Environment Design
20/04/2026 - 27/07/2026 (Week 1 - Week 15)
WANG JINYI / 0374697
GCD61904 / Environment Design / Bachelor of Design (Honours) in Creative Media / Taylor's University
Environment Design
TABLE OF CONTENT
1. Instruction
2. Progress
3. Feedback
4. Reflection
INSTRUCTION
PROGRESS
Week 1-Week 2
Pre-Production
For this project, I decided to explore a fountain environment located within an ancient temple ruin.
My main inspiration comes from Sky: Children of the Light, especially its peaceful atmosphere, soft lighting, and spiritual environmental storytelling.
Instead of focusing on highly detailed architecture, I want the environment to feel natural, quiet, and emotionally immersive.
I collected references focusing on:
- Natural ruins
- Minimal architectural forms
- Organic integration between nature and structures
- Soft atmospheric lighting
Fig 1.1 Moodboard
I noticed that many successful environment designs use simple shapes combined with strong mood and lighting rather than excessive detail.
I wanted the environment to feel ancient yet closely connected to nature. Instead of using overly decorative fantasy architecture, I explored simpler stone structures combined with plants, roots and natural elements. I focused on circular layouts to create a calm and sacred feeling.
Fig 2.1 Initial sketches
After determining the general stylistic direction, I began exploring several exterior and interior environment concepts.
Fig 2.2 Thumbnail exploration #1
My initial interior layout felt relatively open and desolate. However, during the design process, I realized that the space lacked a clear distinction between interior and exterior areas, as the architecture itself was largely open-air.
Fig 2.3 Thumbnail exploration #2
Because of this, I started considering ways to create a stronger sense of enclosure and spatial definition, such as placing the fountain within a cave-like environment or partially enclosed ruin structure. At this stage, I am still experimenting with different spatial layouts and atmospheric directions.
Project Proposal
Week 3-Week 4
After producing many thumbnail sketches, I decided on the main direction for my environment design. The environment is set on a floating island above a lake, with a rotunda located at the centre. Inside the rotunda is a dried altar pool waiting to be reactivated.
The story follows a Child of Light who brings the ancestor’s memory fragments back to the altar. Once the fragments are reconstructed, the altar will be activated again.
Fig 3.1 Ideation Sketches
Fig 3.2 Main concept visual
I then created two interior and two exterior compositions to establish the main camera angles and scene layout.
Fig 4.1 Composition
Week 5-Week 6
I continued exploring the exterior scene from different camera angles to find the composition with the strongest narrative focus.
Fig 5.1 Exterior composition & value study
Fig 6.1 Pillar 3D blockout
Fig 6.2 Interior 3D blockout in Blender
Fig 6.3 Rotunda structure blockout testing in Blender
Project 1 PDF
Week 7-Week 9
I explored several interior compositions and designed the interior hero assets.
Fig 7.1 Interior composition & value study
I wanted the interior to feel lost, quiet and sacred. After confirming the mood and layout, I produced a more detailed interior cutaway drawing to show the altar, circular platform, columns, arches, candles and surrounding plants.
Fig 7.2 Interior Hero Asset & Color
Project 2 PDF
Week 10-Week 11
Here comes the interesting and challenging part. I started modelling the main architecture in Blender. The circular platform and spiral columns alone took around three days to complete.
Fig 8.1 3D blockout in Blender
During this stage, I repeatedly adjusted the size, spacing and proportions of the structure. When I encountered architectural forms that I did not understand, I searched for relevant YouTube tutorials and tested the methods in my own model.
Fig 8.2 Making arches
While modelling the dome, I found that the online tutorials did not fully solve my problem. I asked Mr Kannan for advice, and he demonstrated several possible modelling methods.
Fig 8.3 Trying to fix the dome
This made me realise that simply following tutorials was not enough. I needed to understand how Blender’s tools worked and adapt them to my own design.
