Art of William Sweetman

Working, Working, Working

2012-01-30T13:11:00.001-06:00

Nothing new to show at the moment, hopefully I'll have some stuff up this coming week. I'm currently working on a new portfolio piece that I'm excited to start sharing and getting some feedback on and I'm also starting to update my portfolio with some of the stuff I did on Scarygirl. If everything goes good at work these should all be up this week!

Mutant League Challenge Final Entry

2012-01-07T09:22:00.000-06:00

Final entry time, I had an absolute blast working on this project. I've learned a ton of stuff that I had no idea about and I got to work on some of those sculpting skills. Here are the final shots. Click to enlarge the Images.

Beauty Shot 01

Beauty Shot 02

Beauty Shot 03

Construction Shot

Textures

Now a week off before I start working on something else!

Scarygirl out later this month!

2012-01-06T11:06:00.000-06:00

ScaryGirl now has a release date!

Scarygirl is the latest game I worked on!

EDIT: Added Trailer!

Mutant League Challenge WIP shots

2012-01-05T09:02:00.002-06:00

Some more work in progress shots, I had a chance to get a few more things done last night. More info in the WIP thread on polycount, link below.

WIP Thread is here

MLF-WIP (quick post)

2012-01-03T09:28:00.003-06:00

Here is another quick update with the latest WIP shots. More detailed post located here

I've been really busy lately and I hope to finish on time, due date is this coming sat!

Mutant League Football Stadium WIP Update

2011-12-28T21:21:00.003-06:00

Small Update, more on it here.

Polycount Thread

Mutant League Challenge

2011-12-12T23:45:00.002-06:00

I've taken a small break from the Warhammer 40k post, a challenge has shown up on polycount and I couldn't help myself! It's MUTANT LEAGUE FOOTBALL, I've been wanting to work on an update to this game for ages! I've decided to tackle a stadium for the Icebay Bashers. I want to make their stadium look like it was built out in the middle endless land of snow. I'm hoping to really sell some of the snow effects if I get time.

Here are some screenshots of my current progress!

Warhammer 40k Style Tower Update 2

2011-10-19T11:08:00.000-05:00

Here is what the high poly looks like in max now. I had a chance to get some sculpting done.

Warhammer 40k Style Tower Update

2011-10-05T08:55:00.001-05:00

Small update on the 40k tower, I've got some good feedback on Polycount so I'll be addressing that before taking it into zbrush. I'm fairly happy with how the hardsurface work turned out and pretty excited to get this asset on to the next stage.

Warhammer 40k Style Tower

2011-09-29T18:05:00.000-05:00

Start of a new asset I've started, It's going to be a Warhammer 40k style pylon/flag tower. I'm going to try and wrap up the highpoly soon and drop it into Z brush to detail it up. I've also finished the IG barrier, I'll be getting some better renders of that up shortly and updating my portfolio to include it, but more on that later.

Imperial Guard Defensive Barrier

2011-09-17T08:18:00.003-05:00

Just a small project I did for fun, I know the back side is pretty bland and I'll probably end up redoing this asset at some point. It was a lot of fun and a great learning experience. It was the first asset I've done with a full zbrush integrated pipeline. I'm slowly getting more comfortable using zbrush in my work and I hope to really utilize it fully with my future projects.

Small Scifi Control Panel

2011-07-27T21:10:00.000-05:00

Started a new small lunch time project. It's going to be a Mass Effect style control panel. I'll probably end up doing the retop and the bake next week some time.

You should totally follow this artist's work

2011-07-19T18:53:00.001-05:00

I stumbled upon his work a day ago and can't stop looking at it.

Justin Gerard

New desktop wallpaper.

Material Practice

2011-07-18T22:31:00.000-05:00

I've been away for quite some time, I'll have to get back into the habit of posting more regularly. For now here is some late night work, nothing special, just a small mat test. Sculpted, placed in Max and baked in roughly an hour. Using Xoliul's shader. Sculpt really sucks, I'll be taking a lot more time with the next one. :)

I'm currently gearing up for another environment piece, but I have a few more things to learn so I'll be posting more practice shots here and there as I get time to do them.

Lunch Time Work

2011-06-22T12:44:00.001-05:00

Small bit of concept art I wanted to get out of my head during lunch today. I might do some more facepaint designs later. Drawn over my low poly female base mesh.

