ABSTRACT
Welcome to 3D Landscapes, the first in a new range of books from Focal Press in the Digital Mayhem range. The format and style of Digital Mayhem is a little different from what you’ve seen in book publishing before. It marries the showcase aesthetic of the coffee-table, CGI book with the practicality of magazine-style tutorials, workflow guides and tips. There are three main sections to 3D Landscapes – previz considerations for planning and designing your images in the first place, post-production editing for enhancing or creating completely different variations at the end of the process, and then the landscape images themselves. This is the meat of the sandwich, the jam between the bread. Over the course of 13 chapters 3D Landscapes brings you the best in 3D landscape art, showcasing the talents of enthusiasts and professionals alike. There’s everything from traditional mountains, rivers and lakes, to using characters in the landscape, water features, the use of seasons, as well as urban and post-industrial landscapes. At the end of each chapter is a tutorial, either as a workflow guide or a step-by-step, that explains the concepts and processes used to create it. The entire book has self-contained sections: you can read it in any order, just drop in and out of the parts that interest. Over the course of the 300 pages we hope you’ll feel inspired and encouraged to create your own amazing 3D landscapes and if you liked this first book in the Digital Mayhem series, keep an eye out for the next one – Machines.
