[Portfolio] Blaisoid - Texture/Concept artist
polycounter lvl 7
EDIT (13-06-2012):
MY NEW PORTFOLIO IS AVAILABLE AT b-kaczmarek.weebly.com
Here's my first portfolio that i launched about 1 month ago. I'll happily take some criticism and feedback.
Blaze K - Portfolio
note:
-my control over layout, fonts etc is really limited (free site)
-the "Concept art - Characters" thumbnail doesn't look good, i'll change it.
-i didn't finish an english version of cv/resume yet
-pics are automatically resized to 800x800 at max, hence the different sizes of info bars
questions:
-are there too many pictures in "Environment Textures"?
if yes, which ones would you remove?
-'prop textures' folder contains few models made by me. should i make a new category just for them?
-do you think that inclusion of "illustrations etc" folder is justified? or is it not game-arty enough?
-i do have some ingame screens of my textures. would it help to show them if textures don't look so good there compared to xoliul and other realtime shaders?
(it's source engine)
-should i provide a link to bigger resolution pics on Picasa when applying for a job?
or is such site no pro enough? do recruiters even care about high resolution pics?
-anything else that you would change or add?
MY NEW PORTFOLIO IS AVAILABLE AT b-kaczmarek.weebly.com
Here's my first portfolio that i launched about 1 month ago. I'll happily take some criticism and feedback.
Blaze K - Portfolio
note:
-my control over layout, fonts etc is really limited (free site)
-the "Concept art - Characters" thumbnail doesn't look good, i'll change it.
-i didn't finish an english version of cv/resume yet
-pics are automatically resized to 800x800 at max, hence the different sizes of info bars
questions:
-are there too many pictures in "Environment Textures"?
if yes, which ones would you remove?
-'prop textures' folder contains few models made by me. should i make a new category just for them?
-do you think that inclusion of "illustrations etc" folder is justified? or is it not game-arty enough?
-i do have some ingame screens of my textures. would it help to show them if textures don't look so good there compared to xoliul and other realtime shaders?
(it's source engine)
-should i provide a link to bigger resolution pics on Picasa when applying for a job?
or is such site no pro enough? do recruiters even care about high resolution pics?
-anything else that you would change or add?
Replies
- On the environment textures - yeah, some of them seem redundant. Either the cylindrical tiling pattern or the flat one should be fine. I really like the sci-fi looking ones like the hexagon pattern and the one below it.
- Props and prop textures together is fine.
- I can't say on the illustration. I like it but other people might not so /shrug.
- I've heard some companies mention they like to put work on a big projector so people can view it. if thats the case, you could make a big zip file or something with all your images in it in case people want a high-res version.
- I think you could pick some better thumbnails for the concept art and illustration thumbnails. The ones on there now look alright, but I think the 2nd environment concept art looks more polished. Same with the headcrab guy; I would move him up and use him for a thumbnail.
Your thumbnails are terrible, pretty much as bad as can be. You've got good quality work, but on my first pop through of the website, and thought "eh, I dont even wanna bother looking". Your work is much better then those thumbnails suggest. You should remove probably 80-90% of the concepts and keep only the second image, the room with the water turbines, and the image 3rd from last. The rest feel too rushed or unfinished. Similar with characters, I'd say the last 2 images are worth keeping. and the first illustration is interesting, but dont start or end a page with it. Then I'd say combine the 3 2d art pages into one. I suggest this cause those pieces are MUCH better then the other content and will raise the general bar for you portfolio in that area. Keeping the other stuff just doesnt seem to be worth it, I'm not sure the others demonstrate anything worthwhile that the ones i'd keep dont.
Otherwise you've clearly got texturing chops, its just trimming the fat. I'd be interested to see more interesting materials done in something like UDK or a full environment. Oh and light all your environment textures from above, your normals look inverted when you light them from below. hope that helps!
Hmm, that's what i thought. i find it hard to choose though, both cylinders and flat screens have their advantages.
ok, i'll see how it works.
