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New Sci Fi/ Fantasy Illustrations

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#68

Hello All,

I’ve been incredibly busy recently, which in these economic times can only be good news. So now I’ve finally got a chance to talk about a piece I recently finished for Judge Dredd Megazine:

It was created using Zbrush for the sculpting, 3DSMax for the base meshes/ final rendering and Photoshop for the compositing and painting. Below you can see some of the elements in ZBrush - the head and shoulder pads were from another piece I’ll post about sometime soon:

The gloves:

Being a commercial artist means I have to cut as many artistic corners as reasonable to meet deadlines, which is why I mainly get images finished by hand painting - but ZBrush has to be the only tool in which I can achieve the kind of detail, realism and imagery I’m always aiming for.

Here’s the cover with logo and blurb:

Great stuff, hope you good people like it.

Cheers,

NDredd_001.jpgnr_ZBC_dredd_001A.jpgnr_ZBC_dredd_003A.jpgJDMeg288_Iron_Justice.jpgzbcthumb1.jpg

#69

Great stuff buddy, I find zbrush is a great aid to illustration you have all the freedom and don’t have to worry about the technical restraints that a video game artist has to.

#70

What a fantastic illustration. This is the way I use ZBrush too. It would be interesting to see your process, when you have time to share.

#71

GREAT image!!! I Love the colors…it is looking really cool.

#72

Great! Thanks for posting! :+1: !

#73

Excellent work, great to see!
Look forward to seeing more :slight_smile:

#74

That is one iconic Dredd cover! Are you going to be doing any more Judge Dredd or other 2000 AD related stuff?

So correct me if I’m wrong here, you just “painted” a render of the ZBrush Dredd model in photoshop right? Did you do the same thing for your Warhammer 40k models? Or were those textured in 3D space?

#75

Thanks for all your comments - they’re always greatfully recieved.

So I’ve been really busy recently with comic covers, magazine articles, film concepts and lecturing all taking up my time - which is great!

I thought I’d share some of my images for my article ‘Digital Maquettes in a Production Environment’ in the ‘Avatar’ issue of 3DWorld:

The article talks about how I move from the initial concept:

…to the blocking out in 3DSMax, to taking it all into ZBrush:

…Zsculpting:

…and final compositing and cleanup:

This is an example of the kind of work I do - as always, if anyone wants to talk about to me about freelancing gigs, feel free to drop me a line.

Hope you like - I had a great time making it!

Cheers,

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#76

Awesome !!!

#77

It’s not about how much Zbrush or Maya or Max or Mental Ray or RenderMan you use…but when your mind and heart say “done” what it LOOKS like!!!

And these look GREAT!

Thanks for the look ‘under the hood’.

#78

Skills neil! SKILLS!

Hope you had a good xmas!

#79

Great work! Nice renders and sculpts. Adding you to my list of great artists. Looking forward to seeing more.

#80

I liked the 10-page 3d World tutorial a lot! Thanks Neil! :+1: !

#81

I have a question about how to achieve the effect at the right. First question is:

What is that effect called where the light is bleeding into the color and causes the glare look.

And how can that be achieved? is it part of the render or post work? if it is post work could anyone explain how it is achieved? Is it taking a specific layer and changing the blending?.. im really not sure but I have seen it around in a few works.

Thanks in advance. Amazing work!

#82

Hello,

Aberrant: the effects you mention are all achieved in post - mainly in Photoshop with a few ‘Overlay’ and ‘Colour’ layers to give the glow effect some ‘temperature’ - have a play around, hope it makes sense.

Etcher: I’ve got a few other tutorials in the pipeline so watch this space…!

Right, might ahve some more stuff for you soon, keep those eyes peeled.

N

#83

HarryPalmer Thank you so much for sharing. I have seen this effect in other artists works but I have no idea if there is a name given to the technique. I am well versed in photoshop so I know what you mean and understand the process. However, I do have another interesting question that you may be able to answer.

Is there a certain time you choose to use it? EX: When the light source is visible in the image? or perhaps when the light source is directly behind the subject?

Also, if this was a moving piece, “animated”, would there be a way to “pull” from the original using perhaps, render layers, or the brightest colors in each frame as one of these adjustment layers?

Its all work flow based, thats why I am curious to know if there is any type of “method” or “rule” for using this effect.

Once again, I greatly appreciate it and am inspired by your work. You have some done some really top notch work. :+1:

#84

Awesome Work , I just wonder how much time it took, to finish thid artwork?? I mean I you do this for a living… How much Time you spend on a Project until it´s finished ?? It looks like a lot of work to me ???

Thanks a lot …

#85

Here’s a fun portfolio piece, testing my ZBrush, rendering and Photoshop skills:

[<!--[attach=177645]NR_Cyclops_Amok_FINAL.jpg[/attach]-->]

BOOM! Cyclops is one of the most undervalued superheroes - always in the shadow of Wolverine.

Here’s a few ZB screens so you can see how it was made:

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I deleted all the faces that wouldn’t be seen - this means subdivision detail is kept in the visible areas:

[]

low sculpted mesh:

[]

…and the high res version, to be taken into 3DSMax and rendered:

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Hope you like, I had a great time on this one - maybe some nice person from Marvel is looking…? Hey! over here - can I do covers for you!

:wink:

Later,

N

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#86

haha ,the last composition has the quality aesthetic sense,Really cool. :+1: :wink:

#87

The final piece is just amazing! Great use of color and your sculpt is rad. Are the teeth painted in? It appears that way but I can’t tell for sure. Great stuff, and thanks for sharing!