Southern Graphics Blog

Jetfire Transformer - Old school version

2010-04-29T07:12:00.003+01:00

This old school Transformer was a client job that fell through some time back. I was looking through old hardrives to find interesting models for a friend when I came across him and I couldn't resit firing up Silo and Cinema4D and giving him a whirl.

I would LOVE to get this guy 3Dprinted at some stage but I assume theres some copyright issue there. For now he's firmly a piece of fan art and that's how he'll stay :)

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A ZBrush article from 2001

2010-04-25T23:04:00.002+01:00

ZBrush is ten years old now. Unbelievable. I started to use it around 1999 and here are some scans from an article from 2001.

http://www.subdivisionmodeling.com/forums/showthread.php?p=48878#post48878

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Two new tutorials at the Enter3D site.

2010-04-24T16:50:00.005+01:00

I've added two new videos to Enter3D. Both of them by my good friend Rob Redman from PariahStudios. They finish of the 'Basics' videos with Lighting and Rendering a 3D character. Check them out and give Rob a buzz with some feedback.

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Joining SparkleVFX*2 as Creative director

2010-04-22T18:32:00.004+01:00

Sparkle Media Ltd is entering its 5th year as a motion graphics/post production agency. We’ve grown from strength to strength since opening in 2005. In the last few years our work has become heavily CGI based. This has lead to the formation of a venture in the form of a sister company to handle all the CGI and VFX based work allowing Sparkle Media to return to its media production roots.

Today see’s the soft launch of SparkleVFX, created to handle high end CGI & VFX for print, film & TV. The new company is the brainchild of Sparkle’s Managing Director Glenn Maguire.

“I wanted to create a new company that compliments Sparkle Media, taking the whole business in a new and exciting direction. We have new team members on board who promise to produce the best CGI in the north west of England!”

SparkleVFX would like to welcome its New Creative Director and Head of CG Glen Southern to be part of the new team to head up SparkleVFX.
“Glen has a well established name in the CG industry not just in the UK but throughout the world, we feel especially proud having him head up the new company” Glenn Maguire Director SparkleVFX.

“It’s great to be part of something new like SparkleVFX but it is also reassuring to be joining a team of artists and designers with a proven track record. Sparkle are well known for providing quick turn rounds, quality work at competitive prices. I’m really looking forward to working with the team and hopefully adding more talented artists to the crew in coming months.” Glen Southern Creative Director SparkleVFX.

Glen (and SouthernGFX) is known for his character and creature creations and has credits from across the globe for print and film contributions. He is well known for his 3D training and working closely with a number of 3D software developers and his ability to motivate and manage large teams.

SparkleVFX will now handle all the CG work that originally came through Sparkle Media. This will include:
Character modeling (high and low polygon), product modeling, environment creation, bespoke motion graphics, CG animation, character animation, VFX shots for film & TV. All work will be available for print & motion use.

These are exciting times for Sparkle as a brand and we think this new launch will allow us to produce some of our biggest and boldest work to date.

Sparkle Media will also offer new services as it turns into a production company and media hub.
Services now offered include: Filming & Crew Hire (varying formats including RED), editing, grading, Audio Production/Mastering. In its new media section Sparkle Media will now also over print & web based consultancy for fully content managed site through static & flash sites, through to viral video and game production.

SparkleVFX is open for business as of tomorrow morning, with our major launch and handing over the websites on the 14th May. We’ll be showing off our new team at the FACT centre in Liverpool on the evening of 14th May as part of our on going commitment to CGI. The evening will be an “Entry to 3D”, all our welcome to come along and see live character modeling demos, take part and learn from Glen and the team.
On the night we’ll also be joined by Activision art directors giving advice on entering the games world, with some great giveaways including software license for the Nevercentre’s amazing modeling software Silo

The new company website is www.sparklevfx.com http://www.sparklevfx.com the site will be in holding position until the 14th May when we’ll reveal our new and exciting portfolio. All new enquiries can be sent to your existing contact or to info@sparklevfx.com

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How to model Tado Choop!

2010-04-13T22:04:00.008+01:00

My next video project at Enter3D is a cool series of videos that show you how to make a well known little character in 3D. I'm really lucky to have permission to model Tado's Choop in 3D.

If you have 2D character designs and you want to learn how to turn them into 3D models destined for animation or illustration then these videos are for you. And what better way to learn than to see an amazing design like Choop being turned into a 3D model

I've started a thread at Sub.D.com to discuss this project.

A massive thanks of course to @wearetado Mike and Katie. (catch them on twitter if you get time!)

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Enter3D Project 5-03 Basic head modeling tutorial 'Little Devil 2010'

2010-04-05T21:18:00.004+01:00

Enter3D Project 5-03 Basic head modeling tutorial 'Little Devil 2010'

This is the latest addition to the Enter3D projects. I first did this tutorial about 4 years ago in Silo 1.4 . For some reason I've had lots of emails asking for it in recent weeks. As Silo 2.0 has changed in some significant ways I decided to re-hash the video and add it to Enter3D.

I'll be adding a few videos over the next few weeks so please feel free to follow the Blog for notification of new uploads. It's always great to get some feedback on a video so please take time to leave a comment below.

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Getting confused with Foo the Fox

2010-04-04T12:48:00.012+01:00

I've just had a weird thing happen. I've been working on some ideas for a couple of characters called 'Foo and Bah' (Foo, a small intelligent fox and Bah! his muscle bound bodyguard sheep. I'd been drawing the Fox character for a while and I was getting frustrated as I couldn't get a feel for his anatomy. I wanted to keep him basic and cartoony and as usual I was over-engineering his anatomy. I really do struggle keeping to basic shapes. Where some designers will put in a stick for an arm and it works perfectly I try to put in the full anatomically correct arm with bones, muscles, fat etc. I kept on drawing the Fox over and over and I seemed to keep coming back to the same basic shape and it just didn't feel right for me.

I was about to Google for some reference images and then thought I'd quickly model a fox with primitives in 3D and then spin it around to get the form or silhouette locked off. I opened my favorite modeling package and threw down some boxes and spheres in no particular order. I messed around with them for a few minutes and started to get a basic Fox shape together. Before I knew it I'd gone from primitives into detailed modeling, added a few colors that suited the Fox and started trying out different poses and facial expressions that I had struggled with in the pencil sketches. In no time at all I'd hit upon the right design and I was happy that the anatomy was right for this project.

It is quite liberating to do your concept work in 3D, trying out different shapes, making scale changes to limbs, trying different expressions etc. I used my 3D model as a drawing reference and sketched out five or six different turnarounds and I was pretty happy with every one. I chose one and inked it, scanned it in and did some quick Photoshop coloring.

All done I thought. I'd nailed the concept via a very unusual concept process. Now all there was to do was to use the reference image and make the 3D model....oh..wait...I already did that bit!. Doh! Very confused.com

EDIT:

Added his partner in crime tonight the evil henchman of the piece, 'Bah! the Sheep'. Be VERY careful tonight as Foo & Bah are after your Easter Eggs! Guard them with your life! If you haven't scoffed 'em all already. Happy Easter!

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Help me out with screen shots.

2010-04-02T13:52:00.007+01:00

If anyone wants to help out I'd be ever so grateful. I want to put a screen shot and some images of all major 3D packages and wondered if anyone felt like contributing. I'm updating my old Sub-D Primer as part of my new Enter3D area and I would like to show some examples.

I'm looking for:

1. An interesting screen shot of your 3D program of choice
2. A wire frame shot of one of your models
3. A render if poss.
4. A few words about why you like the package in question.

Zip them up and fire then over to glen.southern@southerngfx.co.uk

Bear in mind that the Enter 3D site is aimed at 2D artists coming to 3D for the first time. What would you show or say about your favorite 3D package?

And if you REALLY love your 3D package, do a little video and send it to Youtube and fire me the link. Now that would be cool!

So far I'm looking for:

Silo
Blender
Wings3D
Lightwave
Modo
Maya
C4D
3DSmax
XSI
Mudbox
ZBrush
3DCoat

and I'm open to offers to add the ones I've missed.

If you look at the Primer Page 2 you'll see where this is going.

Thanks already to Warner for some Modo images and Dave Bates (as ever) for sorting out the scripting for me.

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Entering the Third Dimension (NOW OPEN)

2010-03-31T21:37:00.005+01:00

Are you finding that your sketch books are overflowing with characters these days? Have you been wondering what some of those character would look like if they were a little more three dimensional? Well come on in and Enter the Third Dimension....

Q&A

Whats this Enter3D stuff then?

I've been doing tutorials and 3D training videos for a long time now. I've been working with more and more 2D designers and especially 2D character designers. More and more people have been asking about how to get their concepts into 3D. This new area of my website is designed to help.

What will I find there?

Help and support for one thing. I want to help anyone new to modeling get a feel for how subdivision modeling works and how to learn the basics. The new area of the site is broken down into:

An Introduction
The Basics
Some Projects
A Subdivision modelers Primer

I will use this framework as a place to keep my future tutorial videos. If you have specific requests then please feel free to add comments in this blog post.

Is it finished?

Nope. Not by a long way. I've been getting help and feedback from some amazing designers and I've been given some amazing character designs to use in future tutorials. The site is there as a resource for future modelers and a place to add new video content as I produce it.

Thanks have to go to Wes and the KURV guys who host all my stuff. The ever supportive Nevercenter Silo team for sponsorship and encouragement. For help with or for providing character designs and reference images James Yeah!, Moopf, Tado, Steve Cairney, Steve Talkowski, George Coghill, Lawrence Basso and many more to come. For constant advice and reality checks Wayne Robson, Dave Davidson. The multi-talented Glenn McGuire at Sparkle Media and Anthony Fillice my business guru and life coach. Oran Parker for design feedback. What would I do with out you all and the hundreds of others who I have the pleasure of interacting with on a daily basis. Thanks!

Follow me on twitter for updates.
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Entering the Third Dimension

2010-03-24T08:15:00.004Z

I've been working on a new area of my website for a few weeks now. It's a new tutorial area and I'm hoping to fill it up with training videos over the next few months. For about a year now I've been taking commissions for toy work, both commercial jobs and fun projects. I've spent a little time improving my vector skills and even done a few physical sculpts from ideas that I've really liked.

I decided to set up the new tutorial area in response to lots of emails I've had from 2D artists who want to make the leap into 3D, hence the title 'ENTERING THE THIRD DIMENSION.' Rather than focus on one specific program the videos are made using a range of applications that do a wide variety of things e.g. Silo for modeling, Headus UV for adding UV's, Cinema4D for rendering, ZBrush for sculpting and texturing etc.

I've asked a few fellow artist to let me use their images and characters as reference material so I should be able to show how to make a wide range of characters and creatures and show lots of different techniques along the way. I want to keep adding to the new area in coming months so I've made it expandable.

The tutorials are broken down as follows:

-Preparing a concept image
-Getting the reference image in the viewport background
-Subdivision basics
-Box modeling v point by point
-Using primitives to build shapes
-Modeling in parts and managing objects
-Using material sets to color your characters
-Creating UV co-ordinates
-Creating a texture using a UV map
-Lighting and rendering

Project videos:

1. Basic Penguin toy character using box modeling.
2. Point by point modeling a small character from vector reference.
3. Using primitives to form a character and scene (Artwork by Moopf).
4. Using text in your creations (Artwork supplied by Steve Cairney).
5. How to UV map a complex toy model using Headus UV
6. Sculpting a toy with ZBrush
7. Setting up a toy product shot in Cinema 4D.

I'm hoping to open the new website area by the end of the month and I'll blog and twitter when it's released.

