New 3D Animation Challenge: Robotic Wildlife 🤖🐒(Finished!)

It’s finally time for our new CG Boost Challenge, with the topic “Robotic Wildlife”!

We challenge you to create a nature documentary style 3D animation, featuring one or more animal-inspired robots, living in a natural environment.

You have five weeks time, the deadline is November 22nd, 2023 (16:00 CET).

You can go wild with your idea; a group of robotic insects, mechanical marine life, a flying bot in the sky, a herd of bots running across a plane, anything wildlife related.

The focus is on the robot’s unique design and how it interacts with nature. We recommend being creative with your animation, like the Fish Bot from our Robotic Planet course (see image above).

Once the challenge is complete, we’ll compile the best and most-unique animations into an exciting Robotic Wildlife montage video, which we’ll publish on our YouTube channel (montage from the last challenge).

How to join the Challenge?

1. Read carefully through the rules, info and FAQ sections below

2. Brainstorm your robot design and how it interacts with nature, before jumping into 3D

3. Start working on your 3D scene and (optional but highly recommended) post your work-in-progress renders in the community to get feedback

4. Render and export your final animation with the requirements listed below

5. Submit your animation and 2 behind-the-scenes screenshots through the submission form below

This challenge is made possible thanks to our very own Robotic Planet course. Learn to create, rig and animate hard-surface robots in Blender from scratch.

You can find all our courses, including this one, 20% off until November 2nd, 2023.

Click here to learn more

Challenge Theme

The theme is a robotic animal design, in a natural environment. We recommend that you don’t simply turn an existing animal into a robot, but come up with new, unique ideas of how it can exist in nature and survive.

The camera animation can be whatever you want, meaning there is no need for a template file. We recommend you keep the camera animation subtle and realistic, and don’t risk any crazy camera movements unless you are an expert in that subject.

It can be a close up with shot with high depth of field, or even a big areal shot. As long as the robot design and animation is visible.

Challenge Rules

1. The rendering style must be photo-realistic or semi realistic (e.g. Pixar movie style), no low poly or NPR renders allowed.

2. You can use any 3D software you like.

3. The robot must be modeled from scratch, in high poly (SubD or boolean modeling), minor kit bashing for the robot is allowed.

4. AI can be used to generate ideas and concept art, but cannot be used for creating the final animation.

5. If your animation does not meet the requirements as mentioned below, it might be excluded.

6. If your animation is inappropriate, NSFW, or overly gory, it will not be accepted for this challenge.

7. The animation should be just one shot.
   

Video Export Requirements

When rendering out your animation, make sure that it meets these requirements:

• Resolution: 1920x1080p or 3840x2160p

• Frame Rate: 24 frames per second

• Video Length: 144 frames (6 seconds)

• File Format: *.mp4

• Video codec h.264

• Audio: No sound effects or music
  

Prizes

All in all, the main goal here is to learn, improve, have fun, and work together as a community to create an exciting montage of inspiring animations, however, we also have some prizes for extra motivation.

The CG Boost team will pick the best submissions that will land in the final montage video.

Top 10 winners

• You will be highlighted as one of the top 10 winners in the montage video

• A link to your portfolio or social media will be added to the description of the YouTube montage video

• You will get a custom Top 10 trophy animation video clip, with your name “engraved”. (Click here to see a preview)

• One CG Boost course of your choice

Top 5 winners

• You will get everything mentioned above +

• A custom Top 5 trophy animation video clip, with your name “engraved”. (Click here to see a preview)

• And the option to join a private call with the top 5 winners and the CG Boost team, where you can ask questions, get feedback or just hangout.

1st place winner

• You will get everything mentioned above +

• A custom 1st Place trophy animation video clip, with your name “engraved”. (Click here to see a preview)
  

Submission Form

The deadline is November 22nd, 2023 (16:00 CET)

Use the link below to only submit your final animation. You must also include 2 viewport screenshot of your scene, so we can clearly see that you created the scene yourself.

Click here to submit your final animation

Resources

Videos to get you inspired:

• Seven Worlds, One Planet - Trailer

• A perfect Planet Trailer

• Horizon Zero Dawn Trailer

Useful tutorials:

• Blender Hard-Surface Modeling Fundamentals

• Robot Walk Circle Animation

• 6 Tips to Make Your Renders Instantly Cooler

• 7 Boolean Issues in Blender (And How to Fix Them)

• Fake Large-scale Forests in Blender

• Environments with Geometry Nodes in Blender (Breakdown)

Free 3D nature assets:

• PolyHaven

• Sketchfab (Sketchfab is full of great nature assets, make sure you carefully review their licensing options. And stick only to the photoreal or semi-realistic assets.)

• Blenderkit (Has a paid option.)

• Graswad Gscatter (If you create a free account with Graswald you can download Gscatter for free, it is a geometry nodes scattering tool, with a user-friendly interface and a handful of free high quality vegetation assets.)

• Share Textures

• ambientCG

Paid 3D nature assets:

• Quixel Megascans (Free only with Unreal Engine, paid for exporting the models to other 3D softwares.)

• Geo-Scatter (Also has a free tool called Biome Reader.)

• BlenderMarket

Final Recommendations

• Focus on the robot design first, and then on the environment to support its design.

• Use free (or paid) assets and environmental models, to speed up the work on the environment.

• Remember to take rendering time into account (it can take quite long) before running short on time before the deadline is over.

FAQ

Where do I ask questions about the challenge?
Email us at here about the challenge, or ask below in the CG Boost community.

Can I submit multiple submissions to the challenge?
You can only submit one final animation. However, you can re-submit an improved version of your animation before the deadline is over.

Can I share my final animation on social media before the challenge is over?
Yes, feel free to share your animation and use the hashtag #cgboostchallenge

Can a team participate in the challenge?
No. This challenge is for individuals only.

Where is the template file?
In this challenge, there isn’t one. You can animate the camera however you like. However, we highly recommend you keep it simple and subtle, imitating a nature documentary.

Do I have to add sound to my animation?
No. The entries should be submitted without sound. However, feel free to add sound and music for your personal fun.