[Portfolio] - zerojs - online portfolio, demo reel feedback

zerojs · Feb 2008

Hi all, i am preparing my portfolio and demo reel ready to send out to potential games companies, with the intent of getting a position as a 3d modeler.
Im hoping that people can give me feedback or crits about my work and the way ive presented it, ive seen so many amazing artists here and i would like to hear from any of you.

my website: online portfolio
My website may seem a little over complicated for an online portfolio but i do a lot in flash, so its also to show of my flash skills aswell

my demo reel:
low res version
hi res 180mb version

Since creating the demo reel i have been teaching myself zbrush, here are a few zbrush WIP's that i will add to the demo reel hopefully in the next few weeks:
zb char1
zb char2
zb weapon
zb hand

LoTekK · Feb 2008

[ QUOTE ]
its also to show of my flash skills aswell

[/ QUOTE ]
Unless you expect to need flash in a 3d modelling position, that's basically useless. The flash interface is getting in the way of showing your work. It takes quite a while to load the entire site, and when it /is/ loaded, none of the boxes are labeled until you've moused over them. Bad idea. An employer is going to see the interface, and close it (assuming they can be bothered to wait for the thing to load in the first place).

Keep it simple, kill the flash interface.

Getting to the 3d portion, why have the images as popups? Firefox defaults to not allowing the images unless you allow your site. Which an employer is not going to bother with. Assuming they've gotten this far already, they'll see the FF warning, and close the tab.

I could say more, but I might as well just point you to Jon Jones' fantastic writeup:
Your Portfolio Repels Jobs

Joao Sapiro · Feb 2008

took me ALOT of time to open it. The flash is also really unpractical , i dont care about your flash skills unless you want a web designer job ( wich you would also fail here ).
The work itself is consisted mostly of blobby highpolys in stages of work in progress, you have really few finished stuff and that isnt to par with nowadays work .
I would advise you to start working on finishing more stuff, learn the bases because you seem to lack them , and lack the flash. Good luck !

cholden · Feb 2008

Bad idea, it makes your art look bad, thumbs all bent out of shape, annoying to wait on loading, clicking on things half works, if employer doesn't have your version of flash install you're overlooked.

All your work is unfinished, sloppy and weird. It's either a strange monster or weird mech that no one can relate to. I don't see why anyone would hire you because none of your work represents anything I've seen games needing. EXCEPT for that one textured shotgun (not counting the rifle that's the same piece literally). Unless you were a PHENOMINAL modeler, you're going to have to have finished pieces (modeled AND textured) to get any attention. Additionally, I'd only show 8-10 of your best pieces.

As LoTekk suggested, review the Jon Jones article: Your Portfolio Repels Jobs, and work on getting this together.

and get a Resume/CV, if you have one up there, I can't find it because your site design is terrible. I know I'm being a little harsh here, but after reviewing a lot of portfolios, this is probably one of the worst (by design) I've seen in a while and it really frustaighted me.

Panupat · Feb 2008

Your flash is not easy to navigate... I'll recommend Ryan Church's simple layout... it simply works.

Your Zbrush shows textures but not much anatomical understanding.

zerojs · Feb 2008

Thanks for that link lotekk, good read. As far as my website, yeah i did really make it for myself instead of making it soley for the purpose of self promotion. I will definatly create a seperate site just to promote my 3d art.
And as far as my 3d art style, yes it is different, ive always tried to create original art, i hate creating anything that looks similar to something else.I guess thats where i went wrong with the website too.

LoTekK · Feb 2008

Style means nothing without fundamentals. Focus on modelling stuff from reference, instead of modelling some random thing from your head that, as cholden has pointed out, nobody can actually relate to.

Ferg · Feb 2008

nobody's gonna pay you to make unique art in your own style, employers want you to make art in THEIR style.

if you want to be a professional artist, it's worth it to learn how to do things the way most artists do them. Do your personal art in your free time.

zerojs · Feb 2008

Im curious, would you say the same thing about this artist work? http://www.zbrushcentral.com/zbc/showthread.php?t=055011
His characters are wierd and cant be related to?
Or are they amazing pieces of artwork, thats how i feel about them anyway.
So if something is "wierd" by your standards does it mean it is automatically pointless and bad?

But i guess ferg has made the best comment yet, of course your right but for the past few years ive just wanted to express my own creations in 3d.

cholden · Feb 2008

Let me quote myself "Unless you were a PHENOMINAL modeler".