Week 12-Week 13
Instead of cutting a complete UV sphere in half, I modelled one section of the dome first. I adjusted its topology so that the lower edge could fit the Gothic arches. I then repeated the section using an Array Modifier and joined the sections to form the complete dome.
Fig 9.1 Refine the dome
After solving the dome structure, I continued modelling the remaining assets, including the floating island and crystal clusters. By this stage, the overall model was close to my original plan.
Fig 9.2 Exterior 3D Model
I also started applying materials and textures using Blender’s shader nodes. Connecting and adjusting the material nodes took a considerable amount of time, but it was satisfying to see the white model gradually gain colour, texture and lighting.
Fig 10.1 Shading & texturing
Fig 10.2 Grass texture
Fig 10.3 Crystal clusters
Week 14-Week 15
I continued working on the lighting setup and environment rendering.
Fig 11.1 Light testing
After unwrapping the UVs of the island rocks, I imported the model into Substance 3D Painter. I tested different brushes and adjusted the colours and material settings to create a stylised rock texture that was neither too realistic nor too rough.
Fig 11.2 Texturing in Substance Painter
After completing the textures, I exported the texture maps and connected them back to the rock material in Blender.
Fig 12.1 Rendered image
The model looked complete in Blender, but the render still lacked detail and atmosphere. I imported the rendered image into Procreate for paint-over. I added hanging plants and vines around the edges of the floating islands. I also painted the sky background and adjusted the lighting, colour and reflected light to make the final image feel more complete.
Fig 12.2 Paint over in Procreate
Final Outcome
The scene was developed through thumbnail sketches, composition studies, Blender modelling, Substance 3D Painter texturing, Blender rendering and Procreate paint-over.
Fig 13.1 Final Rendered outcome
Final Project Art Bible
The Rookies Blog link:
FEEDBACK
Week 2: Ok, the idea is nice.. But do aware that if you choose this kind of open-air structure, you have to do both exterior and interior.
Week 3: Try to study more about the silhouettes, you need to explore more possibilities of your building design. Then pick one you think is the best and continue work on it.
Week 4: Now you have the entire world setup already, try to find consistence between each component, and paint some color on it.
Week 5: Can, go explore more possible angles of your composition, do exterior first, the main thing is to perfectly showcase your environment story, and function.
Week 6: Take composition no.4, you can add some botanical elements, or rock cracks, and maybe you can play with the shape of your pillars... Adjust your camera angle a little bit, show your building arches and dome.
Week 7: Holiday. No class.
Week 8: Can, continue your interior composition.
Week 9: No.3 and no.4 is good, you take these two and continue refine it. The pillars seems to thin, try to make it stable.
Week 10: Your hero assets is already there, maybe you would like to play with the shapes..Go find some references, look at how a concept artist delivered their idea through these components, how does it works, what was the function of this props.
Week 11: The color and ambience is already there, could add some texture too make it more realistic and visual storytelling.
Week 12: Much better.
Week 13: The 3D blockout is fine, but for the final outcome not only focus on one single building model, try to create a bigger scene, or maybe you add some trees or flowers, whatever you desire.
Week 14: Can, continue refine it.
Week 15: 3D is enough.. Now take this and paint over it, make it super cool.
REFLECTION
Through this module, I learned the complete process of environment design, from research, thumbnail sketches and composition studies to 3D modelling, texturing, lighting, rendering and final paint-over. The 3D stage was the most challenging part because I spent a long time adjusting the platform, spiral columns, arches and dome. I had to understand the modelling logic and develop my own method to solve the problems. I also learned how to use Blender for modelling, UV unwrapping, materials and rendering, Substance 3D Painter for the rock textures, and Procreate for adding vegetation, lighting and the sky.At the beginning, I expected the final result to look perfect and was afraid of making mistakes. However, after repeated trial and error, I realised that the value of the project was not only the final image, but also the skills and problem-solving experience I gained throughout the process. In future projects, I would plan the 3D structure, file organisation and rendering stage earlier so that the workflow can be more efficient.
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