9 years ago a Woman Walked into a Party......

WARNING: sloppy lovey dovey shit ahead!

9 years ago I was sitting at a party in Stevenage that was one of the only times I partied surrounded by people didn't know in a strange location. When a woman walked into a party it was love at 1st sight and I swore that was the woman I'd spend the rest of my life with. We're still together and now we have 2 kids.

Like any relationship it hasn't been easy especially in the early days when I would commute by train from Durham train station to Dover just to spend time with her. Anyone who knows me it takes a very special person to make me do that. Everyone we both knew repeatedly said it wouldn't last and that we were wrong for each other...everyone except a small handful of people. The majority were wrong and we're still together 9 years later.

Like any relationship at times its been far from easy but like anything that's worth doing, it's worth it. Kat hates her photo taken and hates being on video even tonight when filming a timelapse of putting the xmas tree up she refused point blank to be anywhere near where the camera was. So most of you reading this won't know how beautiful my wife is. But of a shame really. But in a rare moment of sloppy lovey dovey shit... so all my love to the one woman able to put up with me for any length of time apart from my mother. For that reason alone she deserves a medal as big as a bin lid.

Death of a Wacom Tablet

Today is a sad day for me. This morning at 3am my old Wacom Intous 3 died. 'But Wayne its only a bloody tablet, get over it' you're probably thinking. So why does it need a dedicated blog post? Well that was my 1st 'proper' graphics tablet years back that I bought for my 1st ever DVD (which also happened to be the 1st one released by anyone on Mudbox by the way). Me and that thing have been through a lot.

It's in many ways been a very long quality test of an Wacom Intous! It's been abused in many very horrible ways including:

• · having a total of probably in excess of 1000 cups of coffee split on it.
• · Repeatedly dropped when going through customs by customs guys who seem unable to hold it without dropping it.
• · Stabbed by my then very young son with a pencil, a pen and even a metal rod he found leaving the centre portion dead. This is why old time lapses you see me sculpting things to one side and not centre of the screen lol.
• · Nearly set fire to when I was putting some deodorant on one day and some had landed on it when my cigarette was next to it, making it burst into flames. Amazingly that left it unscathed.

So it's been through a lot and until this early hours it still worked. It helped me produce literally thousands and thousands of models in its lifetime. Although it was no longer my 'number 1' since I got the Cintiq a couple of years back, I still used it on my laptop when downstairs working in the early hours, and it went with me on most of my travels around the world. So its fair to say those Intous tablets are built like tanks. If it can take everything I (and my young son) threw at it, then normal careful use should give it no problem. This is why I recommend it to people when asked.

So RIP Intous 3, I think it is fair to give it a nice rest on my shelf for the rest of its days (or until it gets in my way lol).

Practice......

Close but no cigar.....

No one is good at everything.... remember that if your starting out as its important. Like everyone out there I'm not infalible, and there are things I'm not so hot at sculpting. The big ones for me are likenesses and caricatures (in a time less than a milion years.) A side effect of speed sculpting is that (for me at least), its less suitable for any sort of likeness as you really do need to take your time. So I have figured its well overdue time I nailed with problem area. But in usual style I'm trying to integrate it into my speed sculpting. It took me about 2 years of producing total unmitigated crap to get anywhere near where I wanted when speed sculpting 30mins -1 hour speed sculpt (or less) many years back.

So I fully expect it to take a while. My plan is to hit the problem area from two fronts. Firstly keep speed sculpting likenesses as I have time and secondly to do somewhere I take much more time (ie as slow as shit). Eventually the two will mesh into one way of doing it fast. At least thats the plan. I'm only about 25% happy with the sculpt above so theres a long way to go. Like with sculpting anything its a matter of practicing till your sick to death until you get it right.

A Door for a Dracula

Note: I upped this by mistake a week or so back, and pulled it once I'd realised I'd got the broadcast date wrong, so apologies if you were one of the few who saw it before I took it down.

