The Vale of Araluen : Preproduction
World build : Creating the Vale
Concept art, initial modelling and development model
Concept
Imagine a dense green forest, its rugged trunks rise high while the roots reach deep into the earth, the smell of the loam, the sound of the wind rustling the branches and leaves, the feel of its cool embrace as you walk through its depths. In the distance is the sound of water babbling and dancing its way over everything in its path. Further away still is a gentle lapping of ripples across a great loch as they meet outlying rocks and a craggy shoreline. High above you in the canopy birds sing to each other in a rich polyphony and insects glisten where the light filters through. On the forest floor in these light wells grow vibrant, fragrant flowers that delight and sustain the furry and the fowl, now imagine this beautiful scene with magic and a fairy tale castle… this is where we started.
Phases
| # | Phase | Status | Dates |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | 2D concept art and collation of inspiration images | Complete | Mar 2024 |
| 2. | Initial concept 3D model | Complete | Mar 2024 - May 2024 |
| 3. | Development 3D model | Work In Progress | Nov 2024 - May 2025 |
| 4. | Lighting | Pending | May 2025 |
| 5. | Texturing and Materials | Pending | May 2025 |
| 6. | World Animation e.g ripples on water, wind in the trees | Pending | May 2025 |
Aspirations
Build a world for the series to be based in - sounds obvious, but to do this involves a lot of planning and figuring out which includes the following
Learn the basics of Blender
Begin growing our modelling skills by creating everything in the world
Begin developing our own art style for the textures and style of the buildings, plants etc
Hush our imposter syndrome gremlins by doing all of the above
Have fun! This is really important, the whole point of AYANE Studios is to have fun exploring our imaginations and ideas.
summary to date (April 2025)
With our concept sorted Thea put together some inspiration images and did a series of sketches for a simple single turret castle. Even though we had completed a couple of Blender beginner courses prior to starting this world build we knew we still had a lot to learn. But everyone has to start somewhere and the only way to get better is to keep practicing and learning. In the gallery and journal posts below you can follow the evolution of the this world as it went from a sketch to a simple 3D model of a tower and section of forest through to a full castle and valley. You can also find links to all the tutorials and courses we used to help us build it in the reference tutorials section.
Gallery
Explore the evolution and development of the Vale of Araluen from the initial concept art through to the finished world
Loch Elva
Home to the Water Dragons and an ancient Kelp Forest
Castle Araluen Main Gates
A pair of golden phoenix guard the gates, no one knows the full extent of their magic
Castle Araluen
Ancient wisteria trees envelope the front aspect with their colour and scent
Glass Houses
The castle is flanked by two glass houses full of magical and medicinal plants
Castle Araluen
The balcony at the rear of the castle is the perfect place to enjoy the forest at night
Lamp Light Flowers
The beautiful bioluminescence of these flowers lights the way even in the darkest of nights
Fairy Falls Water Lily
Legend has it that the song of the water nymphs that live here is responsible for the beautiful flowers that bloom around the falls
Fairy Falls
The multi tiered falls are what gave the vale it’s name - Araluen the place of the lilies and singing waters
INSPIRATION
From Disney’s Tangled to remote Scottish waterfalls, here you can read about our inspirations for the Vale of Araluen
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Monet Bridge and Lily Pond
I have loved Monet’s water lily series and the gardens that inspired it since I first discovered them in art class at school. They just radiate tranquility and beauty.
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Mother Gothel's Tower
If only you could actually buy houses like this! This tower and it’s valley location was one of the first influences on the early development of The Vale of Araluen.
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Fairy Pools - Isle of Skye
We came across the beautiful Fairy Pools during a hike with our boys. There was a really magical feeling in the air with the sound of crystal clear water babbling down the valley.
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Wisteria Trees
I love the incredible ancient Wisteria trees in Japan. They look like something straight out of a fairy tale, but with the added illumination they are beyond beautiful.
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French Châteaux
A lot of the details of Castle Araluen are inspired by renaissance style château architecture. Château Chenonceau, d’Ussé, Fontainebleau, Pierrefonds, Chamboard and Belle Epoque are some of my favourites.
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Painterly Art Style
I knew from very earlier on that I wanted to use a painterly art style. I love the softness and beautiful light effects that can be achieved. I also like the idea that it can contribute to creating a very unique and beautiful world.