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New SouthernGFX Ident logo

2010-02-05T18:29:00.009Z

I settled on my ident design. A big thanks to Wayne Robson, Glenn McGuire and Oran parker who gave me either inspiration for this little project or design ideas. I decided on the compass point idea for a number of reasons:

1. It's very simple and as a stand alone shape it can mean lots of different things.
2. The link to a compass point (pointing south) is a reference to my name. It doesn't look so much like a compass point in it's final form that it becomes cliched (Like a rip off of the Safari logo for example).
3. The shape has ended up looking like an alien (sort of) which gives me the link back to my work
4. I tried the shape out on a card, pin badge and as a web icon and it seemed to work well in all formats.

I'm not overly worried about colors at this stage. One of my first design sheets focused on getting the colors right before the shape. I realized that the color should be secondary to the symbol and that I may be changing the color to suit the medium anyway eg. black and white on cards, greenish tint to suit the website etc.

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January roundup

2010-02-05T17:40:00.005Z

I always try to end a year with a clean up of the website and hard-drives so that I can hit the ground running in January. For some reason I was a little late this year and only got round to it three weeks into the new year. It's a little different this year actually as in 2009 I switched over to 100% Macs and and 100% external hard-drives. No more Windows in nice and the thought of less OS installing and fighting viruses is just liberating. I wonder what the addition of a new Apple Ipad with bring to the party in two months time.

Ok, projects in January. Things started out a little slow for the first two weeks. I carried on learning to handle Cinema4D and just added to my skill set. Before Xmas I hooked up with Sparkle media on a new project to provide a character modeling service under their Sparkle Media banner. One of the first pitches was for a female Werewolf. The pitch went in and the last I heard they were down to the last 4 so fingers crossed. I've just updated my Linked-In profile to reflect the work I've been doing with Sparkle. After some discussing I've gone with the slightly grandiose title of 'Creative director'. Here's hoping I can live up to the job!

If you need character/creature modeling and animation work doing, contact Glenn at Sparkle.

For some time now I've been wanting to firm up my brand image I've been toying with the idea of developing an icon or ident to use on my websites, blog, cards, pin badges etc. I asked a few friends and designers for some tips and came up with a few ideas. The recuring idea seems to be linking my name, SOUTHERN, in with the design. I've tried the whole Southern Kanji idea in the past so that was a non starter for me. I decided to go with the South compass point reference. Here's my first sheet:

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MonkiTubes model and sculpt

2009-12-16T12:32:00.005Z

Back in September I started working on a toy project with the intention of taking it from design to a finished resin cast. I also wanted to find a good solution to get good product renders of the toy designs. I'm really happy to be using Cinema4D now to get the sorts of shots I want but I thought it was time to move the whole project forward again.

My latest design is a re-hashed version of my Peg toy called the MonkiTubes. Very simple geometric shapes with clearly defined body parts including feet, upper and lower body, ears and a strong tail. I'm still very much in a design stage here but I'm getting closer to a shape that I like.

These tests all have strong personalities even though they have the same underlying shape and that is down to textures and graphics.I want to work on the shape a little more now as I would love to be able to cast these guys in a single mold. I had a rapid prototype done of my T-Rawll creature earlier this year but I think I will try and do this one with sculpey or wax.

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CGTweetup and the dreaded lurgy

2009-12-13T09:01:00.006Z

We held our December CGTweetup on Thursday 3rd December in Circo at the Albert Dock. This time we had a joint event with the cool guys from Draw-the-line and we were blown away by the attendance which topped sixty people. I put up a small gallery of photographs of the event taken by my photographer friend Gary Woodward.

A big thanks to our sponsors Nevercenter and also to the guys a Ballisitic Media for providing prizes. We're looking into doing our next event in February sometime and of course there is always the regular Draw-the-line event in Django's Riff on the first Thursday of every month.

I've asked Mike at Draw-the-Line if I could design one of the event flyers. I spend so much time doing 3D and I love getting to do 2D stuff. I made a start (ignore the dates on this one):

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Learning character/organic modeling in Cinema 4D

2009-11-23T23:47:00.009Z

This is my third week using Maxons Cinema 4d and I've been posting my thoughts and first images all over the place. I thought it was about time I brought all my comments together in one place. I've started a thread at CGT that covers all this off and I'll continue to post my findings as I get more familiar with the software and toolset.

First things first. I have not abandoned Silo3D in any way. In my eyes it is still the best value sub-division modeling package on the market. I explained why I was moving over to Cinema 4D in this blog post here. I have spent a long time working with Silo as my main modeling solution and it will take a very special piece of software to make me move on.

A large amount of my first few weeks with C4D has been spent configuring the layout and shortcuts to suit my needs as an organic character/creature modeler. I wasn't thinking about getting heavily involved with the modeling tools at first but as the days rolled on I started to like the toolset and more-so the configurable palettes and layouts. Add to that the power hidden in the scripting and the ability to add those scripts to buttons and the modeling experience becomes very attractive. I remember doing all this with Maya back in version 6.5 but I have found C4D much easier to learn and therefore I want to keep going.

Lots of tools work as you would expect. A character modeler needs a different set of tools from hard surface modeler. For example I can't remember the last time I used a Boolean operation. The common tools that I use in most 3D modeling packages work as expected including things like extrude, move/scale/rotate/face/point/edge/face/object etc. All very familiar and quickly mapped to my own liking. There are a few quirks and oddities that frustrate me but most can be overcome with tweaks, scripts or plugins.

Symmetry. For a character modeler one essential feature is having the ability to model with symmetry on and all central point to be locked to Zero on X. This is a 'given' to successfully model creatures, characters and heads. In R11 I've only found a symmetry tag which gives me a partial answer but I had to resort to two plugins to get what I needed. Symmetry clamp and Cactus Dans CD Symmetry had what I needed.

Selection of Tri and NGons. Towards the end of a modeling project I like to clean up the mesh removing Ngons and Tris. I have a process where I model a section (an arm for example) then check it and remove what I can using tools like spin quad (an old Lightwave term and favorite of some) or by deleting edges and cutting new ones. Then onto the body, check it, remove what I can etc. If you get into a habit like this you end up with very few stray 3 and more-than-four sided polygons to deal with at the end of a session. I still live by the mantra that the only good mesh is 100% Quadrangles. It is so frustrating to be nearing the end of a mesh and find that you have a stray triangle sitting right on the botton of a foot. To remove it you have to split all the way up the leg giving unwanted edges and poygons. It's much better to keep checking for Ngons and Tris throughout the modeling process and eliminate them whenever possible. To do this quicky and efficiently I like to have the two buttons at hand and mapped to keys (Alt+T and Alt+N)

Select NGons was from Bobtronic here

Select Tri's suggested by VDP at CGT :)

var cnt = op->GetPolygonCount();
if(!cnt) return;

var i;
var poly;
var bs = new(BaseSelect);

for(i=0; iGetPolygon(i);
if(poly->c == poly->d)
bs->Select(i);
}

op->SetPolygonSelection(bs);

Knife. This is a powerful tool and one that I loved in Lightwave and missed in Silo. However, to make it a fast and efficient addition to the toolkit I recorded a couple of scripts with the knife tool with certain settings switched on for example:

1. A Cut button and keycommand (X) which gives me the point to point or edge to edge cutting.

2. The Loop cut button which gives me the full split loop function.

These are all there to be had in the Knife attributes but having them on buttons and keys speeds the modeling process up. You can of course just double click the button to call the tools attributes then adjust them to get the desired effect but, again, this slows down modeling. To keep the processing flowing and more artistic these tools need to be accessable and available at the click of a button. One thing that slows a new modeler down is remembering which menu a tool is located in.

Knife Tool in Loop Mode:

CallCommand(1016030); // Knife
tool()#MDATA_KNIFE_MODE=2;

Tweak. The definition of tweak (for me!) is the ability to move componant parts (point, edge and face) in 3D space without having to select them first. In C4D you have to enter Tweak Mode and leave Default mode. Then when you've finished the tweaking go back to default mode. I am mush more comfortable having Tweak assigned to a Key hold so that you can quickly enter and leave the mode with the press/hold of a key. An analogy I use is that if you were writing a book you would not want to repeatedly press CAPS LOCK on and off all the time when you could simply hold down Shift for a capital letter. To improve things slightly I recorded a script that enters Tweak mode and also enters move mode. It only saves a single keystoke but you do use tweak with Move for 90% of the time.

Brush increase and decrease. This is a must and was achieved with a simple script from here. I much prefer mouse-wheel-roll for this sort of stuff but that is not implemented in the latest release. I got it here

Smooth (Average vertices): This is a vital modeling feature for me and it took me a while to get familiar with it in C4D. My favorite way to do it is to have a selection with an area effect and fall off (example: Select a nose and the effect falls off onto the face). Once selected I like to call the smooth command using a mouse wheel roll to run it incrementally. This isn't available in C4D so I use a combination of things to achieve the same effect. I use Live select in edge or face mode. Select the area I wish to tighten then call Brush>Smooth from my palette and click the area. This tightens the mesh giving the smoothing effect in the selected area. The other way is to call and use the 'Iron' tool. This is pretty much a tighten/average verts command but it feel clumsy at first.

Using the HUD. The HUD allows you to add certain menu items to the viewports. I like to add relevant sliders (Soft selection radius being a well used example) to a viewport to keep things flowing. You can save the document as template.c4d and that retains these HUD items but I'm still undecided if that's the best way to do it. The jury is out on this one so far as I am finding new and better ways to do this every day.

Retopogise: This is a great little script (a few lines of code is all that's needed) from Thomas Paleka at CGTalk. This little retop feature gives me a powerful little tool that allows me to generate my new geometry onto an existing high poly mesh. This is the best way to make clothing that fits a character and change bad edge flows. It is essentially the create- polygon tool with added oomph!!!

Loop and ring select. These work well and are well used.

Extrude/Smooth Shift/Matrix extrude all work perfectly and have lots of settings. I keep them handy in my modeling palette and have them mapped.

I intend to keep adding to this blog post so please check back if you are new to C4D. Please add your comments/additions/amendments below if I've missed something or you know of a great tool for organic modelers in Cinema 4D.

I need to say a massive thanks to everyone at CGTalk and on Twitter that has supported me in learning Cinema4D in recent weeks. And a couple of special thanks to Rob Redman from Pariah Studios. His tutorials have been a godsend. And to Dave Davidson who has put up with me pestering him for years now. Follow these guys all on twitter! It's well worth it!

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Draw the Line time again!

2009-11-04T17:58:00.003Z

"Draw the Line" is a growing creative Liverpool art social event aimed at the everyman and artist alike to unite under one roof and enjoy a casual scribble.

Check here for information on upcoming events, look at photos from previous sessions and spot your own artistic contributions. Stay tuned and get involved.

Next Events:

Thursday 5th November - Django's Riff - 8PM onwards

Remember Remember the 5th of November, as we'll be having a

little give-away bonanza of some Art software DVDs

generously provided by Glen Southern, don't miss out!

Thursday 13th November - The Masque - 10PM onwards

A new and exciting venue to add to the list of places most doodled,

cheers to "Eat your Greens" for the invite!

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Blogging from Loch Ness and another CGTweetup on the way in December

2009-10-24T18:32:00.006+01:00

I'm taking a weekend away from working and spending it in a log cabin with the family on the shores of Loch Lochie in Scotland. Josh (5) has wanted to visit Loch Ness for some years now and is sure he can locate Nessie. His facts and evidence have been drawn together from Scooby Doo and the Blake Clan and from 'The Water Horse'. I'm actually quite convinced by him and who am I to squash his dream. We looked at the Google Earth shots that clearly show a monster swimming in the loch and after seeing that we booked the trip. He is beginning to understand natural selection and is very clued up on fossils and dinosaurs so he is looking for a Plesiosaur fossil whilst were here. He is also influenced by Pokemon so he keeps telling me there is a creature in every Loch in Scotland and that here on the shores of Loch Lochie I could find Latios and Latias.

Ok, back to reality I think. I had a great Thursday evening in the company of my good friend CGTweetups Ant Filice in the Baltic Fleet public house in Liverpool. We had organised a meeting to plan the next CGTweetup and we had arranged to meet in Circo in the Albert Dock. After receiving a text telling me Circo were holding a fashion show it was either a night in drag or a trip across the way to the Baltic Fleet. I look shit in heels so the Baltic won. We got together with the guys from Draw-the-line, Glenn from Sparkle Media and my new ZBrush-wielding buddy Abe.

