Sweet sleepless nights

Hi! I’m Patricia Herráez, a Spanish architect. I have the pleasure to present my master’s degree final project carried out at butic The New School during the academic year 2023-2024.

This is my first archviz video project and, also, my first project developed in Unreal Engine.

The architecture shown in the video is the house Casa Claudia by Arturo Sanz and Fran López architects, located in Valencia, Spain. 

Sweet sleepless nights

“She is a very well-organized architect, working from home. She lives in her dream house, a cozy home with an interior courtyard. She loves to travel and make all kinds of plans. She is looking forward to the birth of her first daughter and imagines including her in all her plans.

Once the baby is born, her whole life is turned upside down. Lack of rest and time do not allow her to keep things in order or make all the plans she has dreamed of.”

Based on real events, except for the cozy house, or, “self-portrait in architectural version".

Dedicated to all mothers who can surely identify with this story and, by extension, to all fathers and all those people (parents or not) who can also see themselves reflected in it.

The making of

I had already made some still images of this house for the Rookies Awards 2023 contest, modeled with 3dsmax and rendered with VRay. On that occasion, the chosen theme was “The aromatic garden”, but, at the same time, I was already starting to develop what would become my master's degree final project, which I present for this edition of the contest.

In the second part of the architectural visualization master's program I learned how to use Unreal Engine 5 and my master's degree final project tries to condense all the knowledge acquired with this software.

The purpose of the video is to show the architecture by telling a story. The idea behind this story is a personal experience that, somehow, I needed to tell. And the best way I have to express myself artistically is 3D and architecture.

So, that is how “Sweet sleepless nights” was born, literally from my sweet sleepless nights, taking care of my baby and seeing how everything else orbits around. Taking time from where there is none to get to everything, without achieving it, or achieving it but in a different way than I had thought. An experience, without a doubt, that has brought me to where I am today. Making me grow as an architect and 3D artist.

Here I share the storyboard in its initial stages. And some reference images that try to describe the mood of each part of the story.

Technical aspects

This project was modeled with 3dsmax and everything else has been developed within Unreal Engine 5.

There are several scenarios and lighting hypotheses in the project and I wanted to test different lighting techniques in Unreal Engine. The main lighting technique chosen has been CPU Baked Lighting. I have combined baked GI and static or dynamic lighting as needed, to set the different moods thoughout the story.

Substance Designer has been used for the creation of some textures such as the terracotta tiles and vaults. As well as Substance Painter for assets such as the lamps of the nightstands.

All the architecture and fixed furniture in the kitchen has been modeled by me, as well as several of the assets, for example, the bamboo headboard, the cradle, the nightstands, the breast pump, the baby’s cup and saucer, the alarm clock, etc.

The rest of the assets and vegetation were dowloaded from different sites like 3dsky, Poly Haven, Quixel Bridge, MaxTree, CG Trader, CG Mood and Epic Games Marketplace.

All textile elements such as curtains, sheets, blankets, oven mitt, etc., have been modeled with Marvelous Designer.

Credits for other authors

Music:

The power of inspiration by Oleg Kyrylkovv.

Chase by Alena Smirnova.

Just Relax by Oleksii Kaplunskyi.

Assets:

“Glasses” (https://skfb.ly/oyp9A) by AlbertVictory. I have made some modifications to this asset to open and close the temples of the glasses.

Photographs,  postcards and others:

Wedding couple photograph by Lydia Jane.

Pregnant woman photograph by Tracie Taylor.

Paragliding photograph by Arturo Baldasano.

Newborn baby photograph by Paul Lender.

Baby standing on a surfboard photograph by Derek Owens.

Rabbit 1st Birthday card created by Kaytealogy.

Architectural blueprints on the desktop: Escuela El Til-ler by Eduard Balcells, Tigges Architekt and Ignasi Rius Architecture.

I would like to thank…

…you, for taking your time watching and reading my entry. I really appreciate it!

…all the staff at butic The New School. Special mention to César Maestre, Paula Reboleiro, Ignacio Álvarez Monteserín y Jacob García.

I hope you have enjoyed the project!

Feel free to leave a comment if you have some feedback. High fives are welcome! ;)