3D Enviroment Design

Technical Report:
Lich Phylactory

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Layout
This is a technical report and guidebook to the creation of the lich phlactory. The concept that will be
designed is a pocket realm keeping the bodys of the Lich s previous lives. The area is split into four. Each
area is drawn from a different point in time and space. The four areas are drawn from these cultures:
Ancient Egypt
Renacance Christianity
Norse Viking
Native American
Each area will be very different from the next, the key aspect of this scene is to show the death of one
character throughout different cultures.

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Research
The research document is going to be an import referance when looking at designing this envioment.
Applying it effectivly will be vital. The areas are
drawn from real cultures and their views on death. To
the right is a few of the symbols that i want to keep
appearing throughout the scene. Each of these symbols
have relation to rebirth, the undead and funeral rites.
With each area the concept of death relates heavily
to the cultures religion. These symbols signify these
aspects in different cultures and will therefore be
placed accordingly to add to any area the designer
would concider effective.

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Stylized Insperation
To gather an overall style together i created this
moodboard. This is to help gather imagry and a
stylistic view of the area as a whole. Looking at
scipture symbols, the design is meant to be a very
dark gothic scene. This moodboard is to help try
and understand that feeling, bringing forth insperation, and help bring the project further to life.

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Programs
To design this scene these programs
will be needed:

Four Areas
Here are sketches of the four sections of the level. Within these show each of the assets that I am going
to design; the color schemes will vary from area to area, three of the areas will have different foliage
styles, the Egyptian area which however will have a sandstone only floor. I will go further into the
model design and the effects that will be needed to utilities these areas effectively further in the document.

Maya
Zbrush
Mudbox
Unreal
Photoshop
Crazybump
Quixel
Spacescape
ATI Cubemap Gen
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SkyBox ATI
An import aspect of this level is going to be the skybox therefore designing it should be the first task of
BA8. As the area is set in a pocket realm the skybox
will be a exciting view of deep space. Here are two
ways of designing the skybox.
Step 1
First the space design must be created in the program
Spacescope, as shown on the first image, this program will develop the overall look of the space scene.
Step 2
After exporting this it will be taken into ATI
cubemap generator, where the image designed will be
turned into a material map.
Step 3
The material will then be altered in the unreal Engine changing aspects to fit desired effect. This is then
added to a mesh of the skybox.

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SkyBox Maya
The second way of designing the skybox is using Maya,
and a texture. I have used the image below as an example
for this demonstration.
Step 1
First a sphere must be made, cutting it in half then applying
the desired texture.
Step 2
Duplicating the object so far and flipping it to create a
globe, from here exporting this object into Unreal
Step 3
In unreal make the static mesh non colidable and make sure
the textures are double sided to finish.

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SkyBox into Unreal

These techniques will work when designing the
main skybox, using space scape. this will be a more
effective option yet more time consuming. Both ways
will require tweaking and alteration within the unreal engine. Changing the material and static mesh
attributes, to achieve the desired effect is a very easy
way to create floating objects within the game, such
as planets and suns.

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Level Mockup
Here are some 3D designs for the scene. These
will be the bases for level building the assets slowly from this scene. This was a quick
mockup, to help show the scope of the design
in a 3D format. The topdown view gives an
indication to the size and layout of the assets.
This design was completed using the Unreal
engine. The materials shown in the bottom
images were used from Unreals free content.
They were added to further show the scope
of the level and to demonstrate a rough colour outline to help define assets as they are
meant to be. This is the map layout of the area
alongside a key reference and scaling tool to
be used through the BA8 design.

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Lighting
Below is a rough outline of the lighting for the environment. In the sketches the whole environment is
lit by fire. I have listed out where and the size of these light sources. Overall the aim is an eerie, atmospheric scene. to try and achieve this one center light will illuminates the whole scene, alongside surronding fog. By altering light radius I can alter the Unreal fire effects to have a variation of lights.

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Main Light
This is the main light of the
scene. It should be broken into
simple building blocks using
the textures on the side. The
top disk should be designed
separately, and will hold the
fire. The discus will be used
multiple times and will be used
in the catholic area and the
Egyptian Area.