The outcome of the meeting is that we are planning to hold a combined CGTweetup and Drawing event in Liverpool on the 4th of December! Thats right, a room full of 2D and 3D artists all getting drunk and chatting and drawing and did I mention getting drunk! What better time to meet like minded people and make some new freinds and discuss what you're working on and what you want to work on. Details will be coming soon via twitter and CGArtist daily

And whilst you're waiting why not join the next Draw-the-line event:

"Draw the Line" is a growing creative Liverpool art social event aimed at the everyman and artist alike to unite under one roof and enjoy a casual scribble.

Check here for information on upcoming events, look at photos from previous sessions and spot your own artistic contributions. Stay tuned and get involved.

Next Events:

Thursday 5th November - Django's Riff - 8PM onwards

Remember, Remember the 5th of November,

Drawings and Doodles; the lot!

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Moving on to Cinema 4D and why.

2009-10-22T07:32:00.004+01:00

Over the past decade I've tried out most of the highend 3D packages on the market. In this last week I've decided to adopt Maxons Cinema4D currently in version 11.5. I wanted to post a bit of an explanation as to why I decided to use C4D and the thought processes that got me here.
I cut my 3D teeth in the early 90's on 3DSdos on a 486 pc. I had been dabbling with an Amiga 1200 for years but never managed to create anything worthwhile. I liked the forerunner to max but I didn't really know any different. I learned all about NURBS with the amazing Rhino but quickly decided hard surface modeling wasn't for me. In 1999 I began to learn Lightwave and got very interested in a new program called ZBrush. Lightwave was a powerful subdivision modeling package but was missing some crucial tools at the time. Around the same time I was trying Caligari Truespace and an early version of Poser neither of which inspired me and I quickly stopped using them. ZBrush rocketed into the limelight with version 1.23b and grabbed the interest of the gaming world whilst Lightwave ambled into the new millennium with minimal changes and still missing things like ngons and a decent mirror function.
I really needed to find a solution to get my ZBrush sculpts into a rendering package and utilize displacement and normal maps. I've always thought of myself as an Illustrator who uses 3D, I don't animate and never want to. Having the ability to render your own characters and creatures is crucial and I just wasn't getting it.
I tried XSI, 3DSmax, Maya, Cinema4d and Modo but these were all big packages that can do much more than just model. I looked at the dedicated modeling packages at the time and tried Hexagon, Clay, Wings and Silo3d. For me, Silo won hands down and I've been modeling exclusively with it for over 5 years now. SO much so that I neglected to keep looking for the best render solution and focused just on my modeling skills.
So for the past few years any job I took worked like this: core polygon modeling all done in Silo. UV mapping in Headus UV. High polygon sculpting in ZBrush. Retopologizing done in Topogun or Silo. Texturing and map creation in ZBrush and Photoshop. Lighting, shaders and final renders.......errrrrr....And therein lies my issue!

Where to go from here. For some reason I've struggled to become proficient in any of the major rendering packages. I've been plugging away at Maya for years but find it hard to get good results at a speed that matches my modelling. Having spent a year working on improving my design skills including illustrator, toy design, pencil and ink work and marker work, I now need to firmly establish myself as a 3D illustrator by adding rendering to my skill set.
Hence a return to Cinema 4D, a package I had tried early in the decade and turned away from. Most of the people I've met this year in the toy design world are using C4D. Not exclusively but it was a high enough number to make me download the demo and take another look under the hood and Wow! was I impressed. It's easy to use. It's clearly laid out and it isn't hard to work out what everything does. It will take a lot to get me to stop using Silo as my core polygon modeling solution but this is the closest I've come. I was waiting for Blender 2.5 and I was hoping to adopt that package but having had a week with C4d my fate is sealed!.

As ever, theres people that help you along the way in life. For this little part of my journey I need to thank Dave Davidson, C4D guru. Glenn from Sparkle Media and my inspirational buddy Ant Filice. Pay it forward folks. You get more back in the end!

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SouthernGFX is down but not out

2009-10-16T06:48:00.003+01:00

I've been having major issues this week with SouthernGFX. It turns out that my host had an over capacity issue which has never happened in all the years he's kindly hosted for me. Apparently it's all fixed now at their end but I seem to be missing pretty much everything. No site, FTP access, linked images etc. All down at my end. I'm being told that by friends around the world that they can access the site but that it now has errors. Very weird! All my linked images at the forums I post on are currently missing which is frustrating for anyone reading any of my posts.

On a brighter not the character work for Sparkle Media on Spring Heeled Jack is going well. As I've said on my forum it is nice to be working on a projects that I can share as it progresses. I've been posting everything at Twitsketch but luckily I've mirrored it all in my Flickr account which isn't affected buy my server problems.

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Draw the Line at Django's Riff in Liverpool

2009-10-10T05:50:00.005+01:00

Anthony from CGArtist Daily and myself goodself took an evening off our busy schedules and made our way into the heart of Bohemian Liverpool on Thursday evening. We joined in with a Draw the Line event at Django's Riff right in the center of town. If you like relaxing with a group of artists from a wide range or backgrounds and skill levels it's worth a visit. It's held on the first Thursday of every month. I was surprised how friendly the atmosphere was and how comfortable if felt sitting in the middle of a club scribbling my doodles on a table top whilst having few scoops. Looking back my only issues is that I didn't take more photos of the end results. Video cam next time!. A big hand clap for Mike Snowden (www.themicrocosm.co.uk) the organiser of the evening.

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Dinosaurs rampaging around a German TV show

2009-10-06T19:22:00.001+01:00

Dinos invading a German TV show. I love it!.

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Spring Heeled Jack - Concepts

2009-10-04T17:39:00.004+01:00

These shots are some concepts for Glenn at Sparkle.tv for a character called `Spring Heeled Jack. Very early days in concept terms and to be honest this is the result of my very first sketching session

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2009-10-01T20:31:00.004+01:00

Needed some 'BugEyed Alien Reference' so I ZBrushed a Sphere for half an hour. See the full forum thread here

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My naughty Toys help launch theTwitsketch forums

2009-10-01T12:51:00.004+01:00

I've just posted my 1000 Twitter message in 6 months! Not sure if that's good, bad or completely irrelevant. It took me 5 years to post a 1000 messages at ZBrush Central so I must have been waffling a lot this year.

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Twitsketch Forum is live and getting a color update.

2009-09-30T23:05:00.005+01:00

My new Twitsketch forum is fully live now and I've just finished another round of style tweaking. I want to start encouraging doodlers, sketchers, twitter-fiends, modelers and general art types over there. I've upgraded the forum to a Premium account from Free and got the ability to edit the style. I've matched the colors to this blog and SGFX although I chose to keep the background very light. If you can help out and spread the word please do. The main idea behind the site is a place for doodlers to find a topic and post their work. I've added a speed modeling section for 3D modelers like myself) and I'll be starting some speed sessions later this week.

I should be able to start up the Silo Forum weekly sessions again soon so if you've missed them over the summer get your polygons ready for round two in October!

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2009-09-30T23:03:00.002+01:00

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Josh designs and builds his Warmachine suit

2009-09-28T21:31:00.007+01:00

The SouthernR&D team have been working day and night on a secret project, a project the lead designer can now share with the world. Josh wanted me to interview him so he could tell everyone about his new battle suit that he calls 'WarMachine'. He has picked up lots of my habits during his 5 years and one that really makes me laugh is his addiction to making things with Duct tape! Whoeverinvented Duct tape needs some form of medal or award.

Anyway, take a listen to my little designer explaining all about his battle armour.

Listen!

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Twitsketch gets its own forum

2009-09-27T21:21:00.005+01:00

This week I’ve been working on improving the look and feel of my website. I have felt for sometime that it needed a once over and now is the time. I've redone the basic page structure starting with the info page and now I'm working on the new gallery pages. I need to get some help as I need to re-hash this blog to match the new graphics

This week saw the launch of my new Twitsketch forum. Twitsketch started as my doodle website where artists can get a daily topic to inspire their doodling. If you like to doodle and want to join us then hop over to the forum. I've been meaning to start a Twitsketch forum since the spring of 2009. I started using Twitter at the start of the year and very soon after that I started to post daily sketch topics called Twitsketches (crap name but it fits the purpose). After a few weeks and a seeing a few great little sketches being posted I decided to register the twitsketch domain (just in case) and parked a single webpage on there to explain what Twitsketch was all about. The next stage for me was to get hold of a forum. It took 6 months for me to get round to it.
 I didn't set out to start up a new forum, of course, like most projects it just evolved. I sketch every day and I often run out of ideas. I normally turn to my inspirations folder on my hard drive (something I'm sure we've all got) or I go and wander around Google images for half an hour. I love visiting www.conceptart.org and taking part in `Creature of the week` or the `Daily sketch group` and if you need sketching topics there is no place better.  

I wanted Twitsketch to be less involved. For example. I'm in a meeting and bored (regularly).  

1. I check out twitter on my Iphone and search for #Twitsketch. 
2. See the daily topic. 
3. Scribble my interpretation down on paper or even on the Iphone. 
4.Snap a picture or screen shot and fire in onto the web with twitfire or twitpic and tag it #twitsketch  

Now with the forum I can see all the Twitsketches in one place and see how other artists have interpreted the subject matter.  So, that's a quick overview of why it's here.

Sign up and join the fun!

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Switching to Mac and Snow Leopard from PC and Vista.

2009-09-19T08:45:00.007+01:00

So after many years of debating it I finally decided to give an Apple Mac a try as my main Laptop solution. I very nearly upgraded to another Toshiba as I've had such great service and reliability out of my Tecra M7 Tablet but after a few conversations with fellow artists I made my mind up and took a trip over to Apple at Liverpool 1. I suppose it is a lie to say I was a complete Apple newbie. My life is littered with Apple products and as an early adopter I've been buying Ipods on a regular basic since the first version for the PC back in 2001. I bought an Imac some years ago (A 21" G5 powerpc version) and I have to say it put me off using Macs for a few years. I didn't like the Tiger OS and I found it much slower than my current PC's when using Photoshop and ZBrush. I ended up using it as DVD player which really is a bit old waste of £1500! AS 90% of my computer time is using graphic applications I have always felt like I should be a a mac fan but for some reason I just wasn't getting it.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not a PC/Windows Fan either. I'm not even an OS fan really. I find that I spend too much time messing with skins, themes, settings, backgrounds, icons etc. Windows has always been painful in one way or other and for years I was plagued with viruses. Windows 95 was always OK for me. ME was a waste of time. Windows 2000NT restored my faith a little and I don't think XP and Vista have brought anything new to the party in recent years. Security has never been an issue to me in terms of people seeing/using my data but as mentioned viruses have cost me money and time almost every year. In the past three years I've managed to find a way to work around this and that is by having lots of external hard-drives and keeping everything I own on them. I use MaCafee virus software and I upgrade my Windows OS or just re-install every 6 months or so. I had an awful time with XP 64 and and even worse time with Vista 64. I hasten to add these are all legal upgrades so I've spent a lot of money with Microsoft over the years with my latest purchase being Windows Vista Ultimate (64 and 32 versions).

So all that said I finally took the pluge and headed off to Apple. I had already decided on a MacBook Pro. I bought my Son, Jack, a white Macbook and I didn't like the look of that so it had to be the aesthetically pleasing aluminum 15" MBP. The native screen resolution is 1440x900 which matches my Toshiba and is about right for my eyes and needs. The look and feel of the laptop is awesome. It is sexy for want of a better term. The sleek aluminum body is clean and high tech and unlike Windows machines sticker free!. I am not a gamer (clearly, or Mac would be a no no!) but graphics performance matters to me. I went for the twin graphics card option which along with Snow Leopard I am hoping I have all the power and graphic umppphff I need. I'm happy so far and all my art apps are playing ball. I've read a few reviews that seem to suggest I've come to the Apple party late and there is no real advantage for an artist to use Macs these days.

