Are generics appropriate for a professional portfolio?

[miroslavhundak]

Hello!

 

The question is in the subject already, so just to elaborate:

I'm in a process of expanding my portfolio to include more arch-viz related subjects. Having very little chance to work in that field so far, I don't have anything unique to showcase, so my plan is to use generic models and materials from stock libraries, maybe change some details and try to make as nice a render as I can. Is it appropriate to use this tactic for a professional portfolio?

 

I'm not an architect, designer, artist, or have any appreciable amount of imagination, but I would very much like to transition to the field of arch-viz, or anything-viz if necessary, purely as a CG expert. In line with that, I would like to partner up with people who have what I don't, in hope that we can complement each other's skills.

 

Here's a link to my current online portfolio: Animat. It's a little outdated and most of the stuff is not related to architecture, hence this.

[marlonmorgan]

Hey Miroslav, sorry for the late reply.

 

Well, here'swhat I do. I'm not an architect and i'm also fairly new to Architectural Viz. I have this app on my ipad that i boughht for about 2.99 called 'modern houseplans'. There are many though... There's one for spanish house plans, beachfronts, gerogian etc. from there, I model the plans just as I would if I was approached by an architect. From there it's on to the render.

 

I suppose the people who upload ready made models expect persons to use them so I don't think there would be much of a problem but maybe you can make a footnote stating the person(s) who created the model.

 

Hope I was of help.

 

Cheers,

Valdano

[heni30]

Cool motorcycle video! If you can model those pieces you can definitely model anything Arch Viz throws at you.

 

Here's my take on it, which many people do not agree with:

 

Case one - You fib and say you did everything. You get the job and have no problem handling the work.

 

Case two - You fib and say you did everything. You get the job and discover that architectural modeling/detailing/mapping are not as easy as industrial products. BIG problem.

 

Case three - You say you did not model nor map everything. They may be hesitant, feeling that you are not well-rounded enough.

Edited October 8, 2014 by heni30

[notamondayfan]

OK say you use pre-made models, materials, lighting, etc, what happens when an architect sends over 100s of drawings, sketches, spec and expects you to turn around the image in a week?

 

It's OK getting the clients, but unless you can deliver then what's the point?!

[miroslavhundak]

Thank you all for your responses and advice. There's some food for thought, but overall conclusion is to model something from the ground up, I guess.

 

@ Dean Punchard

I agree. There is no point in looking for a kind of work that I'm not sure I can handle. I would be fooling myself 1st, then the client. If I should make something from scratch though, is it advisable to use existing plans of something simple and boring, or do I dare make something up that's maybe more original, but not necessarily viable in real life?

 

@ George Sandoval

Thanks for the vote of confidence!

I think I'll stick to case 3. Not because I'm that nice, but because I can't fib with a straight face. I blame my parents.

 

@ Valdano Morgan

Thanks for the info. I'll look that up.

I expect to be modeling stuff based on original designs/blueprints, rather then reusing existing models. At least for the buildings themselves.

 

-

 

I'm attaching a couple of modeling examples that I have currently ongoing. Viewport screenshots only. The blue house is not nearly finished and is based on existing blueprints. The white building is my design (working title: Smallest space port in the world) and I don't even know that it wouldn't just collapse, if it was built like that.

Can't decide which one to give priority. Maybe I should just watch less pewdiepie videos on youtube and finish them both.

 

[M V]

Maybe you can apprentice with someone (maybe even someone on this site), work for a reduced rate in exchange for portfolio building and experience.

[Scott Schroeder]

In this line of work, you are often called upon to be the jack of all trades. Very rarely are you hired on as an expert in one small area of visualization. If you want to be an expert in one area, look to films rather than architecture.

[miroslavhundak]

@ valerostudio

Assuming that kind of arrangement would, at least, cover my basic monthly expenses, I'd definitely be interested. Are you offering?

 

@ Scott Schroeder

I've worked on TV adverts for the past 13 years, doing everything from modeling to final compositing. Usually, my primary role is animation. Physically correct, or cartoony. Inanimate objects, robots, animals, characters, motion graphics, etc. I can't think of an aspect of CG that I hadn't worked on at one point or another, including an arch-viz project that consisted of high-res renders of interiors and exteriors for print and a couple of walk-through animations for DVD presentation. When the studio's video editor was otherwise indisposed, I had to do the video editing and recording of videos to Beta cassettes.

This may sound pretentious, but from my perspective, limiting myself to arch-viz sounds positively serene. That said, it is not my goal to do a narrow specialization. It's to move to an area of CG that is more technical and engineering related. I'm not an artist type and I've never really enjoyed doing TV adverts, but it payed pretty darn well... Until 2009. when all went to the toilet. That's the bottom line.

 

P.S.

I apologize for late answers, but my posts have a very large lag between posting and appearance on forum. I'm assuming that's a feature.

