Pathways to improvement - Alex Zelenski

**bopx** · May 7th, 2012, 05:28 AM

nice sketchbook start. For crits on your most recent still life, i think you have a good idea of color, but you need to work on making your edges sharper and more defined, because right now it just looks like a blurry photo lol

**Alex.Zelenski** · May 10th, 2012, 08:36 PM

little 3d piece im working on - its going to have a grave yard, fog, trees, grass, dirt, well all kinda stuff,im going for kinda a witch house - hopefully i can pull it off.

Loomis practice with some random skull helmet thing, not sure. BUT studying loomis is so boriing..

some progress shots of the castle drawing I did - just figured id post it, to see if there was anything you guys could point out - and well i think process shots are really cool

**Alex.Zelenski** · May 13th, 2012, 02:13 PM

**Alex.Zelenski** · May 13th, 2012, 09:36 PM

=D super improvements (in my opinion) any comments or critiques or ideas

**Alex.Zelenski** · May 15th, 2012, 05:54 PM

Tutorial work -

updated house -

**Alex.Zelenski** · May 27th, 2012, 12:11 AM

starting a revision process. Taking everyones feedback and my own and getting ready to kick some ass!

**Alex.Zelenski** · May 27th, 2012, 10:37 PM

*cross post from my showcase thread*

Well for some reason the vray camera is making the image a little weird. Not sure why. BUT getting closer to the finished (or workable finished product) Im doing a high poly model to learn some different modeling techniques. I wont texture this because of the poly count and besides, before I even think about texturing I need to learn how to model efficiently. I still have A TON to learn. Im glad I have the opportunity to learn such a great program. Thank you autodesk for providing this software for free.

.

Next steps are
1. randomize the roof and siding a little
2. add a bit of damage and disrepair to it
3. Put siding on the front and back
4. Model the fence
5. Dog house
6. Grass and dirt paths
7. Effects on house.
8. Ultra low poly neighbors houses
9. Greeble a city in the background
10. Side walk out side of fence
11. Misc details (dog bone, curtains in windows, ball in yard, old chair, picnic table in yard?)
12. Stylize? - Maybe not.
13. Set up the final production lights and camera paths
14. Do turn table like animation and a few high resolution stills to capture the details and finalize the project
15. Ask you to pass on the final work?

- free marketing

**kdiegert** · May 28th, 2012, 01:55 AM

Originally Posted by Alex.Zelenski

before I even think about texturing I need to learn how to model efficiently.

NOOOO!!!1!

Going to have to disagree, particularly for game art. Get in there and get texturing! You need to understand how everything connects together. You can do all sorts of work with textures to create the illusion of geometry.

How much do you know about game art tech?

Your witch house is looking awesome, but for game art efficiency is half the battle. There's pretty much no way you'd get to make each shingle on the roof as geo. Maybe you could do a few as geo around the edges to get the silhouette nice, but the rest you'd have to do with textures. You'd have to bake that shingle geo down to a normal map, I'd think.

If you're serious about game art, my advice would be to get yourself a copy of UDK, and get your models in-engine!

Now you have an excuse to play games! See if you can figure out how all the assets in your favorite games are built.

games 4 lyfe.

**Alex.Zelenski** · June 15th, 2012, 11:02 AM

My first attempt at a 3d abstract wallpaper

. It didnt really turn out how I had thought it would, but I like it

. No tutorials

A print/advertisement design I did

a redo of an older deviation, without the tutorial this time

did this for a friend

and well he liked it. There isnt much to it. Just kinda thought it looked cool. I need to start doing game dev. art

a 3d scene done with the help of a tutorial. This really helped me learn a lot about modeling. I learned some new techniques that are going towards making my newest model - a G36c

messing with the materials of the original image.

Sorry about my absence, I was busy with school work and everything.

cant wait to get posting again

**Alex.Zelenski** · June 17th, 2012, 07:16 PM

**Alex.Zelenski** · June 17th, 2012, 11:37 PM

My drawing skill sucks.. its nowhere near how good I should be. I've decided to set down the 3d stuff and strictly work on drawing and painting and all that. I will hopefully be getting a job and well the money I get from that will be going towards another pen tablet

. A bamboo one at first, to have one and then a new laptop and then the intous or cintiq

.

Pretty much, im setting down the mouse and picking up the pencil/pen/brush.

lets do this thing.

