In this latest blog we want to talk about stylisation of architectural visualisations, focusing specifically on how we emulate watercolour painting techniques to create softer, more sympathetic images that traditional CGI’s don’t always offer.
Recently we’ve been perfecting a method, in which we can take our finalised CGI’s, and apply post-production techniques to create images with a real likeness to watercolour paintings.
CGI Before Conversion
CGI After Conversion
You can see in the images above the differences between the watercolour styled CGI, and it’s original render. Foremost a lot of the smaller detail gets hidden. For example, the colour and definition in the trees has been reduced to just several shades of green and yellows. Similarly in the brickwork you can no longer see every single element yet still retain the impression of brick. Overall the image is much lighter and atmospheric, yet all this comes from the same image as the traditional CGI.
Why is this important? Well below we’re going to give several reasons why creating watercolours from conventional CGI’s has it’s advantages.
Easy to amend (just like a CGI)
Firstly, watercolours, which have been created using CGI’s, can be amended just as easily as a CGI. This can be a huge advantage for clients. Amending watercolour paintings can be painstakingly hard and time consuming. Perhaps a view needs moving slightly, or the brick bond has changed, maybe trees need adding or the planting specification has been completely revised.
As you’d expect, making these same amendments to watercolours which have been created from CGI’s takes a fraction of the time one would need with a hand-painted watercolours.
More Sympathetic
Secondly, when a building proposal is at the planning stage, watercolour CGIs help immensely, as it allows the planning officers, and committee members to see the project in context and how it may, or may not, fit in with the surroundings. However, a lot of the time a CGI may come across looking too finalised, or having no freedom for change.
This can deter planning officers if they feel there is no scope for change or compromise with a scheme’s design proposals. Sometimes people tend to focus too much on minor, potentially insignificant details, that in the greater scheme of things, play a small role on the impact of the project. Watercolour CGI’s avoid this by shifting the focus back to the overall impression of the proposals, rather than smaller details.
Double the value (CGI & Watercolour version is provided)
Last but not least, due to the process of creating a CGI, and then converting this to a watercolour; once the project has gone through planning successfully, and the watercolours have fulfilled their role, the CGI’s can be used for the sales & marketing literature. They will have already been produced in order to create the watercolours at planning stage. There is a massive saving in time and production costs.
Overall, we have found that creating watercolours from CGI’s is proving very popular, especially when they are difficult to distinguish from traditional hand-painted watercolours. They have all of the benefits, and none of the restrictions, but look just as pleasing.