My work from last year

Time to pull it all together again and see what I accomplished last year. I usually wish it were more, but that's how it is. It was a busy year at the university; there were a lot of projects I was involved in. 

This first image is actually a still from an animation I worked on. I 3D tracked the video in After Effects and exported the data to Cinema 4D. There I built simple geometry to match architectural drawings of this luxury hotel that will be built in Florida. I had to find most of the source material myself. The geometry was rendered out simply, like a blueprint. The source video was from a drone shot. I animated the building being constructed, rising from the ground. Some rotoscoping was necessary to bring it all together and put the CG elements behind the trees.

This one isn't that exciting. It's some construction components called a slide bearing that had been simply rendered for a previous illustration. I needed to jazz it up a bit and change the main plates to look like they were painted green to match the latest version of this product. It was hard to make it look good, but I did my best. I didn't have much in the way of source material, but I did have some closeup photos to show me the color of the paint. I did the best I could on it. It's not great, but it does the job it needs to. I don't think I could have done any better.

Time for some more life drawings. That's the summer class I've taught since I started at UNG. This one is just a simple, quick sketch, probably not taking much more than 30 minutes. It's of one of my favorite models to work with. I've drawn him a lot and for some reason, it's pretty easy for me to catch his likeness. This one is quite simple, done with NuPastel and white. Not much going on here, but it came out strong.

Another sketch from my summer class. This is a newer model I've been working with and she is lots of fun. We were concentrating on standing poses, so that's what we have here. It's also interesting to add some drapery and other elements to the scene. This would have been from the last pose of the class session, lasting one and a half hours. This drawing is just charcoal and white. They don't always turn out well, but I think this one did.

Another final long drawing from the summer class. For this one, we were working on reclining poses. I also try for dramatic lighting to make things interesting. I've done a lot on this little couch, so I keep trying to find ways to change things up. For something like this, I concentrate on the figure while the model is in the class. After the drawing session is over, before cleaning up, I work on finishing up the couch, since it's not going anywhere. I used NuPastel for this one as well; the blue color gives a nice look.

This is not a final image, but a still from a video sequence. I built, textured, and animated this model in Cinema 4D. Luckily, I found a tutorial online to help me with the animation of the teeth going around, which was based on animating a bike chain. This image isn't great, but I was pleased with the model. It was a bit complex for me, but the worst part was that I had to pretty much make it up myself, using random photos of the machine I was supposed to be creating. I had to fudge some parts, but this would be used in an animation where the process was more important than the hardware used. I finished that animation, but honestly, this still here is a better representation of my work. The motion blur visible here was added in After Effects.

Now here's a big one. I did this for a large exhibit graphic. The client was pretty specific about this image: a large commercial plane with a sunset in the background. I did my best to make it look dramatic and pretty. The actual product I'm illustrating here are the little grey patches and expansion joints in the runway pavement. The final configuration of all this stuff changed quite a bit several times after the image was practically complete. It took a long time for this client to be happy. That happens sometimes. I have a few elements here in this image that were not in the final that I delivered. I like this one a bit better, but you have to give clients what they want. But whatever the version, I think this was a successful project.

 

Here's a tricky one. I did a lot of initial sketches to figure out how to fit all the elements in. This image was used for a number of purposes in a few configurations. I try to build images in a manner to fit all these needs. This company makes foundational construction components that are used in a lot of energy-generating projects. That's why all these elements are represented. My main concept was to use the blades of the wind turbine as a compositional device to separate the different scenes, while joining them into one. It's tough to fit all this disparate imagery together into one illustration and make it work. I think this one is pretty successful. Usually, that's best accomplished by keeping the client out of the creation process as much as possible. I mostly like this one.

The previous image, as many details as it contained, was not designed to be the final image. The idea was always to include inset images of the products this company makes and installs. The background illustration shows the products in application, in what are hopefully interesting scenes. But we needed to see what they actually do these inset images show the foundational pieces that keep these structures firmly rooted to the ground. For these more detailed images, I built them all as 3D models in Cinema 4D. This allowed me to make changes more easily, that that was a good thing here. I made so many versions of these things. For some reason, it was hard for the client to get me reliable source material. I just had to keep making final images to get their input.

I did my best to light and texture them to completion in Cinema 4D, but things usually look a bit better if they pass through Photoshop. I do multi-pass renders, so I have various layers to work with to get the best effect. I use a combination of photographic textures for the final result. This soil anchor image went through a number of revisions. I guess this one is the best. 

Another of the inset images. I did a total of four (one was double height), but they weren't all that interesting. I liked how this one turned out, but it wasn't the final version. That one was pulled back a bit more and showed a below ground cutaway of their structure. There's nothing too creative here, just a need to display the required items.

This was my last painting of the year. It was done as a Christmas gift for my daughter. I had made paintings for my other kids as gifts and needed to make sure that they all had one. This is a representation of our favorite vacation spots in the Sawtooth Mountains of Idaho. I had been wanting to do something like this for a while. The truth is, I wish it had turned out better, but I guess it works.