When finishing Uni, how did you manage to find work/ how did you stand out?
Fortunately, I made a few connections through my lecturer. Through those connections I started as an intern at a local studio while I was still finishing up my final semester at university. After graduation I returned to the studio to start my career.
I think the best way to stand out is to show dedication, professionalism and confidence while remaining humble. Spark up conversations with potential clients at conventions, recruitment drives and online via platforms such as LinkedIn.
What is your preference between full time and freelance work?
Full time due to the financial stability it offers over Freelance contracts.
What is your process when working on a sculpt? Do you warm up? / use base meshes?
With any project I will begin with a warm up so that I can get my ‘eye in’. I find it helps to reduce mistakes and makes the creative process flow better. What process I use depends on whether I am doing a commercial or personal project. With commercial work I will generally start with on of my pre-made basemeshes to speed up the process so that more time can be put into details to ensure the client gets what they are looking for.
Personal projects are different, I will generally use a personal project to practice my anatomy and maybe try out new workflows or approaches to keep my skillset up to date. Working this way also helps when I teach as it means I can suggest many different workflows and approaches to the same problem.
The difference between hand sculpting the details vs using xyz maps, to what extent would he use xyz maps?
Efficiency, it is possible to get fine details by hand sculpting, but using an amazing resource like Texturing.XYZ allows you to create those details far quicker and leave you more time to focus on the final output.
How do you manage with the likeness getting the perspective right, since Zbrush perspective settings are different from those in Maya so even if you keep checking it's not always exactly the same?
Generally, I will use Maya to line up photo scan reference to ensure that the overall proportions of the character are correct. Then only use Zbrush for the finer details and skin folds. When working exclusively in Zbrush, you can use the recently added Film Camera settings which are far closer to the cameras found in Maya and this helps a great deal.
Also how would you deal with having to create a likeness of someone when your resource aren't your own pictures taken with one camera, but you have to google them and get pictures where they were taken with cameras that obviously had different focal length?
When you have no photo or photogrammetry reference for a subject, you rely on the internet to get the best reference you can. Then use keen observation to match it as closely as possible. Finding a solid profile shot of a subject, I find, is the best place to start.
When doing hard surface models, do you start from other software e.g. Maya then import it into Zbrush, or do you work entirely from Zbrush?
I almost exclusively work in Maya for hard surface model work as it allows me to be more accurate and efficient. I will use Zbrush for concepting and blocking out the rough shape of say a more complex hard surface shape, but I will then remodel over it in Maya.
For Digital doubles, do you get photoscan’s or is it mostly reference images? Also do you have to model blendshapes for the actors?
I would say that for 95% of the Digi-Doubles I have created; I have had both photo reference and photogrammetry reference to work from. There have been occasions where I have had to work only from references gathered online and every so often you will just get the photogrammetry reference.
Blendshapes are almost always needed, generally the artist that creates the Digi-Double will do them but sometimes it will be handed over to another artist – completely depends on the project/schedule.
Being a Zbrush artist, have there been times where you needed to be more of a generalist? / work in other areas?
When I started in the industry I was hired as a Generalist and I feel that was very beneficial. While I chose to focus on creatures and characters (because that’s what I enjoy the most) I still really enjoy jumping into other areas and I use my personal projects to keep up my generalist skillset, so that I can be more flexible in a studio should they need extra assistance in another department. I suppose you could call me a Generalist with a specialism in Modelling and Sculpting.
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