So you are a teacher then? That is pretty cool. What is it like?
What are some of the things (like 3 or more) you wished you knew when you started out 3D modeling? Something for any aspiring 3D artists out there to think about.
Do you have any creations that you would love to share in this thread?
Teaching 3D to a range of students (from 13-19) or higher, can be stressful. But it also extremely rewarding. One of the highlights I done, was getting classes of a bunch of 13 year olds sculpting, they thought they were going to hate 3D because of the usual awful standard teaching, however after a week with me they were sculpting their ideas they had for characters inside Mudbox, it was a pretty amazing sight to see and also to infuse them to carry on with 3D down the road.
And also teaching Pixars Renderman was something special too. When the students saw their creations come out with such realistic shading, and they understood they were using something Pixar uses in their movies, and other studios around the world are using Renderman to create the movies we love, the enthusiasm they were left with was pretty amazing.
When starting, for characters the things to focus, and wish I knew where:
1: Anatomy is a must, any creation even if it's not human has some sort of bases on human anatomy, so studying this will be king, even if it means taking classes where you draw, or sculpt with your actual hands. The real life models and study their form will help you loads in the long run. And of course books that give in-depth views of the human muscles are a must have.
2: Like one, reference is king. You can never have too much, have your second monitor full of images that relate to what you want to create. So for instance, humans have that monitor full of model/human anatomy reference. No matter how long you've been doing this, or how little they will always use reference. No one opens up a program with no images, or drawings of what they want to do.
3: Never be afraid to get feedback, no matter how harsh it is. At first this can always seem scary, because we hate getting negative feedback, it's only natural. However it's the only way we learn too. So making accounts on places like here, polycount, ect. And asking for honest feedback will help you more then anything, even if someone rips the model to shreds, because you can go back and change your model based on that feedback, you can only make something better. Not worse.
4: Don't worry about software wars. If you read online forums it's a battle over software, it's like the whole Xbox one vs PS4 thing, seriously no joke. The thing is with modelling, the skills can be moved around easily. They all work the same, yes some software have tools that are better then others, and also lack some. However they all usually work the same. Once you learn the core modelling skills, you'll be able to jump around most programs at ease, once you work out what software calls its tools. For instance I know: Softimage, Max, Maya, MODO, C4D, and I've done some little Lightwave. They all work alike. So find a package you like, master it. You will be able to transfer the skills. However, Max, Maya, and industry standard, with MODO catching up as it's growing up fast.
Theses are getting old now, and what I could find at hand because all my new stuff is under NDA:
Thank you very much for all of the advice you have given and I saved it up. It is really enlightening. Makes me motivate to at least make a start on this before the end of the year.
Reminds of this:
I feel like this might be something that would be hard for me to overcome but you know I think I have to treat negative criticism as "You are not there yet.".
Yeah, I will never understand that. Software are just tools to make something. Sure, some are more than others and some have features that others have but if it gets the job done and you are comfortable using it, then who cares? A comparison I can bring up would be game engines like Unity, Game Maker, and RPG Maker. Only reason they get undeserved shit on is because many developers who use them are inexperienced/incompotent. The softwares themselves are totally fine and infact some people made great things out ot them.
The Rake character looks cool. Where is it from? Original or derivative?
You should add some fur and claws to the pig man and you will have manbearpig, Al Gore's greatest fear.
Is this your ArtStation by any chance?
Yes it is! I'm very bad at keeping my stuff up to date because most of the time I'm working on things, and of course you're not allowed to show them. That's why in my spare time I'm working on pumping out some more good sculpts of my own. I made a start on another Dragon. However hopefully if all goes well you should see some stuff from me very soon.
And totally agree about the software wars. As long as it gets the job done in a timely fashion that's all what matters. Even though of course we're all going to have our own personal favourites. But it isn't life or death, as you'd think with some of the users treat their software.
Also the original concept was done by Robotpencil, he's an amazing artist if you google his stuff.
