Viking Village: Sólarorku - Doug Adair

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Name: Doug Adair
Country: Canada
I have read the terms and conditions and am eligible for prizes

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The Grand Exodus

Humanity has triumphed and expanded to the stars. Technology, both mechanical and biological, has made it possible to travel the cosmos, create new civilizations, and bring an era of human expansion and adventure. New stories will be written, new tales told, and neo-humanity will thrive.

Earth is now a refuge and archive of past biome and culture, with some people choosing to stay and preserve the ancient stories, as a celebration of what made humans, human.

Sustainable technology, integration with nature, and the return and embracing of the old cultures means that society now celebrates what was once lost and has built an amalgam of archaic-futurism.

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Diorama Aesthetic

This Viking village has the vibes of cyber cottage-core and Solarpunk. Embracing the building styles unique to the Vikings, integrating both carvings and wires side-by-side, this hybrid construction embraces both the modern robotic voices of new and the calls of the ancient voices of old. A strong sense of community and natural environment integration is the key to success, through the use of sustainable and long-lasting building practices and traditional food and land use harvesting. The Earth has now healed, people are at peace, and the goal is to celebrate and honor the stories and tales of old.

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Archive (What happened?)

Taking Steph's advice posted yesterday on Discord, I realize that like some others, I may have misinterpreted the concept of what the competition was aiming for. With the initial competition summary stating (Diorama Scale: Participants can choose the scale they want to work with. Even build a full environment if you wish.) I was aiming for a larger environment with a village in a setting that was not diorama in feel. Though comfortable with a larger environment, it also meant that there was a certain amount of quantity over quality that was to happen to fit in the timeframe.

With that in mind and after taking the post to heart, though some time loss has occurred, I was able to recycle one of the city assets and shift the project into a diorama scale and feel, focusing on polishing one critical asset with room to expand if time warrants.

This is something that happens. Scope changes, project direction can shift. Sometimes you loose a few assets, sometimes an entire world. Being comfortable with walking away from prior work is something important as an artist. Not everything made will be used in a final product, so, for the sake of having a lot fun on the prior concept, the prior posts are archived here under details:
I . I
VV

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Mushrooms! Some delightful photogrammetry of our little fungi friends. Mushrooms are always welcome in a cozy farm land, never know where they will be popping up!

Photogrammetry was the catalyst that kicked me off in Unreal and made me remember how much I loved creating games. Forever grateful that 3D scanning led me back to creating assets, environments, and worlds. Glad to be on this path and hopeful for a future in the industry 😊

We have a bumper crop of mushrooms this fall in Vancouver!

So many little mushrooms! Photogrammetry is powerful, but capturing small objects can take a bit of finesse,

I knew I had to add some mushrooms to the project, and since I am using UE5, a mid-poly nanite foliage pipeline is used. Reality Capture, though it has its quirks, is a very powerful for PBR workflows. Though one can get a bit crazy with nanite and virtual texture streaming, I find that it is important for optimization to dial things back a bit still if you are looking to gamify a scene. Instead of HP to LP bakes, it is now HP to MP bakes 😅

Clean UV's for easy editing in PS and Substance were critical and careful manual UV and baking was used. Gutters were made in Photoshop with Substance for baking and roughness (ORM) map generation.

Software used is Reality Capture, Photoshop, ZBrush, Blender, Substance Painter/Designer. Mushrooms were from both dinner table (Shitake) and the lawn that the building cleared shortly for leaves, so I felt less guilty harvesting them.