CONCEPT

While studying in the southern Swedish archipelago town of Karlskrona, I was constantly surrounded by views of the Baltic Sea.  As the surface of its dark, brackish water was constantly obscured by waves or ice, I begun to imagine the world below.  This realm served as the perfect setting for inspiration when it came to my final project.  Given the prompt of climate change, I wanted to capture the mystery of nature in an abstract, fantastical way.

PROCESS + R&D

Environment

One essential element in this project was the development of an immersive environment.  Three elements added to this end were lighting effects, sand simulation, and particle systems for fish and bubbles. 

Fake caustics, god rays

Following this tutorial, I set up some simulated caustics similar to those seen underwater in real life.  This light is acheived by the subtraction of two slightly different voronoi textures and modulated with a time-linked driver.

When paired with a principled volume, which added visible "god rays" to the scene, they comprised a major atmospheric effect for the scene.

Particle systems

Using BOIDs, I built a swarm of fish to populate the coral-like subject - a sort of simulated symbiosis.

The trails of bubbles were also particle systems.  Both of these were manipulated using forces.

The pearl-like details on the coral structures were also generated as particles, but this time with a hair system.

Procedural workflow

Noise nodes created the coral-like exterior of the main subjects of the scene. 

Overall, this project served as an excellent opportunity to practice building an environment and compositing in After Effects.   One challenge I faced due to my use of a principled volume for the scene was lengthy render time.  In the future I would like to render as .exr in order to prevent the need for multiple renders and to further empower the post-processing.