Epic Re-Creation of Minas Tirith With Unreal Engine 5
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 15 พ.ค. 2024
- I made Minas Tirith from Lord of the Rings in Unreal Engine! This is the craziest project I have ever done for TH-cam! I had to learn a ton of new things, and work through a lot of issues, but I love the final result and can't wait to share it with you (and the process too). If you want to grab the model for yourself, and create your own version, grab it here:
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CHAPTERS
00:00 Intro
01:35 I Made a Critical Mistake
02:00 Modeling
03:08 First Glimpse
04:06 Inspiration
05:54 3d Artist or Technician?
06:29 Time to Get (Un)Real
08:54 3ds Max Sucks!
10:29 A Welcomed Surprise!
11:53 Showing Some Promise
12:36 Building Gondor
14:44 Pushing Forward
15:57 Crappy Previews
17:45 Please and Thank You!
18:15 Lighting?
20:11 Materials
22:56 I GIVE UP!
25:36 Final Push
25:57 Greatest Comment on One of My Videos Ever!
30:57 Final Cinematics
33:00 What a Relief!
33:27 A Few Stats
33:58 Learn the Software & Get The Model
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FULL DESCRIPTION
Doing this project, and making this video, was a real grind, but I'm really happy I did it. I learned a ton of new stuff, and the results are seriously pretty epic. It was a huge scene for Unreal Engine, and that posed a lot of problems, but I got it all figured out. I think there is much to learn from watching the process, and I'm sure you'll enjoy seeing Gondor and Minas Tirith really come to life with real time rendering. Enjoy, and let me know what you think in the comments!
I still cannot believe that Denethor ran all of that way burning like a torch! It was literally over the top! 🔥
😄
Well ... if youd been once on Fire and survived it
you knew what Panic and Adrenalin could do ... ;)
And when i am remembering that Scene correct
wasnt it mostly his Clothing which burnt ...
@@petrusiusmaximus It is a very long way. Too long, for effect.
dude was just a living L
He went to light the beacons again 😂
Thanks for showing us the human side of these projects. No one ever talks about how hard it is and how self doubt is a real thing to deal with. Glad you kept going and thanks for sharing your knowledge.
Thank you! Yeah, I think some people don't have the experience to know how much goes into some of these things. To me, it makes it so much more impressive when I see really good 3d rendering and effects.
Mindblowingly gorgeous, even if we as artists, designers, architects, and visual people know, oh this thing can be improved or better and it drives you into never completing a job. You made it look "good enough" for the challenge at hand, and it's still amazing.
Yes, I think this is the professional mindset, because you never have unlimited time and budget. Always room for improvement, though
Awesome job! Really enjoyed the closeups and featured personal challenges.
Glad to hear it!
Amazing work, Adam. For 40-50 hours of work you did an amazing job. I love doing big job like this, so I know they can really break you down before it all over.
And of course, I could still spend way more time on it. 🤪
It's fun, though
I believe that tall tower at the top is called Ecthelion tower ....named after the eponimous legendary elf 'Ecthelion' - of the fountain, who slayed the most Balrogs (during the Battle /fall of Gondolin) in the whole of Tolkien's Works. Elves would shout "Ecthelion" as a motivational battle cry before engaging in battle.
Incredible work! thanks for bring this to life. I know there was a project over a decade ago trying to get a lot of people to help to re-create Minas Tirith, got about 60% there then the project disappeared.
Oh, really? Yeah, a team of 3d helpers would be very helpful here. SOOOO much more detail could be added.
26:40 hooooooo boy do I know that feeling! Not gonna lie, I teared up a little bit. That release of pressure and stress at the very end turns into something happy so instantly that it kind of overwhelms you.
Incredible cinematic showcase. Awesome work !
As a lifelong 3ds max user myself, I am glad you addressed the hate in your video. It all comes from people who are uneducated due to the fact blender has become a buzzword/trend in the indie scene. Everyone has their tools for the job and the end product is what matters. Great job on this.
It's true. There is nothing wrong with Max. It is used very widely across many professional 3d disciplines. And yes, it is 100% capable of producing great results in similar time to other leading 3d software. It is just personal preference and which tool you know best.
well said. keep at it man. subscribed.@@Learn-archViz
I always thought the software vs. software arguments were silly, particularly with 3d software. I know Maya and Blender extensively, and it might shock some folks to know they both do the same thing and everything else is preference
@@brianmyers692 Ha ha. Yes!