Plant Test

2011-06-19T18:22:00.000-05:00

I think I know what I'm going to be tackling for my next project. I'm just doing some tests right now, but I'm going to start cracking on it here pretty quick. Here is a screen shot of what I've been messing around with.

Source Photo : CG Textures.com

I think it turned out alright, I snagged a picture and tweaked it a bunch, normals were created using crazybump and textures were tweaked a bunch in photoshop.

Cerberus Hallway

2011-06-09T23:01:00.000-05:00

Finally Done!

Well as far as I'm going to take it. Finishing this hallway I learned quite a bit about baking normals out of 3dsmax, painting textures, and the finer parts of udk. There are things that I would love to change yet, small tweaks here and there, but I need to move on to the next piece. Here is a link to my portfolio entry for the final Cerberus Hallway

For the next few weeks I'm going to work inside of Z Brush. I've got a few links that go over the Naughty Dog way of doing tiling textures for the Uncharted series and I'd like to tackle their way of doing textures. After that I'm going to try to do some assets out of Z Brush. Probably a piece of stone work, metal that's rusty, and maybe a plant. After it's all said and done I will tackle another environment piece. I've already got one in mine.

Well off to read up on Z Brush stuff and probably do some gaming.

Cerb Hall UDK Lighting Issues

2011-06-05T20:40:00.000-05:00

So I got the last bit of my hallway done, but I am having some lighting issues so I can't quite post it up final shots yet. The issue I'm having is the shadows just don't look the same when I bake the lights.

Game Shot Lighting Built

Editor Shot Lighting Not Built

Cerb Hall UDK with some DX 11 features.

2011-05-17T21:12:00.000-05:00

I might go ahead and call this done, because I've been itching to get onto something else. I'll probably tweak the materials some more and the lighting, but I doubt I'll be adding on all of the other stuff I was thinking of doing.

Cerb Hall UDK

2011-05-11T23:50:00.000-05:00

Step 1 - get stuff into udk

Step 2 - tweak until it looks awesome.

Still on step 1...

I've got a bunch of stuff to learn yet with the material system, post processing, and dx 11 features but here is a small bit of progress.

Small Cerb Hallway Update

2011-04-29T12:52:00.000-05:00

Got the back wall panel diffuse about 90%. I'll be wrapping that up next week and starting to work on the intersection bits of the hallway.

I've also started to do a small portfolio layout to replace the one I currently have. Something a bit more specific to the environment art I'm doing. But more on that later.

Morning Sketch - Human Torch

2011-04-14T08:38:00.000-05:00

Another morning warm up sketch, this time The Human Torch.

Justice League Wallpaper Set

2011-04-10T10:33:00.000-05:00

While looking at an Alex Ross book and being sort of excited for the Green Lantern Movie I got inspired to make some Justice League wallpapers for my desktop.

Morning Sketch - Batman

2011-04-07T08:53:00.000-05:00

Small morning doodle, trying to get better at painting and drawing.

More Texture Work

2011-03-29T12:56:00.001-05:00

Alright, the base assets are in, next stop udk and hopefully some dx 11 features to play with.

I'm doing most of my texture work and modeling on my lunch break at the office. What time I get at home I'm going to start learning the ins and outs of the UDK material system and post processing system. I'll need this primarily to make the lighting fixtures glow, add lens flares, etc. I'm really excited to get a hold of the new bokeh* depth of field stuff and the dx 11 features they've added and see how that looks in this little scene I'll be putting together.

*Justin Kovac found typo.

Cerberus Hallway Texture Updates

2011-03-24T12:42:00.000-05:00

A bit more texture work, soon all of the base hallway stuff will be textured. The ceiling might be done tomorrow during lunch. Then on to the 90 degree corner bits, cerb logo, and the back wall panel.

Textures Finally

2011-03-09T01:41:00.001-06:00

Short post tonight, I'm no longer going to update this exclusively on Mondays but when ever I get substantial work done. Here is a render of the first finished wall panel, not in UDK yet but in the bank none the less.

Art of Interaction : Brutal Legend

2011-03-08T08:44:00.002-06:00

I haven't updated this thing in a while and that's breaking my New Years resolution, but I'm hoping to have some more art coming up this next week. It's just been a bit busy around here lately.

In the few hours I have to play games on the weekends I started to re play Double Fine's Brutal Legend. I really forgot how great of a game it is. Double Fine has since moved on to smaller downloadable titles, which are great and you should check them out, but their last triple A project is a piece of gold.