The asset as handed over ready for lighting

A few weeks back a last minute freelance job came in from the guys at Space Digital when they needed a asset super pronto with no existing design. It was for the kids TV series Young Dracula and they needed a trapdoor. After a bit of head scratching (and also knowing that worst case I could make a very simple iron manhole cover type thing, acted as a backup plan and gave me a bit more room on the concept.) So after a day of thinking about things and some rounding up of some inspiration and reference, I decided to go along with an idea of Matt's over at Space Digital and head in a slightly steam punk direction.

I didn't bother drawing any concept art as I had it in my head and this projects development time wasn't long enough that I was likely to forget it. So I made the basic door in 3dmax and a fully working clockwork system by importing some cog shapes from illustrator and then converting these into polys and extruding them.

Untextured raw polys

Texturing was aiming for one thing only..make it look nice and render fast using Renderman. This of course meant changing the whole scene over to Maya (as my max to Renderman plug-in I've been working on is not stable enough for production work). Then it was tweaking of lights and shaders and get it to the guys ASAP.

Sculpting and texturing the inside of the tube leading from beneath the trapdoor to the pit of lava was 'interesting' as texturing and sculpting inside of a tube with inverted normal's is never ever fun...not even a little bit lol.

So Wayne..how do you come up with all these sculpt ideas?

That's probably the question I've been asked most over the years. I've heard it said many times that doing monsters and concept sculpts is 'easy'. But people often find that if you sculpt enough you start to run out of ideas or repeat yourself a lot. I've sculpted thousands upon thousands of concept sculpts and speed sculpts ad very rarely repeated myself. So how do I keep coming up with the ideas? Well these ideas I'll be outlining in this and other blog posts aren't new for the most part an many have been done in 3D and 2D before. but it amazes me how many people don't know about them. I figured it was time to change that.

So here's a couple of videos that'll be far more helpful if I explain what the heck your seeing.

Pareidolia

Using a random picture of clouds

Pareidolia is something I've found very useful over the years and the best thing is I can tell you what it is and how and why it works but as each person is unique, chances are you'll always end up with something that looks different. The chances that you have exactly the same brain as me or any other person are very very slim. This makes it powerful.

The best way to explain Pareidolia is the way you can look at clouds or random shapes and 'see' shapes that make sense within them. Our brains are hard coded to recognise faces and patterns so if there is a often random arrangement it tries to make sense of it and often you see a face (for example the 'face on mars' is nothing more than pareidolia).

I use this either with 2D art or images (or sometimes even in real life) to 'see' shapes that I later sculpt. I also sometime use it on an existing sculpt of mine by turning it upside down and then seeing what shapes and forms pop out at me that I then develop into something. It also works well along side the next tip and I consider them 'twins' that work very well together.

Now the brain is like any muscle in your body if you keep exercising it you'll find you get better at seeing different shapes to other people see. In my opinion some of the best 2D concept artists work in exactly the same way. I can promise it'll always be a source of new ideas.

Using a Random Starting Shape

This is something I've developed over the years as making something truly random is actually harder than you think as the brains ability and need to have order in chaos and see 'patterns' can have you ending up with a not so random shape. I've recently added to this using the technique my son came up with that allows me to have a truly random starting shape. The trick is to have a shape you wouldn't normally use as your starting base shape but not so odd that it would be impossible to sculpt anything meaningful with. In the video shown here I start 'gently' by doing some random pulls on a sphere (which I find works best for me, but feel free to adapt that if you want). I then see if I can see a shape in it....

Sometimes you hit lucky as I did with the 1st sculpt of 5 I did in 70 mins and it looked to me like a sort of weird elephant guy. So that's the direction I headed in. Now my tip is not to go nuts on details like fine wrinkles and skin pores. Why? because to be blunt you could end up polishing a turd. If something looks good without the fine details it sure as hell will look just as good (if not better) once you do a proper sculpt of it with all the details and textures.