The youngster in question, Sanjay Chand, is an outstanding artist. Additionally, his pieces are finished art, and show strong anatomical presence. it doesn't matter that they are all crazy monsters because they are all grounded in reality. He's good to the point where he can shape and distort it to this extreme yet his fundamental skills still show through. You are a LONG way from his level, and it is not an apt analogy for you to use him as an example.

Ferg · Feb 2008

yah, it kind of sucks in a way. It took me a while to realize that my work was repelling employers partially because it just wasn't relevant to the games industry. I knew the tools and tech, I just didn't show that I could be plopped down into a modern game pipeline and crank out the kind of art they needed.

On the plus side, being forced to learn the style and techniques of the "mainstream" is extremely helpful in developing yourself as an artist in general. When doing personal art, I tend to use the same techniques and styles over and over, often ending up with a feeling of stagnation. Forcing myself to work in the established styles and techniques of the average game artist opened my eyes to so many new ways of doing things, and those developments became evident in my personal work, as it improved as well.

For a while I was pretty uppity about being an "artist" (whatever the fuck that is) and really resisted creating realistic characters and props, instead of crazy things in my own style and universes. But once I started working and creating art in a professional environment, I realized how narrow my personal artistic scope was. My personal art began to change and grow, and suddenly I was able to express myself much better through it. I used all the things I learned as a professional commercial artist as tools to help refine my personal art, and both sides benefited.

Duchess Of Dork · Feb 2008

I kind of like the concepts of most of your models, they all follow a similar style. Unfortunately, most of them feel unfinished. I might go with a little diversety too, maybe try throwing in some objects?

zerojs · Feb 2008

to cholden, i wasnt comparing myself to Sanjay Chand.I have no training or qualifications when it comes to 2d or 3d art, everything i know ive taught myself. i was simply asking if you dont like all "wierd" 3d art. You said my stuff was wierd and strange, i just thought that was a little vague and was trying to understand your opinion more.

Thank you ferg again, everything you said is relevant to me and is something i will think about. Oh an BTW that hexbot you made is awesome.

rollin · Feb 2008

cholden our hardest critic...

but apart of the fact your still on the road of learning the basics (what is in no way bad.. bc we ALL where or still are (or should be) on this road)
but apart of this: do not use flash for an portfolio site .. its like giving an painting an 10x bigger border with glowing and flashing pink green and red lights on it while the happy dappy doo song is playing..

make an extra page for showing your flash skills but do not mix

and don´t get demotivated.. cholden is also not perfect: he can´t draw .... yet

zerojs · Feb 2008

thanks rollin, hopefully i will post back here soon when i have created a seperate 3d portfolio website.

zerojs · Mar 2008

Right! after my website got completly roasted in this thread i have made a new one! hopefully it is alot better:
www.zer0pages.co.uk/3d let me know if it is

thanks

cholden · Mar 2008

Ok, now reduce this to 8-10 of your best works. I'd say char_8, the shotgun and the rifle. Get some other opinions of other peoples' top choices.

Your 2d section is mostly better presentations of your 3d section. Consider removing some of the 3d and replace it with the well presented 2d version (since it's the same thing).

Minus the shotgun and rifle, ALL of your characters, vehicles and props are textured with a rock. Almost every one of them appear planar mapped from one side, leaving massive amounts of UV stretching across the front (most seen) faces. Seriously start working on your UV and texturing skills.

WIP sections do not belong in portfolios.

Em. · Mar 2008

What Cholden said AND I can't stress enough how much working on your texturing and UV skills will help you. The texture on the polar bear for instance, reads more like a painted concrete statue than fur. It also, along with most of the models I took a peek at, have some pretty bad stretching. It looks like you have a decent grasp on modeling techniques, you just need to really hunker down and push to get better.

Take a serious look at the games that are currently out and do your damnedest to get to that level. Focus on doing a few really great, really finished pieces of artwork. Post them here for crits as you're working on them.
Keep at it and you'll get there in no time. Best of luck.

zerojs · Mar 2008

thanks for the comments, bit better this time around. I really love modeling and using many different types of modeling, texturing 3d models is something that i dont have a passion for .. yet. So thats why my texturing doesnt look great, i know i have to get better at it, what can i say.. im still learning. I've moved the WIP to its own section.

zerojs · Apr 2008

well ive cut down the portfolio as suggested and added a new one.
www.zer0pages.co.uk/3d

BradMyers82 · Apr 2008

Hey Zero. Some of your stuff looks pretty good to me but their are some problems I think with the way you are going about things.

I think you are better off showing just one kick ass model then a bunch of medicore ones, so make sure anything you put on your site is your absolute best or close to it. Also, if you are looking for a job in the game industry I think you should make presentations sheets that show off your workflow a bit.