One of my favorite features is the weather and sky box visuals, they're really some of the best in the industry. I had a chance to go to a talk at GDC 2009 or 2010 with the art director, Lee Petty , where he covered some of the techniques and systems they used to create the visuals. It was on of the best talks I've ever been to. I was also lucky enough to meet up with Drew Skillman through a co worker of mine and talk with him a bit about the fx used to create these amazing vistas. One day I'd like to try and tackle something similar in UDK. Dynamic sky boxes have always been something that's fascinated me. Until then I'll just watch these time lapse videos. I know they're old but they're amazing to watch in action.

Brutal Legend Time Lapse Climate Video from Drew Skillman on Vimeo.

Climate Variation in Brutal Legend from Drew Skillman on Vimeo.

Cerberus Hallway Pre Weekend Update

2011-02-11T18:19:00.000-06:00

Just a small update today, I got the last panel baked out and I'm going to start texturing the assets I have. There are a few assets I still need to do, such as the stopper, door, and the corner bits but I'm going to get some stuff into UDK and textured before I really tackle those. I'll hopefully also have a dump soon of all of the low poly work I've been working on, we'll see. Now to get some much needed gaming done over the weekend.

Cerberus Hallway Week 04

2011-02-07T23:16:00.000-06:00

Just a small update, about to start putting things in UDK this week. There are 4 more modular bits to go before the entire scene will be done.

Cerberus Hallway Week 03

2011-01-31T23:53:00.000-06:00

Week 3 has come and gone, and I'm moving on to number 4. I've got a good chunk of progress done. I've got two of the panels and the floor baked out and I'm now moving on to the last of the main hallway panels.

Cerberus Hallway Week 02

2011-01-23T22:02:00.000-06:00

Week 2 flew by. We had a build at work and the publishers were in town. Needless to say I didn't get much done. Here is a shot of the first wall chunk in 3ds Max.

It's got a bit of texture work on it but not a whole lot. I don't want to get to crazy with the textures until I finish most of the geo. The block out is basically done and I'm hoping to have all of the wall panels done by next Sunday. Well time to play a bit of the Witcher and call it a night.

-Cheers

Cerberus Hallway Week 01

2011-01-17T23:59:00.001-06:00

Well, the first full week of work on my new environment is under way, and I think I've got some pretty good progress. I'm doing a hallway seen out of the Mass Effect comic, image below.

I started some work with the Cerberus logo asset that I'd like at the back of the hall. The high poly is done and I'm starting to bake it down. I'm getting some weird artifacts in the normals, which is currently stopping me from posting a picture of it in UDK. I'm going to take a look at the bakes again over the weekend and see what I can fix.

As for the actual hallway, I have the block out 100% done and I'm moving on to the individual bits. I'm hoping to have one or two of the panel high poly assets done over the weekend. Once that is done I"ll start my C and C thread on polycount and start to get some feedback. I'm excited to get the work done on this there is still a lot I've got to learn and processes I'd like to get familiar with.

Cheers

First post of the New Year

2011-01-10T20:33:00.000-06:00

So since the New Year has started I sat down and made a small list of projects I'd like to get done. My portfolio is falling behind in the grander scheme of things and this year I really want to focus on getting it up to snuff. Here's a link so you can check it out yourself.

LINK

My first few projects are going to be primarily hard surface stuff, I'm the most comfortable doing it and I really don't have a good piece to show off using that technique, just some floor panels. Once that is done I'm going to look into doing something a bit more organic. For that I'll be trying to use a lot of Z-brush so I can learn the ins and outs of that. I'm hoping I'll have my new pc by then. I'm going to try and do full environments only since that's what I'd like to specialize in. Everything will end up in UDK with lighting and fx as required. I'm going to take care of all the lighting and fx for each scene myself, since learning more about UDK is another goal of mine. I also have one low poly project I'm working on but more on that later.

For now here is a screen cap of the first asset for my first project. I'm going to try and only take snap shots of stuff in UDK and update this blog every Monday night.

Familiar logo?

TRON Girl Final Image Submission

2010-12-26T21:17:00.000-06:00

Here are the final images for the submission, I think she turned out alright. Probably the last project of the year, can't wait to start next year with all sorts of new projects and learning.

You should also check out the submission thread, there is some great stuff there. Link provided below

LINK

WIP Low Poly Adventure Dude.

2010-12-17T12:30:00.000-06:00

TRON Girl with Environment Finalish Render

2010-12-12T15:50:00.000-06:00

TRON Girl with Environment WIP

2010-12-05T10:29:00.002-06:00

Just what I've got done in the last few days, hoping to finish this before Walking Dead tonight.

