UTMC - MidTech - Drain / Vent
Another day, another death trap. I'm back with somethin new!
What started as an extension of the mine http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=137440 as per LandSknetch's suggestion to use a nuclear chimney has become it's own thing. After looking at the awesome architecture of those I really wanted to do something with it. I thought about how to approach this and decided to start with Fractal (a classic tiny DM map). It already has a futuristic like funnel to it so making it a nuclear chimney should be a snap right?
Phase 1 - Starting point.
Ironically I started with the UT3 version of fractal, it's harder to look at than the UT99 version but it's got a general blue-tone and I wanted to do something non-green for once
Pulling the perspective out of the map.
Color edit and extending the general colors and shapes
Phase 2 - Attempting to matte paint some forms in
Phase 3 - Reset
After some initial matte painting fumbling I decided to blow everything out and focus on getting the biggest shapes down with 3 values. I thought it would be cool to have a big fan blade as the main center piece of the map. Much like fractal this has an upper and lower level, the upper level you can jump off and land on the center part of the fan.
Blocking in some colors, oh look it's green again...
Phase 4 - More block in, and more matte painting.
I play with the idea of this lower fan being a deathtrap or just safely blowing air up under a grate youd walk on. I also started going in the direction of having the center blade be a deathtrap but also a platform. Basically a spinning bridge, slow enough to get on but can still kill you if you screw up
Phase 5 - Punching in some more stuff, and getting a bit more moody.
Here I took out the fan on the floor just playing with the idea of a pit. I would imagine the area around it is wide enough to still battle on. It's funny how drastically different the bottom half looks compared to the upper area. I liked the clean industrial look on the bottom part, and I considered the upper area much less taken care of because it was a bunch of maintenance areas, scaffolding catwalks ect.
Everything is still pretty tight together but I'm starting to drift away from this cone and funnel room.
Phase 6 Expanding
The upper areas are significantly changed up DM-Liandri is my main inspiration here, I would imagine everything in this map kind of revolves around this central fan hub. Oh and the bottom fan is back, and I never make up my mind if I want to keep it or not... :shifty:
Phase 7 - Experiment
Toyed with the idea of blasting sunlight down the main chimney shaft, though I decide against this even though it looks cool and moody it's still in the vein of old-tech theme's I've been doing, and I decided I wanted to go for something cleaner.
Phase 8 - Messing around with a bunch of secondary shapes, lights wires and windows.
Phase 9 Some refinement.
The current one, still work in progress. I've added semi-blender fanblades to the top of the platform. Would they kill you? I'm not sure, I could see them spinning so fast it's like a blender and you must jump into the center and down the main shaft to get some item. I could also see
Can you tell I love UT traps?
So what is this place? A ventilation area to clear out the air like the Gasleak mine? Or perhaps it's a sort of mid-tech super drainage system. Who really knows, but the drain is the direction I'm leaning towards when it's so cavernous. I like the morbid nature of Liandri just buying out stuff they think makes good death traps so I can see this as a water plant, with pipes and connecting areas around the central hub. The water would probably be mostly-drained so you can still have some nice water dripping or splashing. And maybe... there's a danger of getting caught in some water pressure or the map has some changing flood-gate levels. :O
What started as an extension of the mine http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=137440 as per LandSknetch's suggestion to use a nuclear chimney has become it's own thing. After looking at the awesome architecture of those I really wanted to do something with it. I thought about how to approach this and decided to start with Fractal (a classic tiny DM map). It already has a futuristic like funnel to it so making it a nuclear chimney should be a snap right?
Phase 1 - Starting point.
Ironically I started with the UT3 version of fractal, it's harder to look at than the UT99 version but it's got a general blue-tone and I wanted to do something non-green for once
Pulling the perspective out of the map.
Color edit and extending the general colors and shapes
Phase 2 - Attempting to matte paint some forms in
Phase 3 - Reset
After some initial matte painting fumbling I decided to blow everything out and focus on getting the biggest shapes down with 3 values. I thought it would be cool to have a big fan blade as the main center piece of the map. Much like fractal this has an upper and lower level, the upper level you can jump off and land on the center part of the fan.
