introduction
Hi, I’m Ngan, a student from Vietnam currently pursuing the Digital Production Certificate Program at Gnomon School of Visual Effects. My interests in this field are character art, hard surfaces, and concept design. The project I’ll be presenting in this article, “Finding Rhythm in the Rigid,” is my first exploration of these three areas.
Before learning 3D, I was a self-taught 2D artist. My first experience with 3D was in 2022 when I created an environment blockout in Blender to take a screenshot of and paint over. Back then, everything I did in 3D was just to create a more solid perspective or anatomical foundation for my 2D artwork.
However, when I learned about Gnomon School in a YouTube video, I dove deep into 3D art and found that this field – which requires both artistic and technical skills – was a better fit for me. During the six-month period of creating my application portfolio for Gnomon, I started to take 3D more seriously. I learned other programs on my own, such as ZBrush, Substance 3D Painter, Marvelous Designer, and Arnold. It was a very difficult process, being on my own and using all the resources I could find online, but the challenges only convinced me that this path was worth pursuing.
I think my background in traditional art has helped me a lot in all my 3D projects – it has given me an artistic standard and helped me with the composition, anatomy and personality of my artworks. On the other hand, I welcome the challenges of 3D software and always try to learn as much as possible down to the basics, because more knowledge frees up my artistic vision.
