Portfolio help (trying to make it awesome)

Benjam

Hey guys,

Im new to this forum and have been directed here by a guy called Tyler Noiles who works for Other Ocean Interactive. He recommended me here to help my portfolio get better and said you guys could help.

As it stands my portfolio is not great, the texture maps are awful, the scenes are too dark and im in the process of updating them and making them better. I am also adding new work to it later today from my final year project which will go up very soon

My site it www.benhearndesigns.webs.com

Any tips, advice, criticism (good and bad), thoughts on my work would be massively appreciated.

Cheers guyyyysss

artquest

Hello Benjam, and welcome!

Here are some ideas for the church scene. Polygon distribution in some areas looks low enougsh to be for omething like mobile imo while other places in the scene seem to go decently high. I'd take a minute and decide what the goals for the scene are. Is it a scene meant for a mobile game with everything baked into the textures or are you going for a console/pc type of look. Once you nail that down you'll have a better idea of what the polygon distribution should be.

The main thing that makes your church scene look good is the lighting and bloom/fog. But I can't help but feel that its trying to hide something. Try to get the scene looking good without the bloom/fog and then add it back in later. Your scene will look that much better for it. I'd revisit the textures on the benches and other objects/walls as well. The scene is begging for some ambient occlusion, whether you opt for screen space AO in an engine or bake it all into the textures I think it will really help.

Looking forward to seeing the update later today. Keep up the good work and good luck!

Darkleopard

Best advice i can give you is this

People want art shoved in their face, they don't really want to read where it came from first. Its fine to have that info available, at the bottom or something, but don't try to make them read it first by having it at the top.

Some personal feelings about your porfolio
- Your lighting needs the most work of all. Pick a scene, or make a new one and make the lighting great. If you have bad lighting, you cant see your models which makes them irrelevant. You aware of this though but im mentioning it anyway.

- Have a clear focus and tons of reference images for everything you make. That church looks destroyed, How and why was it destroyed? These questions let you plan your environment with more purpose then just a abandoned, damaged church'

On the porfolio page, take out your little snowboarding picture and put it in the about me page. It doesn't belong on the page dedicated to art and it takes tons of space away from where your art could be.

And for personal taste (this is just me)
Its about 10:30pm here and ive had a long day, those dark picture on a white background make my eyes struggle to see whats there

Some good examples of portfolios layout wise
http://www.torfrick.com/
http://matthewvia.com/index.html

Heaps more, go check em out
http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=92838

gsokol

Hey Benjam,

artquest kinda nailed it for the church environment.

I have a suggestion as far as your website layout goes. If your going to only have one page with all your work on it like this (which is a totally acceptable way to present work), I would suggest having less images of each thing. You have to scroll down pretty far to get past the church environment. You could probably lose a few beauty shots that are kinda simliar (I'd probably remove the one with the 3 small windows at least) and you could possibly put your lectern and pew props on a single image.

Basically, you don't want to bore a potential employer so much with the same amount of work that they don't care to see what else you have. Personally, when I'm making an environment I always have a primary composition in mind (and a handful of secondary angles usually pop up midway through), so I can focus on getting everything I want people to see in a single shot if neccesary.

Don't sweat your work not being great. Realizing that you have a lot of room to grow is always good (and should never go away). Just keep putting up new work and replacing old work as you go. Make sure you focus on having a couple high quality pieces and get rid of the weaker ones as you go along!

Good luck...also I'm looking forward to seeing the Nascar thing...sounds pretty cool.

Benjam

Cheers for the feedback guys, am gonna update the photos in the next hour or so, also i have a video that i made for a Canada work program,

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vtan0T_Rj40"]2012 Canada Winter Video Introduction - Ben Hearn - YouTube[/ame]

Do you think its worth putting the video on my portfolio instead of having all the about me text?

Benjam

UPDATE:

I have uploaded the Nascar track images and am still waiting on the videos etc. to come through from my mate so you can see the game in full swing.

Texture maps to come next!

stoofoo

Benjam wrote: »

As it stands my portfolio is not great, the texture maps are awful, the scenes are too dark and im in the process of updating them and making them better. I am also adding new work to it later today from my final year project which will go up very soon

Gonna need you to sack up and do more work if this is how you feel. Being one's own worst critic is good. It's the key to success, in fact. As long as you think you have something you can get better at and work at it, you are gonna make it. However, you've also acknowledged it needs work.