So far so good. I upgraded to Snow Leopard on arriving home as it came with the MBP but was not installed. I do use my Toshiba for business so the MBP needed to meet all them same needs and the first issue I came across was the lack of Outlook on a Mac. Bummer!. I have to say of all the programs that Microsoft turn out I love Outlook best of all. I use Mobile Me and like all that connectivity between my Iphone, Mac and Web calenders but Entourage is not Outlook. In fact, it's crap. I would prefer to use ICal, Contacts and a bloody cheesy Note apps rather than Entourage. I find mail is slow to download load and the Rules process is tosh. My solution is a temporary one as I read that Outlook Mac is on the way next year. I decided to use BootCamp and desecrate my MBP by putting Windows Vista on it! I printed the Bootcamp instructions and ignoring the reviews by people who have screwed up their machines with Bootcamp I went ahead and made mine a Dual Boot Macbook Pro. It worked. Like a dream actually.

Now, Apple purists will think I'm cracked for making it a dual boot. For me it means I keep the functionality of my old machine and get the benefits of OSX and some of the cool mac software. Silo doesn't work 100% under Snow Leopard. There are color issues making it hard to use the materials functions. Modeling seems fine though.

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Ren and Stimpy unmade episode in storybord form

2009-09-18T08:19:00.000+01:00

I was looking up some information about an old Loony Tunes cartoon character called Bosko X when I stumbled on an unmade episode of Ren and Stimpy. As I'm a massive fan of the show I thought I'd embed the clip right here. Shame it was never made.

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The Frunkies

2009-09-17T19:18:00.005+01:00

The Frunkies
Originally uploaded by SouthernGFX

I seem to have been in lots of situations this week where only my ears were needed; freeing up my hands to litter the pages of my latest Moleskine sketchbook. I started doodling some little creatures and they evolved into these two little tailed beasties called the Frunkies (Frog Monkies!)

I want to do a few scenes this week with this pair and some of their animal friends getting into difficult and awkward situations.

Twitsketch 206 `Umm.. thats swords a bit big for you isn't it!`

2009-09-10T13:34:00.001+01:00

Japanese fighting toons
Originally uploaded by SouthernGFX

GridIron goes to ER

2009-08-30T23:53:00.005+01:00

When GridIrons cogs stopped working one day the other toys sprang into action. Ted and Crabby checked the wiring while Muggy opened his airway. Mo-hog grabbed his chainsaw and asked the Macak twins to hold his legs.
Zipsack took an X-ray of GridIrons body cavity and that showed Ted which wires to yank. Menguin the Mole grabbed a huge spanner from Mo-hogs toolbox and took off an arm. It didn't help GridIron but it made Physeta and Twingle the Alien laugh.

After an intensive but funpacked three hours they managed to get the cogs moving again and GridIron sat up on the table, good as new.

Or so it seemed! He looked down and where his arm should be he saw a leg, and where his leg should be he saw his clasping claw hand!

He jumped off the ER table and chased the naughty Physeta and Twingle around room waving his leg in the air!

images on Flickr

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Walking with Dinosaurs LIVE tour and Flickr Pro

2009-08-23T19:25:00.007+01:00

Well I'm beginning to regret lashing out on a Mobile me subscription because it looks like I'm never going to use it. I love how FlickR works and I've started to use that for sharing all my photos and some images. I'll still be posting my artwork to my own galleries at Southerngfx but mirroring the ones I like on FlickR. I like having an online gallery for family stuff too and it seems great for that with the Set management being my favorite option.

I've just been to see Walking with Dinosaurs LIVE at the Echo Area in Liverpool and I'm still in shock. It is outstanding. To bring to life a full collection of Dinosaurs at that scale is just amazing. Go and see it now!

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Flickr

2009-08-20T22:26:00.001+01:00

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

Off on my jollies......wish you were here

2009-07-31T07:22:00.003+01:00

Okelydokely! I'm on a 1 day countdown to my holiday cruising around the Mediteranean with family and friends. We're driving down to Southhampton in the Thundertank in the morning and boarding the Independance of the Seas in the afternoon.

I'll be carrying the usually art supplies throughout the trip including my HD camera for vids and stills. I'll have a couple of different moleskines for daily sketching, a grid moleskine and a couple of blank page large ones. If I have good wifi on the ship I'm going to try and upload any sketching I do on a nightly basis to this blog.

On with the packing.....

Ports of Call: Southampton, Gibraltar; Cannes, Florence, Rome, Cagliari, Seville, Vigo, and back to Southhampton

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First CGTweetup in Circo in Liverpool last night.

2009-07-30T11:22:00.005+01:00

Last night was the first CGTweetup held in Circo
in the Albert Dock in Liverpool. I had a great evening and met some awesome talent including the Lee Carter (2000AD fame) and the amazing Raul Ovejero
There were plenty of 3D/2D new comers and plenty of up-coming talent. I'd like to feel that no one was left out. One of the highlights for me was Lee talking through some of his concept and comic work and explaining a little bit about his work flow. Thanks to the guys who sent in introduction videos which provided a little light entertainment at the start of the evening. If you couldn't make it or were a bit unsure if the venue was right for you then let me re-assure you that everyone was made welcome and I'm sure as the event grows that will be an on going theme, making people welcome!. I saw some great portfolios and some amazing websites on screen at the end of the night.

Ideas for the next event include having a drawing wall set up to get some of the 2D/concept and comic talent going art-crazy actually at the event. How cool would it be to win that piece of wall at the end of the night! We raffled off a Ballistic publishing book, `Character Painting 2` at the end of the evening and hopefully next time we can get a few more sponsors signing up. All in all a great night!

If you think it sounds interesting follow Anthony Filice on twitter or sign up at CGArtistDaily.

Some photos to follow soon I hope!

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T-Rawll 3D Print arrives from 3DCreation Labs

2009-07-23T14:49:00.003+01:00

I've been sitting on my doorstep waiting for this little parcel to arrive. The amazing postman left it on his van and only brought it at 1.30pm. Typical! If it was a bill it would have been here a 7.30am!

Anyway, he's here, my very first 3D print from a 3D model and here's a few images of the little fella. I've finally got my head around Adobe Illustrator this week and I've cranked out a few more ideas for boxes and insert cards as you can see below. I've mocked up a `Flesh T-Rrawll` and I'm working on colorways for a Peak T-Rrawll, Magma Trawll, Evergreen T-Rrawll, Nautical T-Rrawll and the Nimbus T-Rrawll

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Monsters can Dance

2009-07-22T23:49:00.007+01:00

I have had loads of great feedback about my recent Breakdancing Mummy #twitsketch and custom sculpt. So much so that after posting at the Kidrobot Forums I decided to go ahead and do more `dancing Monster` concepts in the hope that a new idea for a sculpt would crop up. Below are the results so far.

Please comment below this post and add your thoughts about which other monsters should join the elite `Monster Fame academy` and be immortalized in ink. Maybe a Riverdancing Beast from 40,000 fathoms? Or a Headbanging Predator.?

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T-Rawll heads off to the 3D Printers

2009-07-20T18:19:00.002+01:00

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T-Rawll Toy nearing completion

2009-07-19T21:14:00.004+01:00

I'm almost ready to send my little T-rawll model over to 3DCreation lab to get a 3D print. I'm getting happier with the model and I've made a few changes this weekend. The arms have been remade and after looking at the Yowie I have made it so I only need one arm that can be used on both sides of the model. I'm not too sure if the joint socket will work properly after it's been printed but I suppose I can either sand the peg down or build the hole up.

Here's a few shots of the model as it stands now:

I also mocked up a couple more sculpey T-rawlls

I also managed to knock up a couple of box designs.

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Woodland Yowie

2009-07-18T09:09:00.003+01:00

Having received my Yowie blank the other day I set about working him over. I decided on a Wodland theme and decided to add roots and leaves and paint him with a bark texture. The black in awesome! He is a resin cast by Jon-Does-Doodles and if you get chance grab one from his Bigcartel shop.

One of the main reasons I bought the Yowie was that I want to do some resin casting myself and I thought it would help me to understand the process a little better if I could see a cast first hand. However, as soon as I opened the packaging I decided I needed to get right on and customise the little fella there and then.

I used a dark brown Premo Sculpey to make the roots and a bottle green to make the leaves. That way I didn't need to use the skull white undercoat as the Premo color was very close to the final color. I baked these parts off and gave them a coat of paint then followed that up with some detailed line work.

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A very eventful day or how I lost my eyebrows!

2009-07-16T18:40:00.004+01:00

It isn't often that I sit and write about my day. Today has been a very eventful day. As you will find out as you continue into the narrative, I can't do much else tonight other than sit and type this blog with one finger on my right hand.

The plan for the day should have looked like this: school for Josh, post office for missed deliveries, gym, car wash, meet Anthony Filice for a discussion about CGTweet up, back to school, do some sculpting, a little drawing and finish building a robot with Josh. I didn't turn out that way.

I dropped the little fella off at school and got the parcels from the post office. My new arrivals were a custom Dunny destined for stripping and a cool custom resin blank called `Yowie` from Jon does doodles.

All good so far. I decided to shoot back home and pick up my wallet before heading to the car wash and onto the gym. For some reason that I'll never know I decided to skip the gym and spend an hour or so working on a custom break-dancing mummy figure I have on the go. I settled down in the studio and began mixing some epoxy resin to start piecing together the mummies legs. I finished that and set up my spray booth box outside ready to spray the Yowie blank and the base for the mummy. The wind was a little too high and paint started to go everywhere so I decided to use a galvanised bin to spay into. I put the mummy base into the bin and began spraying down into the bin. I fully coated the base and was going over for a second coat when the paint ignited and blew upwards out of the can. Luckily I wasn't fully over the can and jumped backwards. The flame hit my hand, the crease of my left arm, my neck and the side of my head. The worst area being the crease of the arm. I have no idea what caused the paint to ignite but checking the base later it seems there was some epoxy resin which may have caused some sort of reaction. I can't see any other explanation for the combustion but I know have a new outlook on the dangers of spraying models!

I called Pams Mum and got her to take me to the minor injuries clinic at the local hospital. They hurried me in and very quickly had my arm submerged in water cooling the blisters down. Within an hour I was spattered with cream and bandaged like the mummy I was creating before all this happened.

Speaking of which, here is the little bugger that has lost me half a day of work and is the reason I am now sitting here pecking away with this finger on my righthand.

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SouthernGFX Bigcartel shop now open

2009-07-09T20:20:00.000+01:00

after long years of thinking about it I've finally opened my own online shop to sel my sculptures and sketches. I very often sell off my figures and sculpey models on ebay but I thought it was about time I had somewhere to sell from on a permenant basis. I've limited my self to 25 products at a time for now.

Take a look and if you fancy it get some original art by me!

and the address is:

http://southerngfx.bigcartel.com/products

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Some new Moleskin toy sketches

2009-07-06T23:03:00.003+01:00

So, last week I found out why I'd been getting tired eyes and blurred vision and guess what, I need glasses! What a shock that was. I've been doing loads of close-up painting work on small custom toys and I've really struggled after doing it for an hour or so. So, I visited Specsavers with my prescription and ended up with a two pairs of spanky new Quicksilver shades.

I picked up a couple of new moleskines last week. I decided to go for the `grid` version for a change. The grids are great for keeping characters level and matching in proportion.

Heres a few of the latest sketches:

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Nevercenter Development Update

2009-06-30T10:53:00.005+01:00

Jamchild posted an update at the Nevercenter forum today that clears up the future of Silo. There has been lots of negativity on the forum in recent months and I'm sure there will be in the future, at least until there is a new update for Silo. I have copied the update from the forum and included it here:

Hey guys,

Hmm, looks like some communication from me is in order again, sorry if some of you have felt we've been out of touch by delegating our communication duties to David. I think probably the main point I should make to those of you who are interested is that Silo is very much alive, though our communication and development patterns are different than they were a few years ago, and we should probably realign expectations for forum users now that our patterns are decidedly different.

