Finding help understanding cars!

Over the Xmas break I've been working on improving my drawings from the first semester. I was happy with alot of my progression at the time, but looking back thought I was capable of better now. So I've focused on improving my drawing techniques as well and doing more digipaints.

I think I struggled most with cars when we did them and wasn't happy with my thumbnails or final. It was something I knew I wanted to go back and rework but wasn't really looking forward to it. I think I struggled so much because I saw cars as quite a complex object and I couldn't understand how to break them down and draw them.

While looking for reference I came across this website - http://www.technical-illustrations.co.uk/landrover.html. As the name suggests its a website of technical illustrations and they are stunning. I know my last blog was about 'not looking at other people's artwork' but I found Beau Daniels and Alan Daniels way of drawing cars really helped me to get to grips with it. They seem to have such a simple way of drawing the curves and shapes of cars and it helped me to understand and break down what I was looking at and how a cars shape comes together.

Beau Daniels and Alan Daniels

Beau Daniels and Alan Daniels

Add captionBeau Daniels and Alan Daniels

Beau Daniels and Alan Daniels

I didn't want to copy their fantastic drawings so I stayed clear of Land rovers, but tried to implement this way of drawing to other cars. The result was great!

I'm still a long way off being very good at drawing cars but I think what I was able to do the second time round was miles better than my attempts a few weeks back. I'm really pleased I took the time to redo the subject I think I'm much better off for it.

Too much influence?

So another Christmas has gone by and I was lucky enough to receive some fantastic art books for Xmas presents. I been interested in the d'artiste books for a while and not being able to get a proper look inside them has always intrigued me. I've now got the chance and am the happy owner of a few.

Heres the link to them - http://www.ballisticmedia.net/books/dartiste/character_modeling_3/

They really are fantastic art books with some stunning work inside! I've got masses of other art books as well, ranging from instructional drawing books to video game art book books and I really enjoy looking at them all but I wonder if its all abit much.

I love looking at other people's work and admire it greatly but theres so much of it around and its all so fantastic. I find it both motivates and depresses at the same time. I can't help but think "Oh that's so amazing and kick ass....I can't do that" but on the other hand get a surge of "I'm gonna work hard and become that good!", but its not easy. We're surrounded by places to see stunning artwork like http://www.deviantart.com/, http://www.conceptart.org/ or magazines like http://www.imaginefx.com/ and I find it a bit overwhelming.



Everyone will have favourite artists or preferred styles and we'll all draw inspiration and ideas from different places but when theres too much of it floating around I feel it impacts me negatively. If you look around enough you'll probably find something similar to what ever it is you've tried to do, and chances are, it will be better. I don't like that.




Scott Robertson Vehicle Design


This has become more apparent to me while doing the vehicle project. I'm struggling with it quite alot and not just because vehicles aren't really my thing. Looking around other artwork for ideas and inspiration tends to lead to finding something awesome already and trying to change or use parts would just lead to something worse. I'd compare anything I came up with, with something very similar I found elsewhere, and mine was always worse. Its not surprising the artwork I was comparing myself with was done by people who have been doing it along time, get paid to it and are very good at it. So its not really a fair comparison I guess but I cant help it.I find looking extensively at other people's work for ideas is just going to result in wanting to steal them, because they already look awesome! I don't want to draw something that, to me, is just a worsened version of something that has already been designed. Which just leads to a total creative dry-up, not good.

So what if I just stop looking at other peoples artwork? I could do my best to design what ever it is I'm doing, yes it might be very like something else that has already been drawn but if I don't know about it, I cant copy or compare. If I want to design something I should look to things that already exist for reference and ideas. To design a vehicle I could look at current; cars, helicopters, tanks, trains, bikes, buses, planes, boats, submarines etc for ideas and not other artwork. In guess I still run the same risk of drawing something that already exists but its alot less likely. I think it would be easier to mix and match bits of vehicles that already exist rather than trying to do that with design drawings.

Car Mood board

Long story short, I really enjoy art books but, for me personally, they can do more damage than good. I think too much influence from other people's work can hinder our own creative exploration and development. While its fantastic to view others work its important to not let it overwhelm and steer us.

More trees :O

Felt kinda lazy doing the four trees. So did 2 more, got it down to a one hour process from start to finish. My last two trees.

Feel like I'm doing alright in 3D, the trees could of been better as always and I did want to add some extra bits around them, but didn't know if I could/should with the texture budget.