@@Learn-archVizNothing wrong? Are you kidding? The simple fact there is no shortcut, only drag and drop is a shame. And there is a long list of things that are not OK in 3DSMax and also Maya. The price is insane for this buggy mess. Who want to spend 2k$ for a tool worse than a free tool?
It's an industry standard because at the time, blender didn't exist, and today Autodesk give enough money to subsidize teacher, and it's hard to change the workflow after many years of work. That's only thing that maintain 3DSMax as a standard, it's absolutly not its quality.
And if there is hate, it's because people like you, you're locking young people and independant who want to enter in the industry, we have to learn too 3DSMax even if we know how to use blender or even mayaLite because 3DSMax is the industry standard, but it has absolutly no reason to be. WE LOOSE TIME and money because YOU use this crap.
BTW, seems very convenient for you that unreal is free to use? Why don't you use an overpricy and buggy engine?
WoW, amazing result!!! Congratulations!!!!!
Amazing work! I love how you take your viewers on the whole journey with the ups and downs. Let the haters be haters - in my experience most of them just try to bring great people down because they cannot really lift themselves up to that level...
Agree about the haters. Strange behavior, honestly. Thanks for watching and I'm really glad you enjoyed it.
Good job!
A voice over by Boromir talking to Aragorn about Minas Tirith and returning there one day as heroes hits hard with your video and Unreal artistry of the city.
Oh dang! That would be awesome
Hi Adam, your work looks amazing! I think this masterpiece would take probably a team with a lot of time and effort to make, but you did it all on your own that is incredible!
Brilliant Work Adam
Unbelievable end result! If only had a fracture of your talent I would spend my whole day doing this stuff!
Thanks! It's a lot of fun when you're in the groove 🙂.
Talent is 10% of your ability. Drive is 90%.
Incredible work. I remember years ago (probably closer to decades) on the cgsociety forums, it took an entire group of people to collaborate and create the same thing you’ve just done on your own.
Yeah, things have changed! Although, a team would be nice 😄
You have all my respect man.. congratulations 🎉
Looks awesome man, so glad you've made the model available as well, that's awesome :]
Impresive! Great job!
Really appreciate this video. Not sure if you use layers much in Max but might be helpful when updating. Also I think you could’ve used more deformation in the foreground grass area shadows, and lights like at one percent.
That is incredible!
THIS LOOKS AMAZING, this is my first impression of your work and channel and you did some amazing work here. Just wanna say keep up the good work!
That awesome. Lots of work. Great job. Thanks for sharing.
Hi, Adam, great job! Kudos for not giving up 💪
beautiful and stunning
Amazing work!
Good job Adam. These types of projects are the type of thing that I liked best when I was learning in college. Ultimately, I gave up because back then it was taking hours and hours to render stuff out and you had no idea what it was going to look like. Like you, I felt like I was wasting so much time. At least the technology has caught up we can get a much better idea of what's going on. Maybe I'll start again!
Yes! UE5 makes it so much more accessible and reasonable to do for everyone/anyone. In a lot of ways, it has revitalized my love of 3d.
Looks amazing dude! Its very interesting to see you work on something beyond archviz.
Great! It's fun to learn new stuff
So Happy you showing how much better 3ds max is for Arch....👏👏👏👏
amazing work!
Stunning
Congratulations on pushing yourself to learn areas of 3d art that are uncomfortable, as a seasoned 3D artist myself just getting things to look amazing can take years of study and discovery. It's a personal journey so never get discouraged, there's always a path forward. Great work man.
WOW....and there it is! What an amazing job!!! I know I cannot fully appreciate just how tedious and challenging this must have been for you, but I can definitely imagine just how bad it must have been. Stunning work!! Thank you for your willingness to take on this incredibly painful work of art 🙏
Ha ha! It was very worthwhile. I learned a ton and was quite satisfied with the result.
I really appreciate your dedication to learning and striving for the excellent results that you have achieved. I have done some work in 3dMax, but only have about 1/1000ths of your skill at it. Thank you for making the video, it was something that I really could enjoy and identify with.
Awesome work🎉
Incredible
Absolutely epic. Subbed
That is so amazing!!!!
