I’m trying an approach of doing the modeling, texturing and lighting all kind of together, which makes for an interesting workflow.
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Still working at it, and did a remodel of the pyramids for a cleaner mesh. Improved sky and water are likely my next major tackles, and then the vegetation of the backdrop. Part of me wants to “frame” the view with some fog or drooping vines or such, but I’m undecided on that.
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I’ve seen recently a movie (on Netfilx) where buildings are basically AI robots, caring for the people inside. It was a love story between AI and a resident.
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It looks great! For some reason it reminds me of the game The Forgotten City (well some final locations) which was interestingly made by a team of only 3 people. The scale of the place, dim lighting and colour scheme contribute nicely to the atmosphere of forgotten mysterious ruins.
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Thanks! 
I hadn’t heard of that game but I like the art style, interesting that they used UE4 also.
I certainly won’t finish my environment in time for this week, so I guess it could be considered concept art for the final thing 
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Well that’s not been designed specially for this challenge but is an installation of byproducts of my big project. However, as soon as it fits the topic - why not, thought I 
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This is the potentially-final rendition of my El Dorado. Advice or critiques welcome where they exist. I decided to refrain from the “hanging vines framing” idea so as to not overcrowd the scene.
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My entry is inspired by the Witcher books. There is a creature called “rusałka” that particularly caught my attention. In Slavic folklore, it’s a malevolent spirit in a form of a lake nymph. They are essentially lake dwellers who drown people. A woman can be turned into it if she meets a tragic death in the lake normally associated with unfortunate love affairs (drowned by her lover/took her own life because of the broken heart etc). Their whole being is centred around hatred and scorn towards the living. It’s curious how often folklore legends have truly sinister and dark creatures.
The appearance that I created is a combination of the Witcher books, internet research, and my interpretation. Since it’s a fictional creature I did not exactly try to achieve realism, so I gave her exaggerated bone structure, rough skin texture and veins that stick out in certain areas. As for the end result, this is as good as it can get at this point in time… lol I am still learning. I found it hard to make realistic wet hair and realistic water movement, although I had a blast with liquid simulation! I don’t think I’ll make any further adjustments because I would rather move on to the next project and try to improve the areas where I lack knowledge.
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The Sword in the Stone:
Summary
Since I was working on this prior to the challenge, the materials and some assets were made prior to the week. Software used: Substance Designer, Substance Painter, ZBrush, and obviously Blender
There was a lot more I wanted to do and may still, since the goal is to actually have this in UE4. But I wanted to share something for the collab
Partially inspired by the amazing environments in Elden Ring.
A lot of focus on modular assets, UV’s using trim textures (a new workflow for me!) and mood setting.
What more could be added/changed for the final environment in Unreal?
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I wanted to make this scene so much better. the water ended up looking flat, but I did not consider the camera angle before making it, I also wanted to add more detail to the “leviathan”, like big pincers but I completely forgot about the collab since I was working on a small game. I’m comfortable enough to post this, but I’m not even remotely satisfied.
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Well, everything looks a tad too clean and regular for something that looks like ancient ruins that are bathed in sunlight and even have water pools. I’d expect more jagged edges and cracks in the building, as well as moss and plants here and there as Nature finds its way into them. At least from a point of view of realism.
Just out of curiosity, why are you taking this project to UE4 and not 5 now it’s officially released?
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Oo yes it could really use some moss and plants. 
Well I downloaded UE5 and loaded it up, only to find my computer kick into overdrive just in the basic scene doing nothing. It seemed to have Lumen enabled or something and I’m such a noob that I couldn’t immediately figure out how to turn it off. I hate having my computer too hot so I went back to UE4 for now.
You can disable Lumen in your project settings, under Rendering. Using regular Shadow Maps instead of Virtual ones helps, too. Here’s a hint:
It’s true that UE5 is more demanding than UE4, though.
I also have my doubts because of that.
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My 1-year old project… that fits thematically better here compared to the subject it was made for… Excalibur:
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Should be a hand coming out of the lake catching it!
There is! Just after I took the picture
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This is a witch from Pendle Hill in Lancashire. I only lived there until I was about 5yo, but I remember the stories of the witches that drank red ink and flew around at night. I think it was used as incentive to keep us kids in bed at night. I used to wonder why drinking red ink was supposed to be scary.
Anyway, I tried a bunch of different things to get this witch done - started late because I had no ideas - and then rushed through everything so it’s once again something I might fish back out in the future to make it better. I’m pretty sure I did the grease pencil stuff all wrong, so cannot move the camera. The lighting was very time-consuming as I was trying to get the cat to look less like a collection of mechanical parts. I thoroughly enjoyed the process. Blender is a great adventure.
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I really like the atmosphere of this. The sun is a really great connection to the pyramids. The only comment I would have is the greenery in the background. It makes me wonder if the pyramids are small, and the vegetation is grass or are the pyramids large and the vegetation is huge. My brain seems to go to the former. Love the colour scheme.