Ratchet and Clank Bits and Pieces

Here are a few of the many things that I worked on for Ratchet and Clank: A Crack in Time (RCF2). I had a lot of fun working closely with Darren, Carlo and the rest of the art department, and learned more about art and design then I could have imagined. I'll put more up on a website... when i make one... Have a good day!

Boom Boom

So this is sort of practice for doing useful weapons. I 'll updated this post when i do some mods and attachments for this, which are planned, but lack of time means not right now. This was fun for various reasons, mostly wondering around holding my arms up like i was holding the rifle, and making shooting sounds. For now I'll just say that I imagine the piece in front of the clip on the underside can be removed and a cart with a larger caliber can be attached. I will no doubt do more in the near future, take care!

The Forest Den

Hello again. This is me shifting gears to try something new. I experimented with painting with pattern 'brushes' and such. Early on in this I lost the original sketch, and some how got to distracted by all the craziness to fix the bendy roots and trees. Fortunately I am viewing this as a painting exercise , and not a design exercise . Having said that I kinda like it. Though I have 'painted' in the past, I had generally made more rigid design choices in the forms before. This is one of the first ones where I just let the forms find themselves after the original sketch, which was just a bunch of squiggly lines. Originally I had planned to put various creatures in some sort of festival throughout it. Since I didn't include them in the original sketch or painting, i could see it getting messy fast. Not to mention its time to put this down. It was fun while it lasted , time to move onto something new!


Otherwise things are good, starting my second year at Insomniac. The first was pretty epic, no doubt the next will continue the trend. I am very thankful and fortunate to be in a place with ridiculous artists and teachers. Also the kitchen is pretty sweet too. aha!

Also good luck to all you SCAD students who just started the winter quarter! I hope all those out here and Cali where able to sign up for Concept Design Academy classes before they filled up!

Until Next time!

-Colin

Into The Future!

Well It has been a little bit since I posted something. I've been noodling on this sketch off and on this past week. Its time to put it down. I though it would be a fun break from other things going on. Intuous 3/CS3

In other news Ratchet and Clank a Crack in Time has been out since late October. I've played through the whole thing myself and its very entertaining. For the first time I've been on the other side of development, and have been able to see some things I, and others designed. I was able to work some amazing talent during the project in-house as well as contract. A trend that will continue into the future!

In the mean time, heres some more doodles:

This guy was suppose to be up with the last batch:

First CS4 Sketch:

CS3 is fine.




"Pen Sketches"

So I've mentioned here and there that I often do a lot of pen sketches. For these I used a uniball Pen on straight printer paper. These doodles occupied time in between work and fun. I've filled up many pages, but have no aquired a small sketchbook to keep with me so I can keep things focused. For these I just corrected a few lines in photoshop, as well as erased some of the excess so you can actually see the lines that matter, as well as added some light sources so the forms are more apparent.

That's it for now... more stuff to come soon. Happy Holidays Everyone! Travel Safe!




:D

Sketch Dump and Other News

Multi-Purpose Mech

Fat Plane

Deep Research

Space Cargo

Semi Plane



Bonus!
Rocket Bee

Small Carrier

Hey everyone! So it has been quite some time since I posted. Things have been pretty busy at work, as at the end of next month we release our game!! In the mean time, as things have been winding down, I've had some time here and there to study various art and machinery and things. Finding some time here and there over the last few weeks ive done some sketching, of the sketching these got a layer of value and some clean up.

My favorite is definitly 'Fat Plane' . He started as a very quick scribble and turned into .. pretty much what the scribble was. Since I've been doing so much drawing at work, and of course being around insainly good artists / co workers, ive been able to take many things ive learned and put them into sketching and drawing in general. We dont have forever to do something at work, so thinking quickly and producing something that is legiable, and tells a story on its own is key. I have really gotten into sketching ideas out in pen, and then re drawing them digitally, pen means less chance for chance, more focused thought. Though all of these where digital (intous 3 action), I had a shape or subject in mind when i started, and as soon as a half decent shape was present it was done, just layered on some details and functionality and tada! Fat Plane!


