Hey Reader,

Zach here,

With a fresh dose of inspiration and resources from the 3D world.

Today, I’ll start with an amazing 3D mountain landscape, followed by a free art book PDF from the creators of "Forevergreen". Next, I’ll share an inspiring stop-motion Winter Olympics trailer and finally, a cool procedural house generator for Blender.

Let’s dive in.

​Stunningly Realistic 3D Mountains Landscape made in Blender​

“I want to see mountains again!” said Bilbo Baggins to his friend Gandalf, and I felt the same once I saw this amazing 3D landscape by Maarten Nauta.

Views like that can leave you breathless when you go hiking, and convincingly recreating them in 3D can be almost as hard as climbing these heights.

It can be done, though, and it’s a satisfying journey (as testified by many students who completed our Master 3D Environments Course by Martin Klekner).

​Free PDF Artbook from the Oscar-Nominated "Forevergreen"​

I’ve shared the "Forevergreen" animation in one of the previous newsletters, and since then, it has received an Oscar nomination for Animated Short Film! 🥳

The creators were so generous that they decided to share a high-quality art book (in printable PDF format) containing beautiful concept art and sketches from the production. It’s a work of art in its own right and a great source of inspiration.

​Winter Olympics Stop Motion Trailer is on Fire!​

​This amazing trailer animation for the Winter Olympic Games in Italy was not made with CGI, so you might ask: Why do I even share it in this newsletter?

I find the artistically curious approach of its creators particularly inspiring in the age of AI-generated ads and the constant push for making things faster and easier (which does not always equal better).

The creators made a risky decision to film the fire trails of the stop-motion animated characters as real flames and embers shot in-camera (for every single frame). This led to a unique dynamic effect that would be hard, or even impossible, to achieve any other way.

Was this the cheapest way or the easiest one? Surely not! But it’s such risky, sometimes unpredictable artistic decisions that allow for great things to happen.

Watch this video to learn more about how this unique project was made.

​"House Craft" - A Fun Procedural House Generator​

Modeling 3D houses can be time-consuming (especially when you need to make an entire village or town block), but with House Craft (a procedural house generator), it’s as easy as playing with Lego. All you need is to model a super simple base shape, and the Modifier will do the magic, turning it into a detailed house model.

There are several styles of walls, roofs, windows, and doors to choose from, and even a procedural house destruction system (for that old, abandoned house look).

It is based on Geometry Nodes, so you can tweak and modify it to your liking.

​Get House Craft here (affiliate link)​
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That’s all from me today. Have a great weekend, and until next time.

~Zach

P.S. Our Cubic Worlds 3D Art Challenge is still running, feel free to join in here.