Cliffs

This week, I'm working on a tutorial piece using cliff faces in Blender. The tutorial implements many concepts new to me which in synthesis, produced a beautiful result. This is still a work in progress and I plan on making something entirely different, using the same techniques and materials. I'm using just a plane for now to make perhaps an auxiliary piece or something supplemental for a larger project.

Artist Emulation Piece 1

Using a synthesis of both 3D rendering software and photoshop, I was able to create this image. The pillars were done in Cycles with a normal map and Diffuse BSDF material to create a concrete-like texture. I then placed in the tattered flag, sky, and lighting effects using Photoshop. Most of this could have been done entirely in Blender but that would have taken far too much time, which I was at a lack of to begin with.

Artist Review: Adam Martinakis

For Adam's piece titled "Roots of Fire", and many of his other works is the synthesis of sharp cutaway lines with the smooth and subtle engraved lines throughout the main focus. I particularly enjoy the material he chose for the "skin". It's a concrete-like material with a wonderful looking bump map and slight gloss and specular. The composition of this piece even follows a gentle curve as does the details.

In his next piece, "Fatal", we see the subtle etching again accept this time with a slight bevel or smoothing to them. Personally, I enjoy this style more but it convey a different impression than the former piece; almost as if the face and hands were composed of many of thousands of planes skewed in both size and curvature. Lastly, his use of depth of field helps to add a strong sense of reality and hyperrealism.

Somewhat similar to the first piece listed, "Baptized By Fire" conveys a powerful feeling especially since the giant man at the left looks to have inflicted this blaze upon himself. The detail of the vines and the complexity of the background make for a stunning synthesis and adds a certain sense of depth to the scene.

Continuing with the theme of fragmentation, "truEnd" uses a stunning element of motion blur to convey an action of shattering. This is by far the most active and kinetic work of the other 3 listed.

Lastly, "The Dark Matter" is composed in a completely different style than the other 4. While being similar to a wireframe, what truly amazes me is the randomness of line occurrence and density throughout the piece. Looking closely, the material almost has an extruded and paint look giving it a large amount of tangibility and realism.

5 Artists

Bogdan Zwir: Bogdan Zwir is from Saint Petersburg, Russia and uses photography and photo manipulation as his main medium. Zwir enjoy “the absurd” much in the way that a child’s imagination runs wild, however, Zwir is not a child anyone. His work contains deep hues and powerful messages that conveys physical feelings like pain, love, or bewilderedness.

Alain Mathiot: While I couldn’t find his “about” page on his website, I can infer he’s from a French speaking country and his work contains plenty of oil-on-canvas, inking, and digital art. his variety of mediums is just as numerous as his variety of styles. While some may appear surreal, others may convey a lighter message or something completely of his own.

Mark Powell: Mark Powell lives in the United Kingdom with his main, and almost exclusive, medium being ink on paper. The most striking aspect of all his works is definitely the eyes of the people he draws. They convey a sense of power, experience, or age. None of his works are simple portraits and no detail is left behind.

Apachennov: Eugene Soloviev is from Nizhniy Novgorod and uses photo manipulation to yield surreal and interesting works. His portfolio is expansive and uses plenty of variety from a stark surreal scene, to a busy and emotional one. I’m a big fan of this piece in particular, this artist will probably be one of the artists I write my paper on.

Adam Martinakis: Born in Lubań, Martinakis, is a 3D digital artist with breathtaking taking work and wonderful manipulation of light and raytracing. He follows a similar style juxtaposing a concrete or stone material against a glossy material. He’s had multiple exhibitions and awards. I will definitely be writing my paper on this artist.

What I did over the summer

Over the summer, I tried to sharpen my 3D graphics skills in prep for the new school year. My goal is to implement more 3D into my pieces making it easier to create what I envision instead of having to scour the internet in search of the perfect photo.  I see myself taking a serious path down this journey and I hope to keep up to date in the CG world even when my classroom graphics career ends.

Rainy Window: Finished

Here is the final render of the Rain Droplet piece. I used about 2000 passes for this render in Cycles but the gain is still apparent. I did a little retouching in Photoshop to try and de-noise the image, as well as add in a glare and lens flare. This piece was my first CG project to use the Compositor. The Compositor is basically Photoshop except in 3D and all of the tools are nodes, so the entire render is affected by the changes.

Rainy Window WOP

As a free week, I started more 3D tutorials, mainly using Blender. I'm making a rainy window scene but have hit a couple of bumps along the way. My random particle system for distributing the raindrops is going haywire and not rotating the droplets properly. All the rain drops have been modeled by hand and should be a nice turnout after working out some kinks over the weekend.