Judge feedback

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• A good scene, I think that you should have gone with a smaller sized diorama which would have left you with more time to populate the environment with assets and make something closer to what your references looked like. Some of the chosen assets like the vintage phone remind me more of the 50s rather than the targeted 80s/90s. Try to gather as much references as possible and create a mood board – Pinterest is your friend. Things like crumbled pieces of paper, books and newspapers on the floor, ash tray, bottle of alcohol or general rubbish could bring more character to your scene. Modelling looks clean, although I’d keep practicing your high to low poly workflow as your normal seemed to not be capturing all the detail from your high poly. Not a bad first go at Substance Painter, I like the materials you’ve chosen. They could be greatly enhanced by adding grime, dirt, scratches and general wear and tear. Those help to bring the asset to life. Always work from reference and keep layering different types of wear and dirt until it looks good. There’s a few really good tutorials on ArtStation (paid) or on YouTube from Substance themselves that would get you started. Pay close attention to your UVs as they can make or break how your models look. Make sure they’re properly unfolded, aligned and try to keep a similar texel density. I would turn your volumetric fog off or greatly reduce it as it looks unrealistic otherwise. Lighting is another difficult thing to get right, but there’s an abundance of really good free tutorials on lighting in Unreal on YouTube. Try to use spotlights instead of point lights as they are cheaper to render. A good starting setup would be a skylight for the bounced/ambient light with a directional light angled to be coming through the window. You could also try a night/dusk scene where you utilise the desk lamp. Your documentation is well presented and easy to read. Overall, your project is nice and has a lot of potential. Keep up the good work.