[Portfolio] Gavin Stevens, Texture/Model Design
polycounter lvl 18
Hey guys, first of all let me just say that I've kinda avoided a portfolio for a while now as I've never really thought my work was much good, and while I still don't exactly have faith in my skills I figure its time to actually knuckle down and get a portfolio online.
Can you give it a look over, and see what you think, both in design of the site as well as the content?
Also, a quick point I sadly feel I have to make... You will notice a light water mark on some images. A lot of the art is over a year old, and all of it is what I've created for the OverDose project. Now, let me just say I HATE stealing art, and people that do it. Can't stand it. If you want to design something from scratch based on something else, cool, but dont just steal the assets, thats wrong. Because all the media is on our public SVN, a lot of it has... How can I put this... "Walked about"? I'm not the best artist, granted, but that doesn't mean it doesn't annoy me when I see somebody else had stolen my work
And I've had to send a few mails off before to people who have done such. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is all my art you see here is 100% from scratch, nothing is anybody elses work, so if you spot something and think "I've seen this before?" and its the same asset then please let me know, thank you. (Does that make me sound like an asshole
?)
Anyway enough blabbering... Heres the link, flame away!
http://www.teamblurgames.com/odium/portfolio
Can you give it a look over, and see what you think, both in design of the site as well as the content?
Also, a quick point I sadly feel I have to make... You will notice a light water mark on some images. A lot of the art is over a year old, and all of it is what I've created for the OverDose project. Now, let me just say I HATE stealing art, and people that do it. Can't stand it. If you want to design something from scratch based on something else, cool, but dont just steal the assets, thats wrong. Because all the media is on our public SVN, a lot of it has... How can I put this... "Walked about"? I'm not the best artist, granted, but that doesn't mean it doesn't annoy me when I see somebody else had stolen my work
And I've had to send a few mails off before to people who have done such. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is all my art you see here is 100% from scratch, nothing is anybody elses work, so if you spot something and think "I've seen this before?" and its the same asset then please let me know, thank you. (Does that make me sound like an asshole
?)Anyway enough blabbering... Heres the link, flame away!
http://www.teamblurgames.com/odium/portfolio
Replies
What engine is the environment work done in?
Its the OverDose engine, its based on Quake 2, but its a lot more advanced than Doom 3, so you get all the usual stuff like spec and normal, but also per pixel lighting and shadow mapping, tone mapping, hdr/bloom, you know, the fancy bells and whistels, all those random letters big companies like to throw about these days
someone sounds guilty...
man you're all about not stealing shit.
I just hate art theft, it stinks, and its at its worst when its a sneaky ruskie who you cant do sod all about...
anyway good stuff
Doesnt look bad, I would suggest closer shots though.
Never played it/heard of it
OverDose is a free game thats pretty much RtCW in next gen clothes. We didn't really like the direction ET:QW took sadly. But more a reimagining of the setting, quite different. It just fits the gameplay perfectly, plus shows off the engine.
For me, it feels like some of the textures lack contrast. Also for example the wood shack building - the plastic crates in there are SUPER clean, as well as the tire. The 3 metal cabinets are also identical -maybe make another one that's dented up? Or use some decals to break up the obvious clones?
Nice work though!
Which textures do you feel express a lack of contrast most of all?
Never really thought of the plastic crates being super clean but I will look into that
As for the 3 metal lockers, they are not actually the same. One is closed, one is slightly open and the other has a missing door which has fallen off. There are two that are the same mesh, but I figured with the way they are stacked maybe that wouldn't be an issue. If your eyes picked up on that so easily I'll certainly re-think the placement and/or repetition of the the texture.
Great stuff your texturing and modeling are top notch, if i may ask what kind of position are you looking for in the game industry it would help me give you a better crit.
Also do not make your first page of your portfolio the about page, you should make the first page the UI/2D page if that's what your looking in getting into, if someone wants to know anything about you they'll click on your about section.
At this point you may find you like UI work. If that is the case I would focus on this and make some really stunning UI designs and drop the models / textures. Last thing you want to do is confuse a potential employer as to what your primary focus is.
Like, if you want to make a move to a full time modeling position, then I would highlight the modeling section of your site in some way, and so fourth.
Currently I feel your site lacks focus, but congrats on having so much professional work and being multi faceted.
Anyways, I'm interested too in hearing what your intensions are employment wise, and good luck in whatever you decide.
