Category: Environments

Gaea Mountains – LOTR Inspired Concept Painting

September 12, 2022

I’ve been watching Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power and it got me wanting to create some mountains. I created this quick concept.

So, I opened up Gaea this weekend and did some quick mountains there. Gaea is great. Very intuitive and easy to use with it’s node based system.

Simple node setup

You basically keep adding nodes and moving sliders till you start getting something you like.

Gaea nodes

Once you get shapes then you can apply textures within it as well.

Gaea mountain with textures

You just export out your maps and geometry and bring it into your program of choice. I went into Maya to design my shot.

Maya layout

Here is a simple render using Arnold to test look mountain.

Maya render with Arnold

Once I got the placement of geometry (you can use height maps as another method) in Maya, I exported it all over to Clarisse. Here I added volumes of mist and clouds using VDBs.

Clarisse for final and adding volumes

Here is the final raw render.

Clarisse raw render

I then wanted to add some little character traversing the land, so I exported out a ranger archer character from Mixamo and placed in the scene.

Mixamo Character

Little bit of Photoshop retouching and painting for the final.

Final Quick Concept Painting

A quick little Lord of the Rings-ish Mountain concept painting, definitely not a finished painting but was fun to put together for a few hours.

Strange World Teaser!

June 6, 2022

Latest Feature Animated Film from Walt Disney Animation Studios, Strange World!!

It is a total retro pulp action adventure movie about 3 generations of the Clades family and their relationships as they explore this totally unique breathtaking world. Enjoy!!

Here is the teaser trailer

Dengar on Watch

January 24, 2021

So here’s a little sketch I did using Maya with Arnold. I wanted to play with lighting scenarios and the Lighting Filters I mentioned last week.

I was originally inspired with this piece by trying to pay homage to the 19th century artists, like Jean-Leon Gerome and Ludwig Deutsch. They were part of a movement called Orientalism, which was a depiction of the Middle East thru artists from a Western culture’s perspective and interpretations.

I began researching Star Wars related elements. I wanted to incorporate, specifically a bounty hunter, but with all the attention to Boba Fett with the amazing Mandalorian I chose a more obscure one with Dengar. A friend, Brian LaFrance pointed me to a great reference gathering tool Pure Ref. You can create your own pin board of various references easily.

I was able to find low resolution models on RenderHub. There were a bunch of free Star Wars characters from a user, Rip Van Wrinkle.

From here, it was trying to figure out a layout and characters to support my main character, Dengar. For some characters and environments I swapped out textures, used megascan textures. I combined some characters together (made a jawa out of the emperor, etc).

Then just played with mood using different lights in Arnold.

It was a fun exercise. Now onto the next piece.

New Tutorial: Vehicle Concept Art by Pablo Dominguez

September 21, 2020

I don’t have much to report this week but I wanted to give a plug for a new tutorial that hits the virtual shelves. If you’re looking for something awesome and inspiring, check out Pablo Dominguez‘s new Learn Squared course: Vehicle Concept Art. Check it out soon, it’s marked down 40% as an Early Bird Special.

Pablo’s work is amazing and it’s awe-inspiring to see his workflow and thought process as he tackles his design.

I’ve been following his’s work for awhile now and very excited to see his workflow up close. Needless to say I’ve purchased it and will be tinkering with it ASAP!

New3dge VFX Graduation Projects 2020

August 3, 2020

new3dge

I had the incredible honor of being part of VFX Graduation Projects 2020 for the Senior Projects at New3dge school.  It was supposed to take place at the school in Paris, France, but with Covid totally makes sense to cancel the in person gathering. The school was able to allow us access to the students’ work, breakdowns, and face time with the groups.  The Senior Projects are a bunch of shorts that a small group of students work on as team replicating a mini pipeline as they execute a highly caliber of work. The students of VFX/Animation graduation projects for 2020 were very impressive and produced really outstanding quality! So much great work and inspirational to see!

It was a great pleasure to interact with each team and talk about their projects and questions. The excitement of each team  was infectious and reminded me of my days back at school. New3dge school is doing an amazing job teaching their students to be ready for professional careers in VFX, Animation and Games.

Unfortunately I can’t share the projects that the students worked on yet. The School has them submitted to various festivals. Once I am allowed I’ll share the works with links.

What I can say is these shorts are worth checking out when I do! Below is a demo reel from the school with a sampling of what the quality of work the students there produce. You can watch previous Projects on it as well.

Sincere thanks to Fabien Roumazeilles and New3dge for allowing me to be part of this experience, and my friends Ryan Prestridge and Brian Lafrance for recommending me. 

Utopia Demo

May 25, 2020

I had the honor of giving a demo at University of South Florida St. Petersburg at the beginning of the year. This is one of the demos I made that weekend. Had a fabulous time with the students.

During the long weekend I spent a couple hours touching it up. I have a FREE version of the demo here: https://ericbouffard.artstation.com/store/JXpy/kitbash-demo

demo_utopia2

Big thanks to John Stanko for asking me down to give the lectures and demo.  Hope you enjoy the image.