GduX.me | Making of MonStars remastered with Damon Woods

[Music] so as we're talking through this and for people who are tuning in and we don't have to go through a whole overview of what's happening right now you know one of the biggest aspects of you kind of taking a content and reimagining it it uh i think it takes a lot of the planning uh i feel like a lot of personal projects at least for me it gets very difficult right to go in there and and just take the first steps right so at least having something starting with some kind of fan art right uh inspiration to draw from uh to kind of carry through and and and and kind of reference right really helps especially as a 3d artist

i think concept guys have a lot better time doing this but like as a concept 3d artist you're doing a lot of 3d content to kind of get the wheels turning to kind of get the wheels going right so um you were kind of mentioning 3d concepting and and that is one of your focus point for doing this type of project uh were you always doing that before or is this something a new type of process that you you really wanted to nail this time around um actually yeah like it's 3d concepting is always that was actually my um my first uh like introduction to zbrush um when i first started using zbrush at the time i actually wanted to be a concept artist i was in school for it um well i was in school for concept artists i actually uh i went to the art institute they didn't have a concept art program um so all the people at that school that wanted to be concept artists they would just get together after school's over and find a classroom and just start

drawing start sketching start you know sharing tips and tricks with each other watching videos and doing whatever they could to level up they actually called the concept club um and i was kind of like on i was kind of like on riding the fence at that time because i was um an animation major and i was really getting into modeling um i really liked uh using 3ds max and modeling hard surface stuff and then finally i took a zbrush class this was like towards the end of my time there was like a year three and i really just loved it i picked up immediately i remember i really loved sculpting with clay before that and i just loved how fast you could iterate and um prototype things in zbrush um you know you're not married to topology and stuff like that so i would just kind of absorb that and so that was kind of my uh first kind of step into it and so after school i started just um just playing around trying to pretty much doing things what i'm doing right now just um doing different fan art doing stuff that i want to see myself i did a bebop

um design back in the day that um was really fun um that was all 3d scope uh all 3d concepted um i did like a pirate uh woman um kind of the same way um you know and then and then kind of just uh going off of that like uh learning different tips and tricks along the line um kind of picking up little uh things here and there talking other uh friends of mine that were doing the same thing and so uh this is always just to be kind of a fun kind of exercise for me and actually to this day actually at work now um i do pretty much all my concepting in 3d or at least i integrate 3d into it to you know take care of anatomical things and i do like paint overs so zbrush is great for that that's what makes it such a great program yeah definitely uh so zbrush seems to be your main tool set that you use from beginning to end uh do you use any other programs at least for the modeling process um

while you're concepting to to final yeah i jump back and forth between zbrush and maya or three 3ds max from here to here and there for like uh cleaning up pieces um i use z modeler and zbrush but i've always been like since i kind of learned from on the onset to model in uh 3d suites like max and maya i'm still more comfortable there so usually what i'll do is i'll panel loop stuff out but if i need to do any kind of a a heavy modeling on it then i'll take it to maya i'll clean it up do some things to it and bring it back in onto zbrush and kind of work from there um this piece for instance uh this more i want to play uh more of like some hard surface techniques um trying to pick up some some techniques uh from vicali um and from guys like that um on how they kind of prototype things and so that was like the the challenge with this was that um kind of bashing some things together um but there's a lot of things like for instance marvel's designer would use for the jersey

um because sometimes i'll sculpt things in like the waistband for instance like the compression of this is definitely hand sculpted but some of the other things i just find it a lot easier just to knock it out real quick using a uh marvelous designer um i think you can get like some really quick results um if it's if it's really complicated then maybe it'll be a combination of that and like some some modeling and zbrush so those are my big three right now for 3d suites do you feel anything changing in the future landscape to your techniques where you feel you feel like something's missing uh because it feels like you have the pipeline down uh we looked at you know the future tech of of of game engines being able to pump out more and more polygons and and textures and being able to like characters even better now but do you feel something along your production pipeline where you at least been hearing things that will that cease that seems to

