The Witcher

The Witcher

Framestore, 2019

City Setup

Cityengine CGA lib, Houdini, Arnold, Python, Vex

10 days to set up a system to enable a city for Witcher's Cintra, and a few more days jumping back to add bits whilst working on other projects. Given the short amount of time, I was incredibly satisfied with the result! Upon sharing the Framestore Breakdown, my work was praised by the directors of Cityengine, and I've been offered opportunities to do a presentation at FMX and the Cityengine User Meeting. Unfortunately due to Covid-19 all events were cancelled, however there is a related VES webinar:

https://www.visualeffectssociety.com/event/ves-new-york-presents-common-vfx-workflows-with-cityengine-and-houdini-webinar/

You can see the breakdown at 0:48 below:

Method

At the start of the project, I liased with modelling who were building a library of assets: windows, doors, chimneys; all of several variants, to be used on each tier of the city 'Cintra'. The modelling team were brilliant (as always), and we worked together to discuss the requirements of their models. This was pivotal (hah!) as the assets needed to be instanced with the correct orientation when I brought them into Houdini. Using Cityengine's CGA lib to build rule scripts, I wrote procedural architecture for the buildings, and exported the objects with all data necessary to then wrangle in Houdini, and render with Arnold. Custom buildings were designed by the team for close-up buildings, such as the top tier of the city.

This is a succinct description of the work involved - if you'd like more information, don't hesitate to get in touch.

Special Thanks

To the modelling team members I worked closely with: Benjamin Shearman and Tim Gregson, and my supervisor Felipe Canfora, who is an absolute delight to work with - both technically-minded and humble.