my demo reel

todman · Mar 2005

Sorry if I posted this in the wrong thread, I wasn't exactly sure...My questions are (now that Doom 3 and others are using normal mapping and high-poly models) what should I do with all my low-poly ones; I've spent long hours creating low-poly characters for my demo. Are they going to be worthless now? Am I going to have to start over with high-poly models? I started working in Max in 2000 and am still using my 3.1 version. I guess I just need a little direction here. I'm almost finished with my story and models for my demo and I don't want to start over with all new models. I know, I know, life is hard. Don't tell me, I just got over Cancer! So, any advice would be greatly appreciated!! thanks
todman.
Here's a link to my models and animations:
www.todd3d.com/3dmodel
Check out my art too
www.todd3d.com/airbrush

Sage · Mar 2005

Hmmm I'm not sure why you are so upset but that's what happens in the game industry, it gets a lot harder every year. The more you make models the better you get. I suggest you look at the standard of a current game you like and make your models just as good at the minimum. Target your reel to a company that makes games you like. Use your current reel and see if you can land something but the work seems a bit dated. You may end up doing several updates to your reel before you find you are ready to get a job. Replace your models as you get new work done. Make your screen shots of your models bigger.

As for your question, you need to show you can model higher res models as well as low poly ones. Make some 5000 poly characters and a high res version of the same character. I suggest you make a normal human like say a soldier and make it as realistic as you can to show you can do normal everyday things as well. I hope that helps. Later.

Alex

Bronco · Mar 2005

Personally,from the limited knowledge i have i don't think you need to worry to much,just do your best and stick to what your good at (and in the mean time have a shot at the normal mapping,hi res stuff to see how it goes).

Theres still oppotunity for low res models...I mean you have the rise of the mobile games and a fair number of stratergy games still using pretty low res models.

It comes down to what you want to do,if you want to work with the latest stuff (first person shooters,3d action games etc) then yes learning hi-res and normal mapping can be seen as a requirment and will make you look much better if you have it in your reel,while if your looking to go into mobile games,stratergy games and studios that do low poly work then at this point in time i don't see it as being so nessary,though that will proberly change soon!!

john

todman · Mar 2005

thanks,
I appreciate the feedback. I guess I will try a high res model. I have to finish the dwarf-he's at 2500 and looking very good. I guess I'll bust some more butt and do a 5000 poly model, which will be nice. Is there a tuturial around on normal mapping? I need one as I don't fully understand it.
thanks todman
www.todd3d.com

cholden · Mar 2005

hey todman,

Low polygon modeling is still very important. Even with all bumps and normals, there is still a low poly mesh under it all. Also, two major portable (psp and ds) were just released. Along with the ever expanding cell phone game market, and not all new games are going to use normals.

On the other hand, everyone should be learning high detail modeling along with shaders to keep up with market. There are plenty of CG artists that have been working in the movie industry for years just waiting to take our spot as they've been doing what we have to learn to do for years.

As for your portfolio site, it's really sloppy, blurry and fluffy. Do away with all that old web site art and focus on a clean layout that puts your best art up front. Right now, that web site completely overshadows any of your art. I can't really tell you have any good content because the site itself brings it all down. Unless your selling yourself as a web site designer, you shouldn't waste time on your site. Clean and simple, get to the user directly to your content.

Your concept art and props maybe your best stuff. Most of those characters, minus that main one on the front, don't do anything for me, and your texturing could use a lot of work. And let's be honest here, that whole intro effect has no place on your site.

Here's a list of great portfolio sites I snagged from one of Pior's posts. You may notice the main difference between these sites and your's is they focus the sites on their art, where as your site focus's on the art of the site (as if to draw attention away from your galleries).

http://home.comcast.net/~dpattenden/
http://www.bobotheseal.com/
http://www.artbyfeng.com/
http://www.neilblevins.com/
http://www.lequbisme.com/

todman · Mar 2005

well thanks I appreciate that. I've been meaning to do away with the intro, I'll get right on that. I should be re-posting the dwarf soon, his textures look great, although he's still low-poly. I may get rid of Zar (the guy in red and black) altogether as a lot of people don't dig him. I do need to get an upgrade bad. I'm still in 3.1!!! Thanks again.
todman

todman · Mar 2005

http://www.todd3d.com/
I've made a new home page, whatcha think?

cholden · Mar 2005

This new layout is much better, you put it all right in the face of the user. There's a major downside though. Because the site is dynamically scaled based on the user's window size, all of the textures, model renders, etc will always appear 'off' or scaled weird to the user.

quick edit: I just asked a friend, who's highly involved in the HR process his thoughts on scalable portfolios and his response was that he didn't have flash installed. So you see, the people that could potentially be hiring you don't even know you have a site cause it's all locked down into flash.

Sage · Mar 2005

It looks like you want to be a character artist, since most of your work are characters, and you gave them the most emphasis in your current presentation. Now take a long time and study what D.Pattenden did with his character work. That's the kind of quality you need to have to be competitive. Low or Hi poly modeling. Make your characters have realistic proportions. Texturing is the most important part of low poly work so you need to get those texturing skills to be top notch.