TRON Girl DEREZ

2010-11-16T00:16:00.000-06:00

Added the "De Rez" effect. I think I have enough triangles left for 2 discs. We'll see. Tomorrow during lunch I'm going to take the day off of the Beat 'em up environment I have yet to finish and get her on the rig and posed up. Then off to texture finalization and the environment.I might even toss her into unity with her enviro and make a small web app to view it in 3d. Might be cool, we'll see.

TRON Girl Texture WIP Part 2

2010-11-14T23:46:00.000-06:00

Alright, so I got some stuff done for another project and then jump back to texture the Tron girl I started. I'm pretty happy with where this is going, being my first female character I've done and the way I'm forcing myself to really think about how this texture will work out. I wasn't able to get the Tali eye thing going like I was hoping so her helmet will stay the way it is. There is still a ton more to do with the texture, this is just where I am tonight. I'm currently painting the texture at 1024 and shrinking it to 512, seems to be working ok. Screen capped with 512 applied.

TRON Girl texture WIP

2010-11-14T16:37:00.000-06:00

What I've got so far today texture wise. Still a ways to go, but I'm pretty happy with the progress so far.

LP TRON Contest

2010-11-12T22:38:00.003-06:00

Here is the start of it, had to rig her and make sure it all worked out alright on the rig. Up next will be unwrapping and texturing on Sunday. Once I get that far I'll post it on Polycount and what not.

Currently the tri count is 1018, 6 less than the limit! I might do a small enviro too if time permits.

BEAT-EM-UP! UDK WIP 01

2010-11-12T12:24:00.000-06:00

So things are kind of going slowly, but stuff is going into UDK. I'm working on it only during my lunch period and someday's it's hard to get motivated enough. I'm going to try and get this wrapped up before the end of November. I snapped a quick screen shot from inside of UDK, got the theater screen all set up. Sky Box is the default UDK one. I plan on spending some time making one for the scene.

I've got some contests I'm going to participate in as well, so keep and eye out for those updates.

Low Poly Female

2010-11-09T10:00:00.001-06:00

Just a low poly base mesh. I'm not sure if I'll take it any further than this.

WIP - Low Poly Plane

2010-10-25T22:55:00.002-05:00

Small plane I did for fun over the weekend.

BEAT-EM-UP! WIP Shots with 24 hours left to go

2010-10-21T08:27:00.000-05:00

So I already know I won't finish in time to have everything done. We've been crunching at work and I haven't had much time at home to work on stuff. Here are some new progress shots, I'm going to try and get as much done as possible tonight.

Hopefully I can get a good chunk of stuff done tonight and maybe wrap it up over the weekend.

BEAT-EM-UP! More WIP Shots

2010-10-12T19:45:00.000-05:00

Just one actually. Got a bit more texture work done, this time on the theater screen, the test card is temp, I'll be making a custom on.

BEAT-EM-UP! Useless Updated !

2010-10-05T13:24:00.000-05:00

Not much to show, I'm going to start working on it at home since lunch time isn't really cutting it for me.

BEAT-EM-UP! WIP Shots

2010-09-22T12:25:00.002-05:00

Here are some screens of the larger assets in the scene. I'm going to start throwing down materials in the next day or two.

BEAT-EM-UP! Drive-In WIP.

2010-09-14T12:43:00.003-05:00

Here is some WIP modeling. I've only had a few hours during lunch to work on it so I'm not sure how far I'll get. I'm going to take it a single segment at a time. This is the drive in theater. The idea is that robots would drive hover like cars and would have recharging stations to part their cars in. The roads would all be metal and of course the screen would hover over the cliff. The right side will have a cornfield that would be behind a robotic fence and the left side will have the entrance to the theater. Hopefully I can have this entire thing modeled out this week and start to unwrap and texture this bit.

BEAT-EM-UP! Planning Map

2010-09-08T09:22:00.000-05:00

Here is the start of the planning doc, I'm going to start modeling stuff so I can start to get an idea of how it will look in engine and what not. I'm going to start with the drive in movie theater since that's the thing I want to model the most.

BEAT-EM-UP! Inspiration/influence Map

2010-09-01T12:34:00.000-05:00

So We've spent some time looking for references and a theme. What has been decided is a zombie robots attacking a robot world. This world is similar to ours, but instead of humans it's inhabited by robots. We're going to set it in a B-Movie Horror film setting, similar to Mars Attacks, Aliens Vs Monsters, and Stubbs the Zombie.