to really increase your your workflow or or just really help you with any shortcuts that you're struggling with right now yeah absolutely um i mean the landscape is always changing with uh with when it comes to the tools when i first learned 3d there was no substance painter or substance designer so there's a lot more hand painted techniques you know um and then since then now you know uh more of those procedural suites have come in and really just sped up the workflow immensely um there would be just gonna be a day someday when uvs are gonna be a thing of the past there's gonna be a day someday when hair cards are kind of antiquated um and then it'll make your life easier and what that does is it just opens the door more towards um artists to really get a foothold in you don't have to be such a technical guru anymore to get in i think that's a barrier that a lot i've seen a lot of talented artists that kind of dip their toe in 3d that i know could have excelled you know you know you would see them like tinker around like some dynamesh for an hour and they bust

out some amazing stuff but the you know then when it came time to re-topple it or uv it you know their eyes would cross and they you know go run back to you know 2d where it's safe you know and i feel like a lot of uh and i already kind of see it we actually just hired a character artist and she started off as a 2d artist and she was she has amazing talent and um she picks up 3d so fast because all a lot of those barriers have been kind of knocked down and she can just you know concept and iterate and then we can worry about the technical stuff later there's a lot of tools that can just really streamline that stuff especially with texturing and lighting when i was in school we still had to light everything in mental ray and i don't know if you ever use mental ray that's not user friendly it's not greyed out the out of the box there's a lot of tinkering you have to do with the settings and it can get really daunting but now we have things like key shot and marmoset tool bag that just makes it so much easier you can see all these amazing artists coming out now that can just really knock out some great pieces some great looked up pieces without having to worry about

you know setting their gamma and you know getting all that stuff set up right they can just really just make uh some get some really nice results so absolutely that actually leads to to a very interesting question so with all the tool sets and i'm i feel like i'm becoming the the old man talking about the heydays of photoshop how we used to do things differently right with all these tools getting better um i i i wanted to hear your opinion about like with all these other tools making life so much simpler do you feel like a lot of new artists coming into the field are losing a bit of something foundational skills that we've kind of built up uh through the old ways um that they're they're missing or is it all just all benefits i think so um there's definitely an argument for that um you can make that argument for really in any industry i mean since we're talking about basketball players i guess i'll make a basketball analogy yeah or you know you'll see um all the old-time players you know like bob cousy and stuff talk

about all these kids today that all they want to do is dunk and do fancy dribble moves and stuff like that and they ignore all the fundamentals um well there was some truth to that um till this day the best basketball players are still the ones that have all that athletic stuff and they know all the fundamentals you know you look at any great like truly transcendent uh talent um they don't just get by on national talent alone it's only gonna take you so far you still need to learn the fundamentals but i think um once again when you know when those old school uh players were playing they were smoking cigarettes in the locker room and eating you know red meat every day because they thought that that was the best thing to eat you know like nutrition wasn't where it is today athletic sciences it wasn't where it is today um and so the today's generation kind of uh benefits from that and it's the same thing with you know going back to uh 3d art it's the same thing like the natural talent is still going to be a benefit um and if you could put that together with the fundamentals and use all the tools

that are available today then you're ahead of the curve because a lot of um kind of flip it around a lot of the old school people like me like i was a late adopter relatively late adopt an adapter to uh the newer tools like substances substance designer and marvelous designer because i spent so much time learning how to sculpt drapery and folds and understanding the different types of folds you know compression and gravity folds and things like that i had to spend so much time learning all those uh photoshop techniques learning how to hand paint all that stuff and uh when i picked up when i finally picked up those tools um it was actually a benefit because i was able to apply that fundamental knowledge and i was able to do things like for instance like in substance painter you can't just you know throw a smart material on something and call it a day you're going to see it's going to look very procedural still there's you know there's only so much uh you know a smart material can do you're still going to have to come in as an artist and understand okay well wear and tear is not going to be equal across this whole surface it's going to be more worn out on the knees or on the you know palm of

the hand or things like that on a glove um and you still have to you know bring that kind of fundamental knowledge to it so it's it's really a combination um and for those people who have the talent and also put in the work and kind of keep up with the tech then i think they're leading the pack you can see it across the board did you know the top 10 mobile games in the us grossed more than 340 million dollars in june do you want your game to earn more app figures is all about giving game makers the tools they need to get more downloads and revenue you may already know them for analytics and app store optimization now app figures can help you keep track of competitors and the game market from how many downloads they're getting and how much money they're making to their audience demographics and even which tools they use to power their games their competitor intelligence gives you great context got a great idea for a nap or a game with app figures you can figure out how big the market is and how much money you could be making with it say a competitor adds a new feature or

