Toy Thief 3

I've been working diligently on the model for the Toy Thief character as often as possible. Ideally, I'd like to begin sculpting details in ZBrush before the week is up. The head is about 99% finished, minus a few tweaks here and there. Tonight, I worked on developing the look of his torn and tattered Victorian style clothing. He's showing a little chest now! 

The next part of the project will involve building the various gadgetry that he carries on him. Look for an update on that soon! For now, have another look at the thief!

Toy Thief 02

I don't have much to report on today, except to say that progress on the Toy Thief is moving along slowly, but surely. Take a look at the head.

Talk soon!

I'm Still Alive

OK. I know it's been a long time since I posted last, but 2016 has been an unexpectedly busy year for me. What have I been up to since March? Well, besides my 8-5 job, and a few freelance logo design projects that I took on, I've mainly been focusing on rebranding myself.

I designed a new logo for myself for the first time in 6 years, and I killed my old website and redesigned my new one, which you may view here: www.NickStephas.work.

An author friend of mine named D.W. Gillespie (http://www.dwgillespie.com/)has given me the privilege of reading some of his yet-to-be-published horror novels. One in particular captured my imagination. It's called "Where Toys Go." There is a monster in the book that I found to be quite unique, and after reading the book, I felt inspired to bring it to life as a 3D animated character. So, the cyborg woman from my last post has yet again been put on hold, but the good news is that I'm already well into development of this new character, called the "Toy Thief."

I've almost completed his base mesh. Check out a preview below.

It may look weird now, but trust me, it will all make sense in time.

3D Character Creation-Resurrecting an Unfinished Project.

A few years ago, I created some conceptual art for a character that I ultimately wanted to realize as an animated 3D model. Life got in the way, and the project was placed on hold. Now that I'm back in the workshop and ready to produce new characters, I've decided to finish what I started.

She doesn't have an official name or backstory yet, but I'm working on that too. Here's some concept art that I made:

Finished Rock Model

Here is the finished rock model that I created using Zbrush, Maya and Photoshop.

Book Cover Digital Painting

I recently did a digital painting for a friend of mine who’s also an author of horror stories. 

Check out his work here: 

http://www.dwgillespie.com/

Sculpting Rocks 2

In attempting to sculpt rocks, I've come to appreciate just how much variety rocks can have. The nicks, cuts, peaks and valleys come together to tell a tale; the story of the rock's journey and the land it hails from. I'm surprised and a little overwhelmed by how much responsibility I have as an artist in making sure the rock's story is accurate and easily understood.

Here's a quick render of a work in progress.

I'm back!

Sorry to keep you waiting!

This blog has been closed for repairs for more than two years, but I'm happy to report that today is the grand reopening! 

Since I've been away from ZBrush for so long, I wanted to start with a small project to get the juices flowing. So, I've been sculpting some rocks. Yes, I know; it's not the most exciting project ever, but consider this an appetizer before the smorgasbord!

 First, I created 7 cubes in Maya. Simple enough!

 I exported those cubes as a .OBJ file, and imported them into ZBrush.

 It's good to be back! I activated the Dynamesh feature so that ZBrush would update my models with higher resolution geometry, if I requested it.

 Doing 7 rocks at once takes a lot of time. I was looking at photos of real rocks for reference.

Brushes used: Claybuildup, Claytubes, Flatten, Pinch, hPolish, TrimAdaptive, Trimdynamic, Trimsmoothborder and move. This is a work in progress. Stay tuned for the final product!