"Yggdrasil Surroundings" Environment
polycounter lvl 9
Hi guys,this project started on my 2d sketchbook thread but I decided to bring it over here to avoid offtopic in there by putting 3d stuff.
What is this about: I never created an environment (just a shy attempt long ago resoulting in only an empty map and a sky),never created a next gen ready character,never rigged or animated stuff,never did threes or water,monsters or vehicles,particle effects or level design and so on, Yet I want to be a generalist able to follow a project starting with a concept until the end resoult, and therefore I need this project to unify it all and to be "my sandbox" fo every one of this things.
So the point here is not to create the "final awesome environment",the focus here is me learning and improving while building it piece by piece,for instance if I'll start doing simple foliage then I'll have the base to build a three and after some threes I will know enough about it to build a convincing Yggdrasil, or after I'll learn about water I could make a pond and put a carp in there to study the first simple animation,moving then to a running squirrel and finally to a convincing character.
So,this is totally beyond my current skill,but as a friend said "always better to aim high"
About the place: We are in a village somewhere on the side of a volcano, 1 km from the ground level, the Yggdrasil is in the plain below,roughly 2 - 2,3km away from us,its radius on the base is of 1,5 km (though the roots span further) and the height,foliage included is of 6km...the distances doesn't properly show in the current blockout for lack of scale elements,so that's why all the numbers,also stuff may change since this is only from the current blockout
The mountain village lead to a famous dungeon floating on top of the volcano,so lot of strong adventurer passing by there and that place need to be overall pretty lively.
The mountain village can be reached trough walk or airship,and to go from the village to the plain below there is actually a very long rope wit a 35° inclination connecting the places but you can use it only to "slide" down.
The mountain village will be shrouded in snow and autumn like colors I think,while the plain below (all around Yggdrasil) will be spring.
So the day before yesterday I started putting together my "map" concept (which is not finished) image below,not sure if is all in my head or if other people can read in it what's going on as well :poly136: anyway,is enough to give me the direction to work on.
Yesterday I builted a very basic human placeholder for scale reference (1,80cm) and imported into UE,image below
and started blocking out more volumes,like the placeholder for the three wich I probably improve since this current placeholder is just a basic cylinder,image below
So the plan for today is to get more placeholders done,probably I'll go for a placeholder for the plain in worldmachine.
Also I plan on refining a precise area of the village that could be used as "completed piece" (the erea in the front you can currently see) and reference for the direction of all the other stuff.
So with so much stuff going on that I don't know how to do someone (or many) could be suggesting me to start with something simpler...don't do it. I think I'm well beyond the point where I used to get frustrated and drop the project,as for now time doesn't matter,if I work on this even only 1 hour a day is a win anyway
Also I will totally need your guys help figuring out stuff I don't know from Unreal Engine,so counting on you as well :poly124::):thumbup:
What is this about: I never created an environment (just a shy attempt long ago resoulting in only an empty map and a sky),never created a next gen ready character,never rigged or animated stuff,never did threes or water,monsters or vehicles,particle effects or level design and so on, Yet I want to be a generalist able to follow a project starting with a concept until the end resoult, and therefore I need this project to unify it all and to be "my sandbox" fo every one of this things.
So the point here is not to create the "final awesome environment",the focus here is me learning and improving while building it piece by piece,for instance if I'll start doing simple foliage then I'll have the base to build a three and after some threes I will know enough about it to build a convincing Yggdrasil, or after I'll learn about water I could make a pond and put a carp in there to study the first simple animation,moving then to a running squirrel and finally to a convincing character.
So,this is totally beyond my current skill,but as a friend said "always better to aim high"
About the place: We are in a village somewhere on the side of a volcano, 1 km from the ground level, the Yggdrasil is in the plain below,roughly 2 - 2,3km away from us,its radius on the base is of 1,5 km (though the roots span further) and the height,foliage included is of 6km...the distances doesn't properly show in the current blockout for lack of scale elements,so that's why all the numbers,also stuff may change since this is only from the current blockout
The mountain village lead to a famous dungeon floating on top of the volcano,so lot of strong adventurer passing by there and that place need to be overall pretty lively.
