Johan Handin

Stylized Environment
Forest of Slumber

In 2017 I made a Stylized Environment in Unity. But I have learned a lot between 2017 and 2021, so I decided to remake it with the knowledge and experience that I have now.

In this video I display different parts of the scene and how you can rearrange the assets to get different scenarios and feelings depending on the lighting and setup.

A big part of this project was to incorporate Substance Designer on a big scale and use it in different ways, from terrain materials to trees. Another big part of the project was to put them in a game ready environment in unity. I used HDRP and the Shader Graph to make a flexible environment that looks different with just a few tweaks.

Tech-Art and Custom Shaders

This is my Tech-Art reel for the project. As I wrote before, a big part of the scene was to make it flexible. 

So I made custom Shaders in Unity that used world space to blend between different Albedo/Color maps based on a custom mask map. Take the trees as an example, they switch between red and yellow depending on where they are in world space.

The Rocks have the same world space color effect but much smaller effect, but they also have triplanar moss. This way they always have moss on the polygons and texture normal that are facing upward. But I thought all the rocks looked the same with moss all over the top, and the scene became very orange with a top down camera. So I added a Mask map based on world space that erased some parts of the moss, to make every rock more dynamic and unique. The color of the moss also changes between yellow and orange depending on world space.

Grass and flowers have the same type of shader, just different textures. They change color based on world space, but I wanted to make the scene more alive. So I made them swing in the wind. To add a more magical touch to the scene, I added an emission map that lighted up the grass and parts of the flower when the wind touched them. I also added a moving mask map to take out some of the light to make it less obvious and monotonous.

Assets: Trees

I made the trees in Maya and Substance Designer. I started by modelling different types of High Poly pine (the skinnier) and fir (the wider) branches in Maya. I gave them two different colored materials to make an easy color map that I later made masks of in Substance Designer. 

Then I made the Low Poly planes and baked them together in Substance Designer to get the texture maps I needed. Based on the baked textures I made two different types of Albedo maps for the branches.

The next step was to put the trees together and export them to Unity where I made the Custom Shader.

Assets: Rocks

I made the rocks in Maya, Substance Designer and Zbrush. I began with basic shape primitives in Maya and combined them together to form different Base meshes that I took into Zbrush and retopologize them. There I made my High Poly and Low Poly, then UV mapped the Low Poly version in Maya.

I chose to texture them In Substance Designer, to practice texturing on 3D models and not just materials there. I also wanted to experiment with the triplanar nodes.

Assets: Terrain Materials

I chose to texture them In Substance Designer, to practice texturing on 3D models and not just materials there. I also wanted to experiment with the triplanar nodes.

One of the biggest reasons I chose the HDRP version of Unity was because of the High Based Blending option it came with. I made the textures in Substance Designer.

The Moss is a big part of this scene and gives the environment a more ancient and soft feeling. I knew that it would be a big part when I designed it, and did not want it so monotone. So I made two versions of the Albedo Map to change things up. I used the same textures on the triplanar rocks.

I made the Grass dark red to make the ground more dynamic and have a wider range of values. And also to bring the tree's color palette down to the ground.

I needed a contrast and a resting point from all the vivid colors, so I chose more desaturated and colder colors for the Dirt and Brick Road. The bluer bricks also match with the fog and colder flowers.

Assets: Foliage

The Flowers were the only thing I textured in Substance Painter, because I wanted a bit more control over the specific placement of the colors. I used the same technique for the foliage as I did with the tree branches. model Low and High version of the petals/leaves/grass straws and baked them down in substance Designer or Painter. I also made an Emissive map that activates when the wind hits them. It was really important to me that the flowers stood out and felt magical and alive.

The Old Project

This is the old project I made in 2017 in Unity 5. The assets were made for an unfinished game that me and some friends tried to make. At the time I liked it, but my experience in graphics and aesthetics has grown a lot since then. I still liked the old idea and direction, so it was a perfect project to remake.