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special code gdu 3030 to get thirty percent off for the next three months yeah i mean absolutely i i think um it's very much the same type of argument between uh 2d and and 3d artists and the ones that can do both are insanely talented and you can see through their expression uh how how there's a different this is there's a different type of flavor i i feel whenever i see like a master of everything kind of approaching a particular project so very much the same way i think the old guards are always going to have a an issue how how much things are easier now quote unquote right but i i think for the anyone that has have the longest legs in the industry are the types that that embraces new tech that embraces new

ways that completely opens up a different way of thinking to evolve as an artist to evolve as a developer to evolve as a businessman anything of that sort anytime that you close off in a technology driven industry only spells trouble in my opinion right you're still out there talking about how crt tvs are are used to be the way of things you know no one's gonna take you seriously you're definitely showing your age a bit yeah exactly and it's you know it's um the other thing that comes with the new tools is that the bar rises you have to rise with that bar um where you know a certain character used to take you know a month to finish now the new tools along uh you know they've come along the expectation is to finish that same character in maybe two or three weeks um and so you have to kind of keep up with that and stay um up to date with all the tools um there's just no resting

you know in this industry it's too competitive there's too many people out there churning out i mean i teach at norman i can tell you right now that next class is coming and they're they're pretty good they're like they know their stuff they grew up with these tools and so there's no barrier there and they're also being taught the fundamentals and stuff too because no one's great at that they still have you know traditional sculpting classes and drawing classes and these types of schools are popping up everywhere you know cgma all these different schools so um the competition is pretty crazy out there so that alone is why you have to stay on top of it there's no you know resting and um you know the true pros you know the people who really uh are excelling in this industry in the first place are the ones who love to do it um what they love you know have a love in their personal projects um or you know they they bring it into the studio too which is important um there's always going to be that that kind of drive there and you just need to make sure that you kind of keep that fire going keep the keep the pilot light lit on that and continue to kind of grow

and progress and challenge yourself that's kind of my outlook on it when i look at these personal projects it is definitely uh marketable uh it's a good marketing opportunity too for yourself and that's really important actually as an artist because you want to you know you want to have your name out there because once again it's so competitive um there's a lot of you know killers out there and like they're you know they're really good at marketing themselves so you that's another thing that you need to um uh kind of evolve and grow with that's kind of like where i'm i'm trying to uh improve on this year too um in the past i wasn't really um great at marketing myself i was just kind of like my nose to the grindstone and uh trying to churn stuff out trying to you know reach a certain level in my career um and and just work on projects that were appealing to me but there is a uh like kind of a a meeting point between those two worlds that you can live in where you can make something that people love to look at and then it can blossom into things that you weren't even aware like you know like you could start

you know busting all these pieces and sooner or later people want to buy those people want to buy prints from you people want to you know uh come you know watch your streams and so there's an opportunity to kind of uh share that and then share that knowledge with the with a bigger audience so yeah marketing this stuff is definitely a big part of it too um a lot of people grew up with space jam so i knew that would be a big one i'm actually working on a new series uh i if we have time i have to show you guys real quick uh something i'm working on like a sneak peek no one's seen this before yet but i'm i'm trying to get 3d printing so i'm i've been kind of messing around with uh different stuff so i'm doing like my series on like uh realistic mario so like this is like a whip right now it's like it ripped so yeah big rip mario so like it's like the smash bros smash bros version that's that's before uh coved mario right that's uh yeah that's funny protein yeah all that protein

