Portfolio Review - Character Art
Hi
I would love if you guys could review my portfolio and give me some pointers on how I can expand it and make it stronger. For instance what you find the weakest and what I should work on. I love working with characters and creatures so this is the area I want to improve in. But what should I do for my next portfolio piece? What is missing? I want to compliment it rather than just make the same stuff I'm already showing. I've been doing a lot of anatomy studies lately but it's kind of boring to put in a portfolio and I don't want to show the same stuff over and over again.
Portfolio: https://www.artstation.com/artist/davbi
Hope to hear your input!
I would love if you guys could review my portfolio and give me some pointers on how I can expand it and make it stronger. For instance what you find the weakest and what I should work on. I love working with characters and creatures so this is the area I want to improve in. But what should I do for my next portfolio piece? What is missing? I want to compliment it rather than just make the same stuff I'm already showing. I've been doing a lot of anatomy studies lately but it's kind of boring to put in a portfolio and I don't want to show the same stuff over and over again.
Portfolio: https://www.artstation.com/artist/davbi
Hope to hear your input!
Replies
keep
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/male-anatomy-study-7cae8095-20ec-408c-b81b-2abe59504b62
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/goblin-fan-art
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/athena-bust
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/portrait-c37341e7-8356-4e34-8edf-a7273a95f9d3
everything else can be kicked.
your next project should be an awesome character that showcases all your skills, like the roman soldier, but realy, realy polished, and using a more interesting concept.
it looks like your texturing skills need the most work, so i would try to focus on material definition for a bit, try to replicate a realy cool looking texture from the order or something.
like this one for example
then get a realy cool concept and build your awesome next-gen-PBR-super-character.
you seem to have a good foundation, good luck.
I vote for this one staying in with more polish done on it. The texture on the hair kind of kills it, which kind of goes for all your pieces in regards to the hair being not as good as the rest of the model. The wrinkles on the back of the legs also look slightly strange and could use some re-working in the area where the leg would bend.
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/portrait-2c2ae190-8650-44b9-b8a4-f1f57d9c80e5
is probably your best handling of hair imo. Would be great if you can up the hair textures/treatment on whatever models you end up going with so it's on par with everything else/not blurry or basically a solid color which looks strange directly next to the higher-res patterns on the clothing.
I appreciate your blunt but honest opinion and I see what you are saying, quality over quantity. Even though many of my pieces are not up to par to the quality they should be isn't there a point to show diversity and progression? Are they really that bad? If I only show a few pieces it might come across as if I haven't done many pieces to begin with, but then again they might not be good enough in the first place... I will think about leaving those out, it might be for the best.
Although my portfolio is geared towards characters I thought it might be a good idea to show that I can work on props as well, even though they are not that complex. They were for a game to be released as well.
I thought of creating categories but don't know how that will look with artstation and all that.
Thanks for the feedback, I agree that hair is not my strong suit. I'll think about reworking them or tossing them out and start fresh.
I disagree with some people saying you should remove most of your pieces from your folio.
I do agree your texturing is what needs the most work.
all of your screenshot are also very dark and very littke contrast, I think some of your work could help some new and improved beautyshot.
Your survivor for exemple, the boots and jacket sculpt looks really nice, I believed your sculpt was probably looking good, it would be worth showing it.
I believe your lowrez is not giving your work justice. The screenshot are pretty flat and the color palette a little bit too much uniform to keep it interesting.
Your goblin model does look really nice, I really like the sculpt but once again, the texturing is really hurting yourself, The skin texturing is very generic and way too noisy. Makes your sculpt no justice and makes it very hard to see all of the nice details and work you put into the sculpt. I think you should make a new texture for that one.
Wouldn't be too long to do and would realy improve the outlook of that piece.
Your Roman soldier looks great, the modelling looks really nice and the face is lovely.
Once again, very very dull lighting, way too dark!
Isn't that looking better?
On your portfolio, there is generally not room for showing progression (except maybe from planning>final model). You show your best work up front, that's it. Anything else may just make people doubt that you can consistently create work that's up to scratch. It's also better to just specialize in something-- if that thing is characters, your diversity is only valued if it's relevant and just as good as your character work, or if you're applying for a company that wants a generalist.
Some links.
http://www.gamecareerguide.com/features/963/porn_elves_and_other_offenses_of_the_common_student_portfolio.php
http://www.gamecareerguide.com/features/1113/killer_portfolio_or_portfolio_killer_video_feature.php
http://www.jonjones.com/2005/10/07/your-portfolio-repels-jobs/
Also notes on what you do have:
- Tits nailed it, work on your lighting. You need to add a proper lighting set up with any HDRI, but specifically the darker ones. A few of your pieces are hidden in the dark!
- I really like your survivor piece! I think it's great! But the presentation is really poor compared to some of your other pieces ( a bit flat and boring, mostly just lighting again I think), and... no pose. I think if you posed her, and lit her a little better, you'd have an incredibly appealing piece, as opposed to just a good one!
- Your Joker's pose lacks weight and is a little static. Again, just that extra little bit of work would make a nice piece into a stand-out one.
Interested in seeing more work from you, you're clearly good at what you do. I like your anatomy studies.
I will rework some textures aswell, especially the goblin.
I read them and they were great, you have already mentioned some of the points in ths thread and I will learn from them.
I reorganized my portfolio layout a bit and grouped a lot of stuff, for instance the props and the anatomy studies. I also removed some sketches that I felt were outdated.