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Ncloth and Norman

Throughout the level the Lich s body will appear in
each area, signifying his death from that point in
time
Christian Area- attached to the door of the crypt
Egyptian area - Placed in the Sarcophagus
Norse Area - Placed on the burning ship
American Area - Placed on the raised pedestal
To create the body I will be using Ncloth effect and a
rigged character. In this example I am using Norman
and Maya Ncloth effect.
Step 1
Shaping Norman into the desired position using the
rig already designed.
Step 2
Creating a flat plane and adding a high amount of
divisions to the plane. Then adding the Ncloth effect
to the flat plane.
Step 3
Selecting the mesh of Norman and making it the
collision for Ncloth, from here simply letting the aniPg 14 mation tool create the whole effect.
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Creating the lich Bodies

The effect that ncloth has made is effective, to
complete this asset four different texture sheets
will be made to show the variation from culture to culture. The four textures to be used are
shown on the right.
First Norse Lich body
Second Christian Lich body
Third Native American Lich body
Fourth Egyptian Lich body

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Ground Blocks
This scene will require three different
ground blocks, to further add to the
ground of the level. These blocks will
be duplicated and combined to create
a floor design.
In total three different textures and
normals will be used, to create the
floor blocks. When modeling only
one block should be needed.
Top texture - Egyptian Block
Middle texture - Christian Block
Bottom texture - Center Block

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Creating Grass
To create the grass throughout the level Maya
paint effects should be used. Maya has a vast
range of grass effects, that can be altered and
customised. The level has three areas with grass,
therefore three different grass types will be used.
Altering the density, global scale, twist effects
and color/highlights to achieve the desired grass
effect. To start creating a grass effect, create a 2D
plane and make the object paintable.
The three Grass Effects i will use are:
Grass Clump
Grass Ornament
Grass Wind Narrow
Notes:
Global Scale - Size
Brush width - Width of grass
Overall grass Color
Highlight grass color
Turning the 2D visibility OFF
Addition of other foliage to complement the
results.

Online tutorial to use:

http://www.3dtotal.com/team/Tutorials/realistic_grass/realistic_01.php
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Different Grass brush and color

Here are examples of the three grass samples to use
throughout the project, g rass clump, grass Ornament and grass wind narrow. , I have altered color
and density on each of the exsamples shown.
After a desired effect is found in both color and
grass density, the paint effects must be turned into
polygons ready to be put into the game engine. To
do this the grass must be selected then this action
must be performed.

Modify- Convert- Convert - Paint effect to Poly

Once this has been done, the mesh can be imported into Unreal. From here slight adjustments to the
textures might be needed. Once each grass patch
is acceptable, the mesh can be added to the foliage
brush in Unreal, to help design proccess quicken.
In total nine patches of grass should be created and
added into the unreal engine
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Envioment construction
The landscape itself will be designed in Unreal
engine, using the landscape tool to sculpt the map
layout.
Overall the landscape will be a rectangular flat
surface however one corner will require environment sculpting. The Native American area of the
level is designed to have a raised section forming
a cliff edge. The environment in Unreal can be
sculpted and morphed to fit the desired effect. The
scene will need the size and scale of the level can
be seen to the right. This is the length and width
required to design this level. Once the scale has
been set, the area is ready for sculpting. Sculpting in Unreal is relatively straight forward and
works very similarly to any 3D sculpting software
like Zbursh, or Mudbox. This will help my design
process of the Norse Mounds and Native American Cliff

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Enviroment Material Design

Water effects

Once sculpting has been done, painting the

area is the next process. To do this new materials will need to be added to the environment paint selection. Choosing three images
as textures, and adding normal maps of these
textures to create a material ready for painting the environment. It is very important to
add the normals to the material to avoid the
area looking flat. The way to set up the material is shown on the right. Below it are the
three textures, without normals that will be
used to create the environment for the Native
American cliff and Norse Mounds. Changing
between brush types, to create a variation in
ground atheistics.

