I like the animation 
It’s so scary…
Great work Alex! I owe so much to you for being where I currently am as a digital artist, whether it be all of Gnomon, or your Making of Jester DVD which was the most resourceful training DVD I had ever seen (I learnt Maya that way)
Just some clarification. Why does every1 think this is a Zbrush animation? Alex stated that it was rigged, animated and rendered in Maya / MR, this is not a Zbrush animation, if it was though that would be brilliant
(PS I just referred more people to thegnomonworkshop the same day I’m writing this, I always recommend it)
Again great work!
Cool nice i like it i like your characters Alex Alvarez at theGnomonworkshop
Trying to figure out how it made it up on top row. That would’ve helped explaining it for sure!
I wouldn’t normally say this (due to deep respect for Alex) but I agree with you in this particular case
aesis412: Thanks… a nice compliment!
jinjian: Thanks!
Stefano Dubay: Nice to hear from you! Thanks for the comments… I’ll try to post some more images tomorrow.
locusta: Thanks!
drem026: Yep, I’ll put some images together and post soon. Thanks so much for your interest!
kskovbo: Thanks!
Sofia: Heh… why thank you.
Etcher: Thank you.
danko75: Thank for that… I’ve found that many of the artists I know share a similar feeling, which perhaps is what motivates us to keep working hard. While I think my stuff is ok, there are so many artists out there that I know are way more talented than I am. Many here on ZBC. It is for this reason that any negative comments that pop up in here I accept as valid criticisms. The moment I saw that I got plugged I braced myself for it. I apologize for getting plugged when there is a bunch of other cool stuff in here that probably deserves it more than I do.
testure: Well, asking an artist what the ‘point’ is of what they did is a little ‘pedestrian’. I was just having fun making something for myself. That’s about as much of a reason as any artist should need. Many artists are just making things because it is what they love to do. Most people frame a still, I chose to make it move a little. That’s all. Nothing narrative, no point, no rhyme or reason. Just messing around with the computer. Of course my project has issues and could be improved, so I appreciate your criticisms and thank you for taking the time to make some observations. But in the end, I just needed to move on and call it done. With who I am today, this is what I can make. Tomorrow… we will see.
andrew DRON: Ho hum.
GiorOne: Thank you.
gpepper: Thanks!!
highway star: Heh… Thank you.
pimento: Think of it as a screensaver. It is looping on a monitor on a wall, just as one would hang a print. I originally did 30 seconds but I enjoyed it more as two minutes… and for others out there that are making stuff should remember. Make stuff for yourself first. Because you should only be an artist because the experience makes you happy. Criticisms hurt but they do help you improve and as I’ve stated, I do appreciate both the positive and the negative. But there are so many genres and styles out there, with people who like and dislike them all. I don’t like Thomas Kinkade, but millions do. You can please some of the people some of the time, but trying to please all of the people all of the time will lead you to madness.
Santis: Thanks. I usually don’t spend as much time on something as this, as I was curious to see what I would make if I did… clearly some people think it resulted in a mess, but that’s ok. I’m happy that you like it!
KonginChains: Heh… much appreciated.
tigertiger: Thank you… I should add a button on the right that says ‘Select your character’. Heh…
Xsmoke: wow… thank you. I guess your opinion proves that any piece will appeal to some but not all. But you liking it that much is really a nice thing to hear.
Taron: Umm. I guess so. I don’t think things get plugged so that the people who disagree can begin venting. But thanks for thinking that it is neat. I get the feeling you don’t, but thats ok… I love what you do.
markkens: Well, he does come closer in the second minute… and the textures are much easier to read in the fullsize print/anim. Granted things should generally work both small and big. In the end, this is the first detailed environment project I’ve made in a few years, so let’s hope the next one is better!
Mr.CG: Haha… let’s hope so.
VladimirKudelka: Happy to scare. If only I could do it as well as Wayne Barlow or Chet Zar!
Darukin: Awesome… thanks! Glad to hear that Jester was so helpful to you!
GabrielKnight: Thanks!
