OTHER SPRING
A theory-fiction short film made in UE5.
Finalist at the 5th VH AWARD - Displayed at Vision Hall, Seoul.
My Role:
Technical Environment Artist
Created by: ZZYW(Yang Wang & Zhenzhen Qi)
Creative Producer: Matthew J.X. Doyle
Research Architect: Junling Zhuang
Worldmaking Architect: Mehrdad Ranjbar
Film Editor/Graphic Designer: Qinru Zhang
Music Composer: Maxwell Sterling
OVERVIEW
"Other Spring" is set in a speculative future where an all-seeing, algorithm-driven network UNO (Universal Network Observer) dominates, 'Other Spring' reflects on the urgency of privacy, agency, and individuality.
As the sole Unreal developer, I must wear multiple hats simultaneously.
There are 2 worlds that I need to create:
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UNO — Universal Network Observer. A homogeneous data transparent interconnected society, with the aesthetic of Science-Fiction, mechanical, and brutalist.
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OS — Other Spring. A hidden village in the mountain range isolated from UNO. OS is a much more natural and organic realm.
HOUDINI
There are additional meshes needed to manifest a sense of interconnections in UNO.
It would not be ideal to hand-model each cable because they might be adjusted frequently during the production process.
Therefore, I made a procedural tool that exports clusters of cables from random points on the selected input models.
Cable swinging simulation exported as VAT.
UNO tileable textures created in Substance 3D Designer.
For optimization, I combined the texture maps into color channels:
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ARMA
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Ambient Occlusion/Greyscale Maps - Red Channel
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Roughness - Green Channel
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Metallic - Blue Channel
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Alpha/Greyscale Maps
OS Vertex Paint shader.
I assigned 4 different layers of textures to adhere to the visuals of the mountain:
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Base Material Layer (Without Vertex Painting) - Base mountain rock
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Red Layer - Grass and moss
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Green Layer - Chipped rock cliff
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Blue Layer - River bedrock
