[Portfolio] - Rashad Foux, Character Artist

Slipstream · Dec 2009

I'm graduating soon, and figured now would be a good time to search for some professional critique's on my portfolio/demoreel/website.
I'm focusing on Character Art. I know its a difficult part of the process to break into, but its like a Professor Layton puzzle to me, and I love Layton puzzle's

My feelings on it are that it's a bit weak in actual depictions of anatomy, and I don't have anything in the way of life drawing's either.
And the green girl is going to either be replaced or redone; I received comments in the past about some problems with her texture and low polygon count, and I hope to address those soon.

So here's my website:
http://spiralpowered.com/

And my demoreel:
http://vimeo.com/8197862

Any and all comments are welcome!

vcortis · Dec 2009

You should embed the vimeo file into your website, also it is private and therefore I can't view it. I like most of what you have, it's nice that you have a lot of people/civilian like characters as that is probably what you'd be modeling as a Junior artist. I'd suggest a male character who is a bit more beefy where you can show off your understanding of anatomy.

Your first model I feel like the things comming from her head (like the starwars people right?) are too far back and should be closer to the skull. Not a huge fan of your creature. Agreed on the green girl, but I actually think it's fine if you label her as a low poly character (textures do need improving though).

A lot of your models have a certain style to them that looks a bit cartoony. I'd try to pull of a realistic character.

I'm not a professional, but it's just my 2 cents.

Slipstream · Dec 2009

Thanks vcortis, video should be viewable now btw. Sorry about that, first time using Vimeo
I definitely agree about making a male character; I have one I'm working through now, he's just not ready for showtime yet

Though I kinda surprised about the civilian character's comment; I was worried I had too many "hero" units or individual characters. So thanks!

[Deleted User] · Dec 2009

I think the thumbnails on the front page would look better in full color without the green overlay.

Firecracker197 · Dec 2009

Ok as far as your web design goes, its ok to use decorative fonts, but I say pick one and use one, and never use it for your email, or your phone, leave those in a simple generic sans serif font. I would also say you need to make every page consistent, you have your textures laid out a different way for every piece, pick one way and do them all the same. I would like to see them separate and not spliced together like you have done on some. Also make the diffuse the biggest one, and the others can be smaller.

On your piece called "Dryad" the way you have her posed in the first pic makes it obvious that you did not construct the topology in a way so that the mesh would easily deform when posed or animated, if you want to keep this piece in your portfolio I suggest you pose her differently.

Also I noticed all your characters seem to have a very specific style to them, (with the nose shape and big eyes and such) nothing against your style, but you want to try an avoid having several pieces using the same style in your portfolio, it gives potential employees the impression that you only have one style and you can only do one style. I would suggest that you work on a piece that is realistic, if you can do something realistically you can do anything, you want to show employers that you are diverse.

Other than that your work looks good, I really like your Aang character, and your anatomy from what I can tell seems to be pretty good, I am not a character artist though, they can probably help you out more with that.

chrisradsby · Dec 2009

Hey mate, I really like your portfolio, you got some nice stuff in there. I'm all for the stylized look, but you should probably put something realistic in there as well. When clicking the link to your reel, you should probably fix so that it opens in a new window or tab.

Your Aang character is really great, would love to see it posed on some kind of air-vehicle.

Paul Pepera · Dec 2009

Just some quick observations:

The green on the site is too intense, esspecially that huge green block on the bottom; looking at it too long starts to irritate the eyes.

I agree with vcortis' comment about encoding your demoreel into the site; i don't like clicking links that don't give you an indication they are taking you to another website. Also put an indication that the resume link is to a .doc file.

I like the way you present your work after the thumbnails; small description on top and large, scrollable images.

Slipstream · Dec 2009

@Fly_soup: Will do!

@Firecracker: Thanks, and I will do all of that; I did just about everything on the site over the course of 2 years, so everything wildly varies, especially with presentation.
I agree on the Dryad; I haven't decided whether or not I want to fix her, or redo the entire piece, or just drop it all together.

@Chrisradsby: Thanks! That seems to be the consesus

I don't know yet if I want to do a Steampunk Appa, or a somekind of Mecha version. We'll see!

@Eraserhead: Will fix; I also made the site with a specific resolution in mind, so silly on me

I have fixed the demoreel button, it now takes you to a different page on the site, with the clip embedded.
I also noticed there's some inconsistency with links on the pages, based on some old heirarchy's I had, so those will be corrected shortly as well.

Thanks all, and keep the comments coming!

Firecracker197 · Dec 2009

Hey on your reel after the chick with the Afro there is a pretty cool looking alien like chick, why isn't this on your site? It looks cool on the reel, I wish I could see renders of it. Your main vessel for showing your work should be your website, reels are dying out, so definitely make sure you have everything you want to people to see on your site, or it might get missed. Also I was wondering if you are doing all your characters from your own concepts? You should try doing someone else's concept sometime, it shows you can work with someone else's vision, if you want to be a modeler your most likely never going to do your own concepts.

Slipstream · Dec 2009

I took her off because I wasn't happy with the edge highlighting on her. The geometry for her is mostly smooth, so they don't help the normals catch the light very well. In retrospect though, that not a strong enough reason to remove her, especially in light of the changes I have to make to the Dryad, and that the alien chick is a stronger piece than her too. So she's back up there.

I've also made a bunch of fixes to the site itself; the color is fixed everywhere except for at the bottom of the page; and I have to change the font on the WIP page so that it matches everywhere else.
For the resume section I think I'll make that an html, with the option to download a .doc file, and for the demoreel section, I wanted to have a higher-res version available for download from the site.

I do have something new that demonstrates me modeling from someone elses concept, along with a couple other older and/or last gen pieces that demonstrate the same thing. I'll see about getting permission to put those up.

Having a unified presentation for all the pieces up there is still to come. Should be interesting, as I think I'm missing the finished Big Huge Creature from my HDD.

Thanks for the insights!

[Portfolio] - Rashad Foux, Character Artist

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