Taron#2: Well, I guess pixologic feels that is ok to plug something that wasn’t entirely made in Zbrush. Everything was sculpted in it, but I feel that it would be weird to only highlight images/stills made entirely with Zbrush as that would imply that Pixologic is only interested in promoting that workflow. While beautiful images are being rendered with Zbrush, especially now with Z4, most production artists have no choice but to use it with other tools, especially when animation is involved (yourself included). Some of the artists on ZBC are illustrators making stills, some are production artists who are used to using other things. I personally think it is interesting to see examples of both on the top row. But if your point is more than you think that my image doesn’t deserve to be on the top row, well, how do I respond to that? I didn’t put it there so…
Darukin: I guess my answer to Taron is my response to you and I thank you for offering a kind word. But to be honest, I was surprised to see it there too! Like I mentioned earlier, the moment I saw it plugged I cringed cuz I knew people would say such things. Whenever I finish something, I have no idea if it is any good really. I leave that up to others to decide knowing that I simply had fun making it. Pixologic I guess liked it and for that I am extremely grateful. I know that being up there is a big deal and that many other artists on ZBC deserve it. Put please don’t crucify me for it. I’m just another hermit artist guy who ends up feeling like **** when I hear people slamming me. Several talented and successful friends of mine have stopped posting on forums because they just can’t take the negativity.
With that said… thank you to those of you who dig it and to the others, I will try harder next time.
And thank you to Pixologic for Zbrush. The best thing to happen to 3D in the last ten years.
-Alex
Wow man! Really nice work
Perhaps the admin can find a way to let people express whether certain threads should be there… then again, there is no easy answer.
Good job anyway.
Looks wicked Alex … really think its a cool way to show off your character and the enviro has a nice mood to it with the embers - looks like quite a bit of work - Grats on top row and thx for sharing
–
hmmm - was reading “Several talented and successful friends of mine have stopped posting on forums because they just can’t take the negativity”
and it bumbed me out 
real shame to know its disincoraged artists to share their work - I must say i find it really disrespectful and rude that guys leave negative comments and not sure what they trying to achieve ? apart from looking like …s ?.. everyones got an opinion … sux that some people share theirs with a negative intent - and a little respect would go a long way imo
Anyway I for one am grateful for all the tutorials you and the gnomon team have done they have helped me a lot - and i really get the vibe that you where just having fun … not posting to get top row …which is how it should be …I really dig seeing what you up too and sure most other guys are as well - now lets see some zbrush screen grabs of this dude
Oh boy I feel guilty now, I didn’t mean it that way, if you read my previous post I only have deep respect for u as an artists and love your works and appreciate all what you’ve done, you’ve probably been the most helpful of any to me personally!
And like u said, Pixo put it up there! If they felt it deserves to put it up there it means automatically it’s a brilliant work, regardless of initial reactions of people like us, so please keep posting your works!
P.S on second viewing I like it even more now, because of the completeness of the work, it’s got complete character and great environment and texture work, great atmosphere AND it’s animated, what should people want more 
that’s why it’s plugged, and many artists are jealous and wish to have skill levels like you guys, so if u feel it’s “harsh” out here then think of all the non top-row artists u know. So don’t be silly and keep posting!!
Great to see some new stuff, you sharing your work with the community is greatly appreciated, keep it up. I love the character, I just wish he was a little more of the focal point and stood out from the background more, kinda like when he steps forward in the animation, thats nice. The shoulder strech is so sweet in the animation. The fire particles are really cool, and the breathing cycle is sweet, would love to see some more mouth/facial movement. And thank you for all that you have done for the world of 3d. P.S. the overall feel really reminds me of Diablo II, old school, love it.
really nice to see some new work from you. I dig the character, especially the head, has an almost Wayne Barlowe feel to it. Would definitely be interesting to see him talk.
Ugh, just to explain this properly:
Zbrush 4 has animation features as part of its advertising, which is actually a very exciting concept and felt right long before anyone began hoping it would even try that at all.
One of the demo clips a few weeks or months back was showing a figure being animated to some simple degree.
With your post being toprow and the fact that it’s animated to begin with, it clearly felt like it had to be related to that and manages to impress from that perspective. It made me look more closely at the timeline and I yet have to figure out how to animate a tool such as zspheres with it?!? Is it possible? I havn’t found enough hints on how to do so and couldn’t figure it out by myself. I can move the camera and change properties, but I couldn’t animate the move or deformation of any object, yet. :o
SO, there you are already guilty of making me invest some hours on mystery island, so to say, hahahaha.
It might actually be even nice to add to your disclaimer more explicitly that it’s not a Zbrush4 animation.
