Skills USA 2017 State Best in Show – Digital Render – Fall 2016-Spring 2017

The 3D render, Swiss Cheese, is the splash screen for the game RATions, and depicts the sneaky feel of the game. The render competed in the SkillsUSA 2017 State Animation Technology Exhibit and won Best in Show.

I used the following software programs:

• Maya 2016 – modeling, texturing, lighting, and rendering
  • Derek Jenson’s free IES Light profiles: http://www.derekjenson.com/3d-blog/ies-light-profiles
• Photoshop CS6 – touchups

This project was based on a video game I was working on in fall 2016. The player was a mouse stealing cheese while hiding from the humans. The final image was to be both a splash screen for the game, summarizing the description above, and as its own standalone piece for the competition.

I started with style concept sketches, then moved to thumbnails, and considered color and composition to create a striking image with lasting impact.

Style concepts with messing around between realism, stylized, and geometric shapes and colors.

Thumbnail and color tests to pump out quick concepts and get feedback on what caught people’s eye. I wanted to do a warm/cool color contrast between the foreground and background.

The composition rules between leading lines to draw the viewer’s eye to the focal point; foreground, midground, background; and using rule of thirds to balance the image.

I then moved on to character sheets and modeling. Because these models were going to be used for both the render and game, I needed them to be relatively low-poly, but high enough to make sure the characters could bend to their expression sheets.

The mouse main character topology and their expression sheets.

Ma, the background character’s character concept and modeling sheet along with topology and face close-up.

The next step was rigging and scene set up. I modeled and textured the environment fairly quickly because they were basic shapes and Maya textures. A friend rigged the mouse for me. At first I had not rigged Ma, the background character, because she was stationary. However, later I needed to change the pose. I turned to 3rd party rigs—which did not work the way I intended. So I modified the vertices manually. From that experience, I learned to put basic rigs on everyone, including background characters.

Next was lighting the scene. I thought IES Light profiles would help the render come out more realistic than using Maya lights, so I tried them and they worked. While adjusting the light and render settings, the composition and scene underwent some ideation. I received feedback from peers and mentors to push out better renders. Here, I also learned about bounce light and subsurface scattering, which helped with the rim lighting on Ma and the transparency in the oily cheese.

the various IES light profiles in the package I was using to simulate realistic lighting.

Process images part 1

Process images part 2

This project spanned my senior year in high school. I learned a tremendous amount about the software, industry standards, and the animation process. The entire project was a huge learning curve, but one that inspired me to pursue 3D arts while striving to do more and be better each time.