Creating Fantasy Environment Concept Art: Tips & Tricks

Crafting the perfect fantasy environment isn’t just about adding dragons or castles; it’s about creating atmosphere, mood, and telling a compelling visual story through design. Achieving this requires intentional design choices at every step.

Fantasy worlds are a commonly used theme for video games, movies and books, and world-building is a crucial part of creating immersive experiences. Whether it’s the sprawling landscapes of The Lord of the Rings or the mythological setting of God of War: Ragnarok, environment concept art is the first step to bringing these worlds to life. It serves as a guide for 3D Environment Artists and the wider team who will later be bringing these scenes to life in full detail. Without concept art, development can experience challenges, such as unanswered questions, misaligned visuals, and longer production times.

Creating convincing and original environments, however, is no easy task. Artists often face the challenge of balancing cohesive and believable designs with imaginative elements. They have to ground fantastical places into recognizable reality by blending the familiar with the unknown which gives the viewer a reference point to understand the world, while giving it a unique twist.

In this blog, our experienced concept artist, Eliott Bon will guide you through tips, tricks, and techniques to help you create stunning, storytelling-filled fantasy environments. From architectural details and lighting, to layering details, to textures, and color palettes, we’ll cover the steps we take to help you create your own environments that feel unique, believable and immersive.

Brief & References

Gathering references is an important step to creating concept art, and it can help inform a lot of your design.

"When you first get a brief, you may have a few references or hundreds - it always depends but I will always gather additional references in response to the brief. It helps as well to imagine a story to go along with your brief, as it will help to add a storytelling layer.

My Art Director provided this description in the brief: “The medieval dock bustles with activity as sailors unload cargo, merchants haggle over goods, and dockworkers haul crates onto carts. The air is filled with the scent of fish and sea salt, while ships creak against the wharves and seagulls circle above.”

When I start a project, gathering references is my first step, and I prefer using PureRef for assembling a cohesive board, though Adobe Photoshop works well too. My goal is to build a mood board that pulls from diverse mediums such as old master paintings and movie stills to real-world landscapes and nature.

Finding references is like going on a discovery mission. I’m on the lookout for anything that captures my attention, whether it’s a unique lighting scenario, a striking color scheme, or a captivating composition. Inspiration can come from almost anywhere, and assembling these elements helps me solidify the visual direction for the project before I even begin to put pen to tablet screen.

References can help establish crucial details such as the color palette, mood, style, and even storytelling elements. They provide ideas for props and scene details, showing me how intricate the scene might need to look to be authentic and sell the story.

Throughout this part, I aim to stay open-minded and creative, blending my personal tastes and experiences with the gathered references. Sometimes, that means taking the lighting from a movie still and pairing it with the composition from an old painting. This mix-and-match approach is a great way to brainstorm and keep ideas flowing.

For this particular project, I knew early on that I wanted a cityscape vibe, a scene that captured a small, but busy part of a much larger world.

Having a solid reference board ensures cohesive visual language across the project. In this case, the brief for the harbor scene was straightforward, allowing me the creative freedom to explore within the medieval theme. That said, the level of freedom can vary widely from project to project; some have tight constraints, while others allow a lot of flexibility."

Some of the details in the references that inspired me.

Using 3D Modeling for Sketching

Always aim for 2 - 3 sketches to show to your Art Director or client to give them options to choose from.

"Depending on the project, the creative process may vary - sometimes starting with 2D sketches, while other times jumping straight into 3D modeling. I always create 2 – 3 different sketches or compositional ideas to present to the art director or client, and for this particular project, I anticipated that the scene could become quite busy with the number of characters and storytelling elements that it will need, so I chose to dive directly into 3D to rapidly explore ideas.

Using 3D modeling tools like ZBrush, 3D-Coat, and Blender can be a great way to save time when experimenting with lighting, composition, and perspective. These tools also help achieve the textures and scale necessary to make the scene feel believable and grounded.

When working with 3D, I always place a character in the scene early on to make sure the scaling of objects and structures is accurate. With a mix of custom-modeled assets, kitbash elements, and lighting experimentation, I begin roughing out the scene and searching for an interesting composition. Sometimes, I have a clear composition in mind and work towards it immediately, other times I move around the 3D scene to find a fresh angle that resonates with the story. For this harbor scene, I ultimately chose a composition closer to ground level, which immerses the viewer in the bustling activity of the docks."

With feedback from the Art Director, we are able to tweak the camera and composition of this option to show more of the scene and storytelling moments.

