Environment Design for Movies and Games

Matte Painting

Castle on a foggy mountain

One of my first goes at matte painting and compositing in Nuke. I started off with going in and out of photoshop, and 3d programs such as Maya and Sketchup for the main castle, before moving into Nuke for the rest of the compositing.

Base & Final Plate

Level Design

Fledgling: Forest Ruins 

A personal project. My focus was on a fast paced and forward moving level that emphasised sliding and jumping actions. It was really interesting problem solving how to approach designing a level that's fairly linear but with a lot of verticality and forward progression without biting off more than I could chew.

Initial moodshot for the level

I needed to establish the following things in my moodshot: that this was a momentum based game that relied on verticality, and that it was set in ruins that have long been engulfed by nature.

After establishing the look and feel, I could move into the more technical side of the level design process.

Level Plan

The level plan was initially blocked out in blender to give a good idea of how plausible in game movement would be, before moving into photoshop for further visual problem solving.

I designed the level like a waterslide to maintain both the length and height that would be appropriate for the game play, without getting sidetracked and either designing elements that aren't necessary for gameplay, or expanding my scope to unmanageable levels. I kept any path variation within the scope of this slide, in order to provide players variety in gameplay. 

Call outs

Here are some call outs of the mushrooms and pillars that are a key part of player traversal, and a line drawing with solid blocks of colour to clearly show how the obstacles would be composed in the level section leading up to the big leap.

All traversible areas are organic. Green moss on the architecture and vines are visual indicators that they can be slid or stood on, and the red mushrooms a jumping points, that also mark a more difficult and high paced traversal path.

Most of the ruins arechitecture is based heavily on the Old Summer Palace. I wanted the organic shapes of the structures to blend into the forest, but also from a story telling perspective, reflect how the lost civilisation lived alongside the forest.

Key frames

Following the technical planning for the level layout, I produced two key frames, aiming to combine the look and feel of my mood shot and put it in the context of the actual level.

Key Frame 1

The character jumps onto the giant cluster of mushrooms and is propelled towards a huge stained glass window.

Key Frame 2

The sight of the open world right after blasting through a stained glass window. There's a few seconds where the player can see the next few levels and end goal, before they start falling back to the next tunnel.

Miscellaneous Environments

A collection of painted environments focussing on colour, and using a variety of techniques including: 3d block outs, phototexturing, and straight up painting.