Yeah, that's how it was originally. but i have mixed feelings towards showing the non-original design first. or do you think that it won't matter?
I have one more colored, original concept that i'll upload and try out.
that file would have to be really big though. like 50MB or something. i guess it could be placed on some free hosting site.
Yeah, i indeed put the best ones on top.
exception is the organic texture, i can move it on top as well but i thought it looks out of place between steel and concrete stuff.
But since there isn't much diversity in style of textures (most of them were made for same mod) i thought that i should show at least some diversity in shapes.
I guess i'll remove a few and then see if that's enough.
All thumbnails are cropped and zoomed automatically, i can't move it to make it cover another part of the picture etc.
also, the first pic in the folder is always the one that gets onto thumbnail.
However i just discovered that setting thumbnails to 'medium' makes them cover a bigger part of the picture. i suppose it looks better now?
I kinda agree that many of them look unpolished or rushed.
Despite what description says I started making environment concepts only about 1,5 year ago, so i'm still experimenting with various approaches to style and workflow.
I want to show that i do have some skills though, even if those pieces aren't best looking.
So i'm certainly not going to delete 90% of them, unless more people advise it.
and i agree that last two characters concepts look best.
Unfortunately they are redesigns and not my original characters. i don't want to only show stuff that was based on Half-Life creatures.
not first and not last? not sure if i get the reasoning here.
Good point.
Well, i do have a bit of a rust fetish. not sure what you exactly mean though. Are you talking about amount of rust, strenght of normal map in rusty places or something else?
You always start with your best piece end often end with your "second" best piece. And usually you put more mediocre things in the middle, so you start and end strong. Think of it like a concert, a band will often start with the really big popular current song, then have whatever in between, and end with the big "finale" song, maybe not as strong as the first one but still one of the more memorable songs.
maybe i'll add some color stuff to this folder but it's lowest priority right now.
---
So, i made few changes, deleted some stuff and re-arranged few pictures.
There's probably still too much pics it so i'll perhaps delete few more renders.
here's two possible layouts of the main page:
On the first one the thumbnail content is cropped in a shitty way. there's no denying that.
However, the layout itself looks somehow more professional than the second version.
Opinions i got so far were mixed: screw the layout vs. screw the content. So i hope to get more opinions on that.
btw, I applied to 2 texture job ads so far.
There's one more interesting ad, a full time at major studio so i obviously want to make that portfolio look the best it can. using content and tools i have at this point, that is.
any more advice before i send it?
I think the only thing that feels off is the 2D art.
I feel like some of those pieces are super slick and some feel more like quick sketches/doodles and lack the polish. If your do one more pass and whittle some of those down you'll have much stronger package.
Many of those pretty polished concepts took me way too much time to finish so i also wanted to show something quick.
but maybe that's not the way to go after all.
i assume that those line-art characters is what stands out. do you think that with added shade their designs would be ok?
or do you think that concepts that aren't in full color aren't worth showing?
i've certainly seen some professional concept work that was monochrome and line-arty.
In environment concepts i'll delete this one:
http://files.shownd.com/b/k/a/bkaczmarek/uploads/large/1931703.png?1320429970
not sure about the rest yet.
fate of illustrations/paintings is uncertain as well.
but would you rather delete last 3 or first 3?
As for tutorial - sure, i'd love to write one if i find time for it.
I don't think it would reveal anything groundbreaking but still - it would be fun to add something to game art community's pool of shared knowledge.
Also, tutorials are probably a good way to get more recognition (which translates to more employment options).
In meanwhile, a guy from one of the studios that i applied to earlier just wrote back.
He wrote that their current project is in cartoony style and offered me an art test (i mentioned earlier that i don't have much experience with hand painted textures), and also attached an NDA asking me to sign it.
The studio itself doesn't seem very professional but it looks like they manage to get commissions/jobs anyway.
