This past week, I started working on my diorama project.
For my main reference i’m using an illustration from Amir Zand. Aside from that, I want to incorporate the eerie feeling and the architectural brutalism that Control evokes. On top of that, my texture and graphic references are based on Marathon and graphic realism.
Aside from the scale of the enviroment the challenge lies in trying to mesh three different styles into one and make it work.
As someone who has spent the last five years putting various monoliths in my game, I’d say your main challenge is making it look to scale
I see the little guy in the foreground, yes, and birds are another classic. But I think carefully tuned height fog would help a lot…
If you construct the scene correctly, it will look massive, even if the whole thing is only a few hundred units across.
Punching a hole in the far end like a window ( I’m assuming this inside a building? ), and having a sky-box with a distance planet outside would also imply scale.
That’s actually my current struggle. As you said, it doesn’t only depend on the object’s scale, but also on the environment built around it and on the composition.
A hole somewhere in the room is a good idea. I was also thinking that the back wall is too close and doesn’t generate the depth that I’m looking for.
I’ll be putting more thought into those things.
Thank you for the feedback! I hope to see you around for the next updates
POV very close to the ground, height fog ( volumetric ), lowish sun etc. It’s not quite right, the pillars need to be taller, but it’s a start. Angled view is more interesting.
To show you how large it actually is, here’s the default scale mannequin
This past week, I’ve been mostly modeling the monolith. It’s slowly coming along. There are a few tweaks that I need to do, but the bulk of the modeling is done on that asset. Here’s how it’s looking in Maya:
I’ve also been working in the Unreal scene, but I’m not too happy with how it looks yet. I have to spend a few more hours searching for the best layout of the scene.
Looks good! I haven’t touched much of the lighting aspect yet. I added that “hole” in the back part of the scene, and it helps. It still needs a lot of work, but I’m slowly getting there
I’m still figuring out the best layout for the environment, but I’m pretty happy with where it is right now.
Aside from modeling a few assets (which are still in a WIP state), this past week I started experimenting with some of the materials in the scene to get a little closer to that “Marathon feel.”
I’ve also incorporated some decals so I can start to fill the environment with them. I’m still figuring out which ones I’m going to use. Working on an atlas for them is still on the back burner. Added some more light and a little bit of post-processing.
The focus for this week is decals, decals, decals, and some (a lot of) material work, of course. Aside from that, some 3D modeling is going to happen too.
The colors of the scene are not final, I’m just having some fun with them
