chick4

I've been very busy lately looking for a new job, and I've been neglecting to post again. I'm trying to update this thing regularly. Anyway I never did post the final mock up of that girl I was working on at work. Here she is sans hair and shoes, which were done by someone else. If this project gets picked up there would be some changes I would like to make to the model, but there are always changes I would like to make.

Oh ya I also had to make her smile. All clients seem to want to see their characters with a smile. Normally you don't want any expression on their face, you want a clean base on which to animate. This means I model two heads for every person an expressionless one for us and a smiley one for them. The smile does become a shape we can use in the animation, so it's not a total loss.

She's so trendy it hurts.

chick3

I haven't worked on her much the past few days. Just a version with bumpmaps, still needs work on the hands. She could also use a shoe donation to hide those hideous block feet of hers.

chick2

hoodie mostly done today.

she's all the rage

A character I'm modeling at work. Don't ask who it is I'm too embarrassed to say, but I think it's coming along. I also just finished putting together a new reel, I plan to post it somewhere soon, along with some stills.

1940's car finished

Finally its done, my first TF2 model. It can be found here. Now I just need to figure out what I'm doing next.

Mr. Equator

Here is a painting I had been working on last year, and just submitted to the Ballistic Publishing contest to be published in their next book. There are a lot of great artists entering, so I know the competition is tough but I still have to try and get in. I was really experimenting with coloring skin that looks like it has some substance and flesh to it. I think it came out good for a first try. I think there are some things I would do differently the next time. The hair still bugs me. I also put up a WIP image showing Mr. Eguator at different stages of completion.

normals are anything but

Here is the latest car model for TF2. Everything is working except when I add the normals to the mis it messes up my textures. The car turns all black in color but retains the reflections, which are now smother because they have the normal information. Ah well, it's a leaning experience.

finally

After several days of looking at tutorials and the valve developers community I finally have a working model from xsi into valve hammer. WHOO! now i can sleep without having those horrible nightmares about the valve sdk file system sucking. It finally makes some sort of sick sense. Now I just need to finish the model.

quick photoshop practice

Some doodles I did to warm up, and try out some new color combinations.

I hate Valve for making such great games.

Its been a long few months, and I left this blog slowly die, but I want to continue with this and try to bring it back to life even if I don't update very often. So I'll slowly add some files of what I've been working on. Team Fortress 2 has been one of the contributers to my loss of time. So here is a TF2 1940's car model I am working on for mod levels.

Images will be up tonight.

I'm in the tubes

I started up a youtube account here.

JTheory0

I still have yet to get a high quality video up. The documentation out there is not helping as much as I had hoped.

I think this boy's cheese has done slid off his cracker

I was doing a lot of boring very noncreative promo stuff at work. Even though I had an interest in architecture as a kid I really don’t like to do schematics and practical industrial design. Having to make changes to an object solely on the fact that some dumb unmonitored child might get stuck, loose and eye, or otherwise injure themselves in a way that might cause reason for a lawsuit, and then they complain that the ride looks stupid, drives me crazy. I’m more of a let Darwin work his magic kind of a guy. Anyway I needed something interesting to do before I went nuttier than an acorn, so I took and hour to do this. I didn’t think anything would come of this break from madness, but turns out it was good enough to post.

I’ll sleep when I’m dead

I find it strange that after a very long day at work I find I can have the most energy. I also find that I can be my most creative late at night while by body relaxes the days problems fade away and my mind is left to imagine and create. Here are some of those late night drawings from the past two days. I tend to draw with very clean lines, a byproduct of thinking I needed a backup plan as an architect if this whole animation thing never worked out. Because of this I was taught that neatness can count for as much as accuracy. I’m not sure if this is totally a bad thing, but I try to loosen up my drawings sometimes because I know that can be just as rewarding. These images are evidence of that fact. I hope I have learned something new today.

john out

The inspiration that is Ridley Scott

So I’ve been watching a lot of aliens recently, the first movie being my all time favorite science fiction/horror movie. Anyway I really love how the alien is always lying in wait for someone, and then slowly unfolds itself. Then proceeds to destroy all who are in it’s path, assuming their name is not Ripley. Also for those unawares a second alien vs. predator is in the works, and I just got over the trauma of the first. Heaven help us.

john

something old, something new, something blue

I am terrible at updates.I have a lot of personal projects in the works and have little to show for it right now, so i dug up an old piece. This head you may remember from an earlier post where I put up the flat shaded model. I actually textured this a long time ago but was not entirely happy with it, I planed to rework it but never did. I think the eyes still need a bit of work. Anyway I decided to post it anyway. The new piece isn't all that new. Red guy here is some photoshop over an old sketch. I think someone stole his waffles, and you know you should always eat a balanced breakfast. I've been reading a lot of Batman lately, and well, Catwoman is hot. This is actually more like a cos-player with more lifelike proportions, as apposed to how she appears in the comics. Jim Lee is the man!

fig. 0107

Just doing a little coloring practice on a sketch from last weekends figure drawing. I like to photoshop in colors which resemble red conte, I'm not sure why.

stupid 23 degree axis

I hope everyone is staying warm as the cold winds blow in.

pillheads

So it's been a while since i updated this thing. I've been very busy lately with work, but i wanted to at least post some sketches. The spacemen are ideas for a character in a game we are working on at work, i kind of liked the short out of shape guy but he was not ultimately chosen. The heads are some practice on the shapes of the cheeks. The last few guys were people on the train, the pill heads came from just trying something wacky.

Halloween

So this second piece (pumpkin patch) did not come out quite as well as I intended so I decided to post the sketches to see where I went wrong. Maybe I need a bunch of bats in the air or something cheesy. The second is because I know some people who hate candy corn, and I can't imagine why. Well anyway i hope everyone has a happy Halloween!

creature 001

I dropped some doodles on the train a couple weeks ago. I switch between reading and drawing on the train depending on how awake I happen to be that particular morning. I am currently finishing The Historian, which is an excellent book, although a little slow in the middle. One thing I always come back to in my drawings is creatures. I was recently at the aquarium where they had a special exhibit on lizards, the focus being the Komodo dragon. It was amazing to see this guy up close. I think I could have easily taken down anyone in the room. Many of the smaller lizards were very interesting too, the reference photos I took have proven to be very valuable. I am also posting this because the doodle was interesting enough for me to take into 3D. This is my first attempt at using Z-Brush. The lower image is what I brought into Z-Brush, and the top is after. For those who don’t know Z-Brush allows artists to sculpt their 3D characters in the way you would sculpt clay. It’s built to support a very high level of detail, and is becoming a very common program in the industry because of its ease of use and artist friendly workflow. Oh and lego star wars 2 Rocks!