Alley.

The Alley is a project I have been working on after concluding University as a means of continuing my learning of the various software’s such as Maya, Substance Painter and Unreal engine. Each of the sections contains my step by step process when it came to making this scene of the Alley.

1) Project Planning

Before starting to create the alley environment I first collected a couple of images to use as reference. I wanted to find examples of alleys that were industrial and grimy looking. For this project I wanted to focus on the detail, and get a chance to work with lighting and decals in Unreal Engine.

2) 3D Modelling

Once I had the reference images I began to block out my scene in Maya. I started first with the walls and floor to get an idea for the scale and then moved on to constructing the assets that would make up the scene such as the different windows, pipes, aircons and fire escape.

I later moved these assets to unreal engine to layout the environment there, and also begin experimenting with the lighting for this scene.

3) Making Textures

Using Substance Painter, I took the assets that I had made and created some textures for them that included height maps, which brought in details such as grunge and dirt. I also used the reference images to transfer some of colours into the objects I based them off. Working on these smaller assets has helped the composition of the environment appear more detailed when importing them in the Unreal Engine scene.

4) Lighting & Decals

During the making of the scene I carried on editing and amending the textures I made for the different assets, which I also did with the lighting for the scene. The lighting slowly develops and goes from being very bright to darker in tone as it reaches completion. This being due to using more emissive lighting rather than relying on the daylight settings for this scene, as I wanted it to be set at night time to see the full effects the lighting can bring. To go further with the detail for the scene I also looked at including decals which I had not used before and was a useful addition to the alley, as it allowed me to incorporate things such as graffiti, posters, cracks and markings in the walls.

5) Particle Effects

The last thing I looked at doing to complete the scene was include some particle effects. It now has steam coming out of the vents and emitter that generates rainfall. The rain particles also include small splashes when they collide with the ground.