[Portfolio] JBall Concept artist
Hey guys, I've been with polycount for a while. Lurking mostly! :poly121: Anyway I have got my website up and running. Mostly I am just looking for some Critiques/comments on the design.
I have to get my Arse in gear and fill in those wip sections! But feel free to comment on art that is on there. I greatly value everyones opinion and cant wait to hear what you have to say!
www.jaball.com
I am finishing up my last quarter of school then im being released to the real world... scary!
hopin to hit the ground runnin'
cheers!:)
I have to get my Arse in gear and fill in those wip sections! But feel free to comment on art that is on there. I greatly value everyones opinion and cant wait to hear what you have to say!
www.jaball.com
I am finishing up my last quarter of school then im being released to the real world... scary!
hopin to hit the ground runnin'
cheers!:)
Replies
In terms of the work it self and wanting to be a concept artist, the pieces on there took way to long to complete going off of what you said each one took. As a concept artist you need to be able to convey ideas quickly and clearly with out taking a ton of time. Your resume says you have an excellent understanding of anatomy however you don't have any anatomy/figure studies available. The tree creature is probably the most exciting out of the group. Your other characters kind of fall under the generic WoW style. Just keep at it and get some work up here!
your anatomy on the 2 humanoid drawings seems rather off in the face and some general proportions, like eric said some figure/anatomical studies would be good to see.
Also you should focus on getting faster, each of those paintings would probably be done in 1.4 of the time in a studio, the concept artist I sit next to pumps out 3 or 4 solid character concepts a day sometimes. speed is critical in a production environment, so work on that.
It would be good to see some environment concepts to show you understand perspective and composition.also some different styles other than fantasy would be a great asset to have in your portfolio.
your resume says you have an exceptional knowledge of 3ds max, so get some more work up there to prove it! or perhaps get rid of the 3d section altogether if you want to be a concept artist and focus on producing bangin' concept work one after another, rapid fire.
also, if you dont know about it, check out conceptart.org for some really wicked crits on your 2d stuff, just prepare to have your world rocked/ass torn asunder.
as for the work itself, I really like the tree and ghoul concepts, they have a cool look and style to them, the humanoids are a bit generic for my tastes in comparison. the best advice I can really give is just giv'er every day, dont stop drawing, seems to be the thing all the concept artits i know have in common, always doodling on every paper surface around.
welcome to polycount man, Im sure you will get some good crits
Ericdigital and Pixelmasher nailed it right on spot. The one thing I would like to add is to get some higher res images. It is hard to see any real details in your work, especially the 3d piece.
Imo. quite a few of the works lacks exeactly that like this one- it looks disassembled and the standing pose is off at his feeds- someone who would know anyatomy well should see that imo.
the 'WIP' placeholders suck either show something or not - but dont use those placeholders. If you have just 1 piece or a few in a category just show them - dont give the user the false impression that you will fill them up because most likely you wont or just a few. What matters is what you have now- you can always add more and then claim & prove that you have that many.
Agress with this one that it looks just WOW fanboyish (also the colours in that one are kind of booring/uninspired)- as a concept artist you should avoid such things because it does not give the impression of someone who is confident in his style and his vision. Imo. anyone that puts hype fanart (wow, halo, ...) in his portfolio ranks himself already down to just a execution monkey - not a creative independent beeing because you rely on others work, even worse if its big big mainstream taste.
your 3d content has to many intersections where it simply isn't needed - my impression thus is that you dont know yet how to work with floating geometry, that you dont need to loop the slices through out the whole model but instead can attach compex elements simply to your existing object - not everything has to be made out of 1 solid cube.
personally I hardly read resumes of others or their CV. But what others wrote here regarding excelent skills in x,y,z to me that simply is not yet the case. You have to great potential but your works shows also imo. that you are not that long in the 3d or CG or drawing buisnesss as what the paper of yours claims to be.
my suggestions:
- conceptartist.org (like someone else mentioned before): get some inpiration on ideas on how to develop your own style, develop techniques and confidense in your own execution. Many of the people there simply know how to do that because they did already for a long long time.
- have more practice with modeling (e.g floating geometry)
- remove the WIP tags or simply anything that is a placeholder for NOTHING
oh and dont be to scared of what I wrote - I wish you the best: good luck finding your way and perhaps a job
A few things you guys brought up:
Anatomy: I have been drawing characters since I could first write. So I DO feel comfortable with the human form. That being said I agree 100% that there is room for improvement (there always is) especially on a professional level. I am always drawing and will have more up on my site to back up my claims!
As for the character design I think the humanoids have an "off" look. I need to start working off of reference and do some actual studies... off to conceptart.org! :poly121:
3D: I have about a solid year under my belt with 3Ds Max... I know how to model something properly for a game engine but I dont think im really flexing my 3D muscle... So I have a ways to go. It is something I can see myself really getting into more. I am in a game design program so i feel like I need to show off everything I know. At the same time I dont think the 1 model up there is doing me any good. :thumbdown: lol.
I think there is more to comment on but I should just get working on some more material!
Pixelmasher: Dont worry about being blunt! I came here for some real opinions. You could tell me to take down the site and burn my work... i'd still be back.
Basically what im saying is... Thank you for taking time to post on my work. All advice is not golden but I will learn something from everything that is said!
Again thanks!
cheers
Just be prepared, though, going over to conceptart.org. It's a huge place, huge. And while that might seem like a wonderful place to go - you'll wind up teaching yourself most of what you'll "learn". It's a wonderful source of inspiration and talent, but it can be extremely difficult to get response from people on a personal level.
I for example, have people over at conceptart.org telling me that speed doesn't mean shit, and that I should slow down and take as much time as I can with each piece. And while that's all well and good, I plan on doing work professionally, and as you can see from the folks here - it matters.
Point being, you'll need to take the time and put forth the effort yourself to search the place, and this place, for what can help you move forward and what to log away and forget about.
Best of luck to you.