Ratchet and Clank!


I also need to give a shout out to the awesome team I work with! Our concept team, and art team, and everyone else in the company has done a great job in bringing the game together! I have learned far more then I ever thought I would in an insainly short amount of time. Go team Insomniac!

Heres a trailer that pretty much demonstrights the amount of awesome that goes into making a game like this:

Video Games | Ratchet & Clank Future: CT | PAX 09: Weapons Trailer

XBox 360 | Playstation 3 | Nintendo Wii

Also this on is my favorite:

Video Games | Ratchet & Clank Future: CT | GC 09: Clank's Destiny Trailer

XBox 360 | Playstation 3 | Nintendo Wii

Kudos to our animation team for that one! totally awesome.

I am also very excited for the host of other games coming out this fall, though who knows when I'll have time to play them as I plan on taking another class, and drawing, a lot.

Good Night and Good luck!

-Colin

Another

Another one for now... hopefully ill get more done before an upcoming trip. This was pretty fun. I already have another few sketched out, we'll see what i can get done.

SCAD STUDENTS - GOOD LUCK ON YOUR FINALS!!!! and goodluck to everyone else in general.

This week...

So this weekend Khang Le gave a lecture/demo at the Concept Design Academy. I had originally done some other peices for my class with James Paick. After Khang's demo I scrapped them and started two new ones. It was a combination of burst of creativity as well as oh man Khang is awesome. I might rehash parts of the other two at this point, but for now this is good enough.

Until nextime, goodnight!

Back In Class

Im taking Jame's Paicks class again to get a better grasp of the subject matter. This term he is having us move much faster then before. So far so good, the first one was slightly revised after an in class crit/draw over he did.

Other then that things at work are going well. I really enjoy what im doing, as well as everyone i work with. Take care!

AWESOMENESS!

Hello everyone! for those who don't know, about 4 weeks ago started at Insomniac Games as an Associate Concept Artist. This is basically a junior level concept artist position. It has so far been totally amazing. I know I really lucked out, though it was the result of lots of sacrifice, moving to LA, taking several months of classes, and no clear outcome in site. Fortunately, it more then paid off. I am very happen where I am, and have some amazing talent around me to learn from. Jackpot. Really though it is very fun, they have you hit the ground running, and its been both exciting and relatively manageable. I now get paid to draw all day, specifically scifi oriented stuff. Dream job achieved!

You can do anything you want, if you are ready to find out what you need to know, and what you need to do, and then go do those things.


And Now here's some sketches I've been doodling, I mostly do them for fun now:






Also Happy new year everyone! have fun!!

Old Town

So This is something i started last two weekend ago, but wasnt really able to work on it or other things since my computer died. A a week, and a new computer, later, ive made some ehadywa on it. Probably lots more little things to do, but for now here it is. Also here is the basic sketch where it started.


And here are a few quick sketches, just to keep my mind working in between the longer works.

Also, HAPPY THANKSGIVING! Im currently working on some revisions on older works, trying to bring them up a notch based on peer and instructor crits. You can only do better.

Valley of the Ancients

Started it yesterday, finished it last night. So far there are no photos in there. So i guess its more of a straight up painting. Lord of the Rings-ish for sure. I might go back and add textures/folieage. This was originally going to be one of the 'Overgrown' series, but i wanted to see what it looked like without plants. Though one could say the castle is fairly overgrown. I imagin it was carved out of the rock, and then they added to it.




Heres where it started. I think i made a good choice by changing the color scheme.

Overgrown# 2

"The Lost Land"

This one was fun. Originally there was to be a space ship flying through this environment, following the river. I replaced that with some flying critters, and a raptor. At that point it changed into "lost land". More so a reference to the old Turok Games for n64. Id like to see them return to a place like this. No pictures where used as they are, except for maybe some fo the surface of the water. Everything else is mashed up and as it was originally.