However...... if it's a weak idea then no amount of polishing is gonna make that turd smell sweet. So what you do then is to move onto the next sculpt. Never get too attached to your designs when concepting, they are disposable and treat them as such or you can paint yourself into a corner figuratively speaking.

The 2nd sculpt is a far more standard shape which I immediately saw as a sort of bird guy. As for the 3rd sculpt, well you remember above I mentioned sometimes you hit on with a nice shape straight away? well other times you don't as in this case. So this one I skipped through fairly quickly as I knew chances are it'd not end up as a design that I would ever be using. now this isn't to say that you or anyone else can't see a really fantastic idea in it..that's what makes the ways of concepting so powerful they work differently for everyone.

Number 4 & 5 work together as sort of a 'ideas set' as I think of them. I start with puling a shape and adding a neck and lower jaw to it, then once I am done with that sculpt I then remesh it to a low poly level (about 68 on Dynamesh in this case as I was using Zbrush for this..mainly as it makes it far easier to explain and how). Then I moved onto using random meshes added to it as explained in the workflow my son came up with a few blog posts back. in the case of this one I 'saw' initially a weird Japanese geisha, but didn't want to do another cartoony one after that damn star shaped thingy, so looked a little longer and saw a character from my daughters favourite TV show. (The TV show is 'ZingZillas and the character is 'Tod' by the way). So the damn show has nearly drove me nuts I took the 'tod ' character and did sort of a slightly evil twist on it.

Now I finished on this one (even though its technically a existing character), because it illustrates another problem you can come across from time to time, where you do a random shape and cannot get past seeing a well known character in it. in this case I saw another one after the geisha but before the 'Tod' character. As it was so well known a monster / creature it meant I had to have an 'exit strategy' so I could continue concepting and not simply get walled into a series of existing shapes from a character that's already around. IN my case all I could see was the damn predator lol. So a large comedy monkey janitor from a kids' TV show was preferable in my case as there was more 'wiggle room' for creating either something new or an acceptable alternate version.

Now what I haven't mentioned is the steps I take mentally (simplified a bit) but often it is just a matter of taking your shape, seeing something there and then wrapping /warping human or animal anatomy around that shape. It sounds simple and to be totally frank it is, it just takes a bit of practice.

Now I have many more ways I've collected and came up with over the years and I'll share more of them as I have both the time and inclination to. But for the love of all that's holy don't get caught up on the 'how's of sculpting when learning these techniques, leave those for other sessions and simply enjoy coming up with designs you can later use. Technique and anatomical knowledge is important but its best kept for separate practice sessions, especially if your just starting out. I often twist and warp anatomy to see how far I can take it before it 'breaks' and cases to make sense. But to do that you have to have that knowledge as a starting point.

So there you go, I'm not in the habit of teaching people 'how to think' but in this case I feel it's a rewarding enough way for some of you to do lol. I'll cover another few ways as I have time etc....

Some Tuesday Doodles

Here's a couple of doodles form yesterdauy (Tuesday) The 1st one is unfinished and a Zbrush one and I have no idea what it'd have turned out to be as I was completely freestyling it. The 2nd was done in mudbox and still freestyling but turned out a better design.

Turntable:

Nothing so far today as been having a lazy 'can't be bothered' day.

A Few Doodles

As a side note I'd like to say a thankyou for the goodwishes and emails I recieved after the last blog post. Apart from a mention on my video blog on youtube I'll not be banging on about it any further.




A couple of doodles from last night or two. Tonights went awol due to a crash, so as recompence here's a few turntables....

The Stroke You Never Knew I'd had

Back in the early hours of 1st July this year while only hours away from my final lecture at the End User Event I suffered what turned out what was diagnosed when I got back home to be a mini stroke. Up till now only a handful of close trusted friends in 3D have known this even occurred as I've waited until I felt things were back to normal. I was intending to never mention the whole thing as it could feasibly be a kiss of death to my career, but a mate in 3D pointed out it was such a crazy story I had to share it at some point. Plus as I primarily work as a freelancer anyway its less important than if I was intending to work for a company. Because let's face it after this no company on earth would want to touch me as minor strokes are big health risks and scare the shit out of them.