**Kweckduck** · June 18th, 2012, 02:10 AM

Dude, I LOVE the 3D stuff. What program are you using for that?
Your perspective stuff is pretty solid, needs some polishing, but that will come over time.
As for the anatomy stuff, go through the Loomis books ( http://alexhays.com/loomis/ ) and you'll see some major improvements.

**Alex.Zelenski** · June 25th, 2012, 01:23 AM

WIP of my most recent drawing - nemesis from resident evil

pastels

life drawing from 3 manikins

facial planes study

SO MUCH WRONG!

call of duty drawing - didnt really put a lot of time into this. If i would have, this would have been amazing

life drawing of some foam shapes

**Alex.Zelenski** · June 30th, 2012, 01:23 PM

**Alex.Zelenski** · July 3rd, 2012, 10:21 AM

Anatomy is hard! Does anyone have any good anatomy recommendations that I could learn from? Right now I have Andrew Loomis's Figure drawing book and I like it, but with this being the first time i actually am attempting to draw a figure.. well i suck. Im going to stick with it and hopefully get better at it but I was wondering if there were any other things that break down the figure to an even more simplified version

**Alex.Zelenski** · July 8th, 2012, 11:09 PM

Some sort of monitor creature with a console attached to its lower section and a lighted information console in front of it. Later I plan on developing this a little further.

**Alex.Zelenski** · July 9th, 2012, 06:31 PM

I got some simple advice that I figured I would have known already - keep fairly tight line work if you arent going to render it out that much. Im shocked that it makes such a big difference. Thanks for the tip. Now I do realize that this is still incredibly rough, but I like the concept. I feel like playing with this a little more.

**Alex.Zelenski** · July 9th, 2012, 11:44 PM

90 day life improvement . Among other things, filling two pages of my sketchbook everyday for 90 days. todays topic - rabits. xD

**Alex.Zelenski** · July 10th, 2012, 10:40 PM

Getting sketches in for today

.

**Alex.Zelenski** · July 17th, 2012, 12:40 AM

**Alex.Zelenski** · July 21st, 2012, 12:17 AM

NEWS! And drawing give away announcement

Hey guys, guess what? I am getting a new pen tablet. Yes thats right! Alex Zelenski can finally get around to doing some actual artwork again. And I can really push myself. Instead of screwing around on facebook I can be streaming some artwork. I need ways to get people to my streams. Which will be the hard part. :/. Time to start networking I guess. Anyways the tablet will be here in roughly 6 days.

Till then I will be drawing something that I plan on spending the entire 6 days on - Cathulu - the squid guy a lot of people like. If enough people like the idea and if someone is interested in it- I might be willing to give it away. To show me that you like the idea (and to get some free networking) The only thing I ask, is you share this post on facebook, twitter, google plus. Something. Just help me get my name out there. If you share it on anything - just leave a message or something letting me know.

**poetry man** · July 21st, 2012, 01:06 AM

Your 3d work is cool.Are you aiming for video games or film/tv with that? As for your traditional art, the drive to succeed will determine your competence level. The higher you want to aim, the better you'll get basically. I think an important thing to start working on at this stage is line quality. That alone will work wonders. I personally say, get rid of all the squiggly efforts. Some people take years to get it away, others stick with it. I'm not saying it's a bad thing- it can add some nice atmosphere, but generally, it screws up a lot of awesome effort- so just aim for line quality and you've got a good step in the game. I think there was a thread on here with general art tips that a bunch of people put their share in. It was real inspirational, don't know if it still exists, but search for it man. And GO FOR IT!!

**Alex.Zelenski** · July 21st, 2012, 01:50 AM

Originally Posted by poetry man

Your 3d work is cool.Are you aiming for video games or film/tv with that? As for your traditional art, the drive to succeed will determine your competence level. The higher you want to aim, the better you'll get basically. I think an important thing to start working on at this stage is line quality. That alone will work wonders. I personally say, get rid of all the squiggly efforts. Some people take years to get it away, others stick with it. I'm not saying it's a bad thing- it can add some nice atmosphere, but generally, it screws up a lot of awesome effort- so just aim for line quality and you've got a good step in the game. I think there was a thread on here with general art tips that a bunch of people put their share in. It was real inspirational, don't know if it still exists, but search for it man. And GO FOR IT!!

I dont really do 3d anymore. I just want to focus on 2d concept and development art for game and film. I want this more than anything in the world right now (just ask my angry girlfriend xD). And I will strive for better line work

. Thanks for the hint - long smooth strokes