The Key set pieces will be a neighborhood at night, destroyed gas station and a drive in movie theater.

Our inspiration/influences is in the following order.

Top Right: Planet 51 - we're looking at how they adapted their architecture to the alien theme they went with.

Top Left: Planet 51 - Robot from Planet 51, we're looking into making the citizens have a clean white robotic feel and this will influence how the rest of the environment looks.

Upper Mid Right : Not sure what movie it's from, but we're looking at the night lighting and the clouds in that image.

Upper Mid Left : CG Challenge Short -We're mainly looking at this one for the mood they set up with their short and the color palette.

Mid Right: Salesman Pete- Painting/material style, we're looking into trying something unique with the way we paint the materials.

Mid Left: Portal 2 - Clean robots again.

Lower Right: BUCK! - Hand painted materials again.

Lower Left : Old movie theaters and cars for inspiration.

I've seen some other posts with a similar theme and I'm really excited to see how they all turn out.

BEAT-EM-UP! Challenge at Polycount

2010-08-31T08:43:00.000-05:00

So the Starcraft 2 challenge at work has had a lot of delays, it's hard to work on stuff during lunch when you have a pretty large workload for work. So I'm taking a break on my Starcraft 2 unit, it's basically all blocked out and I just need to wrap up the high poly. The primary reason I'm backing out of the Starcraft 2 unit challenge is a challenge showed up on Polycount that's a bit more up my alley.

BEAT-EM-UP! Challenge

As and aspiring environment artist, this project really appeals to me. So I'm working on it with a coworker, and I hope we can really make a niece piece. I've got a good chunk of the level drawn up. Once I get a cleaner pass I'm going to start posting some pics. Either follow me here or on Polycount.

BEAT-EM-UP! | Deadpixl / Kovac

Lunch Time Art Challenge

2010-08-10T13:06:00.000-05:00

At FCB we started a small lunch time art challenge. It's our first attempt at this and hopefully it goes well. We're trying to get a greater feedback loop going between all of the artists. For our first one we decided to try and make a Starcraft 2 unit. We have a set of rules to follow, for example it can only be about 5000 tri and maximum map size is 1024. I'm hoping this will help all of us expand our skills and abilities as artists, and force us to step away from our comfort zones.

Today I got my block out shape done, I'm going with a Terran Style Mega Tank. I'm hoping to have the low poly done by the end of the week. I figured I'd do the low poly first since a lot of the normal map details will be really big. It needs to look like it belongs in the game so I'm following some guide lines I've given myself and really thinking about it's silhouette from the isometric / 3/4 views.

I'm going to try and post some screen shots soon, I just want to get a bit further and make the asset a bit cleaner. we only have our lunch periods to work on it, so at it's current state it's sort of messy.

I do have some personal stuff I'm also going to try and get going but I need to take the time to plan it out accordingly. Hopefully I have some time off this weekend and I can get started on that.

-b

Lunch Work: High Poly Space Walk Final

2010-08-03T13:03:00.001-05:00

Texture work done, now it's time to start a new lunch project.

Lunch Work: Highpoly Space Walk Day 3

2010-07-28T13:20:00.001-05:00

Baked out normals and Ao, I'll be able to texture this up starting tomorrow or Friday.

Lunch Work: Highpoly Space Walk Day 2

2010-07-27T12:45:00.001-05:00

Added a few more tweaks to the center panels based on some feedback from polycount.

Lunch Work : Highpoly Scifi Walkway

2010-07-26T12:24:00.001-05:00

I saw the new video by 3d motive and got inspired to make a scifish walkway of my own. I'm going to render out the normals and paint it up I think.

Lunch work

2010-07-20T12:50:00.000-05:00

Just some rough thumbnails I did up during lunch, some sort of space rifle I guess. Right now I'm liking some elements from 1,6, and 7. Next I'm going to mash up some of the elements and hopefully come out with a concept I may want to model in the future.

Singularity Art Dump

2010-07-13T20:54:00.001-05:00

Jesse Moody dumped a ton of Singularity art work on polycount. This is all really great stuff, I can't wait to play the game. Raven did a great job with what I've seen so far.

Simple Art Style Test

2010-06-16T13:21:00.003-05:00

Click For Larger Image

Unearthly Challenge

2010-06-09T16:06:00.000-05:00

Looks like they've picked the finalist. Some great work in the bunch.

