How I Created a MASSIVE Lord of the Rings Orc Army... in Blender

[@showmethefunny3300]

if you randomize the flames, it will greatly improve it. They animate exactly the same together and effects the illusion.

[@johnleorid]

Could you randomize the animations of each uruk-hai?

[@DanVogt]

​@@johnleoridyep, just change the starting point to be randomised for each. You could use a driver for it

[@DanVogt]

Hundred percent

[@James-wd9ib]

randomize animation starting point

[@EduardKaresli]

For a project that took you only 24 hours this looks incredibly good. I can only imagine the amount of refinements that you could do if you spent a complete week on this. 🤔👏👍👍👍🔥🔥🔥

[@moeburhanimeez7354]

We need more of these large scale renders!

[@ibrahimaljfout5057]

Depth of field effects and making the edges out of focus + adding dirt and scratches on the lens + adding a vignette + more erratic camera + motion blur + lens flares + a little bit of halation and grain would have took this to another level. but thank you for the in depth tutorial. This was really helpful to me.

[@magmabuddy]

ok Christopher nolan.

[@AzraelArt]

depth of field does not make sense if you want this to look like its filmed with a real camera. erratic camera movement would look really out of place in a crane or helicopter type shot like this, same as dirt and scratches. going for a bit more of a vintage look could be done i guess, but all of this would be totally overdoing it in my opinion

[@unsteadyhandlebar]

trust me u dont wanna lower the aperture and blur the edge, it'll look like a miniature scale, and there is motion blur here, it's subtle, how much motion blur do u even want? ur comment is laughable 😂

[@GaryParris]

here's a challenge, you do it; you replicate this, disney or Weta; with Blender in 24hrs and show us all how you would implement it!

[@ebantero]

Depth of field would make the scene look small, you can't have depth of field on aerial shots unless you fake it

[@deadseamonster]

Dude, amazing for 24 hours. Nice to find all those assets.

[@MinecraftGamerLR]

"You can do this for free!" *grabs a $5000 motion capture set*

[@RokokoMotion]

It's about half of that if you qualify for the Indie Bundle he talks about but fair enough 😅

[@Lynx_cinematics.mp4]

U can still do it for free

[@Shinesart]

I mean you can use Mixamo instead of using expensive motion capture. He just had to do it because of sponsor.

[@cgnovice2969]

@@RokokoMotionor Rokoko video!

[@kerhabplays]

@@RokokoMotion or Animate it yourself(dreaming about Rokoko suit)

[@sweetcorn1936]

You know this guy is really good at what he does, iv fallen in love with blender after 500 hours , I'm not going to lie it's been one of the hardest tasks in my life to learn, I'm 38 now, and I honestly thought it was to late to learn I'm doing aabout 4 hours a day on average when I can get on, fantastic video pal, keep it up 😊

[@GaryParris]

keep it up, its worth it, even if its just for personal growth!

[@aimanghazi7043]

If it actually was done in 24 hours then by God this is amazing. If you spent a week or even a month you could actually make this look just as good as Return of the King.

[@nebilmulugeta8032]

not a chance

[@Im_that_guy_man]

I say, let him do it. Heck I’d even subscribe to his channel

[@Aristographic3D]

Yes, It's possibile, he just download some stuff and put it togheter. (5 hrs of work) MAYBE he did the motion-capture by himself, the rest is just assembling a scene.

[@christopherclaflin]

It is INSANE that 1 dude can do in 24 hours what 1000 people took months to do 20 years ago. Granted, the Weta version still looks better, but considering their resources and time... this just blows my mind. I mean... it's unreal how good this turned out with 24 hours of work on open sourced software. The future is now. Amazing job. 🔥

[@Swansniff2]

While it's impressive whats possible to do for a single person with modern software, this is not even comparable. This looks at best like a PS2 cut scene and many simple steps could make this a lot better, like randomising the fires and not run all animations at the same time, quite basic stuff. Making VFX good is all in it's final details. Especially good lighting, shadows and marry the different composites, which this doesn't do well. Good VFX just takes time. Also, Weta was not 1000 people. They also basically invented crowd control tools that are still in use today.