I will keep on working at it and try to improve what I already got in my portfolio so far.
Better? I have some more shots in the folio.
Thanks for the feedback so far guys!
--Also, kill the GOLD lion statue. The stone one is ok, but the flat material on the shiny one really looks cheap. It's a sore spot on that page and your eye is drawn to it in the worst way possible.
I have been thinking about this too and I agree that the characters are a bit generic. When I started creating pieces for my folio I thought that it was more important too showcase individual skill sets rather then the character itself. For instance how I handle cloth and anatomy. I wasn't too hung up on the character itself and none of my pieces are from a pre-existing concept. I will work from a concept for my next character, I can see how that is important now.
Done
I'm not exactly sure in what way it's cranked up, do you mean the subdermis?
I adjusted it in the shot below, if it's still not looking right it might be my maps.
As for concepts, I've been told by a lead character artist at EA that using concept art from other people is fine and even better sometimes if you don't have the concept creativity/ drawing skills. Just make sure to get permission from the concept artist and to give them credit. not everything needs to be original from your mind.
personally I dont like the lion facial features. I think that is your weakest work. I don't think you need your hair practice image. the face looks so so and you already have many images with hair in it that are good.
Also, as I was told by a wise character artist - ANATOMY IS KING
I'm keeping most of my stuff too show variation in my work. Even though my goal is to work at a AAA studio I feel that I have a long way to go. My best bet is a junior position and even then I still think I need to grow some more as an artist. Instead I focus on getting into a smaller studio, probably indie. Anything paid really.
I have had my doubts about these two as well. I finished the lion statue and right now I don't like it at all. I might throw it out, I'm going to give it a couple of days though, maybe rework the texture.
Thanks to all that replied in this thread, helped a lot!
Edit:
Redid the eyes and those horrible eyebrows. Just took the eyes I made for my latest character and replaced them with the old. Don't know why I haven't done this before, took like 10 minutes.
Below you can see the before and after. Also reworked the Roman character the same way.
Also, the darker eyes made more sense for her ethnicity.
Did as you said, hopefully it's better. I can hardly tell but it feels better.
As for the eye color, yes it makes more sense to be a darker browner tone but I wanted to try something different. Since you weren't a fan of it I changed it back to brown again.
At 52 minutes in they talk about eyes specifically.
Thats looking better. I think you should really redo the knit cap. You can make that look so much better with a proper sculpt. I think the hair could also be improved...
about the beanie, do you think I should redo how it folds or the surface details? I'm pretty satisfied with how it looks, it shouldn't wrinkle that much.
The hair on the other hand needs fixing, I tweaked the mesh a bit and did another texture pass, trying to salvage what I got. Am I going in the right direction or should I just rethink it and start from scratch? Thinking of adding smaller and thinner dreadlocks to make it look more interesting. The color might need tweaking as well.
Knit hats usually have ribbing around the edge. This is done with an alternating pattern of regular and inverted stitches, so you can see a distinctly different stitch pattern around the edge. Also, the hats are often made as a straight tube and then cinched together at the top, creating deep folds radiating from the top middle. Check out this example:
https://www.etsy.com/listing/116430100/slouchy-knit-hat-camel-brown-knit-hat?ref=market
In your hat, it doesn't seem to have that construction. Ofcourse, there are more ways to make a knit cap, so you'll just want to pick one you like and stick to it. The main idea is that your hat needs to follow a real world pattern/construction for it to look realistic.
I also think the chunkiness and unevenness of the stitches isn't really coming through in your normal map.
Lastly, you can give it more of a fluffy impression if you use a fall-off shader on it.
Gonna actually elaborate on what I think holds this piece back. Nit picking, but I hope you can understand better what I mean.
I personally find fault in the eyebrow change. Who has perfectly plucked eyebrows as a survivor? Though more importantly, girls who do take care of their eyebrows actually fill them. These look a little thin, and sit a little too far apart.
She also looks a little... ill (and not just in a roughin' it kind of way, which would be cool). Needs a little more color or different lighting or somethin'. Her translucency/subdermis map are also a set a little high from the looks of it.
Paintover (AND HUGE DISCLAIMER my monitor is a bit dodgy so several grains of salt):
Also, I feel like something is coloring my opinion of these new renders and my gut makes me think your FOV might be off, or at least different to the original render. maybe try a bit of a different FOV or angle?
I did look at reference, the pattern I went with is just a simplified version of what I ended up going with, something like this:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/sand_and_sky/2924281571/in/photostream/
Without the part in the middle. I did however not get the rolled up patter right, might go back and fix that.
It was very subtle when I went back and checked, I bumped it up in the high poly and rebaked it, still very subtle but not sure how to fix that without some kind of displacement. This is the high poly btw:
It was done with noise maker and a fairly tileable alpha.
Not sure what that is I'm afraid.
Yes, the neatly groomed eyebrows might not make that much sense on a character like this but I still want to keep some appeal to her, and also, just because the world has gone to shit doesn't mean you have to stop taking care of yourself right? I did however try to break it up a bit more, even if it's subtle.
She does look pale, I did another pass on her face, can barely see it though, think I'm gonna give it another go later.
She kind of looks like a homeless prostitute on that paintover though but I got your point
I have had a 30 FOV in marmoset for all my latest render atleast, for this last one I changed it to 20 because I've hear it's a good FOV for portraits. Using 30 for full body shots though.
Latest update: (I noticed that Imgur messed up the colors a bit so this one is straight from my artstation.)