sketchbook: robertg

robertg · Oct 2013

iv been lurking for a couple months now and figured it was finally time to make the plunge. Anywho, about a year ago i bought a wacom tablet and thus began my journey to become a digital artist! (or at least not embarrasingly bad at art). After numerous failed attempts at bringing ambitious ideas to fruition i figured it was time to focus on more basic fundamentals. With that said here are some recent figure sculpts/ studies i have done over the past month or 2 (ps most of these were done during an online figure sculpture course, so they will likely be familiar to some of you)

any criticisms you can think of would be greatly appreciated

thanks for taking the time to look.

(iv spent so much time looking at these that i completely forgot they are kind of nsfw, im not really sure how to edit the title?? so if this is a problem ill just delete this and restart. sorry in advance!!)

horse%20sculpt.jpg

robertg · Oct 2013

an ecorche sculpt done after watching some videos by ryan kingslien ecorche%20sculpt.jpg

robertg · Oct 2013

a car i made a while ago, probably the first 3d thing i made that i was genuinely proud of. It seems pretty flawed looking at it now, but i still have a big old soft spot for it

robertg · Nov 2013

some experimenting with environment modeling in zbrush, and hard surface work in 3ds... im planning on taking the plane into zbrush and adding realistic detailing like dents and scratches, etc. id also like to take it an extra step by adding rivets and bolts and what not, but am unsure of whether that would be best accomplished in 3ds or zbrush??? with that said any advice at all on taking a high poly model into zbrush for sculpting would be greatly appreciated. thanks in advance!

medieval%20house.jpg

robertg · Nov 2013

hand always on ctrl z

robertg · Nov 2013

Nut · Nov 2013

realy awesome anatomy sculps, the dino looks good too

robertg · Nov 2013

Thanks! hopefully ill have some more dino stuff to post in the next couple of days.

paulchen83 · Nov 2013

great stuff man!!! i'm subscribing to this thread. I could use some honest, no B.S critique from you if you have some time on ur hands. heh.

robertg · Nov 2013

thanks for the kind words man and Id love to take a look at your sketchbook!

robertg · Nov 2013

some generic heads and a ballerina that i made after being inspired by this artists work http://dildonicus.cghub.com/images/http://

generic%20heads.jpg

paulchen83 · Nov 2013

awesome studies. would love to see you apply that wealth of anatomy and gesture knowledge into creature sculpts. Keep up the good work man!!!

robertg · Nov 2013

2d sketch dump

paulchen83 · Nov 2013

can see you are a bit weak with colors, but great anatomy and figure sketches. show more!!!!

robertg · Nov 2013

thanks, I totally agree about colours though, the whole value, hue, saturation, temperature balancing act still frightens the hell out of me lol

paulchen83 · Nov 2013

you should check out: Gnomon Workshop, Practical Light and Color - Theory and Application with Jeremy Vickery if you havent. it helped me a great deal.

robertg · Nov 2013

thanks ill deff check it out, i really do need to force myself get back into 2d stuff. Im just having so much fun with 3d at the moment though :P

robertg · Nov 2013

more 2d stuff (deff nsfw)

robertg · Nov 2013

woops forgot 2, and i should mention that some of these are direct reproductions of other peoples works

Nut · Nov 2013

i know that feel, about 2D and 3D, really want to improve in drawing but want to learn zbrush like hell. I'm weak at colors too, would like to suggest "Color and Light" book by James Gurney, that one with a dino on it's Cover. It's really helping, but i need more practice and have to much fun with 3D.

And your sketches are awesome, anatomy is amazing, good stuff.

robertg · Nov 2013

heres an update on the dino, hopefully by the end of the weekend ill have either the ballerina or the dino semi finished lol
dino%202.jpg

Nut · Nov 2013

love the dino, I'm working on a dog for my school project, have problems to sculpt the chops, do you have any advices for me?

robertg · Nov 2013

hmm, without seeing the model, its hard to give any specific advice. in general though, when sculpting wrinkles i use the standard brush with something like alpha 42 applied. let me know if that helps at all. and good luck on the assignment!

Nut · Nov 2013

^^° sure, yea i try out and post the progress later in my sketchbook

robertg · Nov 2013

mini update on the dino, learning a ton about polypaiting in the process.
dino%203.jpg

robertg · Nov 2013

so i think I'm ready to start working on the low poly for the dinosaur, hopefully ill be able to preserve most of the details in the maps. and i also got a bit more work done on the plane, the engine is nearing completion.

ZBrush%20Document.jpg

paulchen83 · Nov 2013

Great polypaint. I'm new to it. Wonder if you have any tips and tricks to share. im preparing my demo reel, so it helps if i could spend less time experimenting and more on doing the actual work.

robertg · Nov 2013

Im pretty new to it myself, but ill give what little advice i can. firstly, it might be worth your while to do some paint overs of the model in photoshop or something before actualy diving into poly paint (i didnt bother with this step and in retrospect it would have definitely saved me some time). secondly build up your details slowly, much like sculpting you have to create a solid foundation before moving into the detailed stuff. so for example, lay down some base colors to begin with, applying the spray or colour spray stroke option is very helpful in this initial step to achieve an organic base. from there start refining your base colors. for the dino this meant ensuring his belly was lighter than his back. from there you can start building up your details, it is really helpful to use alphas at this point (for the dino i mostly used alpha 23 and 58. lastly, you can save yourself lots of headaches if you properly use layers (im guilty of constantly forgetting to to do this, lol). and as with anything using lots of high quality reference will make your life way easier. hopefully this helps you out!