[@Adiattor]

25 years ago 1500 employees made a professional and highly polished film production. Today one guy in his bedroom makes a comparison with an amateur production but still a good advertorial.

[@WorkFps]

It actually looks really decent. For the volumetrics alternative setup, try using the camera's position information to drive a gradient that slowly makes the fog transparent as the camera approaches the fog planes instead of disappearing abruptly. This will add some depth to it

[@CGGeek]

I did this in a sense, by using the Mist pass to add some fog in the compositor as well.

[@WorkFps]

@@CGGeek Noice, I did notice it. Great work

[@WaterShowsProd]

Not to take away from what you managed to accomplish, because it is impressive, but the crowd software Weta designed actually had some basic A.I. that caused individuals to move toward enemies, and engage with them, etc. This crowd animation is more similar to what Disney did in Mulan, and originally for the background characters in the "Topsy-Turvy" number for The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, and it certainly surpasses that. Of course, if you'd added moths it would have brought everything to another level.

[@ghosteclipz7007]

Moths are life

[@deeves8986]

Agreed. Maybe should have grabbed Unreal 5 to render this one...

[@kerhabplays]

@@ghosteclipz7007 **proceed to add moth on a space scene**

[@GaryParris]

here's a challenge, you do it; you replicate this, disney or Weta; with Blender in 24hrs and show us all how you would implement it!

[@WaterShowsProd]

@@GaryParris Alright, and here's a challenge for you: re-read my comment, and this time try to comprehend it.

[@GaryParris]

well done! it's truly amazing that anyone has criticism of the time and effort you put in to showing it can be done, and still there are people saying oh you should have done this or that etc. like how do people think at this stage it could be better, i remember not too long ago that people were saying it's not possible to have this scale in Blender, really you can't enjoy what is being demonstrated without complaining about something. Keep up the great work! 👏👏👏

[@viipeditz]

Color grading left the chat☠️ ,all the work was fantastic 🔥

[@markonar140]

Wow!!! What a Creative Process!!! Thanks for Sharing!!! 👍😎

[@MythicBricks]

Everything here is so so good. I would echo other commenters in saying that randomizing flames would go a long way because the flame loop kinda stuck out in the final project. but i am so impressed, i could never pull this off

[@work1309]

also randomizing the animations would have improved the scene a lot, all characters with the same equipment play the animations at the exact same time and speed, in general I think if he would have taken 1 more hour to redo some of the animations it would have had a great impact on the quality, some of the animations kinda drag down the final product

[@harshparihar9679]

this video literally amazed me its so impressive keep it up . like if u give week or months to this output will be really high budget periodic movie

[@AKG5555]

Thats a commendable effort you have made and the color grading looks great. Very nice. I really want you to look on the randomization, as the motions sometimes looks too rhythmic.

[@itchart]

I have always loved these types of shot too. Bro, really amazing for 24hrs. I’d like to see what you could do with a few weeks and a budget.

[@DemiK-AE]

Felt like a scene from a 5-10 year old game. Great job in 24 hours, i couldn't do this in a month... given a few more days of work and the proper render settings i'd bet it would look like Lotr 4 came out! big ups!

[@RenderRevolution]

@CGGeek Thanks mate, totally awesome content. The free assets on the pateron make it even better. Keep up the grind bro 💯

[@conwayfitzgerald]

Liked the video. When you said you put twelve hours in I figured that's what making good clips is - time and knowledge. I'm very interested.

[@magmabuddy]

ayo that was amazing. i would not be able to make this in a month or so. damn bro. amazing work

[@Abz-q2kSSB]

Amazing work, CG Geek, just a tip. For the ember particles, they seem to just disappear instantly once the lifetime is done. Maybe you could add a blend texture to your particles with strand/particles on, so that the particles sheink once their lifetime is done Love ur content btw❤❤

[@MIIQ130]

This is so awesome dude

[@cd2028]

This is bonkers. Good job!

[@themeg5199]

I’m in North West Michigan!!! Nice to know someone is so close.