Blocking in some colors, oh look it's green again...
Phase 4 - More block in, and more matte painting.
I play with the idea of this lower fan being a deathtrap or just safely blowing air up under a grate youd walk on. I also started going in the direction of having the center blade be a deathtrap but also a platform. Basically a spinning bridge, slow enough to get on but can still kill you if you screw up
Phase 5 - Punching in some more stuff, and getting a bit more moody.
Here I took out the fan on the floor just playing with the idea of a pit. I would imagine the area around it is wide enough to still battle on. It's funny how drastically different the bottom half looks compared to the upper area. I liked the clean industrial look on the bottom part, and I considered the upper area much less taken care of because it was a bunch of maintenance areas, scaffolding catwalks ect.
Everything is still pretty tight together but I'm starting to drift away from this cone and funnel room.
Phase 6 Expanding
The upper areas are significantly changed up DM-Liandri is my main inspiration here, I would imagine everything in this map kind of revolves around this central fan hub. Oh and the bottom fan is back, and I never make up my mind if I want to keep it or not... :shifty:
Phase 7 - Experiment
Toyed with the idea of blasting sunlight down the main chimney shaft, though I decide against this even though it looks cool and moody it's still in the vein of old-tech theme's I've been doing, and I decided I wanted to go for something cleaner.
Phase 8 - Messing around with a bunch of secondary shapes, lights wires and windows.
Phase 9 Some refinement.
The current one, still work in progress. I've added semi-blender fanblades to the top of the platform. Would they kill you? I'm not sure, I could see them spinning so fast it's like a blender and you must jump into the center and down the main shaft to get some item. I could also see
Can you tell I love UT traps?
So what is this place? A ventilation area to clear out the air like the Gasleak mine? Or perhaps it's a sort of mid-tech super drainage system. Who really knows, but the drain is the direction I'm leaning towards when it's so cavernous. I like the morbid nature of Liandri just buying out stuff they think makes good death traps so I can see this as a water plant, with pipes and connecting areas around the central hub. The water would probably be mostly-drained so you can still have some nice water dripping or splashing. And maybe... there's a danger of getting caught in some water pressure or the map has some changing flood-gate levels. :O
Replies
As I ponder over the idea of filling the lower area with water I did a really quick and dirty attempt of exploring this idea.
Are you ready for another huge fork in the road in terms of theme direction and design? After thinking about the drain I started messing around in Sketchup for a while and made a really sloppy model. In this complete diversion I would consider this an entirely new theme and it would not be derelict and more in terms of Liandri cleaner industrial look.
I imagine this to be a water plant of sorts, with turbines pipes and drains. I don't even call this "Drain" to fit with the more higher techy clean name I would call this "Syphon" I could easily see water being piped around or different levels of it, whirl-pools and suction tubes. Where there isn't that much water with the fan blades I would imagine these would be spinning much slower so it's more like a moving platform to jump around on, less likely to get chopped up than earlier versions.
Like the name states Syphon could have a way to pump the water around and you could use these as unique methods of transportation going through the tubes (Sort of similar to Hall of Giants except not just straight lines and not magic-tractorbeams). Maybe the drains put you somewhere else in the map, or maybe it just kills you
After that brief theme diversion I went back to this and put more focus on making it thematically connected to the Gasleak mine and dropped out the main lawnmower fan and opened up the area in the back. I wanted a more clear view. Messed around with somewhat sickly colored lighting.
The 13 on the wall is something I came up with similar to "Deck 16" and "17". I could see elements of this in the "Deck" layout and I already explored the concept that this area is a biohazard that would have been condemned until Liandri opened it back up for the tournament. The 13 is just "unlucky number 13" because this place has gone to hell.