awesome bling on there dude so that's what i'm putting on and then yeah yeah there we go this is what i'm working on right now um i'm gonna do it like a a more realistic yoshi and put him on his back and uh you know try to get some 3d prints out of this and see where it goes so this is my first attempt at something from the beginning planning it out as a 3d print yeah um i still plans on printing some of my older stuff but this one i just want to streamline for that um and uh hopefully you know i can kind of like start developing new hobby and then maybe that hobby can turn into something else in the future but now just that's a way of keeping it fresh for me so that i don't um kind of get bogged down in the same flow every time yeah so explain to me while you're getting into this world i'm sure you have a lot more character art friends than i do right so 3d printing has become like quite synonymous with character uh developers uh character artists in the game

industry it just seems to be like a natural extension of your skill set you know i'm already sculpting it now why don't i print it so i can hold things um from at least your beginning understanding of that industry i mean how uh what what is that world like like is there like a i know that you're you're kind of approaching this as a hobbyist but i mean is there a potential uptake in that in in building a business venture or any extension beyond just just making cool cool art pieces absolutely and you know if you look at some of the other uh really successful 3d artists out there who are um uh kind of branching out and uh kind of monetizing themselves they all started from just being uh a fan and a student of of character art and art in general and they kind of blossomed out from that usually very organically you know like um you they start off just you know really enjoying making art and then they would build a fan base sooner or

later and then you you start getting requests from like man like can i can i print that out i would love to have that as a print and it's like well like maybe what's this 3d printing stuff maybe you should look into that and then you start you know you kind of go down that rabbit hole and then you discover prints for yourself and then you start busting these out and before you know it you know different collectible companies are hitting you up for contract work or or uh maybe you know speaking of contract work maybe you're you're a contractor and um after a while you build a a clientele to the point where you decide to maybe branch out and create your own contracting business where you uh you know just you're an outsourced company um all of that kind of organically comes from you know you know starting at that grassroots place kind of building it organically um and uh building up a clientele and a fan base uh from there and uh that's kind of like where i'm i'm trying to uh go to that's like the kind of the next step in things is uh you know i'm still kind of a student of the year you're always a student of the craft but at the same time um i think teaching to that next group

is really important so i've tried to you know set aside time to teach um at the same time grow like other businesses as far as like uh outsourcing and just really helping out like studios where they need it because i think that's really important yeah i mean that's um i think that's one of the biggest benefits of uh of being an instructor and and being a part of uh the new crop of developers uh at the same time you're you're in the forefront of uh giving back to the community which is huge i want to thank you for that and um and and you learn a lot by teaching right you you kind of better your your knowledge your foundation at the same time you know a part of you is like scouting the talent right you're like all right how many how many years i got left before these guys take my job right because they're coming in cheaper and more and more more willing right i mean there's a lot of things stacked with them right i mean if

they come with the skill set of course of course it's a huge huge plus uh that's not to downplay you know experienced veterans right i mean there's a place there's a reason why aaa studios or what they call quad a studios now want to hire senior professionals because there's a certain i would say patience right there's a certain quality an approach uh a certain general aspect of game development that requires a senior professionals to kind of take hold and and be leads right because come on right just hand the key kid to the i mean hand the kid to the keys to the car and just expect him to be suddenly driving these multi-million dollar projects it's that's one thing and that's fine yeah absolutely and that's uh you know um when you you know kind of put your years in and you pay your dues that's ultimately like everyone's different obviously everyone has their different ambitions um i've always seen it as yeah

like um uh i don't plan to be a production artist forever as much as i love it um it can wear on you um especially the way the industry is going right now crunch is becoming more and more uh just an accepted cultural thing in the game industry um but there's other avenues and i think uh as artists sometimes we kind of accept um the way things are um where you know there's other avenues you can go to kind of you know build for yourself you know um outsourcing is obviously going to become more prevalent in these years especially you know the way things are going um as an artist and i'm just talking about as an individual artist um you know working from home working remotely um and then also just keeping in mind uh smaller studios that don't uh require as much crunch obviously the largest studios they're gonna you know it it kind of is what it is right now hopefully there's reform coming but i went bank on it because like you know there's the quality bar is at a place right now where you can't go backwards you can