[@nightshadow7116]

That looks absolutely epic and I have the highest respect for that :,) But I think one thing, that would really give a nice touch to the scene would be some banners - They would add scale, verticallity and movement (there you could've used the cloth-animation) to the scene. And overall I think that banners just make armies look 10x as epic. But the scene looks great as it is!

[@mr_geometrikz]

AWESOME! 👏👏👏

[@DECODEDVFX]

Great video Steve.

[@CGGeek]

Thanks mate! appreciate it

[@omarislam4489]

For 24 hours, thats bloody amazing!!! Imagine you had the time and the budget and a production team!

[@LeoMattMan]

That is really impressive! It doesn't look as good as LOTR, but you're just one dude!! Keep up the good work!

[@LuxoJunior]

FKN LOL! Love your videos man. Something about CGI crowds have always got me too excited in the wrong places. Brings back memories of obsessing over Weta Digital's Massive some 20yrs ago, to nowadays dabbling in Golaem Crowd in Maya. This iss sooo cool, love the Easter Egg at the end XD

[@ThisUsersNameIsTaken]

Super cool job for only 24 hours! Would love to see it again when you can spend more time on it

[@thereeg1073]

Bro, you could have give that Troll some love on the left arm :D

[@amitdhawan579]

Amazing job!!

[@Unveriefable]

Ngl at the start of the video I thought you were capping but bloody good work doin that in 24 hours you are one with the flow of productivity, locked in, respect

[@WW_Studios]

Final shot looks epic!

[@OduzzRocks]

Really nice... I feel like it would have come out better if you made some offset to the flame touch and brought them a bit closer

[@klatchabobby]

I love that you pronounce Rokoko the same way you'd pronounce Sudoku despite it not having any Us in it

[@afjer]

I think there was like one time he said it right.

[@suzukito]

thanks to rukuku for sponsoring this video

[@Ennio444]

Amazing to think you can do this in little more than a couple of days and relatively basic tools nowadays.

[@betulcn]

Your videos are theraputic. It's crazy that you did it in 24 hours, amazing 🧿

[@CGGeek]

thx so much! great to hear

[@blenderbones]

Spotted the Uruk doing the caterpillar straight away...prize please ;)

[@gillall4828]

These guys from Oasis even know Blender. Respect!

[@JamieDunbar]

I am absoluteness dumbfounded Blender is playing the animation with thousands of orcs in real time 🤩 I know they have simplified rigs, but still, can we get a round of applause for the Blender developers? Wow!

[@DoctorMadness]

Great breakdown!

[@theophile4043]

This was so interesting ! Thanks and bravo

[@Milo_qc]

Man what a fantastic job you've done... how bad I want to learn this kind of stuff 🥺🤩

[@samdoyle9048]

great job dude. Very impressive.

[@srb20012001]

Really cool exercise, very well done!

[@paulcamilleri2001]

Amazing work for a 24 hour job! Although as some said Weta employed an AI system like Golem has for creating certain intelligence in the avatars created the scene you did shows how much technology has improved and using Free software! Some suggestions: I think using geometry nodes one can instruct the instances not only to move on terrain but also avoid obstacles or move towards an object (enemies). You could have also outputted a Zdepth pass and use DaVinci Resolve Fusion to add more spice like fog in post! The end colour grading the scene in DaVinci instead of doing a colour grade in Blender! This is my humble advice! Else Awesome work and kudos to you for sharing with us!

[@thefilthelement]

the fact that we've come so far that we can do mocap at home now 😆

[@ryn1986]

Impressive work!

[@user-akrturuus]

Emitter of fire 🔥 sprites is the same time loop in final shoot, do it in random to more realistic

[@kevinl20082008]

This is AWESOME!!!!

[@MAQUETTE3DSTUDIO-zk2tg]

Fantastic work Bro

[@MarioGalvan-rt1xz]

Very nice man I love it.

[@HumanTouchArt]

can you do more of this kind of stuff love the lotr CGI effects and large scale armies

[@3DEnthusiast-z5d]

Very cool project und result.

[@RenzGFXS]

Yeah Worm is infront of the Main Giant in the ending scene, where you explained that you added the data to one of the models.

