Portfolio Work

Modeled and rendered with 3DS Max, ZBrush, Photoshop, Vray, and Mental Ray. Models were all sculpted, textured, setup, and rendered by myself. All the work below is my own. Most photo-based textures are my own with a few exceptions from free texture sources online. Each lantern/pot has a displacement map and normal map adding up to several million polygons per render. Paintings done in Photoshop by hand.

Sculpted in Zbrush and rendered inVRay
Mental Ray Render	Low poly model imported into a real-time renderer.
Low poly model imported into a real-time renderer.	Low poly model imported into a real-time renderer.
	Mental Ray Render
Illustration Work
An Environment Prop Concept

WIP - Sci Fi Character Renders

Update - July 22, 2014

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Updated Renders - Completely Redone Walls and Ground

Updates - HD Geometry and Technical Problems

Rubble and MassFX Simulations

I've been looking for a quick way to lay out some piles of rubble and debris for my scene. Instead of placing individual objects on the floor I thought maybe running a rigid body simulation would do the job faster. Looks like I was right. :D

New Props

Left - Vray Right - Mental Ray

Diffuse Painting Progress

I've been using Zbrush to paint the diffuse texture for the walls. There's a lot of space to cover and I have to zoom in close to make sure micro details are captured. It has been really helpful for me to use photo textures from my library to help me with color since I struggle with color blindness. I use Zapplink to link up with Photoshop and then project the photos and even do some hand painting too. In Photoshop I use layer masks alot, that way it's like I'm painting with photos. I just make a brush stroke where I need different texture materials to show. This technique is fast so allows me to easily get huge amounts of detail so I can worry about the big picture.

Vray

First test render of my scene with Vray. I took about an hour converting the scene from Mental Ray to Vray and quickly fired of a few renders until I got this. Total render time for this frame using just one of maybe 6 different rendering methods was just under two minutes. It's amazing, that same render would've taken MR something like 15-20 minutes at least. Vray could be a game changer for this project of mine, hopefully I can now work without the software getting in the way.

Memory Issues

I've come very far with the bazaar scene. At a certain point a few months ago, I decided to bring in all of my geometry from Zbrush as decimated geometry which renders quickly but adds tens of thousands of polygons to the master 3DS Max file. Sure enough, I maxed out my all of my RAM and can no longer add to the scene. So, as a result, I now am running tests to find the best method of dealing with the problem. The question here is: do I want to use bump maps on low poly geometry or displacement maps. I don't like working with displacement maps alone because they are a pain to generate and take a long time to render. Here's a test render with high lighting and shadow quality settings.

Concepts for Zbrush

WIP Renders

Still seems flat and unrealistic despite carefully sculpting realistic details into the wood and plaster walls. I wonder if that is because I haven't placed anything in the foreground and most of the mid ground?

Composite Map Render Test

I've been experimenting with using 3ds Max's composite map node to layer multiple bump maps on top of one another. Here is a test render.

1 Hour Portrait Study

Sat down today and was able to try a portrait. I always have this internal fear that causes hesitation before I try something like this. These types of drawings always upset me. I hate looking at an observational drawing and then comparing it to the reference and seeing how badly the proportions are off. Anyways, I went for it and after an hour I had this pretty close. It doesn't look like the actor in the photo but it's decent. And I refined the lines and shapes several times over before it looked reasonable.

Update: I've added some quick overlays in Photoshop and used some contrast/color adjustments to create both a specular map and glossy map that gave me the following results. I'm pretty happy with this and I think I'll move on to the next prop for my scene. This lantern took me one week from start to finish.

Update: Got most of the color texture done. I'm not the best painter because I struggle with color and I don't quite have a process. As a result, I just go at it painting away in an uncontrolled and experimental manner until I'm happy enough with what I see.

Update: Finished sculpting phase mostly. Next I will add some imperfections like scratches and a dent or two. I'll soon texture this lantern to look old and fill the crevices with dirt.

Tonight, I worked on one of the many lanterns I plan to have in my bazaar scene. This is two days of work so far. I just started right in with Zbrush sculpting using the default sphere. I spent a few hours making Photoshop patterns observed from reference photos.