Pushing The Storytelling

"Once I was satisfied with the sketching phase and settled on a direction, I began refining my initial sketch, developing it into a more polished piece. I’m always open to enhancing or exaggerating the original composition if it helps create a more cohesive and visually engaging image.

Throughout this process, I keep my references close by, continually seeking inspiration for interesting design elements that could add depth. Storytelling is at the heart of environment design, and as I refine my ideas, I think carefully about how each design element can contribute to the narrative. From architectural details and material textures to mood and props, every decision should reinforce the story you want to convey. For this scene, my goal was to depict a lively harbor filled with side stories, details, and activity.

With the composition coming together, I start establishing a color palette. Using references as a guide, I can quickly hone in on colors that support the atmosphere and story I want to tell.

Character interaction within the scene is crucial as well, as it brings the environment to life. I want people to appear as though they’re interacting with each other and their surroundings, making the scene feel dynamic and bustling. The characters themselves need to feel cohesive within the environment. For this project, I used 3DProp Store assets, which allowed me to quickly populate the scene without needing to design each character from scratch. In some projects, creating unique characters is essential, but sometimes you can blend existing assets with custom elements. In this scene, for instance, background characters are more generic, while any foreground elements are crafted to draw attention.

Ultimately, the focus here was on communicating the busyness and layout of the dock rather than getting caught up in detailed character modeling. This approach kept the emphasis on the environment’s story and atmosphere."

The addition of characters adds little storytelling moments to the scene, and helps it feel more alive.

Importance of Lighting

Lighting is part of a good design too. Try different lighting setups to see which is the best for the story you are trying to tell.

"Lighting plays a crucial role in the design and storytelling of an image. It sets the mood, guiding viewers to feel emotions like worry, sadness, happiness, or tension within the environment. For instance, if you changed Mordor from The Lord of the Rings from its iconic dark overcast skies to blue skies and bright lighting, it would lose that ominous, foreboding atmosphere essential to its impact.

My goal with lighting is to find the best way to highlight shapes and reinforce the composition while conveying the desired emotion. For this scene, a daylight setting felt like the best option to get across the busyness of the harbor. Within that daylight scenario, I experimented with several variations to find the right angle and intensity.

To push the depth, I focused on pushing the light and shadow contrast between the foreground and background, ensuring that each element stands out and conveys distance clearly.

I typically refine values and colors later in Photoshop, where I have finer control and can see the full effect on the image.

Additionally, Blender’s Compositor is a helpful tool for enhancing lighting directly, without having to adjust physical lights, allowing for quick adjustments that improve overall composition and mood."

The final output from Blender, without characters present.

Time to Polish

The final render pass from Blender, ready to overpaint and push further.

"Once I’m satisfied with the scene in Blender, I start rendering and typically export several passes that I take into Adobe Photoshop.

The mist pass is one I rely on heavily in Photoshop, as it allows me to fine-tune the atmosphere, adding depth and improving readability across the image. I also use a clown pass, which makes selecting individual 3D elements easier and allows for more control over adjustments.

Additionally, I render a composite pass directly from Blender. I find that using Blender’s compositing nodes as an initial post-processing step provides a polished starting point before moving into Photoshop.

The mist pass on the left, and the clown pass on the right are useful passes to export from Blender to give you greater control over your image.

In Photoshop, my primary focus is to finalize the image by enhancing mood, refining details, and correcting any areas that need improvement. Depending on the project timeline and the goal, this step can be as brief or as extensive as needed. In this case, I applied some color corrections and aimed for a cinematic feel. For personal work, I might go further, adding brushstrokes and overpainting to push shapes or textures, depending on the brief and personal style."

Final Thoughts

"Environment design draws on a range of skills, requiring careful consideration of each element’s impact on story and composition. Every project and concept can be achieved through different methods; every artist has their own strengths and workflow preferences. While 3D is a vital tool in today’s industry, understanding fundamentals like lighting, storytelling, color theory, and composition is equally important for crafting compelling scenes.

Lastly, feedback is invaluable. Whether it’s from an art director on a client project or art friends for personal work, getting another perspective on your work can be key to growth and improvement. Collaboration and constructive critique are essential parts of a concept artists journey.

Thanks for reading!"

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The Final Concept

Creating environment concept art that is filled with storytelling moments, from the tiniest detail to the largest element is a hard task, but our concept art team have years of experience in providing concept art services to some of the top video games in the industry.

If you’re looking to create unforgettable environments, our concept art studio is ready to bring your vision to life with exceptional design, emotion, and storytelling. Discover how our team can help today!