[edit] Oh, and I don't mean totally get rid of the about page, but just don't make it your index
Hopefully these posts give you a better idea of what you want and need to do.
Good luck you got potential.
Starting with the lockers, of course they're going to have the same texture - they're the same prop pretty much. Which is a good thing. But the texture has some very identifiable markings on it, so when they're stacked next to each other like that, it's REAL obvious. A few decals here can go a long way to make that look really great
The milk crate isn't so much too clean on it's own, but in relation to it's environment, it looks brand new. With all of the dirt, rust and filth on the other objects, it looks a bit strange having a rather clean crate. I think a bit more mung (at least around the bottom edges) would help a lot.
The wood texture here is one of those places where I feel there's not enough contrast. Now, I can't see the raw texture, so maybe it's just the scene lighting, but it falls very flat regardless. There's a lot of wasted tonal range in the image, so if it is just the lighting, it's failing at it's job.
Overall though it's nice, clean work. Just a few touches and I think it'll be swanky.
ae.: I'll look into changing the order of whats loaded when, but as for the UI video there are a few videos on the tube of you, which can be found liked on the OverDose site.
Cojax:/BradMyers82: I have to say I don't agree. I've seen portfolio sites with far, far more content that people here have said are fine, content wise. If antyhing, I don't think I added enough variation, and maybe not even enough renders. However, you have to understand that I'm pretty much the only artist on a full scale game. One artist. We do have Mo, who is a modeller and helps me/the project out a great deal, but of the few THOUSAND textures, remember thats me. The UI, is me, the design, the scripting, the materials, the levels, the art... Its all one guy, and thats me. So while you may think that its all a "bit much" and that you can really put your finger on what I do, thats simply because I do pretty much everything. of the some 3,000+ files in OverDose so far, I've created roughly 98% of them. So its fair to say my portfolio shows a lot of different areas, but thats because... I "DO" a lot of different areas
Wilex: That sounds a bit insulting, to be fair. Saying it all looks boring and plain isn't exactly a crit, its an oppinion. In a world dominated at the moment by first person games with rust on every square inch and dirt in every crack, would that not suggest that my stuff shown there is, well, bang on? I do think the portfolio needs more variation, and I'm going to get my DS stuff on there to give some contrast. But when your working on a game with a set design, it stands to reason that the bulk of stuff I do will most likely be for that design style.
Vassago: Perfect, thank you very much. I'm feeling a bit ill atm, head ache
ZacD: What...? An object that can be moved anywhere, any time and you dont understand how it can be in a position thats not out of place at all...? I could understand if they were doing something not possible in real life but what I did there was perfectly possible.
Autocon: Thank you.
and i totally understand what ZacD says about the lockers, yes it is "physically possible" that they could be like that, but it just looks completely unlikely and unbelievable as a result.
maybe if one fell forward and one was leaning over the gap where the other one was, I don't know, just playing around with ideas.
There's a couple of things that came to mind while viewing your seperate pages. As Brad mentioned, there is a lot of work being shown here. And he's right. As a portfolio page, there is just too much content being shown.
From your textures page, I'd take out half of them. The ones that aren't as interesting, or not as good as the others. Then I'd probably take out half again. Show the best of each type of texture you have. Here's a screen to show what I mean.
You want to show the best stuff you have, and not overdose on the amount of things you've made for this game.
Could definitely use more variety, and some better list shots of the models. They're pretty dark/hard to read with the bright normal maps next to them.
The texture work is good as well, but as it has already kinda been said; The specular is a bit to high on some of them, especialy on the brick-in-the-mud one. They look a bit wet/plastic-ish.
Also I feel like you're losing some of your low/mid-level details in your normal maps, I noticed this the most in your wooden planks texture.
Oh and, none of the stuff that is posted here should insult you. If it sounds like an insult, or even if someone actualy tries to insult you, you should pick out the useful crits from the sentances and use it to your advantage and make your art even better.
X's n O's should be pretty self-explanatory.
I hope. -,-
I would also consolidate the modeling/texturing into the enviroments page, ie you click the thumb on the environment page which takes you to say the locker scene, and underneath the ingame screen will be the breakdown for the objects in the scene(lockers, crates, floor etc).
good luck
You obviously have a lot of talent and from reading your posts and checking out the overdose website. From what you said it seems like your doing somewhere around a third to 50% of the work on that project maybe more.
