Walrus Droppings

5/31/2009 - Avalanche

Here's my finished puppy (The frame was a required part of the entry, by the way.)

Avalanche

5/25/2009 - Alien Doggie sketches

These are some preliminary sketches for a pet contest (aka Dominance War Pet Portrait mini-challenge #2) over at Game Artisans.

sketches #1

The last one is more where I'm heading with it, as the front view speaks more to the "portrait" part of the assignment.

5/13/2009 - Lupus Major - final Dominance War entry

Here are my final pieces for the contest: The required painting , model sheet, concept/WIP sheet, and text description:

4/18/2009 - More progress on the Dominance War entry...

And some sketches of a sidekick:

Doggies!

4/10/2009 - Lupus Major almost complete in 3D

An update on the 3D models that I will paint over for my final concept piece:

Lupus Major front

4/1/2009 - Lupus Major in 3D

As part of my continued exploration of this character, I'm building him out in 3D: It helps me visualize him better, and I'll eventually use the model for overpainting (making sure that I get the perspective on the more technical details correct.)

Lupus Major in 3D

He's not done yet - I have other details to try out, and I still need to capture some of the feeling of my earlier sketches.

3/21/2009 - Mad cyborgs 02

Continued sketch exploration...

3/18/2009 - Mad cyborgs 01

The annual game character competition Dominance War IV has started up. The rules are basically to make a cool character in 2D or 3D, and I'll be entering in the concept art division again this year. robots have been added as a class, so I am working on an insane cyborg, someone combining the killing power of a 'bot with the insane glee of, um, an insane person. Here are my first very rough doodles:

mad cyborgs

3/2/2009 - General Arcturus Fiste

Here's the finished version of the textured 3D model started in the previous post:

General Arcturus Fiste

2/27/2009 - Alien general in progress

'dominance War,' the big annual game character design contest, is almost here and I'm very excited. To get everyone warmed up, they're holding a mini-challenge before the main event, a little 9-day thing that's drawing huge crowds. I plan on entering the main contest in the 2D division (where I placed 14th last year) but as the mini-challenge "doesn't count," I'm entering on the 3D side. The challenge was to take one of 3 existing meshes, not change a thing (but you can add up to 500 tris more geometry) and texture it to look like a military general of some sort. I'm skipping the normal mapping and going right for the hand-painted diffuse map. Here's how it's coming along:

The model and the unwrap:

model and unwrap

Some color tests:

Texturing mostly done except for a lot more dimensionality to add to the face:

mostly textured

For the record, the parts I added to the mesh were the collars and flaps and the hat, and the medals themselves. The chains and the face was what was supplied and immutable. I'll post the final texture soon.

2/14/2009 - Predatoddler

Here's the finished colors. He's actually younger than a toddler, but I liked the pun.

Predatoddler color

In other news, there's a small article in this month's (April?) ImagineFX magazine on me and my 'Escape Plan B' piece, below. Check it out!

2/5/2009 - Predator Baby

Another fun activity at Game Artisans, make a cute baby version of a movie monster. I chose the Predator. Here are some sketches:

sketch 1

(yes, I used my son - or at least his photos - as a model)

2/5/2009 - Brer Rabbit, Kingdom Hearts style

Another recent contest over at Game Artisans: Creating a 3D character in the style of the kingdom Hearts games (including the same specs for the characters too: 3000 triangles and one 512x512 diffuse map. (We were free to use others so I used an alpha also.) Because my blog is all abotu process, not just finals, here are some making-of images:

The model mostly done:

model in progress

The UV Unwrap:

unwrapping

color tests:

And the final layout sheet:

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1/20/2009 - 'Escape Plan B' - final

I finally finished this painting. Thanks for all who gave me comments, I appreciate them!

Escape Plan B

1/12/2009 - 'Escape Plan B'

Hi, everyone! Wow, thanks for the comments on the last post - i think that's the most comments I've ever received on a blog post here! I appreciate the feedback and the "votes" about not using the anime speed lines. Anyhow, here's how the piece is looking now, without them (and a lot of other changes along the way, too!)

Escape Plan B

I'm rather thinking this is finished, but feel free to comment if you see anything else that needs polishing.

To answer the poster who asked about the perspective, most of this scene was mocked-up in 3D before rendering in Photoshop. And when I say "mocked up," i mean I completely built the walking mech, the monocycle, and included rough geometry for the buildings. Who wants to hand-draw all of those gears in proper perspective when the computer can do it all for you? I still painted over everything - this is in no way a 3D render - but it does mean I'm reasonably confident in the proper perspective. I didn't cheat anything to make it work.

Anyhow, thanks for commenting and for dropping by!

1/9/2009 - Steampunk at a (small) crossroads

Well, I'm a lot farther along with this painting, and now I'm just trying to decide between 2 different versions:

version a

Before you scratch your heads playing guessing games, the only difference between the two pieces is the motion lines in the background. Some people have compared my protagonist to Porco Rosso or Mario, so why not complete the Japanese metaphor and add in some good old-fashioned anime speed lines in the background?... Well, maybe because they're really cheesy and not painterly at all? Anyhow, that's why I posted both. Which do YOU think works better?

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1/1/2009 - Steampunk work-in-progress

There's yet another Challenge going on over at CGTalk, and the theme for this one is Steampunk. I am actually a judge for this Challenge and am inelligible to win, but I've been working on a piece for it anyhow, just because it's a fun theme and I like all of the great feedback I get when working on pieces for their contests. Here are some shots of how it's been coming along:

layout sketch

Still tons of detailing to go, but at least it's coming along...!

12/24/2008 - Happy New Year!

A portrait of my son Zachary for the holidays. He's almost two and just loves being naked!

Zachary happy 2009

Happy holidays and a good New Year to you all!