Digital Art Zone

im looking for an underwater city tutorial and cant find one here. Would anyone know where to find one. Im trying to do something like rapture from bioshock. Interior and exterior. Would i just do an underwater scene tutorial with a city tutorial or is there an actual tutorial

These might help…

Bryce light gel underwater effect - a 15 minute tutorial by David Brinnen
Bryce DTE > terrain skyscraper - part 1 - a 15 minute tutorial by David Brinnen
Bryce DTE > terrain skyscraper - part 2 - a 15 minute tutorial by David Brinnen

You can also use the terrain DTE control to create a heightmap to look like the shapes of buildings in city blocks.  It depends on your level of experience with Bryce.  Underwater is one of the hardest effects to create and, as it happens, creating cityscapes isn’t that easy either.  I would recommend getting to grips with underwater first and sorting out the lighting, then tackling the “city” afterwards.

Looking at online images and video of Rapture from the Bioshock game, the exterior shots of the underwater city could be achieved by going for an “even darker and more smoggy Bladerunner” look whilst adding some bubbles and the occasional fish.

In the pre CGI world of movie special effects, underwater shots were often achieved with “dry for wet” methods, where the model stage is smoked up and lit with blue gels. With a few touches (and suitable sound effects) these did a good job of simulating the dark, murky world under the sea. “The Abyss” is a good example.

So in Bryce terms, you’re looking at using fog and haze, and/or volumetric materials to simulate underwater suspended particulates. Bear in mind that Fog and Haze do not respond to lighting sources within the scene. Volumetric materials can respond to such lighting but will result in longer renders.

I hesitate to counter the Bryce Master (David), but given the specifics of Rapture (self-lit underwater city at night), I would get a building with lights into your test scenes quite early on to see what effects work best for that particular scenario. This will have different requirements to scenes of coral reef in daylight.

This is the only underwater render I’ve ever done.
I used volumetric material for the water, render time; long.

Thank you all for the replies. Sorry it took so long for me to get back to you but i only have internet on my phone right now. would you by chance happen to have a pdf for those tutorials david? i may have to work up to them but i can still give them a shot and see what happens. trying to reply quickly, pjf thank you for the additional info i can use all i can get. nice underwater scene savage 64 have you tried a city yet?

Yes, I’ve done cities…. just not underwater ones.

As for David’s tutorials, they are Videos, very easy to watch and follow, but I think you’d need more than phone access to get the most from them as they really need to be watched big and at high def to see the parameters and which buttons he’s pressing..

Being on dial-up is a bit of a problem for video… I noticed that the last written tutorial on this page http://www.bryce-tutorials.info/bryce-tutorials.html relates to underwater.  But as PJF suggested above, you might wish to build your city first and apply the underwater effect afterwards.  This would not be my approach, but it depends what works for you best.  I tend to try to solve all my environmental problems first and build the scene into the environment.  But then again, I don’t tend to build very complex scenes.  For a complex scene, it may be better to approach the problem from the other direction as suggested, and build your scene and then work out how to make it underwatery.

David Brinnen - 06 October 2012 02:04 AM

But as PJF suggested above, you might wish to build your city first and apply the underwater effect afterwards.  This would not be my approach, but it depends what works for you best.  I tend to try to solve all my environmental problems first and build the scene into the environment.

More specifically, I said to bring in building + lights early on in testing the scene development.

I suggested that approach after looking at some images and video of dsmccurdy’s design target. It’s essentially a self-lit city at night with a very murky atmosphere. It is its own environment. Without the lights of the city, it would mostly be just dark (maybe some dim light from above; it’s a bit ambiguous in the video). The buildings are illuminated by city lighting, and silhouetted by city lighting. There is a lot of varied interaction with the lights and the water (suspended paticulates).

That’s how I’d handle this particular assignment - regarding the scene and environment as one and the same.

OK, I’ve had a little go at this…

Bryce 15 minute scene - underwater city effect - a tutorial by David Brinnen

Very nice scene, David. To me, it looks rather like a city at dusk or at night with a lot of haze or pollution in the air. Perhaps because the lights stream upwards. I like the scene but I don’t get the underwater feeling.

Horo - 07 October 2012 11:25 AM

Very nice scene, David. To me, it looks rather like a city at dusk or at night with a lot of haze or pollution in the air. Perhaps because the lights stream upwards. I like the scene but I don’t get the underwater feeling.

Hmn… see what you mean.  Maybe the image needs more degradation (and possibly fish).  I’ll try degradation first.  Here it is blurred and rippled in PSP8.  Better?

I think it looks good. Maybe add some bubbles.

Frank0314 - 07 October 2012 11:38 AM

I think it looks good. Maybe add some bubbles.

Well… since we are going postwork crazy…

Yeah, that makes a big difference.

Frank0314 - 07 October 2012 12:01 PM

Yeah, that makes a big difference.

Thanks Frank!  I just hope the “Bryce fundamentalists” don’t decide to track me down and skin me alive for using postwork.  Shhhh… don’t let them know.

Nothing wrong with a tad of postwork.

It’s a cool image.  If the city was a bit further back in the scene, then caustics on the foreground sea floor would increase the idea of underwater.