I am not knowledgeable about the work that goes into creating these projects, or the software. But. It looks amazing. The final result, these shots look absolutely stunning, immersive, real and magical. Considering you are a one-man team to have worked on this, I think your work really did justice to the magic that's shown I the movies. Another thing is, just to share how picky I can be about these things, I feel like the reason in lotr these scenes look so real is because for the most part - they are! In the hobbit, IMHO some of the scenery is not as powerful, and I wonder if it's because as much as beautiful work can be created in software, nothing beats the real thing. However, your work here is so beautiful. Of course you can forever keep zooming I and out and making every brick look real no two bricks the same, but I think where you took it is great. Great ammount is done to perfection, and some room for the viewer to build up on it. The final shot is incredible. And the one on 32.27 also incredible. I went bakc to rewatch them because they're that impressive. And the nature landscape looks great, especailly int hat last shot. Wow. Thank you for sharing , and also seeing the process was fun. 8:48 8:51 8:52 8:55
Wow! Thank you!
i remember looking at this city on lego lord of the rings on the xbox 360 - crazy how far we have come
lots of hard work, well done. those last camera movement were so real
Thanks!
I used my Space Mouse to record those
Looks good man
looks so good
Thank you!
I think the most impressive architecture for me is Barad-Dûr, I really love how they visualized the scale of it in the Battle for Middle Earth game intro / start screen
Super cool to see this!
Really nice work.
Amazing!
Beautiful!
Thanks!
I have one of those little Weta Minas Tirith jewelry boxes that came with the Deluxe dvd's and your model looks great - would love to be able see a 1st person walk-through the city. super cool project man.
quite enjoyable. thanks
Glad you liked it!
Woah. That's a lot of work. Definitely paid off! Well done. Very well done indeed!
Thanks!
Well done. Awesome! I remember visiting the LOTR exhibition at Te Papa Museum in Wellington New Zealand and they had the 7 metre (22ft) miniature of Minas Tirith. I distinctly remember gasping for air as I came across it. It was incredible. The detail was stunning. That's why it held up so well on screen. I kept going back to it because it was so awe inspiring.
That is so awesome. It would have been nice to have some really good pictures of that model for this project, but instead I was using pictures of the very small version.
@@Learn-archViz from memory cameras were prohibited at that exhibition (it was an awesome exhibition), but it was also early 2000 so my Nokia phone wouldn't have cut the mustard .😄
@@maorifulla 😂
Wonderful scene!
Thank you!
great work dude, great video of a boss artist grinding for love,, absolutely love your work
Much appreciated!
Amazing
GEORGEOUS!!
you are a excellent artist!
Thank you!
Thank you for this huge effort and documenting how you felt during the project. Very nice results at the end. It is also fun to see you do these kind of projects with Max.
Space Mouse (I use a Space Pilot Pro now) is fantastic. It's rare to see anyone else actually using them... which I always find a little weird.
I also like that terrain material, it looks pretty sweet.
Yeah, it is super nice and I'm surprised more people don't use them. It take a tiny bit of getting used to, but then its gold.
A friend of mine bought one, and frankly it's collecting dust. It's like Marmite, I guess. You either love or hate it.
wow, amazing job!, plz do the halls of khazad dum!
I love Minas Tirith design, you did a great work.
I also find you quite similar to the actor Kevin Rankin, there is a particular photo of him on google images which look pretty similar.
Ha! Usually I hear Steve Zahn 🤣
@@Learn-archViz ah you are completely right, I knew that there was another actor in my head that remind me your look.
Yeah, Steve Zahn looks even more similar.
Haha, well, it seem that when you get tired from CGI, you have the hollywood look that all producers search for a role :)
ya should check out the nanite settings in the engine it will help add details and help with a bit less taxing on the rendering part
This was possibly more epic than the LOTR director’s cut trilogy! But seriously I know it’s a massive long haul, good to see another max user battle it out, you shared some great tips which I think will inspire and help a lot of us, I’ll track down that AO console command, thanks for going on the epic journey!
Thanks! I posted the link for the AO commands here in the chat somewhere
LORRDDDD the amount of money id pay for an open world LOTR!
