HOW TO BECOME A HARD SURFACE (Blender) Artist
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## STEP 1 : IDENTIFY YOUR CALLING
Every pro artist tends to make the same type of art(asset) over and over again e.g. female characters(armor), weapons, robots, vehicles e.t.c. They become better by practicing what they love most.
Just go to Art station and look at the work of Tor Frick, Daniel Bystedt, Masterxeon1001, or Vitaly Bulgarov
Your first model is always going to suck. If you try modelling different types of assets every time, all your models will suck because you are trying to do something for the first time. However, if you try modelling the same thing or the same type of asset again, you will see some improvement.
"I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times." Bruce Lee
Try creating hundreds of the same type of asset, and in a few months you will become a pro in your own niche. You will become the kind of artists that studios are looking to hire.
## STEP 2: GET FINANCIALLY STABLE
Becoming a pro is a process that can take quite a while before you start generating income. This means you will need to rely on other sources of income as your pursue your career. If you are still living under your parents roof, you are in luck. You can spend everyday learning and acquiring new 3D skills.
If you are looking after yourself, you will need a job. Then practice after hours on improving your 3D skills. Don't rely on your savings. There is no telling when you can start making sufficient earnings from your 3D career.
Personally, I've always been too tired to work on anything after hours. I also find it difficult to focus on two different types of tasks on the same day. One task(modelling) will always become a priority in my mind and make it difficult to complete the other task.
Luckily I have a freelance writing gig. What I do is I spend one whole month writing articles, then I spend the next month leveling up my 3D skills. My recommendation is to try to find a balance between work and study that will work for you. Go to YouTube and check out videos on "time management" and "motivation".
## STEP 3: LEVEL UP WITH COMMERCIAL TRAINING
Most people believe that free training on YouTube is enough to make them great artists in Blender or any other software. Technically, it is possible. However, it will take you a very long time to get there. Gleb Alexandrov and Aidy Burrows admit it took them about 10 years to reach their current level(if you don't know who they are, just Google them).
Are you willing to spend the next 10 years to get to the pro level??
Free tutorials can take you from a complete noob to the intermediate level. Unfortunately most people don't know what to do after they complete Blender Guru's "Donut" and "Anvil" tutorials. Those tutorials are great for beginners. However, they teach only 1% of what you can do with Blender. There is still a ton more skills you need to acquire.
Commercial training will compress 10+ years of learning on your own, into just 1 year. Colleges and Universities that teach CG and VFX are very expensive. And from what I hear, most are not that good. As a Blender artist, you have access to the most affordable online courses on the planet.
I would recommend you start with CG Cookie if you are a beginner. A month's subscription costs $29. What you can learn in a month on their platform is equal to what you can learn on your own in 3+ months. If you can afford a laptop or
Other courses that I would recommend for hard surface artists are:
- Blender Hard Surface Modelling by Aidy Burrows and Gleb Alexandrov (CgShrimp.com)
- CG Masters Training courses
- Udemy (you can find courses as low as $9.99)
By picking a commercial course, you learn how to use a workflow to develop an asset from 2D to a finished textured 3D asset. You get to learn how to create quality models that studios will pay you for.
## STEP 4: BECOME A FAST ARTIST
Junior artists will earn about $100 or less (depending on where your are living) per day. Senior artists can earn upto $1,000 a day. The reason why a senior artist gets paid more is because they can pump out more quality assets than a junior artist can.
How can one model and texture assets as fast possible?
I believe the answer lies in the pipeline you use.
As a Blender artist, you know you can do modelling, uv unwrapping, baking and texturing stuff in Blender. If you are a professional artist, you know they are certain tasks that are always repetitive, time consuming that must get done. Hence, you need tools(free or commercial) that will help speed up your work workflow in your 3D asset creation pipeline.
Am currently developing mine and this what I have so far:
1. Autodesk Fusion 360 - For me this is the fastest 100% procedural tool for modelling hard surface assets
2. Blender 2.79 - Importing CAD assets, splitting mesh, cleaning up and converting to obj and fbx formats
3. Hardops - I use this manage smoothing groups and to bevel edges quickly(create high-poly mesh)
4. RizomUV - Easiest and fastest UV unwrapping tool especially for triangulated Meshes
5. Substance Painter - Best PBR texturing tool in the market
6. Decal Machine - For fast hard surface detailing on models using decals. Huge time saver add on that is only available for Blender
7. Blender 2.80 - I use the Eevee engine to render out the finished models in seconds.
I have other tools in my arsenal but I haven't found a use for it yet. I'll talk more about my 3D asset creation pipeline later in another post.
## STEP 5: NETWORKING
Whenever you finish your asset, post your work on all popular social media sites. Specifically art related like:
- Blender Facebook Groups
- Twitter
- Artstation
- Polycount
- Gaming Collaboration Sites
- Discord groups
This is probably where your next income gig will come from. I'll do a detailed post another day on networking.
## SUMMARY
In case I've forgotten something, please leave a comment. If you agree with me leave a like. If you disagree with any of the points I'v mentioned AND you have a "great portfolio" as a 3D artist, please let us know.
Am still figuring this all out. Thanks for reading til the end of this post 😃
Replies
EDIT: Well, here's the deal. I always wanted to jump into hard surface modeling but I cannot afford to attend schools like Gnomon and I horribly suck at teaching myself. So far, I decided to stick with Zbrush for now until Blender 2.8 has enough learning resources for modeling and probably some rudimentary rigging because I want to rig my mech models someday. I can never get used to any UI before 2.8 at all.
https://blendermarket.com/products/hard-surface-modeling-in-blender
...which as a Blenderite modeller with 15yrs hobbyest and semi pro experience was certainly an eye opener learning a few new techniques...by the way is also worth every cent too.