In the past we've aimed for continual Silo development dialog with users, which had its benefits and drawbacks to us as developers, and sometimes we've been good at keeping that up and sometimes we've been bad at it. It can be a lot of work to pacify the vocal minority of Silo users who get worked up about certain things and start worrying that the company doesn't value its users or is dying (neither is true, we love all our users and the company is doing great :]). There have also been both benefits and drawbacks to having everyone know what was coming in the next update to Silo. Now instead of saying "ok, we're going to be really good at posting development updates every week", we'll say instead that sometimes we probably will and sometimes we probably won't.

As a company, Nevercenter continues to grow and develop into the boutique software company we dreamed of from the beginning - a place where we can follow our many interests and allow all of our projects to cross-pollinate and make each other stronger. (For example, we're developing a game engine which relates heavily to Silo and has helped us understand what some of you game artists have been saying all along :]). As we embrace this approach, it means that we no longer devote all our time and energy to the development of Silo -- and we feel like Silo has reached a point of maturity where it doesn't need that. We still have a plan for Silo, and it is still under active development, but you'll probably see that development happen in shorter bursts at key times.

So if you enjoy using Silo, use it and discuss techniques and make suggestions to us and we'll be watching and contributing where we can. There will likely be times when we're very actively involved and releasing quick updates, and times when we're not. Promised updates will come out. Sometimes we'll be letting on what we're working on and sometimes we won't until we're ready to release it. We do read your suggestions and comments, especially the bug reports.

As for me, I'm quite literally off to go do some modeling with Silo, I hope you'll do the same!

Jamchild

The full thread can be found here

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Orcs ahoy! More Warhammer than Lord of the rings.

2009-06-28T21:45:00.000+01:00

We just had a red hot day here in the Northwest of England. In fact, too humid for my liking. Time to update a few of my galleries tonight and here's some Orc models I've been messing with:

Check out my gallery pages as I've been updating Sketches, Cartoons and toys and 3D characters.

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Customise Custom`I`vor and win a DVD.

2009-06-27T22:54:00.000+01:00

Not so much a collaboration but a competition! The prize is tiny but the winner will have the adoration of millions!

THE PRIZE!

A copy of Visual Story telling with Ian McCaig from Gnomon.

The COMPETITION!

Easy!

Just Custom`I`vor!!!!!

1. Download the base mesh
http://www.southerngfx.co.uk/uploads..._IVOR_BASE.rar

2. Download the .PSD template
http://www.southerngfx.co.uk/uploads...R_TEMPLATE.rar

3. Download the frame for your final entry
http://www.southerngfx.co.uk/uploads/zips/TEMPLATE.rar

So, download the Ivor model, download his UV template. Mess him up however you like and create a whole new outfit and texture map for him. Look to the Vinyl toy world for inspiration folks! Give him equipment if needed. Render him out however you like and slip him into the little Custom`Ivor picture frame provided.

Winner will be chosen in two weeks by Joshua Southern aged 5 + 1/2 So make it appealing to him folks!

The competition is running from the Nevercenter forum. Post your finals there.
http://www.silo3d.com/forum/showthread.php?t=16382

Here's an example you may have seen me doing this week:

Don't want to use Silo? Ok...go to NURBS AND POLYS and Jason will be running the same competition, different prize and you can use any Software you like over there.

http://www.nurbsandpolys.com/forums/...ead.php?p=2427

Have fun and good luck messing up a Custom`I`vor!

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Custom`I`vor - A virtual vinyl buddy!

2009-06-24T10:35:00.000+01:00

Do you want to use some Virtual Vinyl? Want to try out your graphics on a virtual toy before getting the brushes out?

Meet Custom`I`vor the Virtual Toy customizers new best friend!

Customer`I`vor is a small 3D model and a layered photoshop texture template availalble soon from SouthernGFX.

And the great news? You will even have a template that can be printed out which lets you use any medium, scan it back in and apply that to your Custom`I`vor

Updates will be posted to my Blog
http://southerngfxblog.blogspot.com/

Custom`I`vor is in development and any feedback would be a big help!!!!!

Iphone-Ivor-Screens

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Ivor lost some of his cuteness in translation

2009-06-23T09:24:00.001+01:00

I'm quite happy with the first set of 3D tests for Ivor but the feedback from a few guys was that the model is a little different than the concept and that it had lost some of its cuteness. I went back into Silo and bulked up the belly area, increased the size of his hands and repostitioned his arms. Added his ears back as I thought he lacked something without them and lowered his eyes giving him a bigger forehead (ie. younger).

I am happy enough with the progress so far, so much so that I am looking at having him 3D printed if costs aren't too high. I would like to get about 4 main characters done in concept and 3D before commiting to print I think.

I wanted to hold off with doing any real sculpting until I was happy with the 3D concept but I ended up making a start this morning. Out came the pasta maker and off I went with my black sculpey Premo.

A few more concepts for the next toy.

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Ivor gets his first appearance in 3D

2009-06-22T22:20:00.000+01:00

I took the Ivor concept one stage further today and modeled him in Silo. I asked a buddy (Thanks Wayne!) to run me off a couple of renders this evening and they aren't looking too bad so far. I'm not sure where to go with this idea now. I've started creating Ivor in Sculpey but as I was un-wrappping the first block I began thinking about getting Ivor 3D Printed. Need some sleep to think about this one.

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Some studio shots and a look at some of my books

2009-06-21T20:33:00.000+01:00

I really love snooping through other artists studios and work rooms. It is the first thing I look for in a new art book and it's often the best thing on a new training DVD. With that in mind and on the request of a couple of twitterers I'm reposting shots of my shit-pit studio. I have always had a work room of one type or another. Sometimes a bedroom, sometimes a shed. This one is a custom built studio made by converting a double garage and I will have to be carried out of here in a large wooden box before I relinquish the helm! If you have a special art place in your life you will know what I mean.

Note: These are quite big images compared to my normal posting size so they may take a second or two to load.

No one cleans it but me (not often as you may know from my blogs) and the kids have to ask for a pass to even look in here (thats a lie but it would be great wouldn't it!). I keep it in such a way that I can move desks and stands around to suit whatever project I have on the go. The PC/Mac table stays pretty much the same and is a great setup when I bring 3D artists here to train. The other areas of the studio are alwasy in flux. Sometimes covered over if I'm spraying. Sometimes just a table in the middle if I'm scultping clay or messing with wax. A 20ft wall is dedicated to DVD's and books and I love my little library. I keep lots more books in the house but the studio is filled with inspirational stuff in the main.

If you've got any snaps of your work space please share them in the comments. `I've shown you mine...` as they say on Carry On films!

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Ivor the Diver concept and color tests

2009-06-21T11:23:00.000+01:00

A little more on Ivor today.

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Needed a toy template

2009-06-21T07:09:00.000+01:00

Having finished a few more sketches I went looking for some templates to use to start fleshing out the `Ivor` design a little more. I couldn't find anything that quite met my requirements so I sketched out a triple set of blanks and scanned them into photoshop. Using vector magic I cleaned them up and converted them to .EPS files. The lines are nice and crisp now and are fine when printed out at A4.

Here are the files if anyone wants a look or maybe even to mess with them on your own projects.

Small triple blank jpg
Large triple blank jpg
Vector triple blank eps (compressed as a rar. Get winrar if you can't open it.)

Onward and upwards. Ivor-the-Diver here we come.

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Sculpey order and some more concepts

2009-06-20T20:42:00.000+01:00

I ordered my Sculpey PREMO from the amazing Dougarts on Ebay (Ordered Friday, it arrived Saturday am. Cool!). If you are in the UK and need modeling supplies fast and fairly cheap he seems to be the man! So I am now just waiting for some 1lb blocks of super sculpey and I'm ready to start some serious toy modeling. I'll be sketching all weekend and see if I can lock down an idea or two so I can have a go with the new modeling supplies.

I carried on playing with the underwater theme and I've started to refine one or two characters. I really like my little `Ivor-the-Diver` and `Ocho` so far. I think I will ink one or two images of these characters and then convert them to vector line art to see how they turn out. That way I can have a go at several color variations in photoshop. Ivor seems to be shaping up as my lead creation so I think I'll start with him. I'm trying not to look at too many other peoples toys as I don't want to be influenced too much, however, I need to research some eyes. I can't decided how I want Ivors eye to look like through his mask.

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Diving into toys for a while

2009-06-19T21:34:00.000+01:00

Although I've been sculpting for years I've never designed and made any toys myself. I've done plenty of toy concepts and I've modelled a fair few in 3D for a variety of clients. I've been talking to a few amazing toy-dude (you know who you are!!) and I have ordered a shed load of sculpey, premo sculpey and miliput and I'm going to get sketching for a few days. I want to design a range of little diving characters that I've had in the back of my mind for ages.

I was thinking of a couple of divers (boy and girl perhaps), a couple of hero sea creatures, maybe a Sperm Whale and a Shark and then a plethora of smaller characters like clown fish, a turtle, a baracuda etc.

I made a start tonight to get my juices flowing and I'm more than open to suggestions and critisism. It's nothing more than a fun project and one where I can learn a little about getting into toy design. It seems i've picked up lots of new followers this week and I'm hoping theres some toy-designer-gurus in there to help me out.

Comments, hints, tips, crits and color help more than welcome.

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Fuse Wax by Willow products

2009-06-18T13:01:00.000+01:00

I've been talking to a few artists this week about using `Fuse` Wax for sculpting and I thought I'd re-post the video that Willow products made to demonstate the basic properties of the wax. I'm a long time sculpey user but last year I fell in love with this wax. I tried about 5 or 6 different type of wax from very soft almost playdoh like Wax to the other end of the scale with carving waxes. Fuse was the best imho.

Heres the demo video to give you an idea of why I like it so much.

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Additions to my Library for June 2009

2009-06-17T17:07:00.001+01:00

Lot of new books on my shelves in the past few weeks. Parlty due to my birthday on the 11th and partly due to the fact that when I'm on holiday I spend far too much time browsing round old book shops and on amazon or Ebay. I just finished Guernica by Dave Boling which is an interesting little novel about a Basque town that was wiped out by the German just before WW2.

Other titles of interest I've aquired this month:

From Amazon:

From Ebay:

THE LIFE OF TURNER - P.G. HAMERTON - BIOGRAPHY - 1895 Really old and smelly!
Michael Parkes Art Book from the US. Expensive but well worth the importing.

From Balistic:

and loads more from the discount book shops I've trawled though. So lots to read and look at in the next few weeks.

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June and no art in site!

2009-06-17T16:37:00.000+01:00

I’m going to have to start this post off with a MASSIVE rant at O2. I’m not an early adopter by nature but I was quick off the mark with my Iphone first gen. I lost it on a Bus in Barcelona. I `amazingly` had it insured so got another in three days and a week later promptly upgraded to the Iphone 3G and have had a fantastic year with it (11 months). So, I wait with baited breath about how to upgrade to the new Iphone 3GS on the 19th of June and I am now faced with having to buy out my contract to the tune of £180+ and then buy the Iphone for £180 and then increase my monthly contract fee as well. What is going on! They clearly do not want current Iphone users to have the new unit. Maybe because we got a discount on our 3G units but believe me this has knocked my confidence so much I will not now get one until the Iphone 4.0 which will no doubt be June 19th 2010. The fact that there is no form factor change either (not even an S on the back I read) means I wouldn't really want the 3GS anyway (Sounds like a bitter man taklking here right!!!). All the real goodies are in the 3.0 update not the new hardware and yes, faster would be good but I care not one fig about the camera. Enough said.

