A LITTLE INFORMATION ABOUT ME

I currently live in the UK in North Cheshire with my wife Pam and two boys, Jack and Josh. I moved here in 2005 having spent almost a year finding the right property and selling my old house.

I needed a house with enough room for us all but also the potential to create a home studio. Although I've always had a dedicated art room for myself in every house I've owned but in the new house I wanted something more. The new house had a double garage joined to the house and accessed from the kitchen.

It was exactly what I needed to create my first real studio space. We moved in in the July of 2005 and in August we went on a family holiday to Bulgaria. I handed my plans and my house keys to a builder and left him to it. We came back two weeks later to a converted 20"x20" studio with a window, spotlights, a laminate wooded floor, 35 power socket with their own feed and 18" of Book/DVD shelving. Paradise in four walls!



Although Artwork does not provide me with me sole income it is a huge part of me and I have always needed a creative outlet of some type. Have my own studio allows me to work on whatever projects come my way in a relaxed, spacious environment that is only 25 feet from my Kitchen. Who could ask for more!

Why did you create subdivisionmodeling.com

Sub-D.com came about when I became dissatisfied with the gap in the market for a digital sculpting forum that would welcome new and inexperienced modelers. I had spent a lot of time at ZBrush central and Spiriloid but I wanted more from a forum. There are a few excellent forums like the ubiquitous CGTalk and a plethora of Software specific forums (in fact, one for every 3D program on the market)
The feedback is often that these sites, although inspiring, are not always `newbie friendly`. Sub-D Welcomes new modelers and sculptors with open arms and provides unbiased recommendations about the right program, plug-in or tool.

A LITTLE HISTORY


I started dabbling with computer art in about `93 with an Amiga 1200. I can still remember thinking how great it was having a palette of 256 colors in Deluxe Paint. I cut my 3D teeth on the Amiga as well using `Imagine`. My first PC was a 4meg 486 and I started using PC Paintbrush. I always thought that software was odd as they gave away a tin of pencils with the disks? Contradiction in terms really! I have always illustrated for pleasure and started college doing commercial graphics but became disillusioned with the whole scene very quickly and decided to take another career route. The first bite at serious software came with my DX2 66 and Paintshop Pro. That, coupled with a co lour dot-matrix printer seemed like a revolution compared with the Amiga. I produced a CD cover for an ISP with Paintshop pro and thought I had hit the big-time. Looking at it now I could do it in ten minutes.

Back then I taught myself how to hand code html and as things have developed it has proved a very useful skill. Every week I throw together demo pages for people and upload pages of on-going projects. I have used Photoshop since version 4 and still use the old 3DS4 (dos). I often do a run of work with Bryce and every now and then I have a dabble with Poser 3. Last year I was given a demo of Pixologics ZBrush and for some reason I took to it immediately. I think the combination or 2D and 3D fits my quick-fire style and lets me see results with hours not days. At first I struggled to grasp the concept of modeling an object, placing it in a document window but then not being able to adjust it's position again. It was radically different than the software that I had been used to. I started to post my feeble attempts on a ZBrush forum and was well received from day one. Unlike other forums I was encouraged to post my work whatever the standard. So I did.

Within weeks Pixologic contacted me and asked me to join their beta testers and gave me the next version of the software and said go for it.... so I did! I had to keep posting and asking questions, how do layers work in ZBrush? How do I light a model correctly? One guy who really helped me went by the pseudonym of `Pixolator`. He set the benchmark for me back then and I was determined to learn some of his techniques. I contacted him privately and asked how he got glossy lips on his images, how did he make the eyes so well. He helped me by email and by posting tutorials on the forums. Earlier this year Pixologic started the `Zbrush Central` forum run exclusively by Pixologic staff and their software creator Ofer Alon who it turned out, was Pixolator! Helped by the master all along! I have now produced 150+ images in Zbrush and I am fairly competent at producing quality images that use some of the amazing features found in the program. I would say one of the most powerful features of the program (and believe me there are many) is modeling. You can take a default sphere and within minutes mould it into what ever you can imagine. The modeling is done in an `edit` mode that keeps the sphere live and shows your modifications in real-time. You can `pull` a nose out of a head and then indent the nostril holes. Follow this by subtly raising the edges around the holes and you have a perfect nose. It is hard to describe how responsive the software is but I would say it is the easiest modeling tool I have ever used. Add to this that the latest versions export and import DXF (3DS) and OBJ (Light wave) formats and you have one powerful piece of kit. It is the kind of application that is very hard to label. OTHER APP is where you normally find it in On-line graphic sites.

I have found a spirit of helpfulness and camaraderie attached to this software that is unusual in the graphic forums I have visited in the past. New users aren't afraid to post work as the criticism is always supportive, helpful or informative (telling where to find a tutorial to help with a problem). I still feel that there is a lot for me to learn about ZBrush but it is always fun and fast.