Networking|PPP

During this year I've decided to push myself more and get out there, to the wild world of concept art and animation. I was publishing my work on forums and websites before, but never really paid much attention to it. However, since I've joined college, started taking it more seriously. I've started publishing my work often, joined few facebook groups and behance. Since then, I got lot of nice feedback and met many talented artists, who works already in the industry. I've also got myself twitter account which bean also very helpful, although not many people follow me there.
The plan for summer is to improve my drawing skills as well as to do more animations. I'm planning on creating YouTube channel for my short 2D animations (that will be called 'few seconds animated' ;)). Summer definitely will be a busy period, filled with many exciting projects. For next year I'm hoping to get better at time management and make more quality work that I can add to my portfolio.

2D animation experiments|PPP

2D animation is one of the things I want to do practice more over the summer. I had done few, very basic tests, below is one I did for PPP Reflect presentation:

It is only 24 frames, 8fps. I really enjoyed creating it, but wish I could have more time for creating it. I'm going to visit tutorial websites and learn AfterEffects more since it have many great tools and features.

Transformers Trilogy|PPP

Transformers trilogy is a series of action movies based on popular toy line, directed by Michael Bay and released in 2007, 2009 and 2011. All three movies were massive box office hits.

Although being very successful and lucrative productions, story line is really weak and simple. However, I think it's visuals that attract most viewers. Personally I like to re-watch those movies from time to time, just to see amazing robot animations that those VFX guys did. Getting more familiar with 3D software made me appreciate the work those people did even more, as it's very difficult and time consuming task. Also robots re-desings are very interesting and fresh, with great amount of little moving details.  

polish concept artists|PPP

In this post I'll present few of polish concept artists (follow up to the post about polish animators).

Artur Sadlos - is a concept artist, who worked on projects like: Dead Island,  Call of Jaruez , The Witcher.

What I really like about his work is the amount of  little details he puts in, as well as cartoon-y feel of the illustrations. Bright colours and bold brush strokes are best visible in his personal work, although there're traces of them in his professional work.

Maciej Kuciara - is well known from working for Naughty Dogs (Uncharted,  The Last of Us)

Kuciara blends photo textures extremely well in his work, both professional and personal. The quality of published artwork is great, very realistic.

Marek Okon - currently works for Naughty Dogs (The Last of Us), but also did some work for Crysis and many magazines.

His work is very dynamic, full of little flying particles and crazy explosions; mostly sci-fi or fantasy settings.

Ikuko Itoh|PPP

Ikuko Itoh is a Japanese animator and character designer, mostly known from the work on Princess Tutu and Sailor Moon. I believe it's good to know work of animators from different countries and styles.

Her animations are always very expressive, well - timed and beautiful. Same goes to characters. It is very easy to see, when comparing different seasons of Sailor Moon, as there was many different animators working. Episodes that she mostly worked on have characters very expressive and fluid, with amazing little details and emotions.

Lois van Baarle|PPP

 Lois van Baarle is the freelance artist and animator, with unique sstyle based in Netherlands. I've been fan of her work for good few years and seeing her journey is very inspiring.

I've came across Lois work first through her deviantart account. Her styled changed slightly, techniques improved, but alway had the same 'feel'. I particulary like the line quality - thick and bold, very expressive, dynamic. Also colours are very bright and vivid. One of her favourite theme to draw are pin-u girls.

Lois worked on many projects, drawn graphics for games, graphic novels, did some animations. As she kept publishing a lot of her artwork online, unfortunately she had to deal with a lot of copyright fraud. It must be very difficult to deal with companies based in, for example, China. Luckily her followers are usually happy to help with law issues (how to get a lawyer, basic copyright laws) as well as reporting artwork theft (some of her work was used on sweater and other products).

Atomhawk Design|PPP

Atomahawk Design is a visual design studio based in Newcastle, UK. Their specilise in delivering interface and motion graphics for games, film and online entertainment industries.

