Quadruped Zbrush Sculpt

I have a love/hate relationship with Zbrush. When you can really enter a zen like state and just sculpt, it is amazing. And then without warning, it crashes. Then you get back into the groove, and it decides that rendering really means washing out all the colors you just polypainted for the last several hours.

However, the end result is something I am proud of. This is the first quadruped I have made in 3d. It is also only my 2nd real Zbrush sculpt (the first being a human). I have learned a lot about the program, but I have the feeling there is a lot more, and with that knowledge hopefully less hate and more love. 

Mind the Gap

Mind the Gap from Stephanie Keene on Vimeo.

This is the second assignment for my animation class. The Character had to deal with a "gap" of some kind. This is an amazing class with a great teacher. I am learning a lot very quickly, which means I will probably hate this animation very soon when I realize how good it is or isnt. Today, however, I like it!

Environment Concept

For class I was asked to paint a Look and Feel for my environment. I took a default render of my high poly scene and painted over it. In a class last year a teacher told me that designing your lighting is very important, it doesn't have to accurate, it has to lead the eye correctly. (it does however, have to be accurate enough so that people believe it)

The next step will be to texture and light the scene in Maya. I really hope that I can get it to feel this same way. It's a melancholy scene about a forgotten man who has died. The paper on the desk is his will. I am worried that it won't be quite obvious enough. However, I do want to keep the scene simple - more haunting than morbid.

Zero Engine Texture Work

I spent about a month this summer doing contract work on the Zero Engine. My task: create some tile-able textures. Preferably some with emissive maps. That is all the instruction I was given.

How does one show tile-able textures in a portfolio? They are inherently not that interesting out of context. Do you put the diffuse, specular, normal, and emissive maps in -- or just the render? I really have no idea.  I think it took me longer to decide I was just gonna show just the render than it did to paint some of the textures.

 

I had more trouble than I was expecting with inspiration. I love texturing, but with no real direction inspiration can easily wane. I started by making lists of textures I wanted to create. They really needed a bit of everything. I separated them into categories -- metal, plastic, concrete etc. Looked up some reference and got to work! 

These are not all of the textures I made, but they are my favorite and/or some of the most interesting. A few of them are intended as sets. I really hope I get to do more work like this in the future, texturing is kinda my favorite!

Annecto

I worked on an XBOX Live indie title that has finally been released!

Annecto

Its official release date was 8/4/2011. It was an amazing experience. As the only artist on the team it really makes a difference how close you get to work with the programmers. On the other hand, I definitely wish there had been another person I could have asked about some things. Programmers just do not think the same way.

I learned so many lessons on this project. Such as the need of proper naming conventions. You might not think they are important if you are the only one using them - but this is not true! Finding a 2 month old file to edit is not easy when you haven't organized things properly. Also, I did all of the work on this project before I took any 3D classes. This means I did some really dumb things. Do not ask me what the poly count is for the background... Lets just be thankful it's pre-rendered!

I am very proud of this project. Working form start to finish on a title is something everyone (who wants to work in the industry) should try. Starting small really gives perspective on AAA titles. Going through months of play testing and forgetting that it is a fun game to begin with... well, you just have to keep going. I played so much multi-player that I had forgotten how meditative the game was in single player.

We already were reviewed by a game review blog: Gear Fish. We were their "Catch of the Week"

While I know that most indie games don't really go far, I am extremely proud to have worked on this one. Go team ohfourhundred!

3d Render of Braedan

Here is a first pass at texturing for Braedan.

She is an albino evil elf. (Things that live underground usually lack pigment as they do not have contact with the sun... they are often also blind.)

I am definitely going to be updating her as I can already see some flaws in the normal map. Creating her has been a very fun. I will probably be adding her process work soon.

Finished Background Painting

As spring break is now upon us I may have some free time to upload this blog and do some art for myself. Until then here is a follow up to my last post.

Final Background Painting

I got most of my inspiration for my animation background from  Lou Romano. He uses a lot more texture which I am going to try and incorporate if I do another pass on this. I loved his concept work on UP!

Some Process Work to Start

When creating this blog I thought long and hard on what to call it. After many failed attempts (blogger is saturated with names that are taken but unused!) I came upon this: art.process.mind. 

Process and Art go hand-in-hand. I added Mind as I am sure my opinion will find its way into these posts, although you are not likely to care about it.

This is some process work for my 2D animation project.

I really like the way these color comps came out. I am currently going through a second pass on them so that the characters really stand out. The final background painting is sure to follow.