We haven't got a 3D project over X-mas but I know I'll probably forget things if I don't try keep up with it over the break. So I'm planning to do my own project or something from the 2nd year set to keep me busy and challenged. Doing something from a later year would also give me a good chance to get ahead, so by the time we do it, it should be pretty easy.

3D - Trees and an evil bunny

I put off 3D again *sad face*. So I have been working on it for the last few days solid, the way I work best!
The fruit of my efforts has been 4 trees and an evil looking bunny.

The tree project brief only required 2 trees, but I'd given myself several days to do it, expecting some problems only to find it was relatively easy compared to the house. So I did 4, pretty quickly I might add.

Which left me with enough time to have a bash at the Guru project. I was rather disappointed with myself in regards to the guru project. I haven't been engaging in it well and ignoring it somewhat. I was pleased I got to have a go at it, but found it difficult. All projects to date have used textures that you 'plaster on', coming up with your own model meant I couldn't do that, so texturing became alot harder. I did what I could and this is the result of 1 days brain waving in 3D. I know 1 day isnt alot, but I didn't rush it I had several days to do it, that's just all it took. It could be improved but the texturing was annoying me ¬.¬

The life drain of the MMO...

So its 10-something in the morning and I've not long got up. I cleaned up the house abit, sat down to my PC to check a few things before starting 3D where I left off last night and the thought occurs. Just a few years back I would of done something very different. I, like so many others, was absorbed into the life drain of the MMO, namely World of Warcraft (WoW). A few years ago my morning would consist of, waking up, then immediately sitting at my PC to spend the entire day playing WoW. Hours, days, weeks would float by and my characters would level up and get better items, that was it.

Looking back I find it really hard to understand how or why WoW became everything I did for those years. The game in itself isn't the best or most enjoyable I've ever played and yet its the one game I've devoted the most time out of my life for, why? I'd like to know that myself.

The concern over World of Warcraft is far spread with addictions to it being contributing factors in some deaths. These people will be the extreme cases but its been estimated at least 40% of people who play WoW are addicted to it, having played it myself I would think that's a hefty understatement.

It doesn't take much looking to find news about people who've died due to causes apparently linked to WoW, like this story from the Daily Mail's website -

"An Internet computer game has been condemned as being as addictive as cocaine after a teenager who played it 24 hours non-stop had convulsions. World of Warcraft has been hugely successful in capturing the imagination of players by drawing them into a virtual universe of battles and quests.
However, it is at the centre of a growing problem of computer game addiction. Many players will sit alone in their rooms for hours at a time, immersed in the lives of their fantasy character creations - or Avatars.
Some 11milion around the globe play World of Warcraft - making it the world's most successful 'MMORPG' - massively multi-player online role-playing game. However, a report from Sweden's Youth Care Foundation describes it as 'the most dangerous game on the market'. "

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1157362/World-Of-Warcraft-addictive-crack-cocaine-teenager-suffers-convulsions-24-hour-long-game.html#ixzz1g808eX2N
The media does tend to exaggerate and overlook other factors and put more blame on something than is due, but there are websites out there to help people overcome WoW addictions and the thousands of members telling their own stories means its a wide problem. Not everyone is going to play till they die but just how does WoW manage to pull in 11 million players worldwide and keep them coming back for more?

Its a difficult thing to try understand and break down, people are going to be addicted for different reasons so all I can do is think about why I was so absorbed by it.
I was addicted to WoW pretty quickly after starting to play, I didn't know anyone else playing and didn't bother interacting with alot of the other players so it wasn't about social interaction with me to begin with. What got me was the reward system WoW uses. The way you play, quest, level up, get better stronger gear- and repeat. Then you start getting into guilds and raids and even when you are the maximum level there will always be better gear and items out there for you to get, and they don't make it easy to obtain. Even if you somehow managed to get all the best gear, your sucked into playing with guild members and helping them out and showing off how awesome your character and gear is. Then Blizzard release a new dungeon or expansion and all those months you've spent becoming the best are wasted because there is better stuff out there, and now you need to go get it! Its just never ending there will always be something you need to do or need to get inside WoW. The world in itself is massive with different races and classes to play giving it masses of re playability. With accomplishments and feats of strength to try achieve theres even more to do. I played for a few years and I didn't really scratch the surface of how much there is to actually do and complete in WoW, I never even played the Alliance faction, which is essentially half the game.

Blizzard have managed to nail WoW over the years into a perfectly formed, money generating life drain. Everyone will have their own reasons for playing WoW but the way in which it manages to addict so many of us will be the same. There are warnings to take breaks in it and the options of parental control, but we should be able to control ourselves. WoW seems to take that away from us, it plays on our weaknesses and addictive habits as humans to the point some people's lives really suffer.

