An old personal DMP

This is an old project that I never got the chance to finish. Reason being is probably that I was aiming for something way beyond my skills at the time. 

I was inspired by the 1st Mass Effect videogame, in a stage where you visit a world called Virmire. The action takes place in this beach resort-like environment, with big mountains, tropical vegetation and futuristic facilities. 

My favorite feature was how well the futuristic buildings integrated in the tropical environment, and the lovely channels of water and natural corridors protected by natural exotic rock walls and creeks.

It is one of those level that makes you want to explore rather than continue playing the actual mission of the game.

I wanted to represent all this things that I found attractive in my project, but I realized it was way to ambitious for what I was capable of doing and I got frustrated and decided to leave it and come back till I felt I was ready. About 3 years later (currently while I post this) I had the chance to open the file again. Someone at work saw this file and told me "hey prepare those layers for comp and lets do a test projection" So I opened the file and realized there were many areas that looked pretty bad. I spent a day doing refinements and adjustments on the fly, matching colors better, adjusting black levels, remove this,, add that, more atmosphere... all very quickly. It felt good opening the file after a long time, have a fresh look at it and change things that didn't work for me.

However, I still didn't feel ready to finish the piece the way it was in my mind. Simply because it was a very ambitious project and something that was way over my head and also because I get burned and bored of my own crap very quickly. So I decided this would be one of those projects (like many others) that I would never finish. The result I am publishing here is not at all what I had in my mind, but it looks OK ish the way it is. Of course, even though I  decided to leave it this way, I could still go on and refine details and make it look more photo-realistic and "finished", but that is simply not me, not my style. Now I look at it and just think, "yeah its ok... let's move on" I just feel it is a healthier attitude when doing art in general.

Hope you enjoyed it!