Raphael Medina - Portfolio Review

Raph

Hey guys!

Iv been working hard on getting a good environment artist portfolio going after graduating back in May. Any feedback on anything would be greatly appreciated.
The Environment was done in UE4 and the turntables were rendered in Marmoset toolbag.

my site: raphaelmedina.com


Here is one of the screenshots of my latest environment.

pixelpatron

Your texel density is all over the board, lighting could use major overhaul (those torches are crazy bright), broken column is good, but no corresponding damage to the floor weakens believability. The weird bevel at the base of the stairs seems out of place. The stairs repeat, everything is the same color value, the columns look greek inspired and not fitting for a dungeon. The spiral decoration is also to ornate for the theme. Do some homework, find realistic reference, think of a focal point, think of how things would actually be constructed, and really focus on giving things a purpose, and re-execute this.

As it stands now, no art director at any studio I've worked for would give this a second look.

start with solid reference: this took me 5 mins to find.....how long did you work on this project? See where I'm going with this?















find texture ref, find lighting ref, find column and stone ref. Make a board of your favs, do some tests, and then make a solid block-out....composition. Do base lighting while it's untextured, work on your silhouettes and then do final models and textures.

Good luck.

Leto

+1 to everything pixelpatron said.

on the topic of disparity of fidelity you have from the ref models pixelpatron showed, don't get overwhelmed! just start by getting that ONE asset to that level of detail. it may take several attacks, but once you've done it you can apply all that you learned to all the other assets in the scene. good luck, keep the thread updated!

Raph

Thanks for the solid critique! Ill definitely be reworking this and will keep the thread updated with any progress I make. I'v got a lot to learn and a lot to work on but it'll be fun.

Ervin

I agree with what others have said; it looks very rushed and effortless. You're far better off making one good object than an entire mediocre looking scene. You should focus on one object and really think about what you need to do to make it professional looking. There are a lot of tutorials on the internet that will help you make great stuff, check some out. Once you've made one object that you're happy with, move on to another, and then maybe you'll eventually have a scene that looks good.

Also, you don't really need to have a complete and detailed scene in order to find a job. Just make sure you have several varying objects that prove that you can make almost anything your employer might ask you to make.

Shrike

the website looks very nice tho

Well a quick advice from me, use as many polys as you need to make objects look flawless. Same for texture resolution. You can always go down, and nobody cares about numbers, youre not helping anyone, so make round things round (etc) and pack away the unwanted edges.

It looks like your artistic vision needs more training, that needs time and is fine, just make sure to look at other peoples work often. Here on polycount and everywhere else. Make a daily habit of looking at compilations of new 3D and 2D art, your brain recognizes the patterns of what makes good art and you will become better over time. http://abduzeedo.com/ is good for mixed mostly non 3d stuff, save their daily inspiration, it will help a lot over time. Aside check out the what are you working on thread and this forum at best to see other 3D stuff. The main time should be spent on modeling new things, and only go for real objects with good references. It also looks like you dont bake normal maps yet ? Very important to know the highpoly > lowpoly workflow

then i wish good luck