The Education of Cat Banjo
polycounter lvl 2
I am so new to 3d sculpting/painting that I am still clunky and ackward in the land of hotkeys and workflow.
i just started school in the cyber world and I have challenged myself via the urging of those who love me to expose my successes,failures, triumphs and questionable attempts. All are valid in the persuit of excellence and I will trust the good people here to guide me in the ways of the initiated.
Thanks for your patience in advance.
Chances are I'll make blazingly bright gaffes along the way.
i just started school in the cyber world and I have challenged myself via the urging of those who love me to expose my successes,failures, triumphs and questionable attempts. All are valid in the persuit of excellence and I will trust the good people here to guide me in the ways of the initiated.
Thanks for your patience in advance.
Chances are I'll make blazingly bright gaffes along the way.
Replies
Also, Welcome. Should post something soon so its not an empty Critique thread ^.^
I believe that a thick skin should come with the artist suit.
Sometimes it can be missing but I'll do my best to grow one.
Gogogo!
thnx
Panda!
Excellent advice!
I am grateful for gentle guidance, Panda.
Please stay tuned for some Zbrush soon!
So here....
Do not be afraid to scrap a project! Especially if you feel like you aren't making meaningful progress, or you get bored with it. It is one thing to see a project through, it's another to just pick at something you no longer care about, especially when you're learning! Being bored on a project is like staying up really late to keep working on something. Eventually you will spend hours making as much progress as you could in a fraction of the time if you were feeling fresh or inspired, and you just hinder your own progress and growth. Maybe you get inspired to take a new direction on a piece, or maybe you find something better you would rather work on; this is not a bad thing! Don't think you HAVE to finish everything you start. Or maybe just take a step away and come back to it later. It could end up being something you don't yet have the skill to fully accomplish.
If you do end up scrapping a project, start a new one immediately, or very soon after. Especially when you are just starting out or learning something new, you need to keep that muscle memory, or you will lose the skills you worked so hard to gain. On every new project, try to use every single technique you used on previous projects. Try and use every brush, even if it's just a little, so you constantly have that feel for what it can do. Later down the road, you will know instinctively what tools you will need, and how far you can go with each.
Keep old projects! I do game effects work, and I have recently been revisiting a lot of my beginner projects. I've ended up scrapping 3/4 of my assets for each one With the skills I've learned after I made those, I've been able to not only make my effects look better, but re work them even faster than it took to make the original effect.
Even if you model/sculpt yourself into a corner, again, don't be afraid to scrap it and start over. You will be able to make what you originally had in a fraction of the time.
As for the art itself, REFERENCE IS KEY!! Reference, reference, then reference some more. Keep gathering more reference even as you work on stuff. Tons of artists end up with a whole page full of things like just eyebrows, or wrinkles. Make mood and inspiration boards for your project. Take a ton of relevant images and smash them together in photoshop. Add color pallets you like, clothing references, skin, even poses or other full works of art. One of the best things an artist can do is to make something from someone else's concept. It is polite to ask the artist if you can use there work, or if you can't reach them, at least give credit to them, or the link where you found it.
first and foremost....
THANK YOU!
This information is not only useful and encouraging but mighty kind of you to invest such a great deal of time to respond to these wobbly first attempts.
Scrapping projects is and will continue to be no problem. Many years of being a traditional sculptor has toughened my ability to not get too attached to a project. That said, I think the idea of letting the project be is maybe a better course of action at this time, maybe storing them in a file to be approached some time later so I can look back and see the progress I have made. it is nice to reference the path, no?
The poking at something while not inspired or tired...yeah...that is a plate of dumb with a side of stupid sauce. I agree, while learning, keeping the hands moving and re-enfiorcing "muscle memory" will be my best ally.
Oh reference...I love you so much. My teacher is asking us to work from our minds and I am frustrated because, well you know, reference.
'Nuff said.
I appreciate the suggestion to utilize a 3rd pty. I prefer Flickr. Being rather new to this, the "insert image" option is found where on which, PF or Flickr? (Total newb, remember?)
I hope I responded fully to your post. I want to respect your efforts to guide me along the learning curve.
It leads me to want to extend myself to others as I go along!
I look forward to your perspective on my next submission.
Makes it easier for people to type out a response while still looking at your stuff in the same window, and gives a decent preview. Hope that helps!
I'm curious can you post some of your traditional sculpts?
Thanks for asking to see my "analogue" sculpting.
Here's a few samples...
I'm particularly fornd of smaller work like these maquettes for Disneyland Tokyo...
The above suggestions as how to present my imagery was very welcome, Sir!
I hope that I will continue to progress swiftly with your other salient and well received thoughts!
So, here is my baby.
man
This is clearly not finished (where's her tail???) and I have not broken symetry yet but as promised, each week, I'll show what I'm working on.
Thanks for the feed back.
Is there any opportunity at all to just sit down and make one nice sculpt?
It is truly a basics class.
Because I am not familiar with work flow, hotkeys and the magic of meshs. I am ultra slow.
Ive never used any digital programme before 6 weeks ago.
I mean zero.
I apologize for the rudimentary nature of these sculpts.
I will endeavor to execute a bit more time to refining them.
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Good luck, and welcome to the club!
A Year and a half later.....
So much has happened and wish I could say it has been fun, but like most, 2016 was wicked hard on too many fronts.
My Digital development suffered and now, 18 months after my last posting, I am feeling strong enough to reassert myself into this very challenging community.
It is a gentle process, here in my 'blanket fort" as I slowly and surely integrate the lessons I was gifted when I first started out.
I will continue to be open to supportive and helpful critiques as I move along.
Thanks, Cat