Breakdown of 30 Minute sketch

enough of you have asked, so here's a very simple breakdown
1. grad for sky and water
2. marquee tool for land shape and basic brush with scatter for texture
3. flip layer for reflection, set to overlay
4. light and shadow, transform to match mass better
5. water, reflection and ripples (basic round, squashed with scatter)
6. waves, soft edges and a little value adjustment

MORE 30 MINUTES STUDIES

the latest quick studies. the water brush i made worked well. it's just a flattened round with scatter. most of the "custom" brushes just have a little scatter used. in 30 minutes i think perspective is what suffers most but that's not what i'm aiming for with these.

Art of Uncharted 2

Ballistic releases the long awaited concept art book to the game of the year title. we're all really proud of how well the game and book came out. there's also an interview with yours truly here to tie in with the release. thanks Ballistic! great job :)

PLAYIN' in the sandbox

I spent a few hours exploring the Sandbox feature in Sketchup this
weekend after reading this book. Sketchup has again shown what a
powerful simple tool it is. Now it's not going to be as robust as
Zbrush or Mudbox but it is a nice terrain modeler with a few hidden
features.
The first is changing the area of influence

but you can also select

points

lines

surfaces

and multiple selections of each.

So, you can model with the circular brush or pick only what you want to shape.

Here's a simple mountain I made. Again, other programs are going to
have a lot more perameters to work with but this , like the whole
program, has lots of hidden power.

Work in progress

Here's a little something I cooked up over the weekend. It's been awhile since I worked on something more design oriented. Kinda nice. I'm really pushing what can be done with paths. Here's a close up of just one section. No deadline on this. Just seeing what can be learned from taking things farther. Which is a lot actually.

30 minute studies

i recently started doing these 30 minute studies. they are from photos but no photo textures or actual photo images are in the studies. the purpose is to capture the essentials as quickly as possible. i'm trying to get the big impression of realism so that at first glance it seems convincing. as i do more of these i'll publish some comprehensive tutorials on what i'm discovering. stay tuned :)

HIGHWAY BOT

he waits......but for what? a quick sketch started Sunday night. wish the book wasn't at the printers...oh well, next book :)

SKETCHBOOK FOR COMIC CON

i haven't been posting as much lately but it's all for a good cause. i've been putting this together! it's in China now. more details as they come =)

Uncharted 2 wins again!

we've had phenomenal success with the DICE Awards and Game Developers Choice awards. i even got a quote!

Latest Tutorial online

just finished another informative tutorial for the great folks over at 3D Total. head over to take a look...

2 More OILS

red rock nevada and altadena california. the brush work on the red rock painting is starting to feel "right"

CG Unit shout out

thanks to CG Unit for the shout out. a daily source of visual inspiration!
http://www.cgunit.net/2010/02/robh-ruppel.html
http://www.cgunit.net/

in Depth Tutorial

head on over the 3D Total for a look into the making of Steampunk Village.

Another Award from 3D Total !

thanks again to 3 D total for their award of excellence. i've made a step by step tutorial for the Steampunk Village and am working on one for this image as well. i'll let you know when it's available and posted on their site!

STEAMPUNK-update

based on the quick demo i did at Gnomon. worked on it over my break...and yes, i consider that relaxing. i want to take more paintings even farther than this one. just scratching the surface. added my block in for anonymous