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Enchanted Forest
Every good fairy tale has an enchanted forest. Some are good and some are bad. I’ve embraced both sides with our forest, the deciding factor for which side you see depends on your motivation for entering The Vale.
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Loch Ness and Nessie
I grew up not far from the beautiful Loch Ness and the legend of Nessie (the Loch Ness monster) is something I’ve always known. My dream castle just had to have it’s own loch and legendary creatures inhabiting it.
If you have any questions about our inspirations or the world in general, please send us a note
Journal Posts
Follow our progress and adventures as we build The Vale through our journal posts
Want to read more? Explore our Journal
Reference Tutorials
If you like the elements we’ve created and would like to have a go at creating something similar I’ve listed all the tutorials we’ve done to build the Vale of Araluen below. Please note that they are only reference tutorials and that I have modified my resulting models, in some cases pretty significantly. But hopefully they will be enough to get you started. Also if you would like to know which courses we did to get started with Blender you can find them on the bottom row.
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Water Lily
Tutorial Link : Water Lily
Notes : I have modified the petal array nodes to achieve the flower shape I wanted. I have also added emission shaders to the petals and stamen to make our lilies more magical.
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Silver Birch Bark
Tutorial Link : Bark Texture 1
Notes : I started with this texture tutorial but I have changed it quite a lot by adding in more, and more detailed colour ramp nodes to achieve the watercolour texture.
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Pine Tree Bark
Tutorial Link : Bark Texture 2
Notes : I did a similar thing with this texture to the silver birch bark. I put in additional and more detailed color ramps and removed the bump and displacement mapping.
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Lamp Light Flowers
Tutorial Link : Glowing Flower
Notes : I’ve stuck to the geometry pretty closely but I have changed the colours and the opacity settings to get the bioluminescent effect I wanted for our glowing flowers.
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Grass
Tutorial Link : Stylised Grass
Notes : As we’re using the Cycles render engine I had to make lots of changes to the materials to get them to work, but the linked tutorial should get you started.
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Wisteria
Tutorial Link : Twisted Tree
Notes : I couldn’t find any wisteria tutorials, so I got creative and adapted this twisted tree tutorial. I have modified the way the ‘leaves’ are placed on the branches a fair bit.
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Willow Trees
Tutorial Link : Twisted Tree
Notes : Another variation of the twisted tree tutorial. Like the wisteria I tweaked the placement of the leaves and in this case the shape too to get the desired shape.
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Scroll Work Gates
Tutorial Link : Scrolls
Notes : This was a very tricky build! Trying to get all the scrolls to tesselate together in a nice pattern was a challenge. Blender Studio’s scrolls were a big help in figuring it all out.
A huge thank you Kaizen, Ryan King, Tiny Nocky, Grant Abbitt…. for sharing their Blender knowledge and expertise through their tutorials. Without their contributions to the ‘YouTube Academy’ I wouldn’t have been able to create the Vale of Araluen. If you are looking for a tutorial to help you with your own project I highly recommend checking out their channels. Happy creating!
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Blender Beginner Course
Course Link : GameDev 1
Notes : Grant Abbitt is a really good teacher! We both really recommend doing this course if you want to learn blender. There are modules covering all aspects and the pacing is great.
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Blender Geometry Nodes
Course Link : GameDev 2
Notes : Geometry nodes are a game changer. This is definitely an intermediate level course but well worth doing as it opens up so much creative potential.
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Blender Texture nodes
Course Link : GameDev 3
Notes : Much like geometry nodes learning more about the capabilities of texture nodes opens up pretty much limitless creative potential. This is an intermediate level course.
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Blender Environment Artist
Course Link : GameDev 4
Notes : A really helpful beginner level course that walks you through lots of very useful skills for creating environments and modelling organic elements.
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Fir Tree Generator
Tutorial Link : Blender Studio 1
Notes : Blender studio’s amazing tutorial for a low poly procedural pine tree is the base model for all the Visken Forest fir trees. I also used painterly brushstrokes to add some variety.
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Blender Painterly Course
Course Link : Blender Studio 2
Notes : I’m so excited about the potential of this new feature in Blender. Thommas is an amazing teacher, I highly recommend doing this great course.
The past couple of weeks have been all about landscaping, it has been quite a challenge but I think I’m getting there.