A Journey from Stylized to Realistic
This scene was an exercise to demonstrate my and other team member's ability to transition from a Stylized Art style to Realistic in a very short time frame (Less than two weeks). We used "Hogwarts Legacy" as a point of reference. There was no official art direction so I played a large role in guiding the project towards the final result. Additional tasks included modeling, texturing, lighting, set-dressing, and world building.
Using Hogwarts Legacy as a visual target, I was the Art Director who provided visual guidance and creative leadership for three of our environment artists to create the scene in this project in less than two weeks.
This comparison of MultiVersus and the scene illustrate the visual gap we bridged on a tight schedule. I adapted by utilizing more procedural pipelines, studying our reference, and leaning on my critical eye to make meaningful adjustments.
My top priority was taking an initial block-out of the cottage and making it feel like it fit in Hogwarts Legacy. This involved sculpting, modeling, procedural textures, implementation in UE5, and adjustments to the scale of assets relative to it.
In the next phase I updated the thatched roof and changed the lighting to better silhouette the cottage. High frequency detail on the grass/foliage was next on the list to fix. This involved guiding another artist in addition to altering assets myself.
Lastly I did a pass on the set-dressing and world building to better ground the scene in reality. I added less randomly dispersed foliage and additional man-made structures to make the cottage feel more lived in.
A series of materials and assets I authored for the scene in a realistic art style.
