Interloper: Atlas

This update consisted of explorations into the creation of foliage and sculpted geometry. Sourced textures were used to create simple meshes for use as ferns and grasses with adjusted UVs. A material was then applied in to allow foliage specific shading and opacity masking. This also enabled wind animations. Some of the existing geometry was revisited, where a high poly mesh was sculpted to create more natural edge and surface wear. This was then baked onto low poly meshes and applied as a custom normal map in a material instance.

Next I began work on the first art pass. This included replacing the blockout with modular custom meshes created in Blender, prototyping of a material to act as a concrete-like substance with coverings of moss, and some early testing of the animated centrepiece models.

There were several issues I encountered during this stage (including a delay due to outside circumstances) and things I learned. The concrete blocks which make up the majority of the scene would be much improved with some mesh sculpting, the placeholder foliage will need replaced, and the materials and shaders will need to be further developed.

As such I plan to develop my knowledge of digital sculpting, foliage creation, LODs and UE4 materials as I work further on this project. I plan to implement these features to some extent towards the next art pass.

Next, I used my sketches and references to create a blockout of the environment. This was accomplished in Unreal Engine using geometry brushes, a simple foliage setup and some placeholder models. Key considerations at this stage were scale, composition and optimisation for later developments. As such this process is iterative and subject to change.

I initially created a mood board of references from various media to help in the design for the environment. These were chosen for their examples of imposing artificial structures surrounded by vegetation. They were then used as inspiration for a paper sketch to determine the basic structure of the environment before starting development.