Unearthly Challenge

Totally True

2010-05-28T15:02:00.002-05:00

This is a really cool video, I've seen it before and really enjoyed it. Now it has some really cool illustrations.

Hits home a bit

2010-05-28T11:57:00.000-05:00

Here's the reality: on a creative project there's the vision that once it's locked, we all must be slaves to. Protect that vision at all costs. And sometimes that means you open the doors a bit to let the vision grow and be improved by the right members of the team who 'get' it. But not everyone on a game will always get it and so it's key to know when an idea improves and when it takes away from the game's core.

And never allow your desire to be nice and liked to get in the way of the vision because the game will suffer. And the team will suffer as well because a failed game means the studio is at risk.

From David Jaffe

Small Update

2010-05-25T20:52:00.000-05:00

So I've totally neglected this and the projects I'm working on. But I had good reasons.....I just can't think of them right now. Haha. I do come with a small render, this is just a low poly project I'm working on atm, it's spec'd for the Iphone. Well sort of, the textures are all a bit big right now, but they'll all be crushed down in the final screen shots.

Render is pretty small, but I want to keep all of the renders at a similar res as the iphone.

Low Poly Lunch Work

2010-04-17T00:49:00.000-05:00

Quick update before I head home for the night. I made a small sword and shield, total tri count is around 192. The shield is 60 tri and the sword is 132. The version on the left is at half of the painted texture resolution. I'm not happy with the sword so I'm planning on redoing it some time. Hopefully I'll have some more stuff next week.

Work Work Work

2010-04-15T09:58:00.000-05:00

I've been on a bit of a hiatus, work has been getting considerably more busy so my time at home is usually used for relaxing and catching up on some games. I've decided to start working on another small project so I'm not completely idle on the weekdays. I'm thinking of taking up some extremely lowpoly work, Iphone and Ds style stuff. A good friend of mine has been doing it for a while now and told me I should give it a try. I might start today or tomorrow and I'll most likely work on it over my lunch periods so I'm not sure how much stuff I will get done in one sitting. Hopefully I'll have an update soon.

Last Post in March

2010-03-31T09:57:00.001-05:00

Well it's the last day of March. I did manage to get some more stuff done in the last few days but no pics for a few more days. I'm trying to get all of the WIP stuff to a certain point then I'll generate the rest of the frame assets and take some screenshots. There is a pretty interesting blog post by the Bounty Arms guys about UDK's lightmass stuff and I thought I'd share it.

Another Small Update

2010-03-25T08:51:00.000-05:00

Some simple floor panels, they're kind of getting washed out so I need to address that tonight.

Small UDK update

2010-03-22T22:12:00.000-05:00

I finally got some more stuff in UDK. I've got two bits here, two more that need texturing and one that needs a low poly bake and unwrap. At that point I'll export everything and start piecing the environment together and start doing my renders from the desired camera angle.

I'm hoping to wrap up some of the floor textures tomorrow and the corner wall piece later this week. I've got a pretty busy week and weekend ahead of me.

-cheers

Art Of Uncharted 2

2010-03-22T14:10:00.000-05:00

I just saw a link to something pretty interesting on Game-Artist.net, with the Uncharted art book coming out CG Society did a small interview with some of the team. Very interesting read, I can't wait to get my hands on the art book.

Procedural Rocks

2010-03-17T15:44:00.000-05:00

This was thrown my way today by a co-worker.

3dsmax Environment Modeling #1 Procedural Stone from sascha henrichs on Vimeo.

Pretty cool tutorial on making some nice looking rocks, link to Sascha's blog below.

Modeling Rocks

High Poly Wrapped

2010-03-16T21:46:00.000-05:00

Starting on the lowpoly and textures tomorrow night. I just have to get xNormal reinstalled.

Some Kick-Ass Press

2010-03-16T16:12:00.000-05:00

During GDC our Producers were out showing off Kick-Ass: The Game. Here is an interview with Ben.

Kick-Ass The Video Game Preview

Some High Poly Work

2010-03-09T22:32:00.000-06:00

We finally wrapped up our prototype and I've had some more time to work on the Mass Effect environment. It's going to sit in this stage until I get back from GDC, but here is a small pic.

More WIP

2010-03-03T23:12:00.000-06:00

Got the second segment of the wall pieced together tonight. I'm not calling this section completely done, but I want to move to some of the more detailed assets. This stuff is all kind of on the back side of things. My next asset will be non lava flowing panel from the left side of the image. The highlighted in green section.