So if things don't work out with my primary target, maybe i'll get to work for them.
finished the art test, the company wants me do some freelance jobs for them (yay!)
in meanwhile, i colored the 4 character concepts that originally were just line art.
hopefuly they don't stick out as much anymore.
I'd still want to get more opinions on layout choice btw.
don't wanna be pushy but i think the layout thing is important.
(read post #8 of this thread)
i was about to switch to version one but then i stumbled upon this folio:
http://jeangorospe.carbonmade.com/
and i felt pretty much what danjohncox wrote. "don't even wanna bother looking".
(no offence jean)
but then again the auto-cropping on my page doesn't seem THAT hardcore.
i deleted bunch of stuff from each category, and i'll probably throw away few more pieces since the more i look at them the more issues i see.
Recently i added a new prop, this time diffuse only:
and also a new environment concept:
http://files.shownd.com/b/k/a/bkaczmarek/uploads/large/2313265.png
now i'd like to make 2-3 more handpainted pieces and make a separate Hand Painted Textures page, most likely replacing the Digital Painting page.
should i add "modeler" to the portfolio title? or change into 2D/3D artist? or generalist?
i'm not sure which has the best connotations.
modeling isn't my main skill but i'd like HR people to have no doubts that i can make models at basic level.
If they are all suppose to be separate at least name them something more then just personal.
at the moment i think there's too many pics on each page to combine them.
but i'll take that into account.
you mean the "guard duty & personal" etc texts?
it's supposed to be a field for client's name, but i can imagine it's not too clear.
i changed that to "personal projects", i don't have any better ideas.
if i leave nothing in that field. it'll automatically change to "no client"
i can hide all the homepage text though.
does it look better this way?
http://shownd.com/bkaczmarek
@Laughing_Bun
gee, that block of text could use some formatting.
you make pretty good points nonetheless.
i suppose that by "generator thing" you mean this?
http://files.shownd.com/b/k/a/bkaczmarek/uploads/large/1918977.jpg
i can only agree that it has lots of issues and too much of high frequency detail.
i was kinda hoping it won't be as noticable.
the texture also suffers from:
-lack of baked normal map
-crappy uvw with big differences in texel density and stretched bits
-texture seams
the high specularity is caused by the fact that it's standing in the water and it's meant to be pretty wet. But i did have doubts about whether it looks as such.
i'll see if i can fix those issues, if not then perhaps i'll remove it.
As for the gravestone, i'm indeed guilty of pushing the specularity in order to make highlighs more pretty, maybe i overdid it.
anyway, here's a new WIP texture that'll hopefully bring more variety to my portfolio:
i recently decided that i have too much of contemporary stuff so i'm trying out other styles.
most noticably on these pieces:
http://files.shownd.com/b/k/a/bkaczmarek/uploads/large/1917906.jpg
http://files.shownd.com/b/k/a/bkaczmarek/uploads/large/1917936.jpg
http://files.shownd.com/b/k/a/bkaczmarek/uploads/large/1917984.jpg
http://files.shownd.com/b/k/a/bkaczmarek/uploads/large/1917918.jpg
that said, there are some pieces i do like. Most of the cleaner textures look really good, and that organic cell-like texture is pretty funky too.
What really blew me away was your concept art.. Mostly your environment pieces are really awesome, but i also like the character concepts.
One thing i might suggest is that you trim the amount of models youre showcasing to just the "best" ones.. Having two concept art categories (env and char seperate) is just bad, because your work needs to be accessible. Theres a lot more you could be doing to better present your portfolio, but i understand that most of the free sites have restrictions and pre-made portfolio templates you need to follow.
oh and one more thing. I really dont know why you have this in your portfolio: http://files.shownd.com/b/k/a/bkaczmarek/uploads/large/1918960.jpg
The diffuse is plain and simple, the specular doesn't work with the rusty material at all, the normals are flat and repetitive, and it just overall doesn't represent your level of skill at all. (worst of all its nearly at the top of the page, and tbh it might turn some potential employers away without even looking at the other [better] stuff below)
i swear i did get completely opposite opinions as well (concepts = meh, textures = cool).
