Here are some of the environment VFX I worked on for New World. I really love working on World VFX because it gives players the feeling of the world being alive when you walk around. The subtle or aggressive movements that’s added to a beautiful environment really brings them to another level. There’s quite a bit of videos to load so I apologize if the server loads up a bit.
The Azoth Tree: This just used to be a giant tree in the scene. The Art Director asked me to push some magic into it similar to the exploded Obelisk, so I just ran with it. Have to say I’m pretty proud of this one as they use it in most of the marketing videos! They also did a viral marketing event with it. Pretty freaking cool!
The Obelisk: This was actually the very first “Magical” site created in New World. The Art Director wanted a “Center piece” for the game and asked if I could do something of a frozen explosion with a very limited amount of time. Had some anxiety at the time as I’ve never created something so huge, but in the end it turned out pretty cool. Modeler did a great job of creating the mesh and I just added the magical elements to it. It’s always good to see marketing use your assets for the game and this was one of them.
Waterfalls: From the World building team wanted to make waterfalls. Not just one but wanted the ability to create different type of setups throughout the world. So I made up these “Waterfall Kits” that the environment artists could put together. It was made up of mesh and particle emitters that were specifically matched for the model setup. Artists I worked with did a phenomenal job of placement and you can see them in game. LODs are pretty tight though due to performance reasons. As you get closer to them, you’ll see more details that pop from them.
Ambience: I wanted to help the world feel more alive while you’re walking through it so I created these ambient VFX for world artists to insert into the world. There’s more but these are just some of the things I was able to get captures of. There’s butterflies, fireflies, glowing embers, etc all throughout New World. Creating these are pretty simple but a ton of fun because it just adds that finishing touch to the beautiful environment that the world artists have created.
Winter Camp: Worked closely with a wonderful world artist to help push the coldness of this corrupted soldiers’ campsite. Snow flutters, heavy fog cards, bonfires, molten lava zones, birds(yes they’re particles), and basically anything that moves which gives it ambience. It came out pretty good and I think we captured the cold camp feel pretty well. Fun times!
Alchemy Plants: These alchemy plants are something you collect for the deep crafting mechanic New World offers. Worked closely with the Audio team to have these plants “react” when you’re close by. These also help spread some of that magical element throughout the vast landscape we have. It was a lot of fun playing with different elements for this.
Teleport Shrine: A Shrine where players can teleport in and out of. Just subtly pushing the azoth flavor without being too heavy handed. Pretty simple but I really enjoy things like this as it’s all about finding that balance of how much to put in. Pushing the already beautiful asset like this with hints of the right VFX to the next level is what I really love. It’s all about that collaboration between the two different disciplines and helps each other shine.
Church Ambience: There was a request from the world team to help sell the haunted feeling of this church POI(Point of Interest). So I created some light beam cards along with dust puffs and particles to put inside the church. This scene was a sample I made with the model given to me by the artist to help explain to them how to use the VFX. One of the more difficult things about creating VFX in New World is that it has a constant Night and Day cycle. VFX needs to work in both conditions in everything we create.
All media are from the game New World and Amazon Game Studios owns all the rights. For more about the game:http://www.newworld.com