I no longer play WoW, its about the time I stopped playing that my life starting moving forwards again and I went to college. I do miss WoW, being able to waste the days away questing and raiding, but life is infinitely better without it. My advice to people playing WoW, stop. My advice for people thinking of playing WoW, don't.

Interesting piece on how World of Warcraft works - http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/world-of-warcraft1.htm

Uncharted - Awesomesauce

I've recently managed to play and finish Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception and I wasn't disappointed, I thoroughly enjoyed the first two games and had been looking forward to the 3rd instalment for sometime. The Uncharted games are arguably one of my favourite gaming series of all time and are true masterpieces.

The original Drake's Fortune had stunning visuals and set the bar for third-person adventure games. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves greatly improved on that, added multiplayer and got a Game of the Year award in 2009. Uncharted 3 however has gone even further and improved on an already winning formula and manages to seamlessly merge game play and story telling.



Uncharted 2's clumsy stealth parts no longer exist. Running through levels and taking cover doesn't get old because Naughty Dog has done so much to merge the game play with the story, perfecting the pacing and making everything look fantastic in the process thanks to cutting edge graphics and excellent cinematography. The way Drake moves and acts impacts you and you can feel him more as a person than a character in a game. You struggle with him and push him up when he falls to the ground in complete exhaustion.

The characters in the game are compelling, funny, interesting and most importantly they sound and feel real. They are believable and that's so important in making a game feel enjoyable to me. The cut scenes blend with game play and you can't help but love each character, their back story and the way they banter with each other. It all makes for a thoroughly enjoyable experience that matches, if not betters that of a cinema.

Naughty Dog have nailed this game in my opinion, and looking at reviews its highly thought of by most.
"IGN defines a 10.0 -- a masterpiece -- as "the pinnacle of gaming, a masterpiece may not be flawless, but it is so exceptional that it is hard to imagine a game being better." That's Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception. From start to finish, single player to multiplayer, this game sings. The characters, the graphics, the sound, the story – they’re all top notch. If you’re willing to skip Uncharted 3, be prepared to miss one of gaming’s finest moments."
IGN Review

If you love games, you'll love Uncharted, its simply stunning.
10/10

Moving forward.

So we had another review just 2 short weeks after our first. The first assessment was somewhat of a shock to everyone but highlighted just what was going wrong. Over the last two weeks I feel I've made some positive changes and altered the mindset I approach work in. Not calling it work is a good start. 'Work' immediately implies its something you don't want to do, its effort and hard, its work. I don't want to see the course this way because it wont be as enjoyable and I'm therefore less likely to do my best at it. I want to enjoy the course and do well and I think that's what I'm doing.

I've spent the last two weeks drawing mostly, visual design is my weakest area and that's been highlighted in my assessment. I think I've improved since the beginning of the course but I still have a way to go. I've been doing still life sessions most days, doing a series of quick 1 to 5 minute sketches followed by a single longer piece. I've also spent several days at the space centre, our drawing assignment for the week. I wasn't really sure what to draw and starting looking to other things that caught my interest to sketch, like the people around and the cafe or gift shop. I have improved my mark to adequate for visual design, which I'm pleased about but I know I need to spend more time practising to get that up further.

I was really pleased with my mark for 3D. I put alot of effort into my building project and think I did well at it. There are still areas I could improve and should of. Although the project has been marked I'd like to add more to the model during the Christmas break to make it more interesting. I will also have the freedom to add as much detail as I like because I won't have to worry about the tri limit and I can try some other features/methods out. I think 3D is probably my strongest area at the moment and I think with more practice and understanding I could get really good at it. Just need to stick with it and do more things with it, even if they aren't part of any projects!

I'm also pleased with my critical studies mark. I've been doing more blogs and enjoying them but I know I could still do more. I'm going to try not forget to write about stuff and keep things flowing and up to date and I'll hopefully keep the marks going up to.



So the x-mas break is coming up soon. Alot of people are going to be looking forward to going home and having fun. Although I will be going home for X-mas day and boxing day I'm still going to be working. I'm not really considering the holiday time as a break but just time we aren't in University. I'm still going to keep up drawing, 3D and blogs. I find it difficult to not do stuff when I know I probably should be and I'm not a fan of Christmas anyway! So hopefully I'll use the time well and improve as much as possible. There is alot of things I want to get done over the break including revisiting alot of the 2D from the first 6 weeks and improving on them. Maybe play some games as well! :D