Some of the projects their worked on: Dead Island, Doctor Who, Enslaved, Pottermore, Wheelman. I've came across this studio thanks to Charlie Bowater, as she is one of the concept artists. Moreover, Atomhawk is trying the Kickstarter platform to crowd-fund their game project: The Realm. I've blogged a little bit more about this amazing project during game module. Futhermore, there is a very good artcile on guardian website.

Their portfolio of work is very rich and interesting. Projects have different styles, from realistic to cartoon-y. Since I'm considering concept art as my future path, it's good to know about many different studios based in UK.

Templum Magazine Feature|PPP

Last February one of my traditional pieces was featured in issue 5 of digital Templum magazine.

Memory of Seashells was created during my time in Access course, for Memory brief. I've used range of different media to produce this piece, which include more organic materials, like sea salt and coffee.
As I want to break into creative industry, getting artwork published in a magazine is very important, since it's able to reach to wider audience.
It was my first time getting magazine feature and it was very positive experience, and I definately will try to submit more pieces to other mags in the near future.

Basilisk Animation|PPP

Basilisk is a 2D animation created by Ami Thompson, student of Sheridan University.

 It is very bright and dynamic piece, with a great humor and interesting character designs, also music complimates the mood. Story may be very simple, but presented in interesting way.
As I found from Ami's blog, she've already interned at Ghibli studio (and met Miyazaki, wow!), which influence can be seen in this short animation. Backgrounds, characters, creatures - everything is painted beautifully, each frame must took a lot of time to create.
Basilisk is pretty good example of what I would love to achive within next few years - vivid, dynamic piece, thats brings a smile :).

Freelance game project|PPP

Couple months ago I was lucky enough to take part in wonderful project with Jakub Wydro. My task was to create graphics for the iOS game (backgrounds, objects). It was my first paid freelance job, and I've learnt a lot. As I had to work closely with a client and create visuals to cater specific needs, I had to change my approach to drawing. Being pushed outside of my comfort zone (not single character drawn, everything had to be without lineart) and work with tight deadlines also helped me improve - especially when it comes to technique and Photoshop workflow.

Above is a little example of what I did for this project, more pieces can be viewed here or there.

Nest comics|PPP

Thanks to Sacha I was able to contribute to two issues of college magazine Nest. I enjoy working with them, as the themes where very funny and interesting to illustrate (and a bit challenging).

Working with different people on a project is a very rewarding experience, plus, usually you can learn a lot :)! As book/magazine illustration is something I would love to pursuit in the future, getting a chance to work along with editorial department, managing deadlines, and producing work to the high standart (also keeping in mind the given themes and target audience - students) was great.

I had some previous experience with game and college magazines years ago, when I was still living in Poland. I think that made me more aware of how hectic and crazy deadlines can be (basically, can you draw it now ;)).

Game Module| Knack

During the GDC Sony annouced PlayStation 4 and Knack is set to be one of the launch titles

As a fan of colorful platform games, Knack definitely got my attention. It's bright, funny and interesting. Particle animations look very good, same goes to neat textures that gave this cartoon-y look. Characters also look very nice, especially little robot creature :). So now I just have to wait for it to be released.

Unreal Engine 4 Tech Demo

As the next generation consoles are soon to be released (PS4 and Xbox, possibly called Infinity) the new technologies and engines are developed.  During Game Developers Conference technical demo of Unreal Engine 4 (developed by Epic Games) was presented.


First demo is called 'Infiltrator' and have amazing textures, great lighting and multiple, complex effects (particles). It look very realistic and dynamic. Even for the technical demo, story of this video is very interesting and I wish it could be made into a real game in the future.

Both of those demos were made specially to show Unreal 4 potencial. First one was run on computer, second one presents the Playstation 4 power and it's ability to deal with complex particle animations.

Game Module| Rigging Introduction

During one of the sessions we were introduced to the basics of rigging.
Below is a very basic basic leg rig:

From video guides I've learned about joints and different types of handles, invert kinematics and how they can be use. It was a very important lesson which will be very useful in future projects.
For the level I will need to model and rig fabrics hanged and decorating shells. As I've found rigging a quite relaxing task, and basically enjoying animating, this exercise went quite smoothly. Below screenshots of flag and fabric I've made for my level.