Your models are wasteful. You are using massive amounts of polygons for something that you could describe in very few. Every arch, every piece of rubble. It's all too wasteful.

The textures are almost all photos that are being blasted out with filters. As such, they look pixelated and muddy.

The absolute best thing you can do for yourself at this point, is to start a new scene. Start from photo reference and bang out something that looks great. Post pictures along the way! This forum has a multitude of amazing artists who will critique everything you have to show--go through the wringer! Get guidance and sponge up the wealth of knowledge that will be dumped on you.

This may all sound a bit harsh--but you want that job, right? You've got work to do. Make moves!

Benjam

stoofoo wrote: »

This may all sound a bit harsh--but you want that job, right? You've got work to do. Make moves!

Not harsh, quality criticism im getting on it!

UPDATED PORTFOLIO:

www.benhearndesigns.webs.com

i have added straplines to my images, also a couple of texture maps ive added.

I was just wondering the image that has the wireframe merge into it, should i leave it like that and have another like it or have the image normal then the wireframe next to it?

Cheers for the help guys!

Benjam

I have finally figured out how to link up images on here! The image that i posted with the trucks that has the wireframe merged into it, i have put it on my portfolio, how does this look?

Should i keep it or should i put up the full original and then the wireframe next to it?

artquest

The trucks look like origami! you may want to remodel them. Or if you are trying to do a stylized racetrack try to make it clear that you aren't going for realism. Be meticulous and make it look like everything is carefully planned to fit your vision. That's what will make you stand out.

Benjam

I can see what you mean about the trucks, I can remodel them, its the cabs that need remodelling i think. They are a bit too square. When i was modelling i was trying to keep it as low tris as possible and the trucks were modelled quickly before my deadline but remodelling will be done



Here is one of the lightmaps i used in game what do you think?

Benjam

Hey guys,

I have changed the layout of my portfolio and given it a new look what do you think?

Benjam

www.benhearndesigns.webs.com

loneraver

I would move all the racetrack images to the bottom. I think the Church and the Hell's Gate scenes make a better first impression.

specsowl

Just to be clear, are those walls in the church N-gons? If so they have about a million sides because of those arches. When working, you have to be careful about your workflow and keep in mind how you want the final product to look without relying on texturing. All of the people above me are probably more qualified and you should definitely look at what they have to say.

switz

One huge tip to always remember - never stretch or skew typefaces; just find another if the one you're using isn't working

Benjam

I am in the process of completely re-doing the church because of the amount of errors in it ( especially the arches ) and am going to re-light the hells gate scene and do some better texture maps for it. I thought that about the church being before the racetrack as well but i wasn't sure if displayed work as a good standard of practice should be chronological?

Benjam

switz wrote: »

One huge tip to always remember - never stretch or skew typefaces; just find another if the one you're using isn't working

Point taken, someone else mentioned the straplines as tacky the other day so i need to change them as well

Benjam

Hey guys, I need to get into the habit of using a game engine so when i re-do my church or make a new scene im going to use UDK, I was just wondering if it is better to make an object in Maya and texture it in there and import it in, orrrrr to texture it in UDK.

Or is it only certain things you should texture in UDK??

Benjam

Hey guys, i have just started the re-make of the church but bigger and better!

After a few hours here is what i have, what do you think?

AlexCatMasterSupreme

Do you want honesty?

Snader

You got any concept art for that latest project?

Benjam

AlexCatMasterSupreme wrote: »

Do you want honesty?

Yeah sure honesty is good, hit me.

I have concept art but they are nothing but sketches i did (terrible ones at that) and a few photos from the net and some photos i took of a real church for the last church project that i did

Benjam

Hey guys have spent a bit more time on the church today and am making progress, I have taken into account everyones comments about arches being too high tris, and the walls being n-gons etc. and have applied it to this version of the church.

I have also scaled it down a little bit from the last lot of screenshots to make it seem a little bit more claustrophobic instead of a wacking great cathedral type thing

Images are in the attachments, what do you guys think?

Benjam

oh also the little cylinders with heads on them are for scale purposes if you hadn't already guessed