[@el_chico1313]

dude thats amazing, its magic

[@monke1709]

I see new CG Geek Video, I click CG Geek Video

[@anzaklaynimation]

Thumbnail is epic. ❤

[@caleldonini]

So cool! although the Weta shot had a lower angle for the camera. That helps sell the large scale. Of course the color grading also matters. Looks awesome though!

[@jiamingzuo9416]

Should do bunch of variations of trolls, cuz they are big and easier to notice the single variation of their movements

[@LordBaronGaming]

Amazing brother, amazing.

[@BF-Gaming_forHIRE]

it looks amazing dude, but trolls are much faster fr!

[@jakefelzien]

This was sick

[@RomboutVersluijs]

You could have track the flames to an emptie and then track the emoty to the active camera. That way the flame would look to have more volume. Other trick is duolicate the plane and rotate it.

[@Pixelsplasher]

Crowd simulation can be someone's niche expertise in the 3d animation industry. I'd love to see a demo reel of that guy.

[@ukmonk]

for 24 hours this was awesome dude!!

[@magnus6003]

Looks great.

[@mtgsculptor]

It's absolutely epic and in 24 hours is nuts ofc. I just wonder if you could've given all the orcs slightly ofset animations from eachother through geometry nodes. That's the one thing that I think would've been the biggest improvement.

[@trillkodex1235]

U are amazing 🔥

[@etienne4081]

The geonode technic is so smart, good job

[@danol5749]

Awesome tutorial, keep up the amazing content

[@MrLittleSmall3]

this looks awesome. However, the giants stood out too much, they doesn't seems to blend into the scene very well from the front view. Another nitpick I have is the armies should march around the giants instead of underneath them. Nevertheless, this is a great tutorial! Thanks for making it.

[@mtscott44]

Awesome dude. You're a blender legend.

[@angryITGuy]

nice for 1 day's work.. needed to vary the torches animation.

[@aleksamrkela831]

Well done!

[@nshutijuni0r_5]

You’re genius man

[@Radwalls]

CGgeek is such a god... the GOAT even...

[@CGGeek]

Thanks so much mate! We all know Ian Hubs is the GOAT ;) but appreciate the compliment! Glad you enjoyed the vid

[@bktamila4589]

nice work

[@jemormaypa4005]

I don't understand why KZbin doesn't recommend your latest uploads. I'm subscribed and my notifications are on.

[@MarcoCapelli74]

Amazing as usual!

[@NeilBensonYamit]

ggreat workkkk, just wow. A one man team

[@MrDebranjandutta]

Great stuff, only the fire seemed unrealistic. can the light sprites be substituted with VDBs without much of a performance hit

[@3dblenderbms]

Very good video 👏

[@PatrickKniesler]

24hrs!? wow! good job

[@socialnetworking4782]

For anything that moves on two feet, never make arms operate with the same foot. That's why the walk animations look funky for the trolls. The arms should be moving forward as the opposite leg does.

[@kings_of_tekken6795]

Just.....thank you 😊

[@vipul3571]

Wd nailed it, they deserve every worth of Penny,

[@THER3ALDUDE]

Amazing Bro!!!!

[@SuperYahoom]

Great work

[@intruderstudio4703]

Hey Man, nice tutorial, I think that at the end you could benefit with more elaborate comp work but still you made it! May I ask you what are your two monitors in the back, I'm looking for that combination but no luck so far. Maybe you could add it affiliate links in the description and benefit a little bit from the info ;)

[@einiyan2000]

Oh man, this looks really good! If you put a bit more time into the character movement, it’ll be 🔥 for me those character movement is little off

[@kelajuan_]

Adding a tiny bit of blur and grain in post, it'll get more photorealistic.

[@Onlygoodsir]

this is great for the short time you did it :) but i feel the fire looks repeated but great video :)

[@Jossy.mp4]

LOL i found the worm 11:13 Amazing work sir :)

[@YourLocalWarGorilla]

where?

[@Jossy.mp4]

@@YourLocalWarGorilla next to the goblin on the left,

[@YourLocalWarGorilla]

@@Jossy.mp4 Thanks dude :)

[@rayanmagneto]

excellent 🔥🔥🔥