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Fire effects
As fire is going to be the main source of
lighting throughout the level, getting thefire effects correctly is vital. The fire thatll
be used is, the standard fire effect in Unreal.
However adjustments will be needed, in
the attribute editor, creating different effect.
Overall the animation and detail on this
effect is very nice quality. Alongside fire effect the use of Unreal smoke effects to really
bring the variety of both effect should be used.
Things to note upon are:
Scale Of fire
Light radius amount
Flame offset attribute effects
Spark Effects
Addition of smoke effects
Reference Website
https://docs.unrealengine.com/latest/INT/
Engine/Rendering/ParticleSystems/Reference/index.html
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Symbols
Throughout the level there will be a
number of symbols that will crop up.
Here are four sketches of some of the
symbols they will need to be turned
into textures. This is so they can be
repeated throughout the scene in the
design aspect. They will be either inscribed onto ornaments, or applied to
a 2D plane with Ncloth physics attached. This will help with the design
process of the flags, and engravings
throughout the level design proccess.

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Norse MoodBoard
Norse way of life
The life of the Nordic people was very
war based, with heavy raiding party s that attacked surrounding country s.
Throughout Europe they were feared as
devils, that did not fear death. In actual fact the concept of death, to the Norse
was beautiful, and only with a warriors
death could feast in the halls of Valhalla.
Magic in Norse Culture
Magic for the Norse was important and
sacred, they believed that seers and oracles
were sent from the gods to help guide us
throughout our lives. They normally dabbled in herbs, remedies and fortune telling.
They were also the elders of the village
offering advice and guidance to the village
head, overseeing funerals and make sure
that the gods were pleased with the village
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Norse Funeral Boat

The Norse funeral boat is going to be one of the
key aspects for this area, and will be the holding
point of one of the Lich bodies. The boat will be
burning alongside the pyre, so adding burn effects
to the texture sheet will be needed. The helm of
the head will be made out of metal with a steel
insignia on the tip.
Notes
Splitting the asset into four objects to design
main boat, back end, front end, planks
Designing it alongside pyre to keep scale correct
Burn marks throughout the texture sheet

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Norse Pyre
The Norse pyre will be one of the
center pieces of the Norse area.
Standing alongside the Norse funeral ship. While designing the
Norse pyre, the funeral boat should
also be modeled, this will help
with scaling both models. The Pyre
should be split into three assets; the
brace the floor and a wood plank
that will be duplicated
Notes
Range of wood textures
Addition of burn marks
throughout textures
Bottom half will require design
of one or two wood planks
Duplication of wood planks and
alteration of scale in Unreal will
Help with design productivity
Consideration of Boat placement
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Norse Ornaments
The two Norse ornaments that will have to be
designed are the gravestones surrounding the pyre
and the shield of the Lich.
Gravestone
Broken into two objects, the Base and main
tombstone.
The base should have two texture pages showing the inscriptions on the model sheet.
The raised ground of the gravestone will be
made using Unreal landscape tools.
Shield
The circles around the shield should be raised.
The frame of the shield should also be raised
slightly use

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Norse Mast
The mast should be relatively straight forward
throughout modeling. The only issue is the robe
effects, these will have to be completed using
Maya paint effects, then transformed into polys.
The flag should be designed alongside the mast.
As part of the design is using Ncloths the mast
will have to be the collider for the Ncloth physics
to be applied to the flag.
Notes
Use of dark wood Texture
Addition of burn marks throughout textures
Should be broken into five assets, the vertical
mast, the horizontal mast, hooks, platform and
base
The Rope around the mast will be completed
using Maya paint effects and making the mask

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Norse Flag
The Norse flag will be one set flat 2D
plane with one texture sheet. It will not
need a normal map either. The whole
flag will be given a Ncloth attribute
with a collision with part of the mast
design.
Notes
The symbol must be proportionally equal to symbolize Eternal life in
Norse religion
The symbol will be a black cloth texture along with the bottom section.
The rest of the flag will be a grey
cloth texture
When making the flag an N cloth
changing the attributes of N cloth, to
keep it from just wrapping round the
whole mask will take some time to
apply and get right
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Catholic Moodboard
Christian Catholic Culture
This is a religion that we can all draw
from. For the crypt concept the aspects
that this crypt is based on looks a lot at
occult, necromancy and the old testament. These aspects are what drives this
crypt idea, the photo reference that will
be used for this crypt is very similar to
the bottom left image of the motherboard.
This was the main inspiration and a key
point of reference throughout the design
process.
Old Testament Death Culture
The concept of death throughout Christianity is that of heaven and hell. Within
that there is purgatory,. What the main
focus point in this aspect of the level is
the occult looking heavily at a character
called John Dee
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Catholic Crypt
The catholic crypt is going to be the center
piece for the Christian area, the Lichs body will
be upright against the doors, this asset itself has
a lot of lights and fire effects to add at game
engine point. The overall crypt itself should
be broken into smaller assets to help make this
more manageable.
Notes
Spikes and wall hanging, should be made
separately and duplicated at game engine
point.
The drapes will be made using Ncloth using the small brackets above as the collision
therefore they should be designed separately.