Oh man, that would be so cool
My hat's Off for you Good Sir! Thank you. Best Books,Best movies that will NEVER BE BEAT! (specially looking how Insane "modern day" writers are..if you know what I mean)
True classics, no doubt.
oh wow that space mouse looks so cool. Ive been using my xbox one controller lol
Ha ha! That sounds cool too, but one handed 3d control is awesome
This popped up in my YT recommended and I'm so here for all LotR content.. So, I guess those comments were right! You've hit it up with the nerdy group.. 😂
Oh, and the results were outstanding, by the way. You should definitely do Barad-dur, Rivendell and the Grey Havens. 😂
Really amazing and exciting work! Working on a lotr bot that user is a ranger captain and trying to save captured rangers from Osgiliath after the defeat. I usually use Anduin river to reach Minas Tirith as there are orcs everywhere. Normally Anduin isn't nowhere near the city but i think there must be tributaries. Because both Minas Tirith sits at a mountain range and without a significant water source such a large city wouldn't be possible at first place. If you enlarge mountain range and add tributaries with bridges etc i'm sure it would look more natural. The city itself looks very beautiful but it is seperated from background i think.
I wish there was a way to use such models with text generation, as we row to Minas Tirith you never know in what state we will find it. Usually it is under siege and burning while other rangers are crying lol. AI acts like it is just hopeless and might kill us in any point which is quite different perspective than lotr games etc. I guess in 5 years or so it will be possible..
Bravo, seriously bravo
31:01 that localized volumetric whatever feature that's in UE 5.4 was added exactly for shots like these
I'll have to experiment with that
This is awesome! great job! Can someone please use this to create a murder mystery game with this city as the location. How cool would it be to be a normal citizen and walk around the city streets collecting clues to find out who murdered your father???? All while hearing rumors of an army of orcs coming soon. Climax of the game takes place during the siege when the lower levels are burning. In the end you find out your father was killed because he learned someone was a spy for Mordor and was going to open one of the gates during the siege. Then you have to stop the saboteur and avenge your father.
This sounds awesome! I'm not planning on a full game, but I'm definitely planning on adding some first person navigation.
The model is looking awesome! You only need to add some hero statues around the city and make lore friendly Ephel Duath and Osgiliath on Anduin. Keep up the good work, man of Gondor!
Good comments! So much more that could be done. Thanks for watching.
You can use the PCG system or the materials grass system.
The systems can place grass on mass for you everywhere where it’s appropriate more or less automatically.
There’s a lot of tutorials on auto landscape materials.
The grass system doesn’t play nicely with cameras that well , so I would probably go for PCG in this case
I was using an auto landscape material with grass, but I was having a hard time with seeing it far enough away without noticing the culling, and then it was crashing my Unreal if I was seeing too much. I also had a hard time getting the shadows to work well on it. Various different little issues that I had a hard time working through, but that is what I got to work in the final renderings.
I think we all kneel before you Adam, King of kings!
😂 Thanks!
@@Learn-archViz Oh! The king replied, thank you!! Hi, I have an idea for a project but might be better for Halloween time, hoe about the research station from The Thing.
There are 2 films and even though a long time between both being made they actually built the set for the prequel to match what was seen years ago in the John Carpenter movie.
Instead of a vast sky high city wit amazing scenery that you did, you can have an almost blank background but fairly detailed interior. Just make sure you give the chess computer MacReady plenty of detail
That's awesome! I'm rebuilding Rivendele in Max and Unreal.
No way! That's awesome
@@Learn-archViz Yes in VR
@@jorchert oh wow, that sounds awesome
I seem to recall that the vast open ground in front of the city was filled with fields and fertile farmsteads between the city walls and the Rammas. But that was never done in the films
It's been 10+ years since I did any sort of environment and the tools that I used back then may be out of date. When making a huge landscape, you may want to use a terrain generator like world machine, then bring that into z-brush or mud box to sculpt in detail. In editor sculpting tools aren't that great.
And definitely think about baking in your AO.
Intriguing suggestions. Thanks!
👏 Definitely rad!🤟🖖
As someone who has never done computer modeling this is insane! Anyone who says you are not good at what you do obviously hasn’t attempted anything like this. Glad I found the channel and can’t wait to see what else you come up with in the future.
I've been paid well to do 3d for many, many years, so yes it does sound pretty dumb to say that. Of course, there is always more to learn. Glad you enjoyed this.
Hey, just found your channel. I love what you are doing and why you are doing it. Keep up the amazing work. Haters gonna hate, potatoes gonna potate.
Thanks!
7:03 Nice clouds ultra-dynamic-sky
Yeah, it does a great job
Amazing work Dude!
About the grass shadows, it is disabled because it consumes a lot of memory by default, I could be wrong, and to enable it just go to the mesh with two clicks and click on "cast Shadow",
and to make the road, I believe there is an easier way to do it and that is using splines.
