LogInKhairizal Rahmat told us about how he captured the coziness of a small town general store in Blender concept art and polished it with hand-painted details in Photoshop.
Introduction
Hello! My name is Khairizal Rahmat, and I'm a Concept Artist based in Singapore. I began to learn 3D when I was in college back in 2010. However, I stopped afterward due to having to serve a 2 year mandatory National Service for my country, but in 2015, I relearned and fully used it in my work process.
I started learning by watching a lot of time-lapse videos from my favorite artists because I couldn't afford a mentorship or a good tutorial video (I had to wait for sale) back then. Fortunately, as time passed by and getting hired for projects, I was able to go to a school (3dsense Media School) and a mentorship by Conar Cross two years after that. I learned a ton of stuff from them, like the basic fundamentals: colors, perspectives, anatomy, etc., and stepped up my level of quality when creating an artwork, for which I will always be grateful.
I've been a Concept Artist since 2018, and I have worked on a handful of projects, from a book cover and horror short film to Toyota, League of Legends, Streetdog BMX, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre game, etc.
The Small Town General Store Project
Firstly, I gathered a lot of references to prepare myself to begin designing the store. I gathered references from the tiniest details, like floor weathering, to how the ceiling is being built. Sometimes, it took nearly half the day because I was very meticulous and maybe perfectionist about it.
I played Life is Strange 2 and Tell Me Why by Don't Nod quite recently, and I was inspired by the studio's portrayal of the game's coziness and slice-of-life vibe. Replicating that feeling and style was my main goal for this project.
When I was doing some referencing hunting, I organized them into props, the overall feeling, and the targeted art style.
After that, I started by picking out which part of the scene I wanted to focus on, and I created a design based on it. This applies to anything, such as the props, textures, and the overall room.
Composition
My main focus was the store's checkout counter, so I adjusted the camera accordingly using the rule of third method. At the same time, I wanted to show everything so that the audience or the environment artists could see every detail, but just enough so that it wouldn't be overwhelming to the eyes.
Whenever I begin to blockout a scene, I would just start with the basic shape of cubes and cylinders just to give me an idea of the space of the store. I can quickly do a lot of variations with those basic shape objects for just one room. Once I was satisfied with the overall placement of the scene, I proceeded to model the props and room in great detail.
Depending on the situation, I use a special add-on that I bought to help speed up my modeling time, but for this project, I didn't use any, just the basic Blender modifiers like array, mirror, boolean, and the simple extrude and insert method.
Retopology
I have a basic skill of retopologizing and unwrapping. All I know is to make sure there are no N-Gons, just quads/tris, and, most importantly, no lag on my PC. The same goes for when I texture an object. I'll just imagine it being flattened out like how I flatten a cereal box for recycling.
All of it was done just by using Blender and Photoshop to make it minimal and streamlined. Blender for the base render while the product, small props, decorations, and post-processing were painted in Photoshop.
Texturing
When it comes to creating a texture, I would just imagine how an object would look without any lighting, shadows or ambient occlusion. Even for complex surfaces, I would just separate them into parts and apply the same technique.
Composition
Whenever I assemble a scene together, my 2 main goals are the details of the environment and an area where the audience can rest their eyes, like the floor. I made a lot of different variations in my head to see which parts work the best and also to see how practical it looks like if a person would walk around the store.
When I'm in Photoshop to paint the props and small details, I simplify the overall shapes and colors of the objects.
Lighting & Rendering
When it came to adding lights in this environment, I used references from real-life stores and movies that I had watched recently and studied how they placed their lighting. I created a natural/artificial light like the sunlight from the outside to break the monotony of the lighting of the store and make it dynamic/cinematic.
I rendered my finalized scene in EEVEE and brought it over to Photoshop to add those small details like bloom, sub-surface scattering, dust, god rays, etc. The reason for that is that I wanted full control of those small details without having to open Blender, change the settings, and re-render the scene. It can be very cumbersome, personally.
Conclusion
It took me close to 1-2 months to finish due to work and the ambitious goal that I set, which was to hand-paint all of the store products in Photoshop. Fortunately, thanks to my motivation, I managed to finish it with satisfying results. Throughout this project, I learned that with patience, determination, and trusting the process, you can overcome it.
My advice would be to keep leveling up your art and social skills cause we're in an ever-evolving industry. Do some networking on LinkedIn, Instagram, or even at an art convention like Lightbox, Concept 101, or GDC, and connect to any artists respectfully. It's gonna be a tough road for those new artists who want to get into the industry, but you will get in eventually. Ultimately, have good mental health and have fun!