Furthermore, start creating various texture maps especially normal maps for your models. I don't think work ethic is the issue for you, so if you keep it up you will get there, but; you really need to create really highly polished models and spend time on just a few, instead of creating an army of average ones.
Your portfolio this way is much better than before in terms of attempting to get a job, and I know it must be painful to give up all the work you put in the flash site but its a must. Now, just start working on the content some more and refining your skills. You should join a art challenge like Dominance War and get feedback as you go, instead of creating something and then getting torn apart after the fact when its too late.

Good luck.

killingpeople · Apr 2008

the mechs/robots you share in your portfolio are abstract and free flowing, which is cool. i call out this fact to point out that from a professional angle, where our goal is to get you a job offer from a game studio, you would be more successful in showing a possible employer your ability to become a valued asset on the team by creating models that would you would be creating under their employment. i would recommend creating models you'd see in your favorite console or pc game today. make a sweet prop to drop in a gears of war 2 level. make a dope bridge that would look sweet in a Starcraft 2 level. or maybe create a character that would fit into a Rachet and Clank or Quake Wars, etc. so, i'm saying, create these types of portfolio pieces will increase the likelihood of you picking up a job offer and will better communicate to game companies of your real abilities as a commercial 3d artist.

also, i felt mentioning that you shouldn't neglect the texturing arena. i'm not saying it's impossible to be hired as a "3d modeler", but i want to point out that it isn't as regular a position as you may want to believe. there has been a case where someone modeled and unwrapped shit for me to texture, but it's good to hold your own in that department and is worth investing time in.

Cody · Apr 2008

I think when you get to the large version of the images, there should be a back and next button, so you can navigate through the images without going back to the portfolio page. That's just my preference, because I think it makes a site flow better, and easier to navigate. And of course, a home button.

Yozora · Apr 2008

HTML error on your resume page "Email: &nbspzero_js@yahoo.com"

zerojs · Apr 2008

thanks for your comments, alot of stuff for me to think about.
but as for the HTML error, how is that an error, thats what its supposed to be.. i just put 2 nbsp's in there to line it up with my name.

Yozora · Apr 2008

zerojs wrote: »

thanks for your comments, alot of stuff for me to think about.
but as for the HTML error, how is that an error, thats what its supposed to be.. i just put 2 nbsp's in there to line it up with my name.

ok sorry, just tested it in IE and its fine... so its a browser error but I'm not the only person using opera so you might wanna fix that for opera users

zerojs · Apr 2008

actually the same thing happens in firefox too, i just notice it, anyway fixed it now, thanks for pointing out.

zerojs · May 2008

updated my portfolio with a few new renders/animations
http://www.zer0pages.co.uk/3d

zerojs · Jul 2008

Major update on my portfolio:

http://www.zer0pages.co.uk/3d/

Joao Sapiro · Jul 2008

the only advice i have is to work more, because right now your work isnt even reaching mediocrity , nothing i see there is industry standard , no actual knowledge of modeling/texturing i would try to tackle one of them at the time, focus in each in separate right now

Sage · Jul 2008

I think you should recreate some real life vehicles buildings facades and props for the building scene, and texture it with one diffuse map. For the building though I suggest you do what's suggested in the polycount challenge though. Employers need to know you can do this perfectly and the only way to prove you can is buy making it. I would get rid of your wip section. Then once you are good with that move to using normal maps and specs. The biggest problem I still see is that your textures look stretched and also the in your structures the textures just seem like you took part of an image and threw it on. You need to add trims and other materials to your textures and make sure there is no stretching. There also seems to have a bit of texel inconsistency. To check for this kind of thing make a grid texture, a bitmap is better, have it at the size you need the final texture to be and have some text and circles on the grid, and apply it to your object. The goal is to keep the grid as even as possible throughout your entire model and have the grid look perfect, especially in the areas where the viewer will see the most. I think there were a bunch already posted on polycount, try doing a search for them.

If you need some motivation to do buildings join the challenge that is taking place on polycount.

DarkAlleyEthics · Nov 2008

Sage wrote: »

There also seems to have a bit of texel inconsistency. To check for this kind of thing make a grid texture, a bitmap is better, have it at the size you need the final texture to be and have some text and circles on the grid, and apply it to your object. The goal is to keep the grid as even as possible throughout your entire model and have the grid look perfect, especially in the areas where the viewer will see the most.

Here ya go. . .

[Portfolio] - zerojs - online portfolio, demo reel feedback

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