It was set to cast shadows, but they disappeared when I enabled Ray traced shadows. You're right about the spline, but I didn't quite figure that method out yet. Thanks for the feedback
@@Learn-archVizWell, that's what messing with unreal is, you try to do something and in the middle of the process problems appear that you still don't know how to solve haha! Spline is much easier to use, you'll quickly get the hang of it for your next projects!
Great result, I wonder if someone will use the model in a game mod or something, would be cool to walk around it
I think at the very least I will add in some first person navigation and explore around myself. VR would be cool too.
Hi Adam - we have a full high-resolution heightmap of Middle-earth that would be useful for this project (if you wanted to make further improvements to the environment). Let us know!
Oh, wow! That would be super nice. I'm working on another project now, but I will definitely hit you up if I end up going back and working on the environment here.
Was half expecting to see the steward of gondor falling from the terrasse
I should definitely figure out how to animate that :)
@@Learn-archViz Next video "I spent a month animating this"
@@Mr.McWatson😅
@@Learn-archViz 😂
What would also be really cool as an alternative option is to add the original Black Wall to the outer wall as it is in the books. In the books Minas Tirith has a wall similar to the material of Orthanc, Saruman's Tower in Isengard. The movie got this wrong, but for understandable reasons (black being associated with Saruman and Mordor). However, it'd be really cool to see a 'true to lore' version rendered in as high fidelity as you've wonderfully created here!
I was aware of this, so my outer wall is a little darker, but I couldn't bring myself to make it totally black. It would be pretty easy to change to make, though, so maybe I'll try it out
@@Learn-archViz it was strange to me too the first time I learned of this, it felt a strange inclusion for Tolkien who tends to think really 'black and white' in that sense. Great work nonetheless!
Great video.... Wow, -I love your work. You are awesome. Thanks.... I use a high level audio system for my computer setup.... please use a pop-filter OR use a High Pass Filter (HPF). Your POPS makes my house move as my subwoofer gets crazy
Yeah, I noticed when editing too. There are lots of upgrades I need to make to my setup, including pop filter
Great!
this is awesome! Any chance we could get a video of like a slow close up stroll through the city?
Maybe! It wouldn't be hard to generate from here, but the problem is that I have not focused on all the close up details yet. I will need to develop the model further in order to make that look good. I want to try it with VR too, which would be awesome.
I used to use 3DS Max and I transferred to Blender.
For modelling, especially for creating assets for UE, I can honestly say, Blender is waaaaaay faster.
It won’t make sense for you to swap, but for modelling, damn I’m glad I switched.
Also glad my comment last video helped.
Great scene btw….
Thanks
Epic!
Try a castle from Game of Thrones next.
Oh, I hadn't thought of that one! Right now I need a little break, but maybe later 😁
"My friend, you bow to no one"
I may never get the opportunity to meet you in person, but just congratulations. The amount of work put into this project really shows in the end. Hats of to you! 🎊 Oh, that one comment really threw me for a loop. Botox? Huh? Really?🤔Anyway, keep up the good work. I believe this work will go on to inspire some future generations of 3d artists. It sure has inspired me to get back into it. Thank you!
Thank you! I mostly enjoy doing things like this (this is the fun stuff), and the end result is very rewarding.
Hi Adam I think it looks great ignore the negative comments those generally don’t do themselves they just criticise I’m actually creating some Udemy courses at the moment for blender and substance painter and having done some of your courses a few years ago it helped motivate me to give udemy a go
Thanks again
Hey, that is awesome to hear! Udemy has been fantastic for me over the years. Thanks for watching.
very nice
Wow
Good!!
Great work, this looks incredible. I dont know how well it would translate but have you considered publishing the environment to steamvr? Im sure there are those of us who would love to experience some of your creations in VR.
Wow, glad TH-cam finally pushed this to my feed. Good to see you take on another mega project after Hogwarts. There's a level of passion going into these that keeps me glued to the screen for half an hour. It's like watching old school Bungie ViDocs back when Halo was Halo. You even put birds, color grading, and went through the arduous process of landscaping for this one 😂That, combined with the new sky and the material work just brought your cinematics to a whole new level. It looks beautiful and a lot more believable. Can't wait to see what you do next. Definitely enabling the bell notifications so I don't miss another drop.
Wow! Thanks a ton. Very nice to have this appreciated.