But I digress...

No doubt you want to know the why's and wherefores..so let me explain what happened from as much as I'm able to remember or have managed to piece together. On the night of the 30th of June after months of only sleeping 2 hours a night working on my short (that very few people saw before I canned it), 'Of Gods and Men', I was on the ragged edge and felt at least twice my age, looked worse and was mentally drained. I felt worse than I ever had in my life. As this was the 1st public day of End User Event 2011 and I had done my lecture during the day, some of the guys from the Autodesk 3D Max team and a few others went for a drink alongside myself till well into the early hours. Without going into the gory details we all had probably a one or two too many and I know I was taken back to my hotel about 3 or 4am.

I passed out face down fully clothed on the bed (something I never do...well not since I was 18) and woke up at 5am feeling very strange indeed. Although I didn't realise it at the time this was directly after I'd had a stroke in my sleep. It's probably the hardest thing to describe in any way that makes sense as its impossible to put the parts you are probably interested in into words, but it felt like I was living with someone else's brain and body. My entire left arm was numb and my coordination was well off . So much so that it took me 15 mins to get to the bathroom (large amounts of liquids will do that to a person lol). I couldn't think straight and it was like having a food mixer in my brain.

As I stood there taking a leak trying to work out why my left arm refused to move the way I wanted it to and why I felt like I was thinking through treacle, I came to the conclusion that it was a combination of way too much alcohol and maybe I had been lying on my arm... so I thought. I made an 'executive decision' that as I wasn't due to lecture till 2 or 3pm that I'd go back to bed and 'sleep it off'.

I got a call from Joep Vander Steen who is one of the guys who run's and organises the End User Event (and a good mate of mine as well) asking if I was still alive. Apparently word had gotten to him about the 'epic night out' the night before and he was a tad worried. My speech slurring, I told him I'd be there in about 45 mins and proceeded to try and get ready. I'll spare you those details but suffice it to say this was far from easy as my body was not cooperating and I had to concentrate more than I ever had in my life just to get my damn pants on without falling over. Buttons proved particularly troublesome as they didn't seem to make sense to me.

By the time I'd gotten to The Florin where the End User Event was held my arm was less numb although my middle finger was still totally dead and remained that way for over a month. The very 1st thing I did was get myself 3 espressos and down the lot one after another. I was later told this was in that particular case the best thing I could have done and it may have saved me from having another massive stroke within 12 hours after the 1st one. I sat down outside next to my mate Alex Morris and vaguely remember telling him I felt as rough as hell and my finger was numb. I probably sounded still a bit pissed I imagine, my memory is sketchy of that part of the day to be honest.

I got through my lecture which was no mean feat and had I been without my notes I'd not been able to do it (we'll cover why in a moment), and the day after next I flew back home.

For weeks I still felt terrible, my head was permanently spinning like I'd been on a rollercoaster day and night, I had suddenly got to the stage of being unable to sleep more than 2 hours at a time (I seem to have been left with this as an after effect of the stroke). I had lost all my knowledge of organic sculpting and couldn't understand it..it was like I'd never done it before. Everything I'd ever learned or knew was wiped out in a single mini stroke. But still I put off going to the doctors.

I couldn't think straight, I had massive holes in my memory and have lost amongst other things, entire years of my life and the memories of the births of both my kids. I found it weird that hard surface and non organic were totally unaffected. Which was lucky as I was working on the cathedral for FXPHD at the time. So whenever I see that model now I remember with pride it was done in the aftermath of a mild stroke, that I managed to tackle and rise to the challenge in the face of one of the worst moments of my life. I am proud of it for that reason alone above all others. I will also always remain grateful that Mike and John at FXPHD kept faith in me when any other people would have run a carpet mile.

