Hi everyone. In this video, we're going to talk about environment design. As we've seen in our previous video, a good design or good composition is a combination of unity and variety. I actually separated a few shapes here which already brings me some variety so I can make a good composition by combining and changing this forms around. So, let's get started. I'll begin with this platform shape by using the free transform and let's change the size and shape of it by Ctrl T and let's use a couple of those and remember, we have variety in our shapes but what's going to bring unity is the repetition of shapes and by repetition, I don't mean to have the same shapes over and over. Actually, we can have variations of this shapes but as long as they have the same characteristics such as the same straight vertical lines, the same cuts in the corners, the same overall shape, we can have a lot of unity. So, let's combine these two actually to make a different shape but one which still retains the same characteristics of the basic platform shape and notice that what makes our design interesting is not only a repetition of the shapes but also changing the space between the shapes creates an interesting design because it creates an interesting rhythm. Let's accept the transformation and now let's place one last bit of the platform here on the corner of our frame, so as it works as a transition to another possible screen. So, let's repeat the same procedure, transform it, and well pretty much this makes our foreground elements or foreground platforms. Let's just trim what we don't need here. Let's keep our image as clean as possible. Now, let's make a group with the platforms and let's rename the group foreground platforms. And now, let's repeat the same procedure with the second level of mountains. The second layer actually which will be our middle ground. So, duplicate the shape of the mountain and remember you can place this mountain wherever you want. Let's just change the shape a little bit and let's flip horizontal. So we can have a mirrored image of the mountain which serves as a good entry point for the screen. Let's repeat the procedure, duplicate the mountain, and let's transform it. Remember, variety, shapes, and size, and angles all this creates interests in your composition. Let's accept it and let's place the other one. Just remember to duplicate the shape which I just forgot. So Ctrl J and let's place this one in the middle and we can keep the shape as it is so we have a variety of heights and shapes in our middle ground. Let's just trim again what we don't need. So make a selection with the right layer selected and hit Delete and let's do it with this other side here so we can keep our frame as clean as possible and again let's make a group with our middle ground mountains. Let's rename this group mountains middle ground, mg, and let's accept it. And now let's repeat the same procedure with the background mountains. So we've copied a basic shape and replace this shape behind the middle ground mountains and it also helps us with the sense of scale because whenever you have an object in the background which is bigger than whatever is in front of it, it looks massive, it looks like giant rock formations. So it's a pretty good way to convey scale okay so let's keep adding shapes and you can see that here I'm duplicating the shape pretty much as I did with the platforms in the foreground and this creates a visual pattern which is good for unity and now I'm mimicking the shape of the rock in the middle ground on the left. You can see that it's pretty much the same angle and again it creates unity and that's it for our background rocks. So let's create a group with all the shapes and rename it to mountains background. So, let's write mountains background, bkg, and let's move on to our next shape which is the bush. So, I'm going to have to move the layer to be behind the foreground but in front of the middle ground. So let's resize it and you can see that now I'm incorporating an organic element inside a pretty geometric composition of shapes. So, it creates another level of variety. We had variety because we had like rectangular and triangular shapes with different sizes and angles but now we have something which is more organic with curves which we didn't have before. So, this brings variety but as we need unity we need to repeat this shape as much and as wisely as possible. So, let's move our bushes in front of the middle ground and of course behind the background and again different sizes and shapes and placement so we have different intervals between shapes. Let's put this on the right side of this platform. And you can see that just by overlapping these shapes, we have a great sense of depth already without too much effort. So, we have these bushes already composing our image and let's create something more interesting here which is a sky. So, we can pretty much darken a little bit the background behind the shapes, let's place it behind the background and let's darken it just a little bit. Now, it just got even more depth and let's duplicate our bush shape and bring it behind the background in front of the sky. Let's place it and resize it so it looks as a cloud. So, you can see that we bring unity by repeating shapes. I mean, it's the same basic shape we just copied that shape and we are now resizing it and of course, we are going to change the color so we can have white cloud lighter than sky, yes, just a little bit and let's click OK and let's create another one but this time, let's place this other one in front of the background. I think it's going to be cool to have this layer of cloud going in between the mountains. So, let's move this up a little bit and look at this, we have now a lot of depth, a lot of overlapping shapes with different angles, different configurations, but also a lot of unity because we have repetition everywhere. Let's trim whatever we don't want and there we go and now we have a beautifully designed environment by using only four shapes and applying the principles of unity and variety. So, study these principles and apply them to your compositions and you'll see that the possibilities are endless. So, thanks for watching and I see you all in the next video.
