Behind The Scenes: Martian Store (Patreon)

The great thing about consistently creating and sharing your work is, that after some time and traction, you get a lot of feedback and tips and suggestions as well. I always read all of the comments and messages and if I read something interesting, I add it to the list. This way, you don't need to always rely on creative spark, but you can take other's ideas to create something (if they are offered to you of course).

This one comes from a member of our group Nicolas Torres (@noclat on social media), who pondered about the idea of a general goods store on mars. What would be sold there?

I've decided to take on this idea in a bit more sci-fi way and create really futuristic aesthetics.  It's a funny thing, that we get to think about is in more ways, because the idea of Martian settlement doesn't seem so distant anymore. But creating a realistic setting would mean a lot of research on construction, materials and space effectivity of potential Martian habitat. Maybe some other time :)

Visit the full Pinboard here

If you visit the reference board, you can see a lot of different stuff saved there. This time I used notes in Pinterest to save my thoughts while browsing. Mostly to put together a list of architectural features to include, but sort of a store inventory as well. I loved the triangular windows and rounded room designs, so I've decided to make it a dominant feature of the room. After that, it was easy to gather few other ideas like an inset shelf and hydroponic plant decorations.

In terms of inventory I just thought for a while, what would be the things most precious to you if you're left on the other planet. Most obvious is something you wouldn't last minutes without and that's oxygen. I'm sure there would be a sophisticated oxygen infrastructure, but I think some backup tanks would be in order too. After that, it's water, food, medical care and of course, batteries.

That gave me a lot of ideas to work with and I could move to a sketching phase.

As I said before, the dominant feature of the diorama would be triangular windows along a rounded wall. And I think it's the first time I was doing a rounded wall on isometric scene, so I was curious to see how will that turn out. I've added the other wall elements and started to test different placements for counter and display table.

I came up with these chunky carved out pieces of furniture inspired by the reference board and sketched in few inventory items to see if it will be enough. It still felt a bit empty and I thought, that in terms of effectivity, some habitats might extend into the underground (radiation protection). That's why I included the stairs section and placed it in a way, that the shape is rounded going along the wall.

That kind of filled the space and rounded up the composition nicely, so I've just brushed off some details, added some more plants and fired up the Blender :)

You can watch the process video on Youtube