Maya, Substance Painter, Arnold Renderer
RiddleVan was a quick exercise turned passion project. I was given Christina Ryan's VW Van model from a previous Rookie's Challenge. I was tasked with the look development to practice hard-surface texturing. After I decided to theme the project based upon my favorite DC Comics villain, The Riddler, I ran with it.
My concept had two parts. The day view was based on Jim Carrey's Riddler from Batman Forever (1995). But at night, the van was inspired by Rocksteady's Riddler from Batman: Arkham Knight (2015). This meant I would have to think about the van's textures under all types of lighting, so it could be used in daytime and nighttime to tell a story.
Moodboard
The trash was an element of worldbuilding I wanted to focus on along with the van. I wanted to create this scene with a game development mindset. I imagined a player could walk around the scene and view each piece of trash on the street during gameplay. So, I created custom fliers, cans, cigarette cartons, newspapers, and more which fit into the world of Gotham. I've included some of the texture maps used for these unique labels.
The day/night shift is a concept I had from the start. I wanted to have a noticeable switch between the campy Riddler and a more psychopathic Riddler. Almost all the riddles are pulled from existing DC Comics, TV shows, or movies. I had a lot of fun writing the riddles and each individual drip of paint. The balance between messy and crazy while still maintaining its readability was difficult, but I relied on the thickness of the paint to highlight the words.