Game Module| Shell House UV Mapping

From the beginning I've knew that shell houses would be a massive challenge for me. Modelling them was pretty difficult. When it came to UV mapping I've decided to use the method I've learnt from 'tree tutorial' made by Mat. I used 'unfold' tool along with cut UV edges, shell spikes were treated like tree branches. It was quite complicated task but I've done it.

 

 Another difficulty that came along was the problem with displaying inside faces of shell houses (as I wanted player to go inside). I've duplicated model, scaled it down and reversed textures to be displayed from inside (I've also changed the inside texture). For the future I've learnt that I need to model a simple inside object.

Game Module| Sound Research

So again I'm back to findsounds.com. I've used this site in my previous modules and found it very useful.


Which sounds I need:
water/ wave/splash
seagulls/other birds
wind/wind chimes (bells)
seashell sounds.

After a long research session, I've picked quite a few sound files, which I've then edited and imported as an asset into Unity. I've mostly used scripts to make sounds be designated to certain places in my level. 

Game Module| Barrels

Finished barrels for studio tasks.

 

 I've made a quite generic fantasy barrel, again using hand-drawn textures. It was a very good exercise before texturing objects for my level.
I'm really proud of futuristic barrel asset I've created in Maya. Although I had some problems at the start (example below), I've manage to over come them :) Lesson for the future - 'keep face together' box selected!
 Futuristc barrel was heavily inspired by games like Jak & Daxter and Rachet and Clank as they're full of nice, electric crates and barrels :)

Game Module| The Realm Game

The Realm is a game project, created by Atomhawk Design and Latern Interactive. The Kickstarter campain was started in late April in order to fund this wonderful looking point&click adventure game. I found out about it through Charlie Bowater tweets (as she is one of the amazing concept artists).

Game is set in fantasy world, beautifully crafted and magical. Story might seems to be quite simple, however characters are very charming and interesting.
Visually it look stunning, with great attention to detail and great color palette.

What also made me really interested in this project is the fact, that they use Unity to put all the levels together.  As we are currently working in same engine it gave another idea of how it could be used. Moreover, it could develop into the over-summer game project.

12-step process|PPP

As I'm constantly trying to improve my drawing skills, it is somehow normal for me to search for new techniques and tutorials. I've created a list of different referance sources, tutorials and got few anatomy books.
Recently I've came across a wonderful blog post by Devin Platts (texahol) about 12-step program, where he explains his workflow. I find this break down process very helpful.

I don't really want to go into too much detail, just to summarise main points (however, I might talk a bit more about this process after trying it out on myself ;)).
First, you have to create a rough sketch, then draw a cleaner version, iterations, and repeat until succesfull with yours final design. Second part of tutorial explains coloring techniques as well as look at silhouettes. The last part is about adding rim-light and making few more adjustments to help character pop-out. Devin also talks about good layer management and sketching process.

Game Module| Enslaved

Enslaved:Odyssey to the West is an action adventure platform game, developed by Ninja Theory (guys that made Heavenly Sword) and released on Xbox360 and PS3 in 2010.

 I'm a casual gamer, prefer to play colorful platformers or jRPGs rather than scary shooting games. Enslaved is very beautiful, magical, with a nice story and charming characters (Trip does remind me a little bit of Nariko from Heavenly Sword). Story is loosely based on old chinese tale - Journey to the West (which many people can connect with Dragon Ball).

Action of Enslaved is set in future post-apocaliptic world, which makes designs very interesting and fresh. Also, it isn't yours typical post-apocaliptic scenery (like in Fallout games) - instead is very colorful, bright, almost friendly. Designs of ships, robots and houses are very organic and functional, made from many different materials.

The only problem with this title was a gamelay, few annoying problems, but overall Enslaved is such a beautiful game and definately worth playing :).

Game Module| Shell House - Texture

So, I've got my shell houses modelled, the next step on my to do list was to get them UV mapped and textured. As I'm still green when it comes to Maya (or Unity) this task was very challenging and I've spent good few hours on creating UV map just for one house. But also I've learnt A LOT ;).