Anyway, you’re doing some crazy comic style fantasy horror that sure has its place particularely here. As you’ve plugged it up on toprow, here’s the best you can hope for from someone like me…some constructive criticism without qualifying the circumstances:
First…THE PROBLEMS (as far as I can tell, of course):
-
Details are not the answer, but the letters of words. Arrange them like aAAaAaaaAsssSSSssshhhhhHHH and it just looks like something that might be ashes or the beginning of another word, :lol:. The subject you chose has been dark, chaotic and bewildering, while the execution has much of the traits of a fairytale illustration for the young ones, where every detail can be viewed clearly and you can imagine yourself skipping happily through the boneyards three-story-motel of lemony fresh prop-horrors, if you did get your express-pass for the year.
-
Everything looks like casts as oppposed to items, composed of various elements and even materials. And you know where you’d find casts for things that are merely meant to look like something they’re not?! Hint: Smells like rubber when you remove the packaging.
-
paths lead to no where with the kind of significance one would hope for.
Now…THE SOLUTION (as far as I’d suggest it, of course):
-
always revisit what you are constructing. Don’t get carried away by the many reasons that brought you to where this is now (I don’t know what they all are, but “a whole lot of work” must’ve been one of them). If it suggests to be or become too much work, really, make a sketch by all means. But judge it for it’s clarity of expression, for it’s meaning: What does it really show. And be explicit! That’s something I’ve learned from some excellent japanese artists back in CA. They don’t beat around the bush and just go for the real deal. Don’t try to pick subtle fears and hope that someone picks up on them, while overloading it with overt fears that nobody could possibly miss. They destroy each other.
Therefore details come last… direction comes first! -
Any item should represent a reality all by itself. It wants to be related to in order to be accepted as existent. Visually declare something to be of many pieces alone by its sillhuette, then make sure that those many pieces have enough hints of isolation as necessary and then bind them by the same exposure they all might have encountered during the time of unity, being stuck together.
The key components of your weapon there, for example, look like they are one cast, as I’ve said above. Even if the idea of their composition would require that, change the idea then. Make prominent pieces out of bone instead of metal, make the different substance more clearly different and at the end, just marry them with the same sort of dirt and wear, knicks that continue from one substance over to the next (however they would have affected that).
There’s certainly more to be said, but here you go… let’s make this a more powerful post then. It’s toprow after all, that means it’s a great chance for all of us to learn together!
That’s really sad to hear but a trend I have noticed all over the net on other big name forums. There is much less work being shared, as well in the CG community. I guess because more and more of the talented artists are being gobbled up by studios and therefore have less time to do more personal creative work that is not bound by NDA’s. Very sad.
Let alone the fact there are allot of jealous and rude people on the net who like to troll. I've had my fair share of that on a certain other site, even by some admins.
Congrats on the front row Alex. I liked your image, although it did feel a little bit dated compared to your other work. I think maybe because of the lighting? or shading? I can't put my finger on it.
The animation on the other hand was very atmospheric, sound effects, movement, altogether just pulls you in, and the thumbnail on the top row looks very inviting! well worth the click 
It’s clear how much passion, time and energy went into it. A piece of art.
Negative criticism is hard but part of the deal I guess :) and the trolls, just ignore their ignorance.
Keep creating, helping and inspiring others! :+1:The thing that I noticed when I was doing my degree, were people that would
come in on their first year not knowing much about graphic design. They
knew what looked cool, just didn’t really know why. They were eventually
instructed to look a little closer at things. With this new gift (as well as many
others) they would always see faults or ways to improve the object.
Some examples:
“Not enough asymmetry”
“Should really have used a consistent ratio of elements”
“I would have preferred some more highlights”
It would end up as a game or a popularity contest at who could pick faults or
find better solutions with each others work. Eventually they would come to
see, that making something similar to what they had previously picked apart in
someone elses work, was a colossal challenge! It first had to be thought of!
It had to be pulled out of the imagination! Formed with their own hands! With
the time they were allowed. And the biggest factor of all, the cheques they
wrote out for others work, their arses had to cash. LOL!
The bigger they are, the harder they fall.
This completely changed the way I looked at a lot of peoples work, after my
own experiences. I came to see greatness in even the simplest of works.
It was funny to watch people come in to school and over time having them
talk a little longer in front of someones display.
It’s just like what Lee said, its just a touch of jealousy and a little bit of new
found knowledge being excuted. I would hate to not see your work anymore.
A tutor once told me that your project should be thought of as a box with a
balloon inside it. How big is your box? Do you have the lung capacity to fill
that box completely with air? You gave yourself a very large box here Alex,
and you have filled the whole box with air. The fluttering bugs about the
place, are icing or the knot in the fully blown balloon.
!!!!!! lol! have fun and look at all
your accomplishments god damn it, and intrinsically stand upon them!!! 
