Joe Baker “C” Tribute - Light Variant

Higher quality versions: G+ | Ello | 2x @ Dribbble | 960x960 @ Imgur.

A little while ago, I saw a design by Joe Baker on Dribbble simply titled “C”. Its atmosphere and materials were so simple, so clean, so beautiful - I just had to make an attempt to recreate it myself, but moving. This animation was the result.

As ‘simple’ as the output for this tribute appears though, it took an abnormally high number of iterations to work it into the polished state that you see here. For many of its iterations, I was fixated on the idea of adding a minimal grid to try and add some sense of “ground plane” to which the viewer could relate while the camera moved around and shifted focus in the scene. I was also fixated on the idea of having more sporadic changes for both the motion and the focus depth of the camera - which were initially a pretty cool effect, were never quite satisfactory in their timing. The timing was so hard to get right, I had to extend this animation from my standard choice of 48 frames to 96 frames, which also cost me twice the render time per iteration. Fun fact: 100% of the particle motion in this design was accomplished through camera movement only.

Along the many iterations on this design, I accidentally broke the primary glass material in the most beautiful way - which also paved the way to a dark variation on this design which I will post next.I’ll call that material “Black Cherry”, and you’ll see why when I post it, because it’s freaking hot.

I’ve posted a gallery of the iterations on this design on Imgur, so you can see how some ideas came and went through the iterations on the design. I know that I always enjoy studying the processes of other designers, so it would be cool to to know what you think of my process too! :)

Anyway, shout-out to Joe Baker, who created the original design which inspired me. Thank you for your work - this has be an incredibly satisfying idea to play with. :)