My new Sanyo Xacti performed well in Egypt this month. I shot about 3 gig of High Def video underwater including three wrecks which is a new thing for me only having dived reefs before this. I am spending the month do some editing and improving my shooting skills. It turns out I have a really bad habit of swinging the camera around too much and it makes the viewer sick. I’ve always been more of a 2D artist than a camera operator. Actually, I’m rubbish at photography and videography it seems but hey, you can’t have it all. I do think I need to look into a decent lighting rig before entering the water with the Xacti again. Whilst the footage was ok there is a definite loss of color when you go deeper than 10 meters.

So I’ve been back from Egypt for a week and I have not managed to draw or model a single thing. As I said in my Blog update about creative highs and lows I don’t do that much work in the summer months. I do think that a break from art re-charges my creative batteries and I leap back into projects with renewed vigour after the summer. I have 6 week now before I leave on my Med cruise and I’m going to focus on losing weight and getting in shape and spending a great deal of time with the kids and Pam. I’ll get some drawing and modeling done this month but it will be the bare minimum I think.

Tweet deck for the Iphone came out today. If you haven’t seen it go grab it. And later this evening the Iphone 3.0 software update is due to be released. At least that will make up for my lack of a new 3GS! O2 you stink!

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Silo tutorials from Itunes on the Iphone

2009-05-28T18:06:00.000+01:00

My Silo Minotaur videos are now all available from Itunes and can be downloaded right onto your Iphone or Ipod touch. Just open the Itunes app and search for `Silo`.

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Edge loops around a mouth

2009-05-27T10:36:00.000+01:00

A friend asked how I created the edge loops around the mouth on my recent Rhino model. Doing written tutorials on a webpage does not compare to actually showing how you do it in a video. I've recorded a silent ten minute video of the process I use to create the correct edge loops around a mouth on a creature like this Rhino.

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Stay on top of your game

2009-05-25T00:26:00.000+01:00

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Sanyo Xacti VPC-2000HD and housing

2009-05-24T22:48:00.000+01:00

So I’m preparing to go off for a week of relaxing and diving in equal measures. We are flying off to El Gouna in Egypt next week and I’m planning on diving with Colona divers again. I have been looking into upgrading my camera equipment for some time now and finally this week I made a choice and a purchase. First off, let me just say, I’m no photographer. I tend to use cameras to capture textures and reference shots to be used in my 3D and 2D art projects. I like to think that one day I’d develop some skill in the field but right now I have to shoot 50 pictures to even get close a one decent image. With that in mind you will understand some of my past purchases and why I’ve gone for a very simple video solution.

For stills I currently have two options. I always carry a black Olympus mju850 which is a nice little 8 megapixel, waterproof (to 3 meters) point and shoot family camera. It’s shockproof and scratchproof (yeah right!) and is a great little pocket camera. I also keep and use a Canon EOS 350D and three lenses. I have a Cannon 18-55mm standard lens, A Sigma DG 50mm Macro lens and a Sigma 70-300. With that combination of lenses and my compact I can pretty much get all the stills images I need.

So, I needed some sort of video solution to replace my aging Panasonic NVGS1 which now looks like a caveman gave it to my at Xmas. My primary requirement was a video camera and housing that could shoot reasonably bright footage in 15-20 meters of water without a complicated lighting rig. I have been looking at the equipment other divers have favoured on recent trips and they seem to be either very basic and not at all suitable for the job at hand or overly large, requiring two hands to use which is not ideal.

I have had some good experience with Toshiba products in recent years especially my Tecra M7 laptop but all the reviews of the Toshiba HD cameras seemed to indicate that they were at the lower end of the quality range unless you spend a small fortune. I like Canon equipment because to-date I have not had a bad experience with anything Cannon in including my awesome printer (Cannon i9950). I looked into the Canon DV camera range and came up with the Canon HF10 but when I held it I found the standard vid cam shape was not for me anymore. The pistol grip or `phaser` camera felt a better option for me and I liked the Sanyo VPC-1000 that I had seen . I actual got to see one in action in February this year whilst diving at a place called Shab-El-Erg just off Hurgada in Egypt. My Dive master wanted to show me a video of an Eagle ray swimming with two sharks underneath it that he had seen the previous week. He whipped out his little Sanyo and showed me that video and a few shots of wild dolphins swimming right up to the camera lens and that was it for me...sold!

I spent a few weeks researching and reading reviews about the different housings that you can buy and this is the kit I came up with. I added a flight case from Maplin as I like to have my gear looking like Mission impossible tech and I always at the relevant Lowepro bag to suit whatever new tech I buy.

Sanyo Xacti VPC-2000HD
MPEG Movie / Stills camera
HD1080, 60p MPEG-4 AVC/H. 8Mp still images
10 x optical zoom (equivalent to 38-380mm in 35mm format) for photo
16 x optical zoom (equivalent to 44-710mm in 35mm format) for video
1cm macro. Manual White balance
2.7" widescreen LCD.
Media: SD card (SDHC compatible)
ISO 50-3200.
Li-Ion rechargeable battery

Epoque EHS-1000HD Housing for Sanyo Xacti
Depth rating 45m
67m filter thread, for optional external macro and wide-angle lenses and UWCC filters
Controls for all camera functions.
¼" tripod socket for lighting trays.
Top accessory shoe for video light or flash.
Internal flash is blocked by port but can trigger

I’ll do some heavy duty testing next week and post my results.

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Rhino Head Tutorial.

2009-05-23T17:03:00.000+01:00

So I finally got some time to get my Rhino sculpt underway. I have managed to put together a little tutorial about how I did the 3D modeling prior to the clay modeling and that can be viewed here

Here a a few of the screen shots that can be seen in the tutorial:

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Missing link found proving Darwins theory

2009-05-20T07:27:00.000+01:00

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Second day of researching for the Rhino bust

2009-05-19T07:41:00.000+01:00

I’m coming close to having a good concept sketched out for my Rhino bust. I started with my own 3D model of a pre-historic Rhino shown in an earlier blog post and I’ve been adapting him to suit. 2, horns or one horn. Weird shapes horn of standard black Rhino horn. All still to play for as I’ve not locked down the final concept yet. What I often do at this stage is rough out a low polygon digital model to allow me to mess with the overall shape or form and with this project it will allow me to actually see the different horn solutions without committing to clay.

Having made a few `novice` mistake with my recent King Kong Clay sculpture I am hoping to do a much better job with this creature. Again, I am planning to use a water based clay stoneware clay from Eric Tiranti in the UK and not a polymer clay like sculpey. I used far too much clay on the last project and that was mainly because I didn’t build a decent frame to add the base layer of clay to. This time I have draw out my armature and supporting rods and I intend to make a fairly accurate Rhino head from the wire armature, paper and maybe a bit of tape. My intention is to keep the maximum depth of clay to less than 1 inch on any part of the model. I am aiming to make the model roughly 26-30 inches long and roughly the same height to the tip of the tallest horn. If I make the clay too thick this time I will get serious cracking as the piece dries.

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Rhino head Sculpture

2009-05-17T08:11:00.000+01:00

I have decided to carry on using clay for a few more projects. I still have about 30Kg of the stuff and I try not to be a wasteful man. I have decided to do a Rhino creature of some type but I have been struggling to find a good set of reference images. I suddenly remembered that I had modeled a pre-historic Rhino some years ago with a ZBrush beta. Having found the image and still liking it I am set on the idea of modeling this but with some modifications. I'm going to start with some pencil sketch this week and I'll post the progress. I very often do a quick 3D model in Silo before start a project like this.

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A week with the classics

2009-05-16T21:44:00.000+01:00

Coming to the end of a long hard week and I just wanted to share what I’ve been up to this week. This week I’ve been listening to a few varied audio books. I’ve spent lots of hours in the car and I’ve been soaking up some Ernest Hemingway, namely a Movable Feast, a memoir about his years in Paris as part of the American expat circle of writers in the 1920s. I listened to a reading of The Old Man and the Sea last week which made me pick up this memoir and I have thoroughly enjoyed it.

I followed that up with Moby Dick which is a huge piece of work and not at all what I expected. I was of the understanding that it was a book about a madman chasing a whale: Well, it is, but it is SO much more. For example, Chapter 32 is entitled Cetology. Now, is the branch of marine mammal science that studies whales, dolphins, and porpoise in the scientific order Cetacea. In Moby Dick Herman Melville describes his belief is that all members of the Whale family are, in fact, Fish. Or more accurately `Spouting Fish`. He goes on to describe a wide variety of the Whales and Dolphin specifically the ones that could be caught by whalers in the mid 19th century and how much oil each species could yield. It was published in 1851 which was 8 years before Darwin let loose with the origin of species but it still shocked me for some reason. As I write I am only 45 chapters into it but I am engrossed. I have a habit of reading a classic novel and then following that up by reading the authors biography. Herman’s biography is now on my book list. He got marooned with Cannibals for three months and didn’t end up on the menu. How cool is that! Strange that I should be so entranced by a book about Whaling when I am in fact a staunch Whale conservationist. I suppose the more you understand about an issue both negative and positive the more you can help to improve the situation. You only have to look at the moving and distrubing film SharkWater by Rob Stewart.

I’ve not had a great deal of time for `real` or `paper` books this week but I’ve squeezed in a look at a couple of art related books. One showing the paintings of Norman Rockwell and the other a brief biography of Dali. I’ve managed to catch a couple of films namely Sexy Beast, The Goonies and Coraline at the Cinema (Amazing film!)

What have I been drawing and modeling? Err...very little actually. I’ve worked on one creature for the Wii title I’m working on and I’ve managed a few scribbles in my Moleskine but that is pretty much it. My Kong sculpt is now fully dry and I’m planning a new clay project which I am hoping will be a Rhino of some type.

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A little look at pavement art

2009-05-14T17:27:00.000+01:00

Had to post this one as it helped me understand how they actually do this amazing street art. Check out Edgar Mellers 3D Street Art site for more of the same.

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Sunday morning pre - `clean the studio` ramble

2009-05-10T09:25:00.000+01:00

Sunday morning and a dull grey start here in Cheshire. I’m up and about early today and I have a plan to finally get my studio cleaned up and all the old projects put away or disposed of. As I said in my blog update yesterday I am getting ready for a few weeks away from my studio so it is time to wrap up as much as I can and prepare for the first of my summer adventures.

I’m a little happier with my Kong Sculpt today. I took it off its back board and removed the paper from inside the armature (see photos). In the process I cracked off his ear and split his head open at the top but overall he seems to be intact and not here is free of the back board he is drying art a quicker rate. I will reattach his ear and do some surface details later this week then that is him finished. I suppose I need to look up how I can make him more permanent without having to resort to baking him which I am sure would lead to him cracking into pieces.

I’ve been neglecting my 2D skills this week in favour of my clay modeling. I recently purchased a set of three Moleskine sketchbooks and it is about time I started putting them to use. I will be drawing all summer and now is as good a time as any to start. I have not been doing as many twitsketches over the last two weeks and I need to rectify that as well. I started twitsketch as a place for doodlers to be able to find a daily topic to draw but I find it boring having to find a daily topic myself. I’d like someone to do it for me but hey, that’s life!.
I must put some serious browsing time in and find a forum of doodlers and sketchers that have the same sort of interests as I do. I don’t really want to join an online flower drawing class or a group of teenage Manga enthusiasts. I love the content and subjects chosen over at conceptart.org and that has been my chosen online home for years now. Maybe I should just try to perfect my COW’s (Creatures of the week) or maybe even try a CHOW sometime (Character of the week). Hohum.

Silo Training Material update.

