Converted | The Foundry

Originally published at: https://www.ronenbekerman.com/?p=136749

My initial idea was the concept of democratized access to sophisticated tools, both hardware and software, which could be easily shared in an open, collaborative workspace by creatives. I thought it matched the main theme rather nicely as one of many examples of how disrupted modern lives are, stuck in a perpetual loop of constant fluctuations, changes and conversions. While I was mainly looking at the context of art and creativity, several associations with industrial revolutions came to mind right away, hence, for the background of the scene I picked an old industrial building, typical for a 19th and 20th century warehouse, factory or foundry. I then filled the space with arrays of little customizable offices and workshops, with robotic arms augmenting artistsā€™ tool- and skill-sets. Such a setup was then fueled with the most valuable resources of current and future times ā€“ data. Thatā€™s how the data crunching clusters were introduced in the middle of the foundry, as a beating heart that keeps everything in motion. Then, as a juxtaposition and balance to the information cloud packaged in the silicon, I put another totem of power, more tangible, probably more powerful too ā€“ a giant old tree, dead in fact and yet still dominant, hovering over modest lounge garden, almost residual. Finally I decided that in this version of the future nature had to be reconstructed and revitalized, rebuilt bit by bit in a chain of biome dioramas which would then return to the original environment and convert it back it its primal state.

For the final output I decided to utilize all the potential of real time graphics, specifically in Unreal Engine 4. I produced a set of still images, an animation, a walkthrough video and a real time experience. Images are presented right below and the remaining content is accessible via provided links. I hope you will all enjoy it.

Animation:

Walkthrough:

Application:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/10pvYC09lP2_LtPuTrb5AJlI5RxkOtDSe/view?usp=sharing

DISCLAIMER:
This project was design with Realtime Ray Tracing in mind, therefore a suitable GPU is required to experience it properly. Also, it is strongly recommended to use Nvidiaā€™s DLSS 2.0, which implies using some of the latest Nvidia drivers. It is, however, possible to explore the project without RTX goodness, although the experience will be of lower fidelity and most likely with very low frame rate.
I would suggest sticking to resolutions around 1080p with DLSS set to Quality or 1440p and DLSS set to Performance. If you would like to try it in 4K ā€“ definitely go with the ultra DLSS settings.
Expected framerate should be around 30-60 fps.

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Very neat design, well done, good job!

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Just as a follow up here - Iā€™ve placed high res images over here:

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Thank you so much, I will enjoy itā€¦ :slightly_smiling_face: :ok_hand:

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Dear god, that was insane! What a great concept, and the tree in the center is so iconic! Very well executed.

I do feel like a bit of an idiot though, I also did a 3 minute short and then went back and read the bold letters of one minute maximum time limit, and spent a lot of time cutting the already finished sequence to fit that. Iā€™ve only seen a couple of participants actually caring about that, so I hope it doesnā€™t play a big role with the jury.

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Amazing!! I will have to download and explore!

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Thank you all!

@Brujah88 ā€“ donā€™t be so hard on yourself! You delivered great piece of work over there! And just for the record ā€“ I aimed at the real-time category and didnā€™t think the animation time restriction applied here :wink: In the end itā€™s more of an addition, just a good way of showcasing the project.

@jamie - let me know if it works for you. Be sure to make some adjustments in the settings menu to get reasonable framerate, just pause with the ā€œEscapeā€ button. I am aware this project is pretty heavy but I tested it on a couple of different machines, it works pretty good even on a mobile 2070 RTX.
BTW that cabin of yours, I remember that one ā€¦ Damn what a stunning piece of work!
And now the Red Barn !

@msum - Great work! I downloaded it and explored pretty much everywhere I think.
My favorite parts were the ground floor - the rows of server racks, and ā€˜machine partsā€™ in the cases and vegetation. Really nice.
FYI I just ran the download file and it played fine without adjusting any settings - my viewport card is a 980Ti and I use 2080Tis (in the same workstation) as compute cards - no idea which gpu was actually being used but playback was smooth, no problems :smiley:

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