Personal Projects

I am a junior level CGI artist with industry experience, I have had the opportunity to work on some ground-breaking projects and literally live my dream career. Although I am currently in-between VFX work I think its so important to have personal projects, this allows me to keep my skills sharp as well as learn and develop more. It has been so incredible to be working and creating projects to a brief that I have set myself. In this blog I am going to share some of my most recent projects and the techniques I used to create them.

What software do I use?

As I am focusing on my hard surface 3D modelling I am using Autodesk maya to model assets. Maya has a great workspace with brilliant tools allowing me to model complex models as well as rig, animate and render to a high standard. I have tried alternative software that is free such as blender. But, as I was trained in maya and used this in industry I found the workspace and flow of blender more difficult compared to maya. This is just a personal preference I know that this is a brilliant and accessible tool for new artists starting their 3D journeys.

For texturing I am using Adobe Substance Painter, this is a great texturing software that allows me to texture with a lot of detail. One thing I love about this software is that it is completely none destructive, I am able to work in layers for example add dirt and scratches but if I decide, I can turn that off, increase its intensity or just remove it entirely. this layer system is more easy to edit and change an element of the texture. This software has so many tools that I am excited to continue to learn and I cant wait to create more assets that allow me to develop my knowledge further.

To edit my showreel together I use Adobe Premiere Pro, this is a brilliant tool that allows me to edit renders together in a way that shows my skills. I am able to add a render, speed it up, slow it down, reverse it, crop it and layer's of titles and images to show my work. This is brilliant and enables me to create a showreel that not only shows my work but also create a well paced and interesting video for recruiters to watch.

Although it isn't VFX specific software I use Canva a lot, this is a website that allows me to create title pages for my showreel, amongst many other things. It has been a great tool for working on my personal projects.

First Personal Project

I find it so difficult to decide what to make, there are so many incredible and interesting objects in the world that could be incredible to model. For my first asset I wanted something with a mixture of shapes and materials so I decided to model and antique telescope (reference 1). This object has a mixture of circular, smooth metal elements, hard wooden elements and small detailed objects such as the leg mechanism.

Reference 01

I start my projects by looking for reference photos, In order to get the most detail I often find many different pictures possibly of slightly different objects and I combine them to get the most detail. Whilst working in maya I often have a reference image on an image plane but then also refer to other photos such as close ups in order to create the smaller elements.

I modelled all of the separate elements in line with the reference images, I always model an asset with topology in mind, the first version of the asset needs to be as low poly as I can make it so when it is later smoothed the topology is clean. Reference 02 shows the final model as just a lambert asset. As you can see there are a lot of different elements including screws, bolts, individual legs and many more making up the asset. This was so much fun to model and although a challenge at first refamiliarizing myself with maya it was great to be working with it again.

Something I really enjoy is UV unwrapping, I find it so relaxing and love the process of unwrapping, in reference 02 you can see what the telescope looks like when it is unwrapped. The checkerboard pattern shows the way in which the texture will lay on the object, if the squares are uniform then your textures will lay flat. If the checkerboard is warped then it is likely that the texture will be distorted. While UVing it is important that I choose the position of the seem carefully, for example this would be hidden under the object or in a creese, this allows the texture to look more seamless when rendered. I do have to alter UV's when in substance painter as sometimes I may think a seem will work but when I take it into substance painter I see it needs changing.

Reference 02

The next stage of the asset workflow is texturing, this is a process I really enjoy, imported a model and bringing it to life. Reference's 01 and 03 show the final textured telescope, I am so pleased with how this model turned out. For some elements I decided to add the detail in the texture rather than in the model, this because it makes the model less heavy and also it gives more of the effect I wanted in the model.

One example of this is the numbers on the dial, to do this I added a fill layer, turned off everything but the height and added a minus value. I then applied a black mask to the layer then a paint. This allowed me to then paint on the lines and numbers in a way that looked like etched metal. This is a technique that I like as it allows me to make small details that have a large impact on the overall look of the asset.

When texturing I like to make the asset like they have been used, this means they require dirt, scratches, ware and just general distress. I do this in various ways, I like to hand paint dirt in areas that it is likely to naturally collect on an object in the real world. Ware and tare is something that I really enjoy adding because nothing in the world is perfect and I love to reflect that in my work.

In future projects I am going to try and make the models themselves less perfect and symmetrical and this will in turn make them more realistic. Adding the smallest dents and imperfections can really make an asset look amazing.

Reference 03

Once I was happy I added the textures onto the model in maya, it was great to see this as when an asset is in substance painter it does look quite different, see reference 04. Although this still looks great and I am extremely happy with it when it is in maya and rendered using 'better' lighting it brings the asset to life. Once all of the textures were plugged in I completed multiple renders to add to my showreel, this asset was so much fun to make and made me so excited to work on something else.

I am so passionate about what I do and being able to work on an asset again was incredible, this experience made me even more excited to work in the film industry again and be a part of more brilliant projects.

Reference 04

What next?

Once I had finished my telescope I was faced yet again with the question 'what do I make next?', this is an extremely difficult thing to decide as I model and create assets for the fun and complexity but ultimately they are also going to help me land my dream job. So I needed to decide what am I going to enjoy doing and also what will show my skills and help me get a job as a junior artist.

I decided on a scene, this would allow me to make multiple objects of varying complexity to populate a room. I wanted a theme that would interest me and therefore decided to make a ship, this is for many reasons first of all I love films such as pirates of the Caribbean and I love the beauty and complexity of antique objects. I have therefore made a long list of objects to model that will slowly populate a ship, this is so much fun for me as one of the elements of asset creation I love is the research. I am able to pick an object and an era learn about what it was used for an find out how it works. Knowing how something works informs the modelling and knowing how it was used allows me to add more detail in the texture such as the ware and tare.

I decided to start off with a smaller object that wouldn't take too long to create from start to finish, this was the compass seen in figure 05. As this is a smaller object with less components it took only a day to model and texture (and a day to render various camera moves).

Figure 05

I really enjoyed creating this small object especially the texturing. I decided to make alphas with designs to add to the inside of the lid, this is something I saw on a few compasses when doing my research and thought it was so beautiful. Figure 06 shows an example of an alpha I made for this object.

The fun thing about working on a personal project is I am able to add personal touches, for example this asset has a reference to my partner by including our favourite star constellation as well as my initials 'M.S.K'. Being able to add these personal touches as well as making a beautiful design was really fun. I made this alpha using Canva, as I mentioned earlier this is a brilliant free tool, I decided on a really simple design but did add a small moon symbol in the centre as well as some stars for detail. I am extremely happy with the design and believe it adds something beautiful to the asset.

To apply this design to the model I used a similar method to the dial on the telescope but rather than drawing the lines I used the alpha as a stencil. This had a brilliant effect and I am so pleased with how it turned out.

Figure 06

I am so excited for my themed project and cant wait to continue to research, design and create more 'realistic' assets. This has been so much fun to work on so far and has only increased my drive and passion for the VFX industry. I look forward to developing my skills and continuing to improve my portfolio of work.