I'm probably going to tackle the high poly for that and the lava flowing bit right after one another, and wait to do their low poly and bakes once those are wrapped. I'll toss the other wall panel into unreal tomorrow and start on the left side, I need to see how much I can wrap up before GDC.

Finally In unreal

2010-03-01T22:15:00.001-06:00

I still need to mess with the materials a bit, but here it is. Tomorrow I'm going to start working out the other wall panel I need then off to work on the left wall stuff. Had to get familiar with the editor a bit. I've got some of the basics down, now I just need to figure out all of the material aspects and the lighting system.

WIP Wall Texture Update

2010-02-28T07:54:00.001-06:00

Got a bit of work done on the wall textures last night. I'm hoping tonight to throw this all into UDK and start only showing updates from there. Next I'm going to work on the larger wall assets that are on the left hand side of the shot.

//Polycount Thread

Busy...Busy...Busy

2010-02-27T09:07:00.002-06:00

Story thus far! I've been super busy so I haven't been able to get a lot of work done on the environment. Some guys from work and myself have been cranking away on a small prototype during our free time and that's been eating up a lot of time. Hopefully tonight I can get the rest of the panel stuff squared away, meaning unwrapped and possibly start to texture it. I'll also be in San Fransisco for GDC so that will eat up a bunch of time, but I'm looking into getting a laptop for the trip. Well, hopefully my next post has some cool stuff to show.

Another note, Frozen Codebase just announced Kick-Ass: The Game for PsN and Iphone, so go check it out and become a fan on Facebook.

Small Update

2010-02-19T21:32:00.000-06:00

So I haven't had much time to work on my environment. I've been working a lot during the day and doing a small prototype game on the weekends. Progress has been slow but there is still progress. I started to put the high poly wall/railing together.

There are a few bits that need reworking yet. They're not holding up when I toss on the turbo smooth so that needs to be fix. I'm hoping to have the high poly done by Sunday night.

//Polycount Thread

Some Blocking Out

2010-02-15T09:16:00.001-06:00

I finally started to block out the full blown environment. I'll hopefully have the entire block out done tonight, then I can start doing the high poly versions of everything.

WIP Shots

2010-02-10T09:21:00.000-06:00

Now I'm not sure if these will be in the actual shot but they've helped me figure out the process for creating the art for this shot. These are real time screen captures using Xoliul's 3DS Max Viewport Shader.

Now that these are kind of there it's time to start working a more detailed block out. I've got a thread started over at Polycount as well.

Texture Tests Round 1

2010-02-09T00:30:00.000-06:00

So I got a bit of time to mess around with the texture. This is about 30 minutes of work with no real spec or anything. I'm still messing around with stuff and I'm pretty sure I will remove the diamond metal, since it doesn't really scream Mass Effect to me at all. I also think the base texture is a bit to scratchy.

Ref Photos

2010-02-08T09:45:00.000-06:00

I took some time over the weekend to collect some reference photos. These are all steel/ceramic factories and they show a lot of surface detail in the metal used to construct the machines and buildings and general dirt build up.

Image below is just to get an idea of different floor patterns.

I also created 4 or 5 floor panels before I could settle on the one I liked, tonight I'll throw a render up of the high poly since last night it still needed some alignment to be done.

Step One Complete: Concept Found

2010-02-05T08:59:00.001-06:00

While packing up my stuff at work after a pretty long day I started to browse the web for a bit. Check my email and what not. Then one thing led to another and I found myself there for an extra 30 minutes or so looking for some concept art. I looked everywhere and finally found 2 pieces I liked. They're both from the Mass Effect games, I think the first game.

After settling on one I started doing some basic scale notes and I started to block out some of the shapes. I then realized I need to make an itemized list of all of the assets I'll need to create. This is what I came up with.

List of assets

Floor Panel Texture (Tiles)
2xWall Panel Texture (Tiles)
Raised Floor
Core Heater Machine and Blaster
Lava Container (Main)
Lava Container Channels
Fusion Wire Container
Wires
Mid Floor Wire Clamp
Back Wall Machinery
Back Wall Arch Post (Not sure what that is)
Lava Funnel Wall Asset
Mid Lava Funnel Asset
Floor Wires and Coils
Back Wall Lave Channels
Outpost Control Room
Outpost Wall Container

I'm pretty sure i'm going to start with either the floor or the wall tiles. I'll use the asset I get done first to start learning UDK and start the feedback train.

