Italian Town - From Reference to Final Concept

Reference Material

To start off I had a look at medieval architecture in general. This mainly consisted of central European structures that can be found across Germany or France. Later on it shifted towards a Mediterranean feel such as can be found in Italian towns and villages. The research consisted of real life photography and detailed window and door references as well as concept art by Maxim Desmettre for the Assassin's Creed series, some fantasy concepts and simple model examples with a similar theme and mood. 

Modelling Process

Low Poly
The goal of the modelling process is to capture the basic shapes of the environment as low poly as possible, yet maintain a certain level of detail to complete a full scene for the final render with a strong mood and atmosphere. I therefore chose a town alley which restricted views to keep the modelling time low.

Planning out the Scene
With the completion of the basic house shapes it was very important to plan out the scene thoroughly before adding any further detail to avoid unnecessary work. The camera angles and composition are chosen accurately and duplicating of objects was key to accelerate the production process.

Some of the houses are duplicated and partly altered to fit the scene. The textures will later on create further differences and stop the scene from becoming too monotone. The same goes for the windows and lamps.

To sum up the modelling content remained minimal so that one could proceed quickly to the uv mapping and texturing phases.

UV Mapping

Saving Time with the Work Flow

The low poly models allowed quick UV mapping with a very clean outcome. After UV mapping separate objects they would be duplicated and moved to their correct positions in the scene.

Texturing and Lighting

Textures
In able to create the Mediterranean feeling I had a closer look at facades of the said regions and combined different photo textures to create the wall texture. I would save these out to TARGA files in Photoshop which also support alpha layers.
To further save time the textures would be copied and altered slightly until all the buildings textures were complete.
For the windows too separate textures were made to create some colour contrast in the scene and create an interesting atmosphere.
Furthermore a background plane with one of my previous paintings was added.

Lighting
The lighting is very important in this scene to create the final feel of the concept art. The blue and orange lights produce great colour contrast and create a suspenseful atmosphere.

Final Concept Art

Breaking Solid Lines
I spent 1-2 hours maximum to paint over the final render and bring all the elements together. I focused and breaking up some of the solid lines and recognizable patterns on the textures as well as added details to the scene.

Colour Adjustments
In able to create a solid painting some colour adjustments were made. The background was desaturated as well as the building to the left of the main building with red windows. The desaturation of the building pushes it further back and creates more depth in the image.

Adding Story Elements
Finally the street lights lead the eye towards the bottom window of the main building, so I decided to place the main story action of the scene into this window. Some domestic abuse with unknown back-story is now taking place and hopefully intriguing you as a viewer.

Reflection

Time management
3 days from research to final artefact. spent a while experimenting with the lighting and my modelling speed must be improved. However the 3D medium has shown me some clear advantages in terms of flexibility, composition and lighting.
Particularly in scenes that require a certain degree of consistency of objects the 3D methods and possibilities tend to be very useful.

Composition
The composition benefits from the rule of thirds and it's well thought through space distribution. The image presents a very organized feeling through the equal distribution of windows on the houses. The 3D modelling definitely influenced this part strongly.
Furthermore the image consists of mainly horizontal and vertical straight lines to create balance in the environment. Solely the lamps and the background have curvy dynamic shapes, and particularly the lamps draw the viewers attention quickly and lead the viewer to the main action window in the centre of the scene which also has dynamic shapes in it. This allows the window scene to really stand out of the picture together with its saturated colours.

Value and Colour Contrast
The reds and greens work well against each other and support the composition of the image. Also, the lamps light cone leads the viewers eye back to the centre of the image, but also breaks up the large plane of the right third of the image.

Concept Quality
The end result has far more depth than most of my other 2D paintings due to the 3D build-up and insure perfect perspective and scale in the image. The artwork's lighting also turned out very convincing and added value to my artwork.