almost all of textures you posted have been made for usage in a section of the mod that takes place in dirty, rusty canals. so obviously they had to be dirty.
as for the execution of dirt, i've been experimenting with different methods and results vary alot.
i think this one isn't too realistic, but others like this and this look like normal rusty metal to me.
that said, i'm still learning and all, so some pieces are present in my portfolio simply because 5 months ago i didn't see anything wrong in them.
as for the machinery, Laughing_Bun pointed it out already. like i wrote, i'll try to fix it or remove it.
concept for possible second hand painted portfolio prop:
i'm experimenting with different colors. specular map needs more work i guess.
on previous renders i used a grayscale spec map, these have a colored one.
at the moment texture has few seams, i'll fix that later.
Cut. All. Fat.
I'd suggest working on some more props and really refining your material/texture work.
Cheers
thanks people.
----
changes:
-the brown rust/dust is less reflective and its highlights are less saturated now
-i added an additional dirt/stain pass on specular that's not present of diffuse, now edge highlights aren't as bold contineous anymore
-normal map lines on marble have been toned down in few places
-added few design details
-specularity toned down
(unfortunately the above pic got blurry when uploaded, but maybe that's only in my browser)
i'll cut some but I don't think i have balls to cut -all- concepts out at the moment. also, concepts might be useless when applying to big studios but they probably can help with small ones, which usually are looking for people who can do a little bit of every job when necessary. they also seem to have lower quality standards.
i dunno if those should be my aim, but if my skills aren't enough for the big ones then i guess I should have a portfolio that will be appealing to those as well.
in any case, on my last job interview they seemed to appreciate the fact that i also had some concept experience. (not that i got the job...)
You mean the latest texture, or my general style?
i know that some of old textures have very rough normal maps, now i'm trying to keep them as clean as possible.
the latest texture is rather clean, i just added some cracks and soft cavities in the marble-like surface. it's still tweakable.
Hm, i think i am a bit oldschool in certain aspects. i'd rather paint everything by hand, without having to struggle with different maps, vector shapes, settings and whatnot. textures from oldschool games surely have been inspiring me, for example Q3A or UT2004.
Also, i think shader may be ampfilying the oldschool feel.
lots of my renders use max 'standard fx' shader which is pretty crappy.
i can only use xoliul on someone elses computer, since my ancient graphics card doesn't support it. this means that i can't accurately preview textures (sob).
they definitely look different with xoliul and i suppose they would look more "modern" in marmoset.
--
@samcole, dirtyharry - glad you like it.
here's the texture sheet, if anyone sees some aspect that could use a different approach, let me know.
i know that 4x5 tiles is not a good number, i decided to stick with it since i didn't want to mess with my original design too much. i'll avoid that in future though.
---
As for the portfolio page, i made custom thumbnails with embedded text, tell me what you think about them.
http://shownd.com/bkaczmarek
in comparison, this was the previous version:
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-D599bmLGne8/TrLdm1yYYDI/AAAAAAAAB2k/Lu3VbkG2qYk/s912/PFscreen1.jpg
i had to use various workarounds due to layout limitations but somehow it works now.
artifacts around text suck, not sure if i can avoid them. are they very distracting?
also, i changed my initials to full name and removed the 'digital painting' section.
not sure what to do next, asset wise.
i'd like to make a more complex prop but my mind is blank when i try to come up with something interesting.
i'll possibly turn some of DS2 competition concepts into models:
http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=95424
the ones on the top were made for the darksiders II competition and were in fact first weapon concepts i ever painted. i didn't finish any of them in time, so later i pushed them in different directions and started making new ones solely for portfolio purposes.
i don't have a fitting page for them at the moment, i guess i'll have to reorganize the portfolio.
I also started some making some new characters, here's 3 latest WIPs for one of them:
I can't make the pose look right, as usual. feedback on colors, design and everything else is welcome.