Starting off the year wrong and fixing it.

2010-02-04T09:14:00.000-06:00

My New Years resolutions this year was to become a better environment artist and finish everything I start. So far I've been doing ok on the second part but I haven't done a whole lot towards the first bit. I want to rectify that now and hopefully come out the other end with a nice portfolio piece.

Recently finishing Mass Effect 2, seeing Adam's great level art thread on Polycount, and the listening to the Game Mentor Podcast has really inspired me to kick this thing in gear. My goal is to finish and entire scene from start to finish and use this as a opportunity to learn as many new techniques as possible. I've gone a head and listed some goals down below.

Set up the project as if it were for a production level not a still

Focus on the scene and not the indvidual asset

Improve my texturing and modeling skills

Learn the UDK pipeline

Document the whole process ( new focus of the blog)

Successfully create an enviornment that I'm happy with.

Now that I'm thinking about the project, it's time to do some research and planning. Once I'm done with that I'll also start a thread on Polycount for critiques and comments. Hopefully this weekend is a productive one.

Just Doing Science.Doma

2009-12-22T23:28:00.002-06:00

Just Doing Science.DOMA by *neocron on deviant ART

I'm back

2009-12-15T20:12:00.002-06:00

Kind of. Wow I've really neglected this. Well here is an awesome video for Iphone developers.

Guitar WIP Low Poly

2009-10-07T17:19:00.002-05:00

Small guitar update, started the low poly work.

WIP 2 Guitar Shot

2009-09-27T19:54:00.000-05:00

Got a bit further, going to wait for some C and C before moving onto the low poly.

[WIP] Kraag Guitar

2009-09-27T10:46:00.003-05:00

I've taken a look at my portfolio and it's really lacking some current gen work. I decided to spend some time ramping it up with a variety of projects. The first one I'm tackling is a guitar. I got really inspired by the guitar Eddie Riggs uses in Brutal Legend and some of the more crazier guitars in Metalocaylpse. I used that as my starting point and riffed this beast out from that.

(Click for larger pic)

Germany Graffiti

2009-08-12T13:05:00.002-05:00

So walking around down town Bayreuth i've seen alot of really cool graffiti. I'm going to toss it up here as I upload pictures.

Germany 09

2009-08-10T16:27:00.001-05:00

So I'm out in Germany for the next week or so. When I return I'll have a bunch of pictures to upload and some more blogging to do. Till then, later.

Video Games and the Female Audience via Ign

2009-07-29T18:09:00.001-05:00

I have not died

2009-07-16T19:19:00.002-05:00

I don't have alot of time to work on things at home and it seems like everything I am working on Ican't really show off yet. This means no new artwork for a while. Atleast for a few weeks. I got a project brewing that I want to get started, and if it takes off I'll post all of the progress. So we'll see.

Today DA put up their portfolio service. Which in my opinion kicks ass. I just set up the bare bones one just to ensure the name. Hehe. Here is the link, it's a really cool service and I hope it stays free.

Link

Kart Racer Asset Pack Done

2009-06-17T08:41:00.002-05:00

Kart Racer Asset Pack #1 is finished. I've gone ahead and tossed it up on Turbo Squid last weekend. I'm not sure if I'll do another pack soon, I've got alot of other projects I'd like to tackle. Well here is a pic with all of the collected assets. I hope some one can use it.

E3 Week Catch Up

2009-06-12T08:41:00.002-05:00

So we got back from E3 last Friday/Saturday. It's taken all week to really get back into the swing of things. I should have some more art work coming up this weekend that I can post. I want to get the outbreak characters rigged and posed up, wrap the asset pack so I can get it uploaded to turbo squid, and finally I have some new art experiments I want to mess with. Lets hope Prototype doesn't consume me all day tomorrow.

Weekend Work

2009-05-31T20:09:00.003-05:00

Just started some work on a 'Mario' Kart Themed Asset Pack. I'm going to take all of my old Kart assets and turn them into some content packs that people can download and use. I'm hoping some of this stuff is usefull for people and they enjoy the assets. First one is almost done. Next weekend it should be live.

Outbreak Game Art

2009-05-28T09:30:00.003-05:00

Got some of the characters done.

Ashley Wood

2009-05-23T01:23:00.003-05:00

Seriously blows my mind, he is such a versitile artist. I would love to translate his art into a game.

3A Production Blog