I put huge pipes in the far back area and I'm not really sure if I would consider this "playable area" or not but thematically speaking I think using giant pipes, mechanisms or plugs as platforms is cool, I just can't really convey that in this shot as this is more standard actual floor area. Maybe briefly having some connecting areas through broken tubing jumping in and out and having it lit from the inside with flares or artificial lights so people arent blind in the dark.
I played around with the bottom pit which was formerly the "drain". Now I imagine it as a broken fan, either no longer spinning or jammed and it allows access for the players to go down into a "secret" area underneath. Not sure if I like having the fan-blades having a hole in them or a later idea as far as which is more "clear to the player they can stand on this"
From this point onward it became less Mid-Tech and more Dead-tech again. The angular slant of the areas are removed for a more olden hard military like utilitarian design. Adding some other touches such as windows and broken glass that people could fit through/shoot through.
After spending a good amount of time on this shot I came to realize while visually interesting, as a concept art it kind of fails. Extreme 3 point perspective doesn't really help explain the area so I spent a while painstakingly removing the 3 point perspective at least in the foreground playable area.
The fan of death returns! But its far in the back or up much higher away from the area. Also playing with throwing grating over the holes or fencing off areas for visual clarity. I imagined Liandri corp just coming in, seeing the hole and tossing some "good enough" solution over it.
The architecture is changing around again and instead of boxy I start to drift towards almost submarine like elements of ultra old tech such as the computer on the left.
And the current version, still work in progress need to clean up the background to foreground and make the doorways clearer.
Overall this is a big challenge trying to balance visual clutter with visual chaos. I opted for more stuff on the sides and floors and tried to keep the details away from playable path areas. I call this controlled chaos, does it work? Well that remains to be seen. But I imagine this area to be more ambient almost overcast lighting from the huge chimney overhead along with some lights instead of harsh areas of light and shadows like further down in the mine so that alone should help clarity.
First up an updated "CTF" version with lights of the big ol tech.
http://i.imgur.com/WZlQxfL.jpg
But that's old news, and my latest last minute project has been something else.
That "something" is a return to an earlier concept, specifically the 3d blockout I spent a little time with. Exploring a mid-tech theme, fighting on the fan-blades happened to be one of the favorite designs of my brother and so here I am hacking away at it.
My concept is exploring a water power plant, and while "it's been done before" this isn't a typical hydro plant and instead it relies on gravitational vortex power. Not to step on the toes of UT's own Hydro-16 I'm calling this one "Vortex" in light of being based off of a supersized gravitational vortex turbine.
See here for my inspiration.
http://www.oilseedcrops.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Gravitational-Vortex-Power-Micro-Hydro-Power-Plant.jpg
Now ramp that to 11 and then some, and you'll end up with a supersized arena.
When I'm ultra pressed for time I usually go to 3d, and this was no exception.
In the interest of time, I wont go over every iteration I made (many) and instead I'll just jump straight to the current sleeker version. Would ya just look at all of those google-guys for scale ref :poly124:
I did make a bunch of different versions of this concept in badly-made 3d. Exploring the idea of the main central room in different stages.
Low water level, flowing down the dam
Completely drained, water flow is shut off.
Totally filled up. Blades sit on the surface.
Slight whirlpool. Blades skim the surface no real danger.
Blades fold down, and could be used to wall-jump or slope dodge off of? Much more dangerous in the center but otherwise, still safe on the outskirts
Central bottom turbine drain activates, GIANT whirlpool. Death everywhere if you touch the water.
Now I could flip the blades any which way, or rotate them backwards. Stall them spin them faster, drain the area or overflood it but I think I've demonstrated the concept enough!
Onto painting!
Current version. I tried to convey that this facility has seen some use and isn't brand spanking new, doing textural touches like mossy residue and water stains on the fan blades. Still not done, and it's getting dangerously close to the deadline but I want to give this concept one last push tomorrow.
Watermarks and some kind of dirt and silt deposits would probably be a good touch here to add use to the plant.
Still not happy with the background. might just blow everything away and go with a straight ocean shot. Right now it's just detracting from the image.
Till tomorrow on the wire of the deadline...