Yeah, I totally understand about NDA. How often do you have time to sculpt in your own free time? Do you have many clients? Also, how is freelance treating you in your experience in terms of clients? I've heard horror stories but never any good stories.
Robotpencil as in Anthony Jones? I found these three pages that might relate:
Site, Portfolio, DeviantArt, Artstation
One more thing to end the software wars talk, I recently watched a video on an introduction to computer graphics by Andrew Price (BlenderGuru) and one of the things he talks about when starting out is how it doesn't matter which software you choose, the fact there is no 'industry standard' as many studios use different software for different purposes whether it may be commercially available like Zbrush, Maya or in-house proprietary like Pixar's Marionette or Dreamworks' Apollo. Studios look for applicants that have strong art foundations and usually train the applicants the software they use in a few weeks.
Video in question (2:12-3:31): https://youtu.be/VT5oZndzj68?t=2m12s
I'll watch the DOOM one instead of Naughty Dog because demons are more interesting and I do not feel like watching 3 hours of footage.
That is true, it's a very daunting thing because once a contract is done, and finished you don't know if another job will come in straight after. So in return it's very stressful, however freelance for me is usually only a part time thing to add extra to the pay when I have some free time. I don't depend on it like I used to when I didn't have to worry about commitments. You do build up somewhat of a client base, and as long as you can keep up with their demands they do tend to come back to you, because usually they like working with someone who they've worked with before, and know can do the work. However the sad truth is there just isn't work sometimes. And also I only roughly have about an hour, or two on a good day to do my own work right now.. But that will probably change soon; you'll probably see some stuff popping up from me.
This one is rather subjective to the area you want to focus on. So for instance Marionette is actually Pixar's in-house animation software, so it only has one use however their back end is actually Maya. They're actually a huge contributor to Autodesk Maya, it's why it has most of Pixars tech integrated into it. Such as Ptex, and OpenSubDiv. And they open source it too, what is awesome. And then of course Pixar Renderman itself is a very heavy in-built Maya tool; also they're probably the only reason we actually have a Linux version of Maya. Usually studios will built pipelines around the software, and will edit it as needed. I've seen some version of Maya that dose not even look like Maya because it's been edited to such a degree. But the core modelling, UV, and animation tools tend to stay the same, or work like one another.. just with faster shortcuts.
However it's rather rare they have their own actual modelling software or sculpting software. Even though there has been cases of software created for projects, such as Mudbox for Lord of the Rings, and Mari for Avatar, then they were brought by companies and pushed to the masses.
Also things like: Arnold, Mental Ray, Render man, ect they're all renders they're not actually standalone pieces of software. So pretty much plugins for Maya, Max, Softimage, ect.
So even so yes, that video is correct to a degree, it's going to depend on what you're actually going to do because you can't dump all 3D software together, because they all do different things, and have different career paths.
That goes for all careers too, you need to always evolve and adapt, and be willing to learn even if it's some half horrible program that a bunch of programmers made with a horrible UI, but it works and dose it's job... you still gotta be willing to learn it. With studios too, they're very organic their pipelines and workflows change constantly depending on new software and tech they get.
If you look at job listings with required software understanding you'll see a common theme. Like with games for instance:
Maya, Max, Photoshop, Substance Painter, Substance Designer, Marvelous Designer, Zbrush.
Thank you for clarifying the software issue. Didn't know Pixar makes contributions to Maya. I thought that being with Disney and how wealthy and successful the company is, they would want to make their own tools to create the things they want but if someone else can provide the tools to do that for them, then I guess it is not necessary then.
Yup! Pixar makes fantastic movies, and they're also a huge technology contributor in the 3D and VFX space, it's why Renderman is pretty much used for all the movies, and their tech is integrated into a lot of packages.
https://renderman.pixar.com/view/movies-and-awards
http://graphics.pixar.com/opensubdiv/docs/intro.html
https://vimeo.com/70600180 <--- Maya in action, Pixar.
