Enigmatic Specimens - Eternal Ascent Breakdown

Breakdown on my entry for pwnisher's Eternal Ascent challenge. I learnt a lot about Unreal Engine NPR shaders, as well as applying my readings on composition, color, and lighting.

I wanted to create something that merges the sci-fi and fantasy elements, hence, as shown in the moodboard, I took primary reference from the Love, Death, and Robots episode "FIsh Night" & Honkai Star Rail's Penacony trailer. I pictured it as a outer-space science facility that is engulfed by fantastical elements of its run-away specimens of housing holographic/fluorescent alien fish, turning into a spectral sea.

For the shaders, I wanted to use NPR shaders as a way to study it further and understand PPV nodes better, as well as to elevate he sense of fantasy in the scene. Hence, before the 'Cartoon Mirage' burst, a cel shader and lineart PPV were applied. They were based on methods previously expanded by Reality Adrift Studio (1) and Delphine Decuyper (2) respectively (sources linked below.)

Meanwhile for the 'cartoon mirage' I tried to build it from scratch, with the goal of creating something with energetically fluctuating shading akin to halftones and that this 'burst' is to be brought upon by the fishes and transforming the context of the space station environment from sci-fi to space fantasy.

Hence, I constructed another PPV shader that overlays two different crayon texture, that is being panned and distorted with noise. I established the mirage colors to be a saturated underwater teal, in contrast to the more purple and orange tones of the environment. I also controlled the scene color by linear interpolating using scene Ambient Occlusion and Scene Depth, and used material parameters to key them in the Sequencer.

Assets I utilized in the creation of this project are:
- Sturgeon model by Digital Life 3D (SketchFab) (https://skfb.ly/6T6n6)
- 4 IN 1 Modular Research Facility / Mega Bundle by Tris Games (https://www.unrealengine.com/marketplace/en-US/product/9b9e3e90efc944979461d7b2de5ce37a)
- Big Star Station LUMEN by 3D SMART (https://answers.unrealengine.com/marketplace/en-US/product/big-star-station)
- Diver Model modified from model by CyberMysticVR (Sketchfab) (https://skfb.ly/oMWt9)

References:
(1) Reality Adrift Studio: https://youtu.be/ry-E3QmpIBU?si=AhVSntVPISAgGM0v
(2) Decuyper: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/B3QeA8