Eventually my family became worried enough to gang up on me one afternoon and make it very clear I WOULD be going to the doctors whether I wanted to or not as something was obviously very, very wrong. I think in my heart I suspected something but hoped if I ignored it, then it'd go away.

So I got an emergency appointment with my doctor. He did a load of tests, asked more questions than I've ever known him to and immediately dialled for an ambulance to rush me to the stroke unit at Durham hospital. When he told me he suspected I'd had a stroke I thought he was joking as he shares my own often dry humour. But when it dawned on me that he WASN'T joking it hit me like 10 ton of shit. You know those bits in horror movies where the foreground rushes towards camera and the background rushes away? That's what it felt like when I was told. It floored me.

I wasn't keen on going to the hospital but as it was over 3 weeks since I'd had the stroke I was told I was in extreme danger as the type of mini stroke I had are usually followed by a massive one inside of 28 days! I was put on some pills and treatments that would stop a 2nd bigger and far more damaging stroke. But there was a catch.... the pills would take nearly a week to be fully active in my system and in that time I was in danger of the massive stroke. So for a week I had to remain totally unstressed and even tempered and keep off caffeine and cross my fingers that it was enough to stave off the 2nd stroke that was hanging over my head. Thankfully it was.

I made a couple of decisions then such as I started learning myself to sculpt organics again. I had the best teacher in the world....me. I relearned from my own videos, books, articles and tutorials by lots of hard slog. Luckily the muscle memory was still there , so the rest was just 2 months of cramming and wall to wall practice as I was determined to get back to where I was. I now believe I have and also explains to the more astute of you that noticed a bit of a slight change in my style here and there. It also explains why I am using Zbrush as well as Mudbox again as I started sculpting in zb and then moved to mud, so had to relearn in that order. After relearning myself from scratch in2 months I'm hesitant to drop it again, so now I use both....I think I've earned it lol.

Now The hospital still aren't sure how much damage was done so I finally had my brain scan last week after being on a 'emergency waiting list' since the end of July. Although I won't get the results of it till December. There is damage that the doctors know for a fact it's done, it's just a matter of finding out how much and what percentage of my frontal lobe is affected. Also compounding matter is the fact I've suffered from a very rare brain condition since I was 17, and not even the neurosurgeons knows how that'll affect things.

But it seems the way I've recovered that damage is either minimal or just knocked out a load of memories. I'm not at deaths door so don't get the wrong idea for gods sakes! But it proves what everyone probably knew all along, that doing months and months of 22 hour work days is not healthy and certainly not when combined with my coffee intake each day. It's meant I had to simplify my life and so I passed mudboxhub.com to Cris from 3d-palace.com to run and stopped the DVD's and free tutorials. If and when I start doing them again is open to debate really. I am certainly back up to speed and more than capable of it both skill and health wise, but the desire right now is not there. Plus I like doing the stuff for FXPHD and will always feel that I owe those guys a debt for sticking with me when everyone else would have ran like the wind.

I didn't outline at the time what was going on because firstly it was a bad time for me and I didn't want a zillion questions, and also I didn't want to mention it until I was sure I was back to my old skills. So those of you who I told and kept the secret, thank you. So there you go, the ironic true story of how I ended up having to relearn sculpting from my own damn videos. Which I have to say is a surreal experience listening to yourself teaching something that you have no memory of ever doing.

It's an experience that I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy and could have been so much worse. I count myself as lucky to have got a warning. Yes its left me with years of my life now with no memory but that's a small price to pay. It's a journey I am proud to have came out of the other side of and one that has changed my attitudes forever.

Now I realise this could be the kiss of death to my career but in reply to anyone or companies that feel like that I say this:

"In the aftermath of my mini stroke I started and finished the image below. So I don't think you have anything to worry about. ;) "