Scene Production

I usually start to paint or 3D-blockout some black and white thumbnail sketches in order to determine the composition and depth of the scene. After that, I think about a colour scheme and maybe do a rough coloured sketch or even some photobashing, to get a more precise idea of which direction I want to go with the environment. Searching for proper references is what usually comes next in my production process. Even in a fantasy landscape, it’s still very important that everything looks believable and physically plausible. I then start to block out the environment using primitive shapes, like a box or cylinder almost exclusively and try to match the composition to my preferred sketch I made earlier or modify it again if I feel the need for it.

More and more smaller objects will be added to the scene and the primitives receive the most necessary modifications to refine their broad outline. Once I’m satisfied with the shape of an object, I can already start detailing most of the time, where I always try to keep the distance to the camera in mind. If the size of an object in the scene is quite small and therefore some detail would not even be visible in the final image resolution, it’s obviously better to keep it more simple. This approach is specifically part of my workflow for still images and changes significantly, when you want to animate the scene or if it’s part of a game environment, where you would make additional LOD’s instead.

Texturing is the next big step but doesn’t necessarily only come into place after I finished modeling everything. When I work on personal projects, I tend to create the materials a bit earlier sometimes, especially if it changes the look and maybe even the shape of an object through displacement drastically. A lot of test rendering is done while texturing and lighting to get the desired look just right and to compensate unforeseen outcomes. Properly rendering the image is really important as well but is a more technical part of the process. Setting up render elements like a z-depth or global illumination data file for post production is necessary, when you want to get the most out of your work.

