In this video, Waylon Brinck teaches the fundamentals of creating materials in the Unreal Development Kit. Waylon begins by showing examples of what s possible to create in Unreal, then dives directly into the basic features of the editor. With an eye on developing a deep fundamental understanding of the tools, Waylon covers a variety of progressively more advanced features, with plenty of examples along the way. You ll also receive a brief introduction to more advanced features like vector math and reflections, as well as performance optimization. Whether you re new to material creation in general, or just new to Unreal, this video contains everything you need to get up to speed quickly.

In this DVD, Alessandro Cangelosi introduces you to the different techniques needed for realistic architectural visualization, creating procedural naturalistic environment, scripting, and secondary effects such as depth of field and volumetric light. He tells the story of a procedural modeling, shading, lighting, scene management by mental ray, as well as about the final unification of rendered passes through Autodesk Combustion and Composite, (aka Toxik), and all for the sake of photo realistic look. Alessandro also explains how you can effectively control the imaging setup using MAXScript, with the possibility of add the necessary tools in the manufacturing process.

This comprehensive introduction to animal anatomy is for artists who want to draw authentic-looking animals from their imagination. Marshall demonstrates that the core of this skill is in knowing animal bones and muscles, constructing them as three-dimensional forms, and practicing these disciplines until they become easy enough to let your impulses take over. He uses hundreds of drawings to show the major components of various animals, how their anatomy works, and how to draw them so that they look anatomically authentic, solid and alive. 3D artists looking to enhance their understanding of basic animal form and motion will also benefit from Marshall's presentation.

In this DVD, Neville offers alternative approaches to developing ideas, specifically for character concept development. There are times you want to approach a project with great specificity and then other times you want to put aside presumption and allow for it to happen to you. This DVD explores a few approaches to fostering happy accidents and ways to efficiently see quickly. Neville begins in Photoshop , very quickly sketching random shapes and areas of value to "find" an image within. After discovering an intriguing image, he takes it to near completion, revealing the importance of staying open to new ideas as he develops a creature. From there he explores the same ideas for head and creature development using ZBrush's mirroring tool. Finally, he finishes with a sculpted ZBrush "sketch" showing ways to keep creativity alive while working in 3D.

In this DVD, Stephen Platt covers how to create a fully penciled page from beginning to end. He begins with exploration in the thumbnail stage and enlarges the chosen rough thumbnail using a photocopier and lightbox. During the course of the demo, Stephen shows how he indicates change in form, graduated shadows, texture and mass, all while maintaining a dramatic graphic expression. In addition, he discusses industry conventions as well as advice on portfolios and earning a living in professional comics.