Your portfolio website show's youre a jack of all trades which isn't really the best thing. The purpose of your portfolio is to get you a job isn't it? What kind of job do you want? What would be your dream job at a game studio? You have listed as the different sections on your site UI/2D, Texturing, Modeling (Probably should be listed as props it implies that you only modeled the pieces you did texture them as well didn't you?) and Environments. Pick one because frankly at the moment I don't think any one section is strong enough to get you a job offer for that specific position. I don't really see any job postings looking for a jack of all trades game artist. Check it out http://www.gamasutra.com/jobs/board.php?category=3
So pick a focus and go with it you have talent in all those areas but pick one and take it from not bad to awesome. I think Xenobond did a pretty good job of picking out the better pieces of your portfolio but even still. The work shown just says generic realistic fps prop or texture or environment. I could see these props being in any realistic fps but I wouldnt remember them. They dont tell any story they dont say this is from the Overdose universe. I could see all those props put together into a compilation shot and thats about all I need to see of them. Yeah they may be good props you have the fundamentals down now use them to make something worth looking at for more than 2 seconds. Your props feel like filler props. Which every game has but dont make the bulk of your portfolio about filler. Show me your trophy props something complex that shows youre not just a mindless filler prop making machine something that tells a story says this is the Overdose universe!! Youre better than just making filler props man and game environments are more than a collection of filler props.
A few people have mentioned your stuff being good but not amazing check out this article its kind of what were trying to get across here.
Adam Bromell (Environment Artist: The Story Teller) Setting up your scene
http://www.adambromell.com/articles/article3.html
Thats my opinion take it or leave it. Im not trying to be insulting Im just sharing what I believe to be true about portfolios and landing a job in the industry. Hopefully that explains things better. You got the skills Odium it just looks like youve been stretched thin and I feel quality stands out over quantity. Focus on the aspect of your work that you enjoy the most and Im sure youll get the job you want. Best of Luck!
Anyway, I'll go get a cup of tea, or about 40, have a relax and give it a good old think over.
Thanks guys.
And, uh, you value people's opinions from Q3W, an ancient gaming site overrun by idiots, higher than people from Polycount, a site where the user base has many professional game artists?
You've made it pretty clear that your "head's a little all over the shop" just by that logic alone...
Daft logic is logic to a daft person
Heres an example of the new lighting:
http://www.teamblurgames.com/odium/example_texture.jpg
EDIT: I didn't want to post another post bumping the thread...
I've just changed the entire textures page and layout. It doesn't display as much info, doesn't have as many textures etc. I took xenobonds advice and removed some of the more poor textures, but I did ignore him on a few, but thats just for my own mind really. I added a few new ones, but most of all kept the count at 12 displayed and decreased the screen space by as much as possible.
Give it a look over and see if this is better or worse than before, if so I'll make the changes else where that have been suggested.
EDIT2: Also of note, notice I remade every "large" pic as well to display the textures with much more natural lighting.
EDIT:3: Got bored so changed the modelling section as well. I think the new icons and over all asset count is much better now.
This texture looks better no more shiny plastic feel but It seems like a bit of a waste of texture space to leave a black hole on it. Why isn't there broken concrete and exposed rebar? The hole doesn't make sense out of context it may be covered in game by a rubble pile but leaving a black spot probably isn't the best idea. Overall I would say your textures need more detail. Your last 3 I like the most the sci-fi door? and the flags and banners. Some of the tiling ones are just too simplistic. The diamond plate and the white brick wall I feel like I could make those fairly quickly from a few photos. Try to add more interest to them or don't display them alone not without a scene. It's not the best show of your talents I would say.
So kick it up a notch. Check out this tutorial maybe it will give you a better idea of what Im talking about. Keep it up man don't throw in your hat over some critiques you don't like. Everyone gets some rough critiques especially when they're trying to get started and get their foot in the door.
Just not 100% sure how I can get this message over, if you get me...? O_o
I really really like your diffuse textures, tho the detail in them get lost because of your normal map, or as you said, perhaps because of the light setup.
I tried to illustrate what I meant by low and mid level details in your normal maps, I personaly always try to stay away from the higher level of details in my normal maps, to make them look a bit sharper. This is a personal 'taste', so I'm definately not saying that it is the correct way or anything
Here's the image:
Wish I could explain it a bit better, but If you look at the cracks in your diffuse, they're tiny. And in your normal map, they look much wider and softer.
But anyways, I see your point, I hope you see mine, let's not derail to much, keep up the good work.