Environment noob - please help

Gallamanji

Hey everyone..

So basically I have been doing 3D for a couple of years now but have recently decided to go down a different direction from my previous work and start building an 3D environment art showreel for games. It's a bit daunting for me as I am going solo, learning on my own but using resources online like polycount (which in really grateful for). I was wondering if anyone had any advice for me, and I also had a couple of questions...

Where should I look for concept art to model from? Is it ok to model environments from "Art of" books of my favourite games for example? Or is it better to model my own or other people's original designs (with permission ofcourse). If so, does anyone know a good place to find concept art to use?

Also, I have a few companies I am catoring my showreel for, but is it a good idea to have some variety in my showreel? For example, realistic and stylised stuff?

Thanks a lot for any help, and all the best
Gallamanji

Tobbo

As far as concept art and reference/inspiration goes:

www.pinterest.com

Create an account and follow artists and boards that you like. Myself and many other artists have mood boards and categories for different art projects.

www.artstation.com

A really great website with plenty of top notch 3d and 2d artwork.

www.deviantart.com

Despite having a bad reputation, Deviantart does have some hidden gems in it and can be useful if you know how to properly navigate it. There is plenty of junk to weed through though.

beefaroni

I also think that it's important to pull from current architecture/environments as well. It can help fill gaps in concepts.

I really love Archatlas: http://archatlas.tumblr.com/

McGreed

And always try contact the original artist and ask for permission, it's only polite to do so. Often they say to go ahead and want to see the result.

Gallamanji

Thanks everyone, great links! And yeah I agree about pulling from architecture, I actually studied architecture for a couple of years too so thats good to have under my belt. I would absolutely ask anyone's permission before I use their design, but I was wondering what's the opinion in using designs from existing games? say, for example, I model a building from Fable, and apply to Lionhead Studios.. Do you think the company would prefer to see models of original designs as opposed to ones from existing games, especially their own? And if I was to use an existing design, I would have to ask permission from the company right?

Gallamanji

Also I am unsure of what my approach should be. Should I design my own environments/levels? Or is it possible, with permission, to take a pre designed level, model it and then light it etc in a game engine? At the moment I have various peices of concept art I have found online of various environments, props and stand-some models that I could make. But the environments are only portions of environments because that's all that can be shown in an image of concept art.

DireWolf

Typically, in a studio you'll be working mainly with concepts that are not your own. So showing that you can re-create concept of various artist and be able to fill in the blanks are very good show case.

Anyhow if you have an idea you're excited to create, then definitely go for it.