BTW, i launched a new portfolio: http://b-kaczmarek.weebly.com
at the moment it's just thumbnails though.
any idea on what may be causing the cut outline on right side of thumbnails?
i'm a html noob.
still need feedback for above posts.
I'd for sure focus on props and inorganic things on your website because I think your understanding of anatomy isn't quite to the level to be concepting characters professionally.
Play to your strengths
If you really want to do characters then I'd suggest doing some figure drawing or anatomical studies before you hammer out a bunch of character concepts.
just my 2 cents tho
i feel that my ability to design things is improving fast but when it comes to fundamental stuff like perspective and anatomy there's a long way ahead of me and the progress is slow as hell.
Playing my strenghts is pretty much what I had in mind - i'm trying to make a portfolio that's still appealing despite the issues of my art.
That's why started to paint those weapons in the first place, understanding of perspective and anatomy isn't necessary to make them look good.
---
2 weeks ago i was out of ideas and decided to redesign and color a bunch of gun sketches i made in 2010. here's the current progress:
cmc444 - thanks!
in meanwhile, i made moar guns:
A little critique for the weapon concepts; Maybe it's just me and the way I'm reading the shapes and all from your concepts but your weapons seem to be missing "mid level" shapes. The silhouettes look great and there is plenty of smaller details but there is no "mid" level shapes which makes your weapons look somewhat flat(not the rendering but design-wise). Perhaps you could add more shadows coming from some of the shapes to suggest a more extruded form or increase the highlights or something...
Keep it up, though. I'd like to see more!
Put me down as being in that camp, I guess.
Would be nice to be able to gain some tips/tricks so I could try practice my own concepts.
@ Saman, mutatedjellyfish
You guys are right and thanks for pointing it out.
I often can't resist the urge to add details. when manage to create some cool looking detail on one part of a concept, other parts start to feel empty and dull so i try to make them consistent with that part. and before i realize it it's all filled with tiny shapes and lines.
also, I think i've been trying use excessive details as a way to distract viewers from the fact that lots of my concepts use very simple and boring dimensional forms. i often use forms that look good from front but have nothing to "offer" from other angles.
That's probably because in the past i would approach design as drawing flat things and for years i've been staying in the comfort zone of frontal ortho shots.
recently i changed my workflow - i started to add details to blockout shapes by using spots of light rather than lines. i found that this way it's easier to feel the perspective so creating forms isn't such a pain in the ass anymore.
anyway, here's some stuff:
@ jestersheepy
Well, "how you made these" a very vague question.
but i'll try to answer it tomorrow.
any feedback?
speaking of portfolio, i finally started uploading stuff to the new weebly version:
b-kaczmarek.weebly.com
(in comparison, old version: shownd.com/bkaczmarek)
it's still unfinished so some bugs are present. but let me know if you find something anyway.
i'm not sure how to organize concept art. i got environment concepts and characters but now i also got weapons and few objects, which don't fit any of current subpages. i'm kinda hesitant to create more subpages. thoughts?
i'd like to send an application tomorrow so any feedback would be appreciatied.
i will admit that i am slightly disappointed though. i read the thread title as blastoise.
i'd maybe switch your images around. the first tiling texture that pops up in your environment section could be the first thing you see on your main site and work a bit better i think.
and yeah, i think i'll change the env tex thumbnail content to this one:
http://b-kaczmarek.weebly.com/uploads/1/1/5/5/11551878/326572458.jpg
in meanwhile here's progress on the chick:
Lol, people misread and misspell it in all kinds of amusing ways.
among others i recall Blaislol, Blaisold and Blastoid (almost like a Mastodon song)
QUESTION:
currently environment textures have outlines, while model textures don't have them. which one looks better?
http://b-kaczmarek.weebly.com/environment-textures.html
http://b-kaczmarek.weebly.com/model-textures.html
in other news, i started re-rendering some of the textures in marmoset. it exposed some of issues that are present in them, but there's few textures that finally showed their true potential thanks to toolbag.