only go forward and it just takes a lot of hours it takes a lot of iteration and it takes a lot of people who just love that lifestyle and there there are those people out there and i used to be one of those people i still am i still really love um just grinding on something until the late hours but there's also a part of me that um is like well i've got a kid on the way uh you know i want to spend some some time with my family oh thank you um and so you know just kind of exploring those other avenues that maybe uh don't go down that same path i would say uh changing the pace uh of a game developer started when a kid is on the way i think that's the traditional scenarios like oh i can't keep doing this the way i've been doing this for so long it's a wake-up call right it's a maturity i think and it's very healthy to kind of think that way because sooner or later you know we're gonna get pretty old gets slower

right right uh and while we're young we need to kind of take these risks and explore uh naturally uh and it's one of the reasons why gdex was built is to kind of get people thinking about what the next five years look like and not just about yeah i mean i'm i can stay up to three a.m uh every day seven days a week all the time right it's like no man at a certain point you don't want to do that anymore and right uh i say that but like i look at you i was like man this guy must be still standing up pretty late to make these crazy projects because it's a lot of work i am yeah like these these things are definitely i'm one of those guys that's the that's the the catch because i want those guys that like my best ideas come at like two three in the morning oh wow so it's strange usually what i uh yeah it's it really is so like at the same time like you know i'm kind of fighting with myself on that um but it's really just about setting your hours you know you can still do you can still work both in it just depends on

you know how you are you're a morning person or you're a lay person i'm just more of a night person so like you know spending time with the family during the day and then like took them all in by you know 10 o'clock that's when i start getting going and then i'll from 10 to 10 to midnight or 10 i usually say i'm gonna conk out at one o'clock um this is me like i'm not telling you all you guys you need to do this some some of you guys it might be the opposite maybe you want to wake up earlier in the morning and start grinding on this that might be an option you know get up at five in the morning and then you know do your stuff like like your rocky training for a fight you know just you know get up with the sun and then do it get all your grinding out of the way and then go drop your kids off at school and then get on with your day but there are slots that you can definitely fit that in without killing yourself um it's really just about time management and uh just prioritizing um i've got a bunch of i've got just as many games on my hard drive i haven't played then projects on my hard drive and finished it yet and i at a certain point i was like i'd rather finish those projects on my hard drive than those games on my hard drive because those games are going to be there you know they'll be there when i

retire if it takes that long but i kind of have that itch that i need to scratch when it comes to making art um and so it's been there and i can definitely see my you know my mood change when i have it it's kind of like uh about athletes going back to the athlete analysis again sorry but um you know like if you talk to athletes and stuff some of them like they just can't if they haven't if they've gone two days without working out they it's like a noticeable change in their demeanor um and i'm kind of like that with art you know it just kind of keeps me centered so that's i just make time for it i definitely you're definitely speaking my language you mentioned athlete i like to uh consider myself as an athlete but i do i do go aggro man especially being quarantined like not going to the gym and doing my regular workout yeah i i totally feel you man if you have a certain habit and basically it's the way you breathe and um if you just venture off of that you do there's something that clicks right i

mean not click so it ticks you off a bit it's just a simple thing right because you're just off your rhythm and uh if anything this time is really testing our rhythm and um right i think there was a certain period for me and it sounds like you haven't hit that switch yet where yeah i was like spending all night doing stuff and then i forgot exactly when where i just suddenly became a morning person where my best thoughts were like i can wake up at 5am and just rock out for the next six seven hours um yeah and work on that but like at 9 00 pm nothing is coming through nothing matters anymore no matter how important the deadline i'm just turned off and need to uh retire so i again definitely hear you on that one yeah different artists man [Music] same approach i think same idea yeah right same approach you know you got that like when you're when you're truly driven by something then there's

