...Unique Creative Styles and Content For Animation
Apr 2014

References: ArtStation

So its goodbye CGHub... Now what?

There are many websites that you can go and subscribe, show your portfolio and search for Artist and Artwork that inspires you. I will post as many of these sites under: Resources / References...

So let’s start: here’s a new site launched by the same people who run ArtStation Magazine, called ArtStation.
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They describe it as:

“…A new community and portfolio website service for professional artists…. ArtStation Beta 1 provides artists an easy and affordable way to create portfolio websites and be discovered. The best way to describe ArtStation Beta 1 is that it takes the best of all the artist community sites you love, Tumblr and SquareSpace, and puts it in one integrated package specifically for artists…”

Click on the image to read more about it!

Cheers!

Game Changers: Marmoset Toolbag 2.0

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I want to review this amazing piece-of-software that I think most of you will end-up trying and hopefully buying. What is Mamoset Toolbag™ 2.0 you may ask? Well, it is described as, “...A full-featured, real-time material editor and renderer bundled in a tidy package... provides 3D artists (with) a powerful and efficient workflow, bringing exemplary rendering quality to every stage of the 3D art pipeline...”

Now here’s my reasoning as to why, I believe, Mamoset Toolbag™ 2.0 could be a game changer for 3D Concept Designers:

You design your character, prop or set using your 3D package of choice... Now what? You could render in your 3D package but we know how long those take.

What you need is a “real-time” renderer and material-editor - Mamoset Toolbag™ 2.0, where you can import your mesh, alter your materials and render high-quality images OR turntables using physically accurate Image Based Lighting - IBLs, and DONE! No long hours waiting in front of the monitor to discover that you forgot to check this attribute or load that texture. In Mamoset Toolbag™ 2.0 you can move the IBLs around, add dynamic lights or cameras, change the DOP, add new textures... whatever you want to change, just hit render, and DONE! Fast high-quality images / turntables without the long and expensive wait!

Check this out!

Turntable


Pretty cool, right?! Hope this helps someone. Don’t forget to check-out the article, smiles and links here!

Cheers!

Tutorial: Custom Color-Palette from Images

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I was asked by a friend to show him how to create a simple color-Palette based on the colors of a specific image. This technique is used by Photographers, Painters, Filmmakers, Color Stylists, Fashion Designers and other Artists to, “simplify an image’s colors to its basics.” For example, let’s say you see someone’s work and you want to figure-out what color palette they used to make that image? Well, in these two tutorials I will show you how to “breakdown” an image’s colors to their basic, what we call a color-Palette...

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As you know, with Photoshop, “there are more ways than one to skin a cat!” (no, I will not be skinning any cats in this tutorial.) What I mean is that, like everything else in Photoshop, there are many ways to do this. In these two tutorial I will show you a couple of simple and fast ways to create a color-Palette and to save them as a Photoshop Swatches. The first example will be based on Vincent van Gogh’s “Self Portrait with Straw Hat” (1887) and the second one on a painting called “Studies of Liza” by contemporary American Painter, Luc Cong.

I hope you find them useful!

Cheers!

References: Best Design Options

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Fantastic site with tons of tutorials on photography, webdesign, - blogging tips, Packaging and Print Design and last, but not least, Photoshop...

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Very easy to access and to find tutorials. Three of the Menus have submenus where you will find more great resources and tutorials!

Hope you find this site very useful!

Cheers!