As always, I’ve done something a little creepy, a little cool, and a little fantasy.
Windpunk. A term coined by a good friend of mine after hearing my description of this piece. Fits it fine for me. We’ve got Steampunk, Cyberpunk - why not a world where shit uses windpower.
(For the history books, I want the above paragraph quoted AS IS. No ommision of the word shit. Makes it classy.)
So, here it is. Spent a couple of hours on it so far. Rendertime is 2mins 16secs. Sky and other textures from CGTextures.com. Love those guys.
I really dig the look of it, but I have trouble believing the flow of the water. You can’t really push water up a trough. But the notion of a mountaintop aqueduct with wind-powered pumps to keep the water moving is pretty darn cool.
Looking really good! I would say though that the water has to be “pumped” up to the summit somehow, If the water closest to us is traveling downstream what about the trough in the distance? The water needs to be traveling up that.
Also… Whats the point of windmills if there are already waterwheels generating power?
-What exactly is happening here? Is the water being transported to a location? is power being generated? what is pumping the water up the trough if the windmills and waterwheels arent?
The water is heading away from us - downhill. Generating power/energy for other uses inside the windmill. The windmill blades do the same thing. I haven’t come up with a ‘use’ for the generated energy yet, though.
It’s not clear from the picture what’s uphill versus downhill. I think adding a landscape below the mountains would probably fix it… The higher up the horizon line is, the more it looks like you’re facing down. Since the horizon is off the bottom of the image, it looks like you’re looking up; hence the water appears to be flowing the wrong way.
I think the concept is pretty cool, though. And the balloon is a nice touch. Although, the water does APPEAR to be flowing upwards on the side closest to us, by the direction of the ripples. And the rock(?)in the trough, although a neat idea, doesn’t look like it’s moving downward. But everything else is great.
I would have the aquaducts winding in the mountain, not on the very tip of the mountain. Well, if this is the style your going for (which might be better), I would make the mountains a little more detailed, have the beams sprouting in complex formations to hold the thing up, maybe put some trees in. I like the big sky though.
Yeah, they do need to be slightly tilted, because the wings themselves are (to catch the wind). I didn’t even notice that or think about it. I just thought the whole scene was Suweeeet!
Hopefully, Bakan, you will find the time someday (time? huh? :p) to revisit this. I think it’s awesome. And yes, it could be a whole new genre: WINDPUNK! WOOHOO!