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Catholic Crypt Steps

The steps will be leading up to the main
crypt. The best way to approach this model would be breaking it into four different
assets.
Steps
Wooden Bar - duplicated four times
Top of the bar
Braces
This asset should be relatively easy to design the only tricky aspect will be creating
an effective stair texture, this could be done
by breaking down each step as a separate
object, or using planar mapping along the
X and Y axis to UV the model correctly.

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Catholic Crypt Pillar

The pillars either side of the crypt should be designed separately, once the pillar is complete it should be duplicated
in Unreal and set just in front of the crypt as shown in
the environment artwork. The top of the pillar will be using the same concept at the main light of the area, shown
above, the only difference is that the fire effects that will
be used will be smaller and not cast as much radius light.
Notes
The majority of the pillar should be the a concrete texture
The bowl holding the fire should be slightly larger than
the pillar
Slight decals and stains should be added to the texture
sheet, to help make the object more interesting.

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Catholic Graves
In total two graves should be modeled and textured, as shown
in each of the side images, in total four graves should be designed. And have a name in printed onto it. The four names
are.
Katherine Dee
Geradus Mercator
Edward Kelly
Thomas Diggles
These are chatters that have connections to john Dee. Only
one triangular grave should be designed the other grave should
be duplicated and have three separate texture sheets with the

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Catholic Ornaments
In total three Catholic ornaments
will be designed, the two braziers,
and the main plaque that hangs
above the crypt door. These assets
must be modeled and textured. The
braziers will be using the same fire
bowl that the main light will be
used, and have its own two separate plaques
Notes
To get the inscriptions on the
plaque correct, an effective
normal map must be designed.
The two designs for the braziers
plaques are shown on the right
of the model sheet.
The braziers should be relatively easy to design however two
different plaque must be designed with there own texture
sheet.

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Catholic Flags
The flags for the Catholic area
are going to be created using
Ncloth. Much like the Norse
sail it will need a collider within
the vertexes of the model. The
Model itself will be a flat 2D
plane, with two separate texture
sheets.
Notes
Using the Ncloth collider as
a cylindrical beam that goes
through the top of the flag
The primary color of these
flags will be red just like the
body of the Lich in this area,
whereas the inscription and
bottom of the flag will be
black.

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Native American Moodboard

Native America way of life
The native American people were a very nomadic
tribal people who lived off the land, they traveled
the plains of America following the buffalo. A very
spiritual believing people, who believed spirits lived
in all things, within them and the nature around
them. Throughout designing this section of the area
this moodboard should be used as a point of reference for designing the ornaments, and the center
piece of the area. The raised Grave, the reference
for the raised grave is the bottom left image of the
moodboard.
Native American Death Culture
Each tribe had similar ways of looking at death, the
tribe i am looking at is the Iroquois tribe who had
a heavy belief in spirits. They believed that upon
death the spirit joins the great spirits in the sky
and become the stars that litter the night. Forever watching over the living. Wise men and witch
doctors could then commune with these spirits asking for guidance and help.

