Entertainment Center Overlay

[blattacker]

This is a project that I’ve been sort of chipping away at for almost if not over a year now. It’s a super personal project and I’m not sure if there will be a widespread interest in it at all, but a friend has convinced me to post it in case other people want to use it, so here it is (GitHub)! For this overlay/Mega Bezel Preset, I wanted to recreate the entertainment center we had in my house from a very specific time period of my life (late middle school/early high school). As much an experiment in how well I remember things as it was (and continues to be) a test of my 3D modeling and texturing skills, this project has nevertheless really scratched a nostalgic itch for me. I hope you all like it, and maybe get some use out of it!

As a note, the movie and CD spines are all specifically the movies I had growing up that my parents still knew the location of the last time I visited so I could take some pictures for reference. Don’t judge too harshly ahaha!

[Duimon]

Welcome to the forum!

Great idea and nicely done!

[blattacker]

Thank you so much! It was actually your TV presets that started me down this path in the first place!

[HyperspaceMadness]

@blattacker

As much an experiment in how well I remember things as it was (and continues to be) a test of my 3D modeling and texturing skills, this project has nevertheless really scratched a nostalgic itch for me. I hope you all like it, and maybe get some use out of it!

This is AWESOME!!! I love all the details

You might be interested in some of the upcoming features especially since you did some of this in 3D. The features coming are going to include normal mapped bounce lighting and heightmap shadows for bounce light, so if you can generate these from your 3D renders you could probably get something pretty cool.

Here’s some work in progress:

Send me a message over DM if you would like to work together on something epic

And again really nice stuff

[soqueroeu]

I loved every detail. It is very rewarding to digitally preserve what was once our entertainment environment. Congratulations on your work and dedication.

[blattacker]

@HyperspaceMadness

You might be interested in some of the upcoming features especially since you did some of this in 3D. The features coming are going to include normal mapped bounce lighting and heightmap shadows for bounce light, so if you can generate these from your 3D renders you could probably get something pretty cool.

I would very much be interested in these new features! This is something I’ve been trying very hard to emulate on my own with very little luck! Also, everything that isn’t added by the shader stack in RetoArch is done in my 3D package (Cinema 4D with V-Ray as the render engine), so it should be very easy to add a normal and depth pass to the render, especially since I just spent the bulk of my free time today cleaning up the scene file so it loads a little bit faster. I will definitely be sending over a DM!

@soqueroeu

I loved every detail. It is very rewarding to digitally preserve what was once our entertainment environment. Congratulations on your work and dedication.

Yours was another influential project for me when I was first starting this! Thank you so much!

[alexb3d]

First time I see a 3D on the forum. I congratulate you, it looks great.

It looks harmonious and is very well merged with the textures, I would only recommend you to change the focus for something less angular, a 35mm. It looks like it’s in 24mm.

The equipment and the TV are textures? you can’t generate normal maps, only 3d.

[blattacker]

@alexb3d

First time I see a 3D on the forum. I congratulate you, it looks great.

Thank you so much!

@alexb3d

It looks harmonious and is very well merged with the textures, I would only recommend you to change the focus for something less angular, a 35mm. It looks like it’s in 24mm.

I played with a bunch of different camera settings, trying to get the right feel, and ended up settling on 22.5mm. Part of the issue was trying to marry the feeling of actually looking at such a scene with causing minimal distortion so that the screen remained the correct aspect ratio to fit an integer scale of the games in RetroArch.

@alexb3d

The equipment and the TV are textures? you can’t generate normal maps, only 3d.

Actually, everything in the scene is physically modeled, including the room seen in the reflection on the TV. Rendering out screen space normals is extremely easy, in this case.

[alexb3d]

@blattacker

a scene with causing minimal distortion

Precisely, the smaller the lens, the more angular and distorted it will look.
The models are very detailed, I would only recommend you to play with the ambient occlusion, a little darker would give more volume and place the wood shader reflection with the texture of the wood.