Study: what is ? Cover Art
This render is a personal study where I recreated the cover art from the “what is ?” YouTube channel. The original image uses a floating cocktail, bold lighting, and heavy film grain. I wanted to recreate the mood and composition using only Blender; without relying on AI or external effects to test my lighting, materials, and composition control inside a purely 3D workflow.
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problem
The reference had a very specific mood that’s difficult to replicate without relying on AI or photographic randomness. The floating glass, the tilted angle, the suspended cherry, and the gradient background all create a surreal but controlled scene. The challenge was to recreate that same feeling in a physically grounded 3D environment without losing the tension and simplicity that makes the image work.
solution
I rebuilt the scene from scratch in Blender, keeping the models simple and focusing mainly on lighting, framing, and the overall mood. Tilting the glass, spacing the ice cubes intentionally, and placing the cherry just above the rim helped preserve the surreal composition of the original. The environment gradient and final grain pass completed the analog-style look. The final render captures the atmosphere of the reference while remaining clearly a deliberate 3D piece.
The cover art from “what is ?” caught my attention because it looked both effortless and intentional, the kind of image that feels like a memory instead of a render. Rebuilding it forced me to slow down and study why the composition works—how the tilt adds tension, how the light cuts across the glass, how the grain softens the digital edges. It was less about accuracy and more about understanding how mood is constructed. Even with a simple setup, the scene carries weight when every choice supports the atmosphere.
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see also