The reality is companies want the most bang they can get for their money. So even if a company is working with dated specs they will always want someone who has it all since future projects may require them.

Here is what next generation RTS games will look like

http://gamesdomain.yahoo.com/pc/rise__fall_civilizations_at_war/preview/66357

that's the trailer.
http://media.pc.ign.com/media/729/729470/vids_1.html

Just go and push yourself and before you know it you'll have a sweet reel. You may want to make a textured model a month and post it so you can get some feedback. That will help you improve a lot. Cholden is correct about the Flash thing, all the HR people I talked to hate Flash sites. Later.

Alex

ElysiumGX · Mar 2005

Hey todman, thanks for the PM the other day. Glad you like.

Now your question. When I look at your characters, I see art that would most likely belong in Q2, or Q3...but the textures are very blurry, and burnt. I can see this is because of your background in airbrushing, the same rules don't apply in small pixelated texture maps. Keep posting more work for show and you'll get the advice you need to improve them. I would keep your old low poly characters around as a comparison of how much you will improve with future characters. Placing them in a demo reel at this point may not get your very far with companies that plan on making D3 clones. But the graphics of that engine aren't the only choice game artists have.

In the end, a nice looking character is a nice looking character no matter the engine it's used for. Normal mapping doesn't always improve the appearance of objects, sometimes it makes it worse. Many companies are guilty of this due to going overkill with shadows. A well designed and original low poly model is better than a poorly designed and bland normal mapped high poly game model. There are plenty of those with so many artists trying to keep up with technology. Take the ingame shots of characters from FarCry, and D3. Disgusting. Now look at the character from TheSims2, and Soul CaliburII. They don't look like corpses; lots of personality. Yet, games such as RE4, and HL2 seem to have found and nice balance between the two. Right now, game technology is in a huge transition, with many designers learning what works best and what's a disaster. Decide what you feel looks best to you, and try to match it's quality. I often find characters with a more cartoon style and proportions more fun to play in games, but getting a job may require the realistic method.

Here's an example of low poly mesh with 512 texture that I think is amazing!
http://cgtalk.com/showthread.php?t=224399&page=1&pp=20

Here's a butt ugly Doom3 guy.
http://doom.neoseeker.com/view_pimages.php?ptid=97

I love your airbrush work btw. Those helmets rule! I have an airbrush that's been collecting dust over the years. My dad wants me to learn so I can help him with his business painting motorcycles and such. Bodypainting would be something new to try. The women make good canvas.

todman · Mar 2005

thanks everyone, It's good to know I'm making progress. It's weird that I'm having trouble with the texture maps as I'm a pretty good airbrush artist, you'd think I would shine the best at texturing. As far as the flash site, well, that's the only way I know how to make websites right now. But, I plan on using a demo reel for job searching somewhere down the road. I think it's too hard to make contacts on line. (SAGE) those textures are very nice and clean at Rise & Fall. Thanks for the link.
thanks
todd

todman · Apr 2005

Elysium,
That girl at CGtalk is waycool looking. However the artist did use two 512's. I only used one. I was trying to keep it to one because at the time I built the models that was what everyone was using, of course it's gone up since than, the dwarf for instance will be a 1024x1024. So his textures should pony up better, I noticed a smeary look on his helmet, I'm having trouble unwrapping heads. They don't ever come out right in the end; they smear and stretch and I end up limited as to what I can do with the texturing.
peace out.

Sage · Apr 2005

Todd your texturing is not that off it just missing some essential final touches. Add overlays to your game textures, it's pretty much essential. Then try to make things as sharp as possible.

I added an overlay to one of your textures. It doesn't show much of a difference but I hope you get the idea.

If you need to learn html quickly this site is pretty good.
www.htmlgoodies.com You can also design your site in Photoshop and make it work with ImageReady. Its pretty easy.
Later

Alex

todman · Apr 2005

sage,
I see, its much sharper and has more contrast, but what are overlays? Could you explain them too me? tanks--I'll work on that html!
todd

Sage · Apr 2005

An Overlay is a layer blending mode found in programs like Photoshop, Illustrator (9 or later), Paintshop Pro or Painter. There are other blending modes you can use to get nice effects too. To make a metal overlay you get a picture that has the texture of metal which is usually rusty , dirty with a lot of texture to it and you set it to overlay. You lower the opacity if you like. I usually just define a texture as a pattern in Photoshop, fill a layer, get the rubber stamp tool define an area for the tool to use, hide the layer that has the fill in it, make a new layer and paint with the rubber stamp tool with an opacity between 60 to 80. I set the layer I'm painting in to overlay and make sure that layer is above the texture I want to have the metal overlay. That's pretty much it. If you want more info you can private message me your IM and I'll talk to you one on one about this and other tricks I know. Later.

Alex

todman · Apr 2005

thanks Alex,
I know what you mean now.
todman

my demo reel

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