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Native American Raised Grave

This is the model sheet and textures that are to be used when
designing the raised grave model.
This model will be the holding
another Lich body. Thus using
the same fur texture for the base
of the bed will be needed. The
asset will need to be broken into
several objects, to be designed
alongside one another.
Notes
The four side posts should be
modeled separately and duplicated after modeling
The tops of the poles should
be stone sharpened flint tips
The spikes should be designed
separately and duplicated a
lot of times, each with adjusments of scale in a number of
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Native American Charms

The native american charms are going
to be leading up the cliffside guiding a
path to the raised grave. There will be
a number of different totems all with
the same cross base. The dangling ornaments will have to be made seperatly
and have a number of different styles.
All these are shown on the model sheet
to the right.
Notes
The Post itself will be two cylindrical objects held together by horse
hair, this will be replicated by using maya 3D paint effects (same as
Norse Mast)
The hanging objects will have to be
made seperatly and will take much
longer than the rest of the asset they
will then be duplicated and added
to the base to create variants of the
asset
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Native American Cliff Design

The cliff design is going to be the most complicated
part of this area, it should be designed using the Unreal Vermont sculpting tool. Then using the paint tool
to sculpt the cliffside, with normals and color, other assets will have to be used to block out the area under the
sculpt. Use of self made rock and Unreal designed rock
that is a free addon for Unreal, this small piece of scenery willhelp with the design here to block out underneath
the cliff. By duplication and changing the scale in all axis
to create quick effective rockface.
Notes
The cliff will have three sections of elevation, each
with grass effects surrounding the area.
The back of the cliff could be designed in zbrush to
create aspects that might be blanked out after the environment sculpting or use of unreal tool.

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Egyptian Moodboard
Egyptian way of life
The ancient Egyptian empire was one of the
worlds first civilizations, stretching throughout
Egypt. The Egyptians were the great architects
of their time, yet there manual labor force was
slave based. Living alongside the Nile, surrounded by desert there way of life was difficult,
a huge aspect of there life was religion. There
belief of the gods and the idea of the afterlife.
Egyptian Death Culture
Egyptians believed that reincarnation and life
after death was possible this part of the area signify the lichs first life and therefore his first life
and the start of his immortal life. The Egyptians
believed that there was a life after death, upon
death Anubis would weigh the heart of the dead
to see if they should rise to the sun with Ra or be
sent to the underworld. This is the point when
the lich tricks Anubis and manages to be reborn
throughout time.

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Egyptian Chest
The Egyptian chest will be a relatively simple design
with a more complex texture sheet. The model should
be simple to design breaking it into two objects, the
posts will have to be duplicated after texturing. The four
symbols will be added onto the texture pages and bumb
mapped in the normal texture map to create an indent
effect.
Notes
Duplication of four beams
Indent in chest
Simple bump mapped flat texture for the bottom of the

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Egyptian Pillar
The Egyptian pillar is going to be
quite a simple asset to design. The
pillar will be split into six cylindrical blocks. The top and bottom
block will have the two inscriptions one signifying eternal life
the other signifying the underworld.
Notes
Design of one pillar then duplication of the object will make
the design process more efficient.
In total three texture pages
must be designed and normals
must be created.
The top brazier will be a duplication of the main torch that
is in the center of the room
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Egyptian Sarcophagus
The sarcophagus is going to be the
holding point for the Lich s body in
the Egyptian area. The sarcophagus
should be broken into two seperate
objects, the main chamber and the
golden area inside the sarcophagus.
The two inscriptions are the same
as the pillar, and should be made
indented by adding the inscriptions
to the normals.
Notes
Two objects
Indents created with normals

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Egyptian Wall 1
There will be two egyptian walls to
design for the Egyptian area. Keeping in line with the style of egyptian culture, the walls are going to
be based on Egyptian spells of the
dead; these were often inscribed on
the walls of the deccessed. This spell
is going to represent the Lich s ritual
for immortality.
Notes
Single objects
Complex Texture sheet
Indents created with normals
The hyroglphs will be made on
the texture sheet and normals
will complete the wall looks

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Egyptian Wall 2
The second walls are going to be based on
an actual. Egyptian spells of the dead called
weighing of the heart, the spell represents
Anubis judging the deceased on the sins of
their life. For this egyptian wall alot of referance will the original Weighing of the heart
spell.
Notes
Single objects
Complex Texture sheet
Indents created with normals
The hyroglphs will be made on the texture
sheet and normals will complete the wall
looks
A deep crack covers the wall signifing the
Lich cheating death
The scales in the spell will also be broken
signifing the Lich cheating death again
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