The mountain village can be reached trough walk or airship,and to go from the village to the plain below there is actually a very long rope wit a 35° inclination connecting the places but you can use it only to "slide" down.
The mountain village will be shrouded in snow and autumn like colors I think,while the plain below (all around Yggdrasil) will be spring.
So the day before yesterday I started putting together my "map" concept (which is not finished) image below,not sure if is all in my head or if other people can read in it what's going on as well :poly136: anyway,is enough to give me the direction to work on.
Yesterday I builted a very basic human placeholder for scale reference (1,80cm) and imported into UE,image below
and started blocking out more volumes,like the placeholder for the three wich I probably improve since this current placeholder is just a basic cylinder,image below
So the plan for today is to get more placeholders done,probably I'll go for a placeholder for the plain in worldmachine.
Also I plan on refining a precise area of the village that could be used as "completed piece" (the erea in the front you can currently see) and reference for the direction of all the other stuff.
So with so much stuff going on that I don't know how to do someone (or many) could be suggesting me to start with something simpler...don't do it.
I think I'm well beyond the point where I used to get frustrated and drop the project,as for now time doesn't matter,if I work on this even only 1 hour a day is a win anyway Also I will totally need your guys help figuring out stuff I don't know from Unreal Engine,so counting on you as well :poly124::):thumbup:
Replies
So,how much is the standard UE FoV? Is just me or is kind of high? :poly122: I saw a tutorial about lowering the FoV so probably I'll follow that,just wanted to know if you guys usually do it as well.
Regarding the landscape,is it possible to create multiple landscapes in the same level? That would help me in handling the plain and mountain area land separated from the area of mountain where the "mountain village" is in. Also since the lower plain will be something like 6,5 km(lenght) x 3,5km (width) do you guys have any suggestion from the technical side that could save me from possible troubles? I guess obvsiously I'll have to check into LoD working and setting,but probably there are also a lot of pitfalls I'm not yet aware of,so if you know ANYTHING that can help me,please let me know!
I replaced the Yggdrasil placeholder whit a slightly better one,also all night watching worldmachine tutorials and still more to watch,next step is to nail the terrain placeholder
[ame]www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTsO5RjXO24[/ame]
Since is a tree of life I'm considering water gushing forth from it,maybe the roots bring huge quantities of water to the top and multiply it since the tree itself is magic,so...huge fountain? Waterfalls coming down from the top? It's a possibility
Doesn't seems like very noticeable in the sculpt but this is because of the roughly 6km tree,therefore a single root has something like 100-200m diameter and I can't push for crazy slopes where the player has to walk :S
Anyway,I think I'll spend another day watching more worldmachine tutorial before jumping in it :P
Quick question: Normal maps from 3ds max or Xnormal need any kind of tweak before going into UE4? Because my placeholder may have fucked up normals,not sure...not that matters since those are placeholder,but... :poly122:
Unreal uses normal maps with green channel flipped.
(You just have to flip it in photoshop, or you can also go in baking options in xNormal and change Y+ to Y-)
Every other concept that will come after that is going straight into this world,everything I will do will be part of the same single project therefore no matter if it takes even years,I'm seriously going to stick to one project and to make this awesome!
do you guys know how to have the "tiles" of terrain that continue beyond my "working area" matching with my terrain? Because since I started by importing my heightmap, in the Explorer View there is a clean cut between my 14km area and the rest of the world,and I would like to have it blending better... :poly141:
Also the question in the last reply is still up :poly124:
Also,and this is the important question: make sense to get the proper color now or I should just take the heightmap and then the coloring is done trough materials inside UE4? This stupid doubts are slowing me down xD
But now I'm back on focus and reading all the official documentation about Landscape,if you have any "outside" tutorials related to the subject please link it to me,I need to download all the information that are scattered around into my brain as quickly as possible