JaySmitt · Nov 2013

Love the raptor, I'll look forward to seeing the low poly version with bakes etc. Seems like you're generally a well rounded artist, do you have a portfolio or plans to make one?

robertg · Nov 2013

thanks for the compliment! I don't actually have a portfolio at the moment, but my goal for the next couple months is to start putting something together. Im fairly inexperienced with the whole production pipeline from start to finish, so im trying to use the dino (organic) and plane (hardsurface) as sort of tests for myself to see where exactly I'm at.

paulchen83 · Nov 2013

thks for your advice man. really appreciate it. Anyway, thew raptor u r doing is pretty much already awesome, nothing much i can comment on, except that i'd prefer those dragon eyes with a long thin pupil rather then a circle one so it looks more menacing and perhaps a stronger impression of the strips. But thats just my preference. the raptor is pretty much good to go and i suppoe you r moving onto other stuff. Cheers!

paulchen83 · Nov 2013

btw, how many polygons is ur raptor?

robertg · Nov 2013

firstly, thx for checking out my progress! as for the model though, i only have the high poly completed as of yet but I'm currently in the process of doing the retopo. Not really sure what ill settle for in the end but at the moment I'm aiming for like 5k polys. i dont have much experience with turning a high poly into a production ready asset, so we will see how it goes lol

omglawl · Nov 2013

If you are going to do just a low-poly dinosaur, then you might try to do retopology using new ZBrush 4R6 feature - ZRemesher, it will be enough for your needs, however if you are planning to make animation ready model you might do it manually, or at least use the base you've created with ZRemesher. But I bet you know all this stuff, so I'll just say that you are doing a good job.

robertg · Nov 2013

thanks for the tip man, i don't have much experience with z remesher so i hadn't actually considered using it for the retopology, ill deff consider it time.

robertg · Nov 2013

so i have been real busy with learning all about topology, uv layouts, and texturing in general over the past week or so (trying to push my knowledge past just sculpting) but its been a real headache and so far my labors havent produced all that much worth showing... hopefully that will change soon though as im deff making some progress on that dino.

i took a little break yesterday though and finished up my ballerina study. i prob should have spent some more time with the rendering but here's a quick beauty shot

i also did some quick little studies from an andrew loomis book, i tried to focus on speed and being more gestural (is that even a word???)

omglawl · Nov 2013

I like where you are going with ballerina. She needs just a bit of work and definitely a nicer render.

robertg · Nov 2013

^ firstly, thanks for the comment. your sketchbook is killer btw.

secondly, you've guilted me into putting a bit more consideration into the render. i still have lots to learn about using materials and lighting properly, but i think this shows off the model a bit better.

arabesque%202.jpg

Nut · Nov 2013

that ballerina so nice, i love to see the brush texture on the sculpt.
but it still seems unfinished to me, because her face is kinda dead. Maybe you could put some expression on the face (lately figured out, i should do it myself) and drag more attention to it, probably it make her livelier. And you can stage the lights same way they do on the real ballet stage, I think it's more suitable for the scene and would create a dramatic feeling.
It's already awesome, I just think it would make it more awesome, maybe not ^^°.

Love the armpit!!!

robertg · Nov 2013

thanks for the crits, i never considered using a ballet stage type lighting set up. if i get a chance to get back to this piece ill deff try making those adjustments. at the moment though i think i want to just push forward onto some new stuff (havent started anything new in what feels like forever)

Nut · Nov 2013

yea i know that feel, I have thousands ideas and want to do it all, but must finish my school project before deadline. I wouldn't fix older things either, just take the critics and do better next time.
Looking forward to your next works.

robertg · Dec 2013

robertg · Dec 2013

nsfw!

omglawl · Dec 2013

That was unexpected at all, great work. For sure there are small details that I'm sure you are aware of, but overall it's a solid work.

robertg · Dec 2013

^ thanks!

robertg · Dec 2013

robertg · Dec 2013

some sketches from the past couple of days (excited for the new hobbit movie if you couldnt tell)

noniol · Dec 2013

Awesome work!
Very nice and clean presentation too!

robertg · Jan 2014

chubby cheeks

zombie

dragon

oskarreftel · Jan 2014

I love your sculpts! What's your workflow for making scales on your dino and dragons? That dragon head from 12-23-2013 is awesome. Lots of character in that stare.

robertg · Jan 2014

thanks!

The dino scales were all done with simple alphas. I think I got the alphas off of the pixologic zbrush download library, and its just a matter of patience and using the drag rectangle stroke on your brush.

The dragon scales (atleast for the latest piece) involved more work because the bigger scales are separate geometry. For the most part i just dragged them out one by one... im sure there is a better way of doing it though lol.

sketchbook: robertg

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