Fox Renderfarm had an interview with Environment Artist Mr. Junliang Zhang, creating Chinese Cyberpunk project, CyberNeon, in UE4. He started from scratch and finished this incredible project all on his own. During the interview, he shared his inspiration and experience with us.
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Thanks to Junliang Zhang.
Transcript(F=Fox Renderfarm, J=Junliang Zhang)
F: What is your inspiration of starting this project?
J:The Cyberpunk Chinese city project--CyberNeon is one of my biggest individual projects. It is also a project created all by myself. The reason why I created this project is that I watched the movie Blade Runner 2049. This movie has left a great impression on me... Blade Runner 2049 depicted a Cyberpunk-styled Los Angeles, so I decided to make a Chinese version, which was unprecedented in China...
F: How did you create CyberNeon?
J: It was in October, 2017, my first step was to find some references and made a Mood Board... I went outdoors to shoot some materials... I spent a long period of time creating the composition. According to the composition, some Shaders were made, and the Pipeline was finished. Because without the completion of Pipeline, later things cannot be done according to standards to make the the objects and other procedures. The first procedure I did is to Block-Out all the scenes and models into one Maya file and to export them respectively into UE4, in order to adjust the composition, to adjust the lighting and to design the lighting. Then I added all the fog effects and particle effects without any textures. All were white models in order to make myself clear about what I had seen at first sight. For the establishment of structures and compositions, I had modified and adjusted more than 100 times over and over again for nearly 2 to 3 months. By adding step by step, in February 2018, one building is finished--the modeling and textures. All the architectural models were made by Modular, built modulizedly like making LEGO. For the large scale of the scene, most shared things were used, art materials were created in the modulized way. After the creation of the art materials, I set about the lighting. For the lighting, I had referred to a lot of Cyberpunk style materials online, and had tried various ways of lighting. During the project, I didn't set any deadline to myself. All I did was making what I could do as perfect as possible... that's why this project took a year and a half.
F: What's the most challenging part in the creation?
J: The most challenging part is the lighting. It is difficult for the computer performance, which is the main reason. Creating an open world with such a big scene will cause a huge performance loss. I had tried multiple techniques to improve the lighting and models...I...continually worked on the improvement, and finally made it to FPS 60.
F: What are the things your interest lead you to persist doing?
J: I've always wanted to make something really sophisticated and advanced. Because, there are many advanced tools have been developed. Many of them are really powerful, like Substance, Quixel, which enable us to make the game environment photorealistic, also with the help of the powerful engines, all kinds of Real time and all kinds of ray tracing technologies. Speaking of the things I persevere with, interest is always the best teacher. With the powerful tools and strong interest, I keep on learning new things, and keep on applying what I've learned into work and life.
F: What are the technological requirements to become an environment artist?
J: ...I've collected many books about architecture... the architectural styles vary in different times, I have a collection of encyclopedias on my shelves ... which is very helpful when dealing with 3D modeling... Nature is the best teacher. As an environment designer, the real world is the best inspiration source... You will learn a lot from it, and can also apply them to your life, apply them to your game design, apply them to the architectural visual effects and so forth. For our life is influenced by the environment.
F: Have you ever heard of Fox Renderfarm?
J: Sure! The Wandering Earth is one of my favorite movies and it is rendered by Fox Renderfarm.
F: Any other things you want to share with the CG enthusiasts?
J: If you are keen on something, try to do it as good as you can, and don't ever regret. It doesn't matter if there is failure, we can start over again. Like the Kyoto Animation accident, though it's very heartbreaking to have lost so many talents. It could still be rebuilt, even though it is such a pity. ... I believe that difficulties and struggles in this industry don't matter, what we need to do is, no matter how big the difficulty we are facing now, we work on the things at hand and in future step by step to bring out the best.
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