At the back end of last year I recorded a series of training videos using Silo to be given away free on the Nevercenter website. In recent months Nevercenter have been releasing the videos a few at a time starting with my `Box modeling a Minotaur` sessions, then `Basics` and finally `Point by point modeling`. I’ve just resent the point-by-point videos as for some reason my files were corrupted when I uploaded them to the NC server. Hopefully these last remaining training videos will be released by mid May thus completing over 8 hours of free Silo training. I have been considering doing Silo training DVD’s again but nothing has been signed as yet. I am not sure how many copies I could hope to sell in this current market and it is a lot of time to invest in a product that may not give any significant payback. I am still very attracted to the idea of creating subdivision modeling DVD’s to help new users understand all the basic elements of modeling creatures and characters from the ground up. Everyone is getting into high polygon sculpting and re-topologizing these days but I am a firm believer in good underlying polygon structure being the foundation of a great sculpt.

Less writing more doing is needed. Off to the studio with dust buster and cloths. I’m going to be really sad now and photograph before and after shots to prove how messy my workroom actually gets.

Kong Sculpt removed from back board

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Managing creative highs and lows over a year

2009-05-09T08:03:00.002+01:00

AUDIOBOO 002: Managing creative highs & lows

It's been great running the Weekly modeling sessions and we are coming into our 10th week. I started the sessions in the hope of ramping up a bit of support for Silo (in its current state) and to enthuse the community in some small way. Those of you that know me well will know that I don’t follow a software company blindly and the reason I support Nevercenter is that Silo does everything that I need right now as a modeling solution (plus the guys are great).

I don’t use the Silo sculpting tools much yet as ZBrush is my long-term life partner (even though my bit-on-the-side Mudbox is very powerful now) and I would love to get more involved with UV’ing in Silo but Headus UV is meeting all my requirements right now. As a core polygon modeling solution I can’t find a better program that suits my needs both price and features and speed. The bits that are missing or buggy don’t worry me and I don’t seem to get that many crashes and those I do get are not an issue as I am a frequent saver (a learned habit). I only had one crash in the making of the Minotaur videos for example.

That said, I am coming into a very busy period of the year in terms of travelling and spending time with family and friends.

A typical year for me is like this: Spring and early summer I spend a lot of time working in my studio on personal projects, catching up with old buddies online via skype, msn, forums and more recently Twitter. I do lots of 3D training with small companies both in my studio and out in the field. I also take on lots of commercial stuff, mainly small, fast, well paid commissions where possible. By Summer I am usually reaching breakpoint and need to change my plans to avoid burnout. I spend lots of time outdoors and abroad either taking family time on a beach somewhere or some sort of walking break and supplement this with lots of diving and outdoor/nature related activities.

This summer, starting in 2 weeks, I plan to spend a couple of weeks diving wrecks in the Northern Red Sea. Then a few week back home in July and I am going to devote the month to fitness and family hoping to drop the weight I’ve put back on since Easter!. Then I’m off for a tour round the Mediterranean for a few weeks on a cruise starting Southampton (UK) then visiting Vigo, Lisbon, Seville, Cagliari, Florence, Livorno, Rome, Cannes, Gibraltar then back to the UK. Following that I’ll spend the summer vacation with my family and get ready to charge headlong into September and a very busy time for me from then right through until the following spring. The kids return to college and school, my Wife’s jobs is very busy around that time, my daily business ramps up and I start taking on new commissions and projects that lead me right into Christmas time and into the New Year brining me back to the Spring.

Interestingly I find that if I don’t have the big breaks from 3D/2D and the online life I get severe burn out and find myself getting negative with forums, bitter about my own work and I also get artists block where I sit for hours in front of a screen or my drawing table with no creative impulse at all. I find this happens to lots of my artist friends and it affects people in lots of different ways. We all seem to develop our own coping strategies for it. Mine is downtime and travelling. It works both ways though. If I am away from my Studio/artwork projects for too long I get irritated, moody, I can’t concentrate and I am generally a pain in the ass to be around. I have to be creating to keep this side of my character at bay. Playing computer games doesn’t help as it is not creating, it’s doing. When I’m in this frame of mind getting out and exercising or experiencing nature doesn’t help as it isn’t creating, inspiring maybe, but you don’t create anything. Spending time with friends is essential, but it isn’t creating. You get the picture. It’s one great big balancing act for me and I’ve been trying to perfect it and understand it my whole life it seems.

From summer 2007 until the end of 2008 I did very little art related work and I was working around the UK. I loved it for a while. It was great to be interacting, coaching, developing yad-a-yadaa. I convinced myself that my 3D/artistic time was up and I was finally moving on to a different stage in my life. Bad move! No creativity=moody bastard. Being in my car all day and travelling around I learned a great deal about myself and my own foibles. This on-off love-hate relationship with my creative side was ok. Having read extensively on the subject that year I see that it is pretty much the norm for artists from lots of different cultures, times in history and differing artistic disciplines and actually there was nothing unusual about it at all.

Please feel free to leave your comments. I'd love to hear what other people are thinking/feeling about Silo in its current build (2.xx)

Glen

May 2009

Some related links:

Beating Artistic block
Tips from painters about overcoming artistic block
Three ways to beat an artistic slump
Drawing Coach give ideas on beating the creative slump

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My first audio Boo recording

2009-05-08T22:28:00.000+01:00

Yet again because of someone posting something on twitter I am off playing with new technology instead of working on a new piece of artwork or model. This time, and mainly thanks to Michael Nobbs, I am trying out the Audio Boo micro podcasting service. And without further a do here is my first attempt:

AUDIOBOO 001: KingKong Sculpting progress

Hope you like my brief chitty chat about making Kong and please excuse the fact that it ended abruptly. I will make sure I keep within the time scales from now on which I believe is a maximum of five minutes. That one crapped out after three and a half so I'm not sure what happened there.

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Sculpting Kong in real water based clay

2009-05-07T21:16:00.000+01:00

For some time now I've been wanting to try out some sculpting with water based clay, something I haven't done in over 20 years. I have used Sculpey, Super Sculpey, Fimo, Plasticene, DAS, Wax, Chavant and the green stuff from the Warhammer world. All of the above are great modeling/sculpting mediums but I have wanted to go back and try good old fashioned clay for ages. Heres the WIP's

2009-04-16T09:15:00.000+01:00

**NEW** COLLABORATION SESSION: CS001 `Boulder and Co` (Click to view the thread)

This is the first of the Collaboration sessions. The idea being that anyone can join in and contribute to the session in a number of ways including:

1. Take the concepts further by drawing more Characters and creatures in the same style.
2. Model any of the characters in the reference
3. Model the environment or any part of the environment.
4. Give advice to other people who have never worked on projects like this.
5. Be prepared to take critisism in the spirit it is intened. Even though this is a fun session there may be a need to improve the qualitry of a model or scene. I will adjudicate if needed. In the real world you would have a tyrano-sore-ass Art director or TD to do this for you

6. Team work works. State what you want to do on the project but be prepared to let someone else do it if needed.

7. Try new stuff! If you are comfortable doing characters then build a Tree or part of the enviro.

Some comments:

1. It's a Silo Session but lots of other software can/may be used. Anything goes for me!

2. Anything you create must be shared with the team of contributors. Upload your models to your own server in a Zip/rar with a password. Only give the password to other contributors via PM or email.

3. If you use anything in your portfolio you must give full credit to the other members.

4. No time limit. If it doesn't take off we won't do anymore. If it does take off I'll be hiring here in the UK....JOKE! no CV's or reels thank you...It's all good clean fun and a bit of practice.

So, to this sessions reference. This is `Boulder and Co`. It is a rejected concept that is begging to be created. The client (fictional of course in case you haven’t guessed!!!) wants to see a set of character models with textures in a range of different environments all based on the stylised concepts provided. We can push the boundaries by making new characters and coming up with new scenes or stages. Work out how to design a multi part environment with re-usable and interchangeable scenery (trees, rocks, equipment, new characters and creatures not shown). Explore indoor and outdoor scenes possible caves?

**NEW** COLLABORATION SESSION: CS001 `Boulder and Co` (Click to view the thread)

Blogging from my Iphone again

2009-04-15T22:13:00.000+01:00

Having an Iphone is great for so many reasons not least because I can sit in meetings and write blog posts like this one. I had quite a busy month and I’ve been working on lots of different commissions and projects.

I'm still trying to improve my sketching and line work and doing the daily twitsketches is helping me pick up speed and become more fluent. If you want to join in checkout my twitsketch site and read the rules then get doodling.

In trying to improve my 2D skills I started to look at the workflow of some of my favourite artists. I am a big fan of Jasen Strong and his 2D creatures and I would love to be able to match his quality of line work and the amount of character he puts into his beasts. I have modelled quite a few of his designs for CGToolkit projects and I find the process of turning his creations into 3D actually takes some of their personality away. Mainly because you have to model in a static pose with everything in a neutral or relaxed stance for rigging and animating. I looked at his work and asked a few questions and I’ve picked up a few tips form him. Use something like Abode Streamliner (discontinued now) or Vector Magic to get great quality lines after you have scanned and cleaned the sketches in Photoshop. Also, use a blue pencil to draw over a printout that you have Gaussian blurred. I struggled with this at first but after a few goes it becomes second nature.

I looked into what Pencils to use and I’ve settled on Faber Castell Art Grip Aquarelles and I have to say I am now hooked. They are water based Pencils but they don’t seem to smudge or mess up the page when dry. I am currently using a Blue and a Red and I’ve ordered a whole set of them to try out this week.

I have just posted some work I’ve been doing on a Flesh Golem Model. Here’s the latest shot:

Weekly Silo Session Review

http://www.silo3d.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=14

We are now well into week 6 of the Silo Modeling Sessions and we've covered some varied topics to date. Well done to everyone of you Elite Silo users who are now wearing your Silo `I model` Shirts with pride (BTW please post your pics of you in your shirt in this thread!)

So, what do you want to see as a modeling topic in the future? I have tried to pick a wide variety of subjects and references but it would be great to get some input from you guys.

I am planning a couple of things in coming weeks.

1. Collaboration Sessions. These will be sessions topics that need to be completed by a group artists or modelers with different skills. The expectation is that anything you model would be made available to the other contributors and the end results (renders or animations) could be used for everyone’s portfolio. No time limit and maybe one a month.
2. Beginners sessions. I think should be encouraging new and inexperienced modelers to join in and to help them feel welcome we should do special beginners threads. Again, no time limit and I’ll post a new one when I feel the thread has added value.
3. More hard-Surface weekly Sessions. I am predominantly a Character/Creature modeler so I have a natural tendency to post organic subjects. If you are a hard surface modeler and you want to give me some suggestions or provide reference material I would be more than happy to post more of that type of session.

All helping to build and promote the Silo community I hope.

Best,

Glen
April 2009-04-15

#twitsketch is live!

2009-03-25T18:14:00.000Z

#Twitsketch is my new twitter project where Doodle artists get a topic everyday and post it on twitter. I decided to get a dedicted domain and registered www.twitsketch.com and .co.uk earlier today. The site is very much in its infancy but it is at least live and working to the best of my knowledge this evening. Artists are posting and images are being shared. Let me have any feedback that you may have about Twitsketch or the new site.

2009-03-22T02:34:00.000Z

Do you doodle all the time? Do you aimlessly sketch when in meetings? Do you deface napkins in your local cafe? Well now you can focus all your latent talent with Twitcketch!

Follow the simple steps opposite and join the Twitsketchers by following @southerngfx and getting the daily sketch topic. As you come across time in your day when your scribble hand gets twitchy then draw that theme, snap a photo of it with your phone and upload it to Twitpic and share with all the other daily doodlers.

And if the topic doesn't ring your bell then upload your scribbles anyway. Don't waste good art just because it's on a scrap of paper.

Remember, follow @southerngfx and search for #twitsketch.

Sketching Gallery updated Sunday pm

2009-03-15T22:30:00.000Z

I've added about 6 scans of my recent pencil work to the Sketching gallery tonight.

I'm a Pig not a human

2009-03-15T08:13:00.000Z

I have decided I am actually a pig not a human.Well, maybe not an actual porcine but a really messy human with Pig like traits. I just posted on twitter that I was embarassed with my studio (see below). I spend all my time juggling work commitments, 3D modleing, sculpting, keeping fit, family time (crap..was making Wife a cup of tea...back now!..realtime interlude there) and at the end oif the week my stuido is just busted. Like a house after a 24hr party that has just been raided and then burgled. Not good. I am going to reflect on this and get some order into my life....err..maybe....after a bit more modeling...