Ahh, Darukin, thank you very much, yeah, I’ve seen your ZAnimator stuff and it looks REALLY interesting!!! 
(joy!)
But I don’t mean for us to hijack the thread with it…:o
I’m sorry guys, it’s burning me in my heart so see this kind of nonsense unfolding here in regards to “negativity”. Awwwwww, such poor thing, can’t mingle in the lowly crowd to let it carry his work to the top and now has to face reactions from everyone. Look, Alex is fantastic and really sweet. I love the guy, honestly. I’ve said it before, we’re friends and dear ones at that and I’d stand up and fight for him, but I would not insult him with ignorance and let him jump up on a horse right in front of me so high and mighty it could crush him at places that can’t be found and fixed. He’s a man on a journey much like all of us and to fool him to stumble into a questionable path will be as hurtful as it would be to anyone of us. He can do better and he will do better, but he needs to approach it with much greater humility not to put himself under redundant pressure. That goes for all of us, while most of us don’t have the same dangerous privileges. We’re all kids in many ways and growing up is simply more risky the more we’re exposed to “powertools” so to say.
I’m familiar with the concept of sandwiching feedback, but to me it has to serve a purpose for the whole. If it’s one on one it’s a little different than how it is within a large group. Everyone should get the chance to learn something from it and somehow the sandwich parts become dedicated to the whole group as well as the feedback itself. And sometimes it’s a key element to learn about winding back the handicap for oneself and embrace a more humble exposure and integration. It gives you far more power from within.
I havn’t been on ZbrushCentral for a long time until Sculptris got pulled into here and now I’m around again…hmmm…funny, I know. I love Zbrush, don’t make this a case against me doing so. However, I’ve seen stuff in that intermediate toprow…thread row? No idea what you call them thumbnails, but there’s stuff that just has to go into the permanent and prominent archives. A female akt of some asian girl, curled up, for example. It’s so incredibly elegant and realistic that it took my breath away for a moment. And that’s just one example. I know it is hard to pick anything for the top in light of such amounts of greatness in here, but those artists have chosen to seek connection and some exposure to a larger group. The idea of an irrelevance of skill and the impression that ones own judgement must’ve failed to recognize the larger group’s relatability to ones own work can actually harm the development of such artists.
I’d say… come down here so I can pet your back and we can actually doodle around together. There’s no pressure here and the temperature is fine.
Good work Alex. I like how you’ve tried to give the viewer many focal areas, it’s something I cannot do, but I think you’ve managed to somehow make it bearable.
Having said that, I get the sense it’s not that professional looking because it breaks a lot of design molds. I think some people here believe it got plugged simply because of who you are, and not because of the work you’ve posted here this time. I could be dead wrong, and I think they should get rid of toprows and awards on all forums!
I’m one artist that has stopped posting work around the net due to negativity. Some people are fighting to get noticed, and sacrificing a lot to put as much time in their work as they can and post with little to no feedback in some cases. I think that crowd feels ripped off when they think there’s a potential that an image is promoted due to a Pixologic/Gnomon relationship, that kind of thing.
Anyway, you’re a good artist and have responded so amazing to the crits that it deserves to be ‘up there’ anyway, as an example on how to respond to negativity.
Take care,
broadstroke
Gah… my word, I’ve always hated the toprow concept. And Alex just got really smashed over the head with it to some degree. It’s a vicious thing as I believe when he said he didn’t ask to be put up there. Well, hell… here’s a hug.
Anyway, then this is to those, who think they’re friends and mean well, but exposed him to that, simply because they weren’t really thinking it through enough. (hint: …help yourself and next time just tell them not to plug it. I’ve done that before! It also would’ve given you more time to respond to feedback and do the few improvements that were interesting to really make it shoot up there for all the right reasons!)
On the other hand, Alex, if you ever want to get some relentless feedback, you know where I am and I always love to help as much as I can. On one hand you’re already such an expert, that you train people to become experts, but on the other hand you don’t get enough chances to develop those aspects that are still in need of focus. I think we’ve never taken enough advantage of that exact chance to exchange and grow through such direct access. A shame that I never cared about Maya, otherwise you’d know that I have no shame to go quid pro quo.
On other forums situations such as this don’t really ever happen, even while I’m on board (LOL :lol: …:o ), but the feedback can be rich and the relaxation is wonderful.
And, please, don’t let emotions get in the way of the actually interesting information inside of all this.
wowo what a lamo, you really going to keep posting Taron???
Alex well done on top row and for being a sound guy