always going to be that thing like in the back your head that just always like poking you when you're not doing that thing you know it's just like um you just you need to get it out it's almost like a hunger you know you have to eat every day although so you guys start getting hungry it's the same thing with anything you're passionate about um and if you're an artist out there listening to this and you don't have that little thing poking you in the back of the head don't feel like that that means you're not cut out for it or anything maybe you're just not inspired maybe um it's time to just kind of reflect and think about the stuff that i'm working on this personal process i'm working on are they really something that i'm interested in or am i doing this because i think this is going to get the most clicks you know you know am i am i doing a sci-fi character because i think sci-fi characters is what people want to see when you really want to do medieval stuff or cartoony stuff um really just doing like an inward look and decide you know and see like what it is you that you really enjoy working on because half those stuff the things in my hard drive that haven't finished because i started on it and i realized it just it wasn't where i want to be at that point i might go back to later when i'm in a different mind space but it like i

i really just give myself a project that i know that is going to challenge me and also it's going to keep my attention um whether it's at five o'clock in the morning or at two o'clock at night wherever it uh you know uh wherever i'm working on it so that's kind of my advice i get that a lot from students that question uh so yeah sometimes it just you gotta look around around a little bit to find that inspiration yeah and inspiration is definitely one of those things that kind of help kick-start your your your mojo for every personal project and personal projects if anything i know there's a lot of talks with indie developers especially throughout the day you know making a game is a huge different undertaking right and i feel like a lot of people just forget the steps in between is like well can you just make something right now uh and then deliver it within a week can you do that and most i would say that can't do that won't be able to work with the team and and deliver that game right i mean that's just the reality

uh like how how can you take a huge step if you can't take the small steps all right right and it's baby steps exactly and i think a lot of the projects if anything i feel like the people who are now that everyone's working from home right um everyone's kind of forced to to kind of think this way but uh i've noticed like a transition for people who who just love working in the office right i was like oh man i can't take this anymore i need to go back to the office i can't concentrate well to me it tells a lot about like well you probably never really did any workout like artistically outside of your nine to five right you're not used to this to this lifestyle so everyone's such as yourself is probably loving this is like yeah man i can be at home finally god give me more of this right it's just a different um it's it's you know and the the the opposite because i've

seen the opposite too because yeah like my for instance my team my character team like it's like a 50 50 split half of them uh wish that they were back in the office because they just um you know like especially it depends on your your your setup at home too like i'm fortunate like uh you know i i have like a lot of space to work with uh at home and um i don't have like noisy roommates that are you know you know making a racket or whatever or you know like or just whatever your home life might be maybe it's not conducive to being creative so some of those people might want to get back in the office just to get um and that space um but wherever you are just it just me it just it's important to understand how to lock in and really just uh get down to it because yeah me personally i i just came up always working alone late at night i've done this since high school or earlier since i was like a kid in grade school really like i have a project and you know it's an art project i go way overboard with it and do all this crazy stuff and i'd be until way late working on it so i've always been that person um

some other people they get their they they got their best work during at school in class like and as soon as the bell rang whatever they kind of just checked out and uh but they still made amazing work in that time so i guess it just depends on the person too um so that's a factor all right i mean we've had we started this with some technical difficulties but i'm i'm glad that we kind of ironed things through and kind of got back in the groove of things we are at the end of that hour and i want to spend this time to personally thank you for joining us and becoming part of g duck's history and it's always a joy to kind of see where you're at with your personal projects i i consider you as one of the best character artists that i know especially not just through your techniques but the the the content and the the joy that you bring into your projects i mean it's just self-evident and it's always a pleasure to kind of see how lazy i am compared to your work ethic man

but uh i want to spend this time to hand over the mic to you to kind of give a shout out give attention to for the people watching the live or the recording uh where they can find your work and connect with you yeah absolutely thanks for having me by the way by the way man it's uh it's really great being on this man uh appreciate you um what i'm working on now is um just stay tuned on my instagram uh uh dk woods 3d um you can also find me on art station under damond woods i'm going to be putting busting out a bunch more of these you guys got a sneak peek at the mario there's more to come there's a bunch more announcements i can't wait to show you guys so just uh stay tuned all right damon i want to thank you for your time and wish you the best dude always connecting always checking up with you hey appreciate you man [Music]

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