[Portfolio] Zac Berry (image-heavy)

zberry

Hello everyone, wanted to post a new portfolio thread here. I am currently looking for freelance or full-time work, so if you have any advice on how to improve my work, or what kind of model I should add to my line-up, it would be greatly appreciated. Here we go:




































Thanks for looking at my work, I should have more coming very soon. Please check out my reel at www.zacberry.com

zberry

And a few more:

Firebert

Your hardsurface work has some great details! Your organic character work is good as well. Couple of things....

Decide what you want to do. I have no clue what kind of specialty you offer. You have solid hard surface and decent organic skills, but most places don't look for generalists. Having a few pieces like the helicopter are good to have to show a sense of detail, but you need to find a focused position and stick to it as well as make it very clear from your work, not from text decleration, but from visually looking at your work the kind of artist you are. Environment, character, etc. I would say you are leaning towards a character artist position, but there's something missing and I can't put my finger on it.

Show wires on your models. EXTREMELY important. If you're going to be modeling anything, you have to show how you construct your polys.

Don't show WIP images. I have made this mistake several times to just fill my portfolio. Anything WIP should stay off your site. I still have a couple of items in my work that were items I never finished, but I liked them and put them on my site.... NOT A GOOD IDEA. Just looks like you don't give a crap. ** speaking of, i gotta take those things off of there! :poly122:

ALL your work should be finished, textured, and presented in some fashion. You don't have to make an elaborate presentation, but at least on a background of some sort or in a simple scene... not in a zbrush work environment.

Get a website. You would be surprised what you could afford. Pay once a year for a domain and web hosting. A website allows you more personal exposure than in a cluttered thread of posts.

GOOD LUCK! I would say you are well on your way, but don't give up and keep truckin'. It is a tough industry, especially if you're trying to get in.

zberry

Thanks for the tips Firebert. I am looking for work as a character artist, but I included some hard-surface work to show that I can do that as well. Actually I am happy doing any kind of modeling, I'm not too picky. I have wireframes for most of the work on my demo reel at my website, www.zacberry.com.


I would like additional feedback if possible regarding the WIP comment. Does anyone else think that having WIPS on my site will hurt my chances for finding work? If so I'll take them off right away.

NyneDown

What's up zac....your site is coming along nicely man, nice to see more work from ya

Personally from what I have read and researched, it's pretty important that employers know exactly what type of position you are seeking just by looking at your portfolio...so throwing that prop stuff in there might detour them a bit. If you want to display your hard surface abilities, ya could always do a character decked out in some hard surface gear. Not necessarily space marine-ish, but something along those lines. And for a "WIP section", that might hurt ya later on when re-applying for jobs. Whoever is doing the hiring might see that you didnt finish any of your wip stuff and might have doubts. If you have 1 WIP up on your site at a time, I dont see anything wrong with it just as long as you finish it. And if not, just take it down. Anyway...looking forward to seeing more stuff from ya and good luck man

zberry

Here is an updated render of a female head I am working on. Crits welcome, I'm trying to get this one in tip-top shape for GDC.

Loraine Howard iii

Yo Zberry, I like your work but i think you should take some pieces out of your portfolio. I'm not a fan of the Sagat, Blanka, and creature designs. I think if you want to include those i would try to make them just as strong as the other pieces. Everything else is on point, did you mean to make the woman portraits elf like?

Loraine Howard iii

back again, i just checked your website and i did not like how you did your demo reel. Some models wire-frame's were done differently and it was not done consistently throughout the reel. After looking at the original model of that creature it actually looks good in the reel but I'm not feeling the textures or lighting for him. I also think you should do a turnaround of the helicopter, that's one of your best pieces including your pilot. In a couple of days I'm gonna put my stuff up as well, I'm in the same position as you updating my website and shyt. I want you to comment on my stuff when i put it up,Good luck.

crazyfingers

Not too bad. You don't seem to have any weakness per say, but as others have stated some pieces aren't strong enough to be in a portfolio.

Your female head models are almost portfolio quality, but something about the lip area really bothers me, you really need to fix this, they're close to being fantastic.
On one, I want to say the upper lip is too thick, and the areas just above and below look like they're smeared with vasoline, a little too much spec. On the other i don't like the hint of anger. Generic female models generally shouldn't look angry unless they're in space armor or weilding some kind of weapon.

You're a bit all over the place, but obviously you're better off for it in the long run. I think if you were to focus on any area for a few months you'd have a nice flushed out portfolio.

Oh and ditch the dude riding the arachnid.

Jeremy Lindstrom

The eyes on the latest head are way too big and too close together.. IMO... and it looks like you have some lighting issues on the right side of the helmet on the pilot.

Looks good though