Three weeks in the Twittersphere

2009-03-13T06:41:00.000Z

On the 22nd February I wrote the following;

I've spent a long time avoiding following the crowd on social networking sites. I was a Powow user in the early 1990's. I tried AIM and I moved on to Messenger as my main IM solution. I have avoided Facebook and MySpace like the plague. Why? Because I see them as a huge waste of my time and resource and like AIM and MSN Messenger I know I will waste time using them.

So, with all that said, I find that today I have joined Twitter. Having recently heard Steven Fry speaking at an Apple shop via a Podcast I took his advice and began to follow him on Twitter. I already feel like I've been wasting my day wrting things like `I'm cooking Pancakes now` or `I'm watching Sharkwater and loving it`

I'll give it a day or so and see how things workout. If I find I am still following peoples boring daily routines then I'll be asking for my money back!

Having now had over three weeks living in the Twittersphere I have a mixed bag of feelings about it. Currently I am following 27 people and I’m being followed by 28 people. I love the fact that I can follow celebrities like Stephen Fry who do lead an exciting and varied life. I like watching what authors are doing and where they are up to in their latest projects. It is great to be able to interact with an author as you are reading his or her works giving them instant feedback. I suppose there was always the facility to email them but Twitter has more immediacy I feel. The downside is the amount of time I have ended up wasting posting useless snippets of information about my daily trials and tribulations. I have been posting from 6.00am and have found myself writing about taking Josh to school, about my gym and diet habits and about what projects I am working on. Would I stop people in the street and tell them? No. Would I post my buinsess on a notice board in Tesco? No. So why do I feel that doing it in Twitter is any different. I suppose one difference is that I do need to promote my work sometimes to get more commissions and this is a great way to get more people to talk about my art. My recent Silo videos are getting good feedback and they always bring me more work so that would have to be seen as a positive. I have had a few artists and bloggers mention me in their blogs or twitters and that has generated more followers and drawn more traffic to my site. Again, a positive. I have a real problem with a syndrome I call `forum burnout`. If I hang around a forum for too long I find myself getting frustrated with the constant negativity and bickering and I walk away. It has happened to me on ZBrush Central, CGtalk, Spinquad and even my own forum at Subd.com. I have had to stop using certain IM clients for the same reasons. I assume I will end up feeling the same way about Twitter soon but for now the plusses are outweighing the minuses. Let’s see what develops in the coming weeks.

My new modeling sessions have started at Nevercenters users forum. I wanted to do them for a number of reasons. Firstly I like the Nevercenter team and I want to help them promote Silo. Secondly, I like to help people and especially new and up-coming artists. Training gives me as much pleasure as modeling or drawing so these videos fit well with that ethos. I would like to see more people joining in but I suppose that will come. I have a cool Toon image being created by Teyon Alexander this week.

The missing Ross Kemp image

2009-03-10T20:04:00.000Z

Strange! This is the repeat of a post I made a few days ago. I'm repeating it as the post has vanished! I didn't delete it and I don't think it has been stolen but the little bugger has just plain vanished. It was a simple little speed painting of Ross Kemp.

A trip down memory lane

2009-03-09T08:35:00.001Z

For some reason this morning I came across a link to a load of old work that still exists on my website. The work goes back to 1992 as far as I can see. I thought I'd share some of the stuff I was doing with a pen, pencil, 386 PC or an Amiga 1200.

Sunday morning SpeedPainting

2009-03-08T11:43:00.000Z

Needed to stretch my tablet hand a tlkittle today and sketched Ross Kemp for some reason. I'm trying to work on improving skin tones this week.

Weekly Silo Modeling sessions

2009-03-07T19:31:00.000Z

Tonight sees the launch of Weekly Silo Modeling sessions at the Nevercenter Forum.

Here's the opening post.......

After some thought and discussion with other Silo users and forum members we’ve decided to get weekly modeling sessions going again. The sessions will be aimed at getting modelers to practice their skills and learn from other modelers in a safe environment. We will provide a reference image/material and occasionally just an open topic. Providing a single reference image is a great way to build your skills as you can compare your own work with that of other contributors and hopefully get to look at other modelers wire frame images. We will run the sessions for a couple of months and see what the response is like.

I would like to keep the sessions informal and with limited rules. There will be no restrictions on how the model is created just as long Silo is used in the process somewhere.

Some guidelines would be:

1. Taking the modeling further in other applications is acceptable.
2. Texturing and UV’ing is encouraged if time allows especially if the processes are explained for the less experienced members.
3. If you take part in the session please post as many WIPs as possible and post discussions about your methods and techniques.
4. If you need advice or critique please feel free to ask.
5. Using models created here in your portfolio/website/show reel is acceptable. All images used will be used with the artists permission to do so. Please try and give credit where needed.
6. Please share your techniques where possible.
7. There is no time limit or judging process at this stage. We will post a new session every weekend.
8. Adapt/evolve/change the model as you need. Do not feel that you have to stick to the reference 100% unless that weeks challenge specifies it.

This week we are starting with a 2D creature concept that was created for a COW or `Creature of the Week` at Conceptart.org. It is a basic bipedal bat-type creature with some complicated modeling needed around the wing flap area. Newer modelers may want to just tackle the basic body shape or even just the head. If more experienced modelers take part we can perhaps explore the process of creating skins flaps and folds.

COW #135 `Two headed undead`

2009-03-04T14:13:00.000Z

COW #135 `Two headed Undead creature`

I started off with the Undead turtles idea but it wasn't working for me at all. i decided to go with the Knuckle dragger. All I have to do now is come up with a convincing background story that would allow an undead ape to have two heads in the first place.

The Fail Whale homage

2009-03-03T21:14:00.000Z

I got around to finishing my little Twitter Fail Whale tonight. Not a useful use of my time but a nice little homage to Yiying Lu the artist behind the Fail Whale. Amazingly, considering the profile given to this Cetacean-inspired 404 image Yiying was not paid directly for the image - she originally posted the image to iStockPhoto.com where the Twitter dudes aquired it.

My tribute, modeled in Silo and finished in ZBrush.

Fail Whale model

2009-03-02T21:00:00.000Z

I'm not sure what overtook me this evening as straight after my tea I sat down and modeled the Fail Whale from Twitter. I saw that someone had made a physical model of it the other day and it's been stuck in my head since then. I quick nailed it freehand in Silo. I'll add the rope and birds later. Complete waste of an hour but it needed doing.

The weekend scans

2009-03-02T08:06:00.000Z

I've been catching up on my scanning as already mentioned this week. I find that very often I have a good run of sketching and bang out a whole load of ideas covering a variety of subjects. It's great practice and keeps the eye keen. I often end up with a lot of un-used or poor quality images but out of that pile I get one or two gems that I can move forward to the next stage. This is a sample of the scans from this weekend including the latest ideas for the COW from the previous Blog post.

The easiest way to view them all is going to the Sketching Gallery

This weeks COW

2009-03-01T19:48:00.000Z

I need some inspiration for this weeks `Creature of the week`. Suggestions welcomed! I keep sketching Undead Turtles which isn't going to cut it I'm afraid.

The COW thread in question

New Silo interface

2009-03-01T02:45:00.000Z

I have been a big fan of customizing my SILO interface for years and I thought it was about time I created a new one for 2009. I usually like to work with a bare interface to keep the screen clear and uncluttered but with large screen resolutions (1900+) it doesn't seem to be so much of a problem these days. I customized my own set of buttons and icons in photoshop using the color scheme from this website. As the images can be saved as .png is is possible to use lots of transparency in the design. I put in a few SILO logos for good measure.

I put my most used tools on the first button page and made it appear top left of the screen. I used the standard SILO arrangement for the bottom buttons but used my own art work. Any button that has an on/off state highlights with an orange bar. The second button page (shown here on the left) contains the create and display buttons. To switch from page 1 to page 2 I simply hit the SILO logo and it switches.

Bottom left of the screen is a persistant page that has the main editors and options panels. I find having them is helpful at certain stages in my modeling, usually toward the end of a session. I will finish the design off this week and post a zip with the the .pngs and .sip files for anyone wanting to try it.

New creature pencil sketches

2009-03-01T01:35:00.000Z

I've finally had a few minutes to scan and upload some recent sketches. I'm hoping to join in with some COW's (Creature of the week) soon at ConceptArt.org but until I get the time these quick sketches keep me going.

The Dog/Bear
Terror Bird - now sculpted in Silo/ZBrush
Sad Old Wooffer

Old head, new life

2009-02-28T20:43:00.001Z

I've been reworking an old Zombie head I made a few years back. I wanted to try out Mudbox this evening but ended up messing around sculpting with ZBrush; Old habits die hard. I'm so comfortable with the ZBrush tool set I find it hard to let go.

Next Silo Tutorials posted

2009-02-25T08:36:00.000Z

Nevercenter have released the next in the series of my Minotaur modeling videos. These new sections show me taking the model from basic form to a more detail mesh by re-working each of the body parts one by one.

http://www.nevercenter.com/videos/tutorials/

21.16

A new script based gallery

2009-02-24T18:58:00.000Z

I’ve been thinking about up-grading my gallery section for years now. I have always used a standard html solution that uses basic thumbnails that when clicked open up full html pages. I wanted to change this antiquated system for a script based solution that opens up irregularly shaped images and gives the `next` and `back` option.

Following a recent email form a very kind person called J. C. Borges Coelho I took his advice and he implemented a solution using LightBox2 by Lokesh Dhakar. Take a look at my gallery pages to see the results. It is a much better solution for a number of reasons

1. It looks better

2. I can upload any sized image without having to put it on a 1024x768 template as with my old system.

3. My gallery sets were repeated sets of 60 html pages which meant re-doing html pages above 60.

I can’t thank J.C enough for the help in setting it all up for me as scripts are not my strong point.

2009-02-22T21:35:00.000Z

I'm just looking into my next trip out to Egypt what Diving skills I want to add. I have a PADI Open Water and Advanced Open Water licence. I did the Enriched Air (NITROX) course last year and a few of the speciality introductions. I have decided to do some first aid training (Emergency first responce) and then go for the Rescue Diver Course later this year.

Diving inspires me in so many ways and the more I do the more I want. 90% of my artwork is creature based and diving introduces you to so many wonderful species every time you take the plunge. In another life I would have loved to have been a marine Biologist but then again, I also wanted to be a trwler fisherman, Deadliest catch style :)

To Twitter or not to Twitter

2009-02-22T21:23:00.000Z

I've spent a long time avoiding following the crowd on social networking sites. I was a Powow user in the early 1990's. I tried AIM and I moved on to Messenger as my main IM solution. I have avoided Facebook and MySpace like the plague. Why? Because I see them as a huge waste of my time and resource and like AIM and MSN Messenger I know I will waste time using them.

So, with all that said, I find that today I have joined Twitter. Having recently heard Steven Fry speaking at an Apple shop via a Podcast I took his advice and began to follow him on Twitter. I already feel like I've been wasting my day wrting things like `I'm cooking Pancakes now` or `I'm watching Sharkwater and loving it`

I'll give it a day or so and see how things workout. If I find I am still following peoples boring daily routines then I'll be asking for my money back!

Garys Tatoo

2009-02-22T20:52:00.000Z

I designed a tatoo a few weeks ago for a good friend. He wanted a traditional skull with horns but with some use of a Steve Wang book I persuaded him to go for a Predator/Alien hybrid.

Here's one of the images we went for:

My All New Blog Page is Launched

2009-02-22T19:47:00.000Z

So, time moved ever onward and at long last Glen gets his very own REAL! Blog page. Gone are the days of sub-standard HTML Blog Pages once knows as WHATS NEW!.