A Bar Scene & Mantis Man

This entry includes both an Environment and Character Art piece. I have been a student at Futuregames for 9 months and hope to join the game development industry as an Environment Artist.

1930s Bar Scene

This was created for my first environment art assignment - 3 months into my education. I chose a 1930s bar scene concept because I was immediately drawn to the lighting and composition. I also have an interest in atmospheric interior spaces and this was the perfect opportunity for that. Rendered in Unity.

I had 3 weeks available to work on this. My intent was to match the concept closely within the short timeframe. The first step in my work process was to establish an asset list. The priority for asset creation was in a largest-to-smallest order.  I wanted to explore making modular kits as well - I knew that I wanted to do a very simple semi-modular set of walls.

It was also important that the blockout dimensions be finalized during the setup of the camera perspective. It was a bit of a challenge to capture the same room size and sense of depth as the concept, but I feel I was able to achieve that. As I worked through the asset list, I regularly imported them into the engine to make sure everything worked well in the space.

In between modeling, I would take breaks and do lighting composition tests. I had a feeling this would take time to balance, so I made sure to start doing so during the first week. The lighting and color palette for this scene was very important for communicating the overall mood. 

There were over 40 assets in this scene! My goal was to complete modeling all objects during the first week. I was able to do this - which felt great. For week 2, I moved on to texturing. Week 3 was for post processing and lighting polish, decals and bonus assets that were in the concept but not essential (small clock, vase, statuette).

In retrospect, I wish I had chosen a less ambitious concept that didn't involve so many assets. However, I feel that I became much faster at modeling and texturing. It's important to focus on completing assets at a steady pace and not to get fixated on small details. There aren't particularly any major 'hero pieces' in this scene, but there were definitely some that needed more detail than others based on proximity to the camera and where the eye is drawn to.

Texturing is absolutely my favorite part of the process. Prior to this assignment, I didn't have many opportunities to work on props. Choosing a concept with an old, smoky, worn, bar setting let me have fun with adding details to every texture. For all assets, I made a lot of use of grunge masks and making surfaces imperfect through roughness and normal changes.

I also focused on learning texture optimization - such as use of texture atlases across similar assets while maintaining a uniform texel density. For example, there were 3 glass bottle meshes used for the entire scene, utilizing one of two materials; a generic tiling glass material or a baked UV map with labels on the bottles.

This project was also my first time making trim sheets. I sculpted high poly trim sheets in ZBrush to give the appearance that the structural-type assets had a baked look. 3 were used across the scene for the bar itself, pillars, walls, railing, ceiling trims, and some wooden furniture. I also used a tiling wood texture on the floors and throughout smaller parts of the scene. A tiled marble floor was made in Substance 3D Designer; everything else was done in Substance 3D Painter.

Mantis Man

In March of this year (6 months into my education) I was given the first character art assignment. Even though I am focusing on environment art, I also love to create characters. I planned to make a humanoid that was an interesting hybrid of something. Making a reptilian or insectoid creature was appealing to me, so that I can push myself with learning to sculpt different types of organic surfaces.  

A praying mantis was my choice of insect because of its already slightly human-like posture. I drew a basic starting concept and gathered references (left), then started a blockout using Zspheres and sculpted a human upper body transitioning into a mantis thorax. Watching Eric Keller streams of him sculpting bugs was very helpful. I listened to hours of these videos while working on this for inspiration and entertainment.

After establishing the primary shapes, I moved onto detail sculpting.

I started with the insect legs because I wanted to get staring at bug reference photos over with. This was what I was least confident with as well. Then moved onto the face, arms, and the torso. I tried to add characteristics to communicate that he is in agony - such as his facial expression, convulsing hand, and exposed bones.

The implication is that this was once a man, that has been losing his human characteristics and involuntarily becoming a mantis. I aimed for a sickly appearance - gaunt and aged.

As a quick break, I made a Nicolas Cage mantis one afternoon. This was a joke that came from a conversation with other students.

The high poly was done and it was time to retopologize. I decimated the model in ZBrush, then exported it for quad drawing in Maya. This was the first time I had done a high-to-low poly workflow. Doing retopology felt tedious but my motivation was to be able to reach the texturing phase.

I also had never made a skin material before so this was exciting to do. To accentuate the deteriorating-human-look, as well as give extra visual interest to the insect parts, I experimented with strong undertones with one base color on top at low opacity. Blues and purples are in the more sunken in areas; yellows where I wanted forward-depth. I also painted over sculpted veins with blue and a small height value.

Base Color, Normal, Occlusion & Roughness Maps (above)

After making this character, I feel that I've become more versatile as an artist, have stronger sculpting ability, and am glad that I learned how to do a high-to-low poly workflow. I would like to make more characters as side projects in the future that are just as unusual and unique as this one!

Wireframe and beauty shot in Marmoset Toolbag 4 (below)

Thank you for viewing my work! I am trying to improve every day and enjoying the journey. Looking forward to sharing more in the future.

Follow me on my ArtStation page for upcoming pieces.