I was thinking it might be a good idea to post in this forum as well as the Polycount one
I have been insane busy at work the past few months and really have been wanting to try something different than I typically work on. I always love working on stylized fx so I thought giving the Riot contest a go would be a good opportunity to play around a bit and learn in the process.
This is just a WIP of what I have currently. Its not very far along as I am trying to get the skeleton of the effect all made. There still needs to be the attack itself and impact on the next sphere as well as work on the timing, anticipation and color.
The idea is to have the constellation follow a path to the other sphere and activate a shield at the moment. I’ll see how that works.
I really like where this is going, very clever idea to have a constellation forming into a path for the attack, impressive!
Maybe it would look cool if you’d make some images briefly overlaying the constellations to show what they are supposed to represent ? Like how we usually overlay an image of a lion over Leo or an image of a man with a club over Orion etc.
Wow man that is looking gorgeous! I love the charge up! Might want to push the blue contrasts a tiny bit towards the outer part of the star, just a slightly darker blue. Maybe throw a tiny indigo or purple in there? Just small tertiary pieces floating.
Just playing with some colors to add depth - Let me know if it works.
Added some contrast to the values in the stars so they get darker toward the outside as well. Haven’t had the chance to test out the other feedback yet, also haven’t looked at the middle section or impact/status effect yet so they’re largely unchanged. Hopefully this weekend.
Looks good. I really like the wispy nebula thing at the beginning and how it swirls out and back. What I would try is making it it 2/1.5 times faster and reducing the duration of all the pauses. It feels waaay too slow. You could also try dimming down some of the elements. The effect is equally bright at all times so there is no sense of what’s important here. It needs more contrast. For example, the discharge moment at the end could be brighter and anything before it should be slightly dimmer. You could also add some secondary elements to the impact location. There’s some glow, a star but nothing much except for that.
i’m not sure the swirly part as it contracts works - its a completely different motion to the rest of the effect and doesnt seem to affect anything. i think you need something to fill the pause between the stars appearing and contracting but i’m not sure thats it - maybe just make the timing on that quicker.
i like the animation you have on the way the stars appear and disappear, that works really well.
the second firing of stars needs a bigger impact on the other sphere i think and some variation in the lifetime - the whole effect just sort of fades out and its nowhere near as nice as the other stars contracting - maybe reverse the timing so it looks like the energy is being sucked into the other sphere or something.
@michalpiatek - Thanks man! I agree it hangs faaaaar too much in spots with little to nothing happening. Gonna try and address that by cutting out the part in the middle of the beginning. Also appreciate the brightness/contrast feedback, it def needs work there to make the individual important elements stand out.
@tharlevfx - Cheers! I agree with you about the swirly part. It feels like its kind of pasted over the effect and not integrated at all. It was kind of a quick addition to add some anticipation but probably tightening up the expansion/contraction and removing it instead would help.
May I ask how you created the constellation growing/shrinking? Is it like line renderers which you have manually animated, or is there some sort of dynamic simulation/generation involved? The movement feel very smooth and nice. Some parts even look like they wooble at some point!
