather than randomly tackling things that I feel like doing in the moment. Still, it's important to have fun doing these side projects but we'll see how I get on with the planning.

If anyone reading has suggestions or would like to share their process, I'd love to hear from you!

Cheers and thanks for reading!

Following after my Office Environment/Archives project, I've plucked another concept from my "future projects" folder. This one is by Hethe Srowada - https://www.hethe.com/ 

Something I'd like to get a lot better at is recording the stages of my process, as I really enjoy seeing and learning from other artist's workflows. I'm also planning to release this as a playable level again, just like the Archives project, as I really love the idea of enabling people to step into an imaginary place and be able to walk around in it and inspect things up close.

At the moment I'm still just blocking things out to get a sense of the scale etc. I initially had stairs leading down into the space behind where the character is standing, but since I envision this as a small level/shop where a player would transition to from outside, I decided on the elevator instead. I envision the entrance to this place in a Blade Runner-esque busy city street or back alley, and that you'd only be seeing peoples legs through the window as they walk past. I've also added a lock up or caged storage space just next to the plants at the right side of the concept, and a door on the wall behind where the camera would be in the concept, which perhaps leads to sleeping quarters.

I'm not entirely sure yet how I'm going to break this up for texturing, but once I get to blocking out all of the pipes and the smaller objects kicking around the place I'll have a better idea of how I want to group things together. 

I'd love any crits, questions, or suggestions as to how I can improve my process, so please feel free to post a comment!

While attempting something called "Active Imagination" this morning instead of doing my 'usual' meditation, I had this cool scenario/vision come to mind where a juggler/jester handed me this object. I noted that there was a "design painted on it in red" but I couldn't exactly make it out, so the design is just what came to me while I was in painter. I did a little sketch which I've also included.

I modeled and textured it as an Uncharted style "examine the item" level of detail, or along the lines of inspecting an item in Skyrim.

Rendered in Painter with Iray and I also chucked it into UE4 and did an in-engine screengrab.

Howdy!

I noticed a neat looking stone wall texture in a screenshot from Warface and decided to try creating a facsimile of it in Substance Designer.

Just normal/roughness for now but I'll jump back in and add the moss and base colours.

This morning I decided to recreate my bathroom sink faucet as a modeling warmup, and since it isn't the most complex model I brought it into Substance Painter and did a quick pass to see if I could get the watermarks and fingerprints to show up.

The photo was taken after for comparison and I see that the handle could be a little thinner and the base a little longer perhaps, but overall it was a fun little warmup!

Rendered from Substance Painter with Iray