I'd visit this place.


Also, heres the Sketch where it started:


When you look at both of them small like this it looks like i didn't do too much. hah.

Overgrown #1

This is one of several I hope to do for this weekend; assuming i have time with all my other work. I am pleased with how this one turned out. Its some sort of ruins on an alien world. This sort of combines two ideas from my sketches from yesterday, towers that seem to support something massive, and the sort of open thing. Though in the sketches i had a light coming from within. I might add a subtle amount of light later, but for now its fine as is.

Some Progress

I have been able to work a little more on this space. I plan to go back in when theres time and mess with my mark making so its not as systematic. Most likely by adding in some photo textures. It is very easy to get lost in color.


No these guys are technically "Color Sketches 3" But they are different in that they where done straight up just painting. I had a vague idea of what i was looking for eaith each one before I started, and i tried to get there as fast as possible by blocking in shapes, and adding a couple details here and there. Cutting out the whole photo thing really saves a lot of time. If I could id just like to be able to a ton of these a day. Unfortunately this wasn't even part of an assignment and was just experimentation, so I'll have to work a little extra now on the actual stuff. hah. Though not directly for my current assignment, these will serve as some idea for the direction of color and composition I'll be going in next. The theme word for these is 'Overgrown" .








until next time, peace.

Dragon

So this is another one of these shiny cars. Mostly a study of rendering the surface. As with all of these I've been working over quick sketches, sort of sculpting the detail with the rendering. Because of the amount of work I have this guys going to stay how he is until I have the time to tweek all the little things, and give him proper rims.

Push Bot Sketch

He can only push forward. He can't even turn his head. The upgraded version can pull backwards.




A quickish render over a sketch that wasn't going to get developed any further. He is symmetrical so your not missing anything. hah.

Coffee Shop

So this guy went from start to finish in a coffee shop. He isnt as well designed as his predacessor, which will stand through now matter how I try to render him, but for all the distractions he came out pretty well. He suffers from lack of continuity between shapes, and some car related proportional issues. He's sort of 'curvy muscle' but not in the cool way. Though at this point I am still more focused on learning this rendering process. I learned from this to never color your object the same color as the sky, then it doesn't stand out as well against the sky. haha.

I am in a coffee shop because I woke up this morning to the sound of water filling something up. I jumped up and realized that my ceiling light fixture was filling with water. I ran to get my land lord, and then waited there for a short while, trying to hold up the light fixture so it didnt fall and shatter, dumping the water everywhere (which wound up happening anyway). Long story short the power is still off in my room while they are working on fixing the problem. So I became uber behind on my work, thus tried to draw and render a car at a coffee shop. Once again, I think under the circumstances it turned out ok, haha. If and when I get to go home I will try another one.

peace.

*Edit* so this looks way different on my monitor at home compared to my laptop. oops. haah.

Speed Demon

This was sort of a focused render practice I did after watching a demo from a professor. I broke down his process and was able to replicate it on a vehicle of my own design. I also took a few steps more to completion since I had more time then the demo , though he was able to get really far really fast, hopefully with a few more practice rounds I'll be as fast. Side note, this is actually a really hardcore version of a car I designed last summer, which I think i drew subconciously. As with the portraits this wasn't looking so hot in the beginning, but given the time to figure things out I think it came together pretty well.

All photoshop, hopefully the first of many in this style.

Irony

"I'm not impressed" said the raccoon.

Someone said this would be a funny picture. They where right.

More Color!

I spent a lot longer then i wanted to on this one. Originally it was one of the color sketches, but I kept fiddling with it. I think i got too caught up in the fiddling on details, working in isolated areas and didnt always check to make sure what i was doing was working for everything else. It looks pretty good small (and from a distance) so I im happy with it.



Here is a a little preview of another thing im working on. I blocked out all the colors and composition pretty quickly, and now its just a matter of deciding on what level to take it to. If i have time hopefully I can finish it early this coming week.






This has definitely been a very busy, productive week. One of many to come.