[notamondayfan]

 

@ Dean Punchard

I agree. There is no point in looking for a kind of work that I'm not sure I can handle. I would be fooling myself 1st, then the client. If I should make something from scratch though, is it advisable to use existing plans of something simple and boring, or do I dare make something up that's maybe more original, but not necessarily viable in real life?

 

It really depend on who you intend to target. A traditional architect would prefer something more "real", but an architect who pitches for larger jobs might want something more creative. If I were you I would do both!

[Rich O]

@ valerostudio

Assuming that kind of arrangement would, at least, cover my basic monthly expenses, I'd definitely be interested. Are you offering?

 

@ Scott Schroeder

I've worked on TV adverts for the past 13 years, doing everything from modeling to final compositing. Usually, my primary role is animation. Physically correct, or cartoony. Inanimate objects, robots, animals, characters, motion graphics, etc. I can't think of an aspect of CG that I hadn't worked on at one point or another, including an arch-viz project that consisted of high-res renders of interiors and exteriors for print and a couple of walk-through animations for DVD presentation. When the studio's video editor was otherwise indisposed, I had to do the video editing and recording of videos to Beta cassettes.

This may sound pretentious, but from my perspective, limiting myself to arch-viz sounds positively serene. That said, it is not my goal to do a narrow specialization. It's to move to an area of CG that is more technical and engineering related. I'm not an artist type and I've never really enjoyed doing TV adverts, but it payed pretty darn well... Until 2009. when all went to the toilet. That's the bottom line.

 

P.S.

I apologize for late answers, but my posts have a very large lag between posting and appearance on forum. I'm assuming that's a feature.

 

With this kind of background I suspect you'll find arch viz a walk in the park, at least from a technical perspective. Obviously it does have different requirements to vfx and character animation though, your workflow will differ quite a bit.

As an aside, the best architectural rendering I've seen typically isn't from people who work in architecture, but from lighting TDs and such.

(Not saying they all do it with a custom Maya pipeline rendering in Arnold and comping in Nuke, but that sort of background definitely seems to help!)

Edited November 27, 2014 by Richard7666

[miroslavhundak]

I've finally had time to complete one of the two personal projects I mentioned in previous post. The building itself is kind of ugly, but that's just because I designed it and not anyone competent. There's couple of renders under my profile here on CGarchitect, but there are more and they are best viewed on this link: http://on.be.net/1yNXlbG

 

So now that I have that, what would you recommend as the next stage of building a portfolio? Concentrate more on interiors, or different exteriors? In terms of design, should I focus more on classical or modern?

 

Thanks.

[RyderSK]

With this kind of background I suspect you'll find arch viz a walk in the park, at least from a technical perspective. Obviously it does have different requirements to vfx and character animation though, your workflow will differ quite a bit.

As an aside, the best architectural rendering I've seen typically isn't from people who work in architecture, but from lighting TDs and such.

 

Would love to honestly see these. Luxigon, Mir, Peter Guthrie....all VFX background {..sarcasm, just incase}. Almost every good or worthy archviz guys come from either architectural background directly, or primary because they have interest in architecture first, not computer graphics. Afterwards it's just blend of these interests.

 

Architectural visualization (in all facets and types) is so much more than sums of its technical features (lighting, modeling,texturing,etc...). Technical quality should be granted, it's not added value. How the architecture is portrayed (visually and logically) and communicated, is what matters.

 

Everyone who's in simply because it's just another type of CGI business for them, is in for dissapoitment. Clients aren't retards, they can see past nice rendering (there are tens of thousands of them now!), they're looking for unique style that fits with their brief (whether it's striking competition visual or sleek polished marketing image to sway customers). And that unique style comes from personal style merged with their understanding of architecture.

 

The unhealthy obsession with technical part in industry isn't problem because technical quality isn't important (it is very much, time goes, technology improves, clients expectations rise), but because so many people put it on pedestal, above other far more important subjects. Clients don't give a **** about nicely rendering random idiotic close-up shots of Evermotion entourage. They want single image that captures the spirit of their architecture,....and looks good. In that very order.

 

Plus this work, can seem monotone compared to other CGI fields (definitely when compared to VFX, Games,... or Ads), to keep inspiration and energy, you have to love architecture foremost. Otherwise it becomes stale boring job, nothing enjoyable for personal life, not saying it's business healthy in ever-increasing competitive global market either.

 

I don't want to comment on project posted in last message, because I avoid this forms of critique. But I will just say what I always do, if you don't have enough self-reflection to judge it yourself and realize that is hardly what any clients would want, no amount of outside advice will help. That's the least harsh way I could say it without wasting more typed space.

Edited February 11, 2015 by RyderSK

[miroslavhundak]

I mostly agree with what you say. But I stated outright that I'm not the designer. It's not my goal to design anything, but to help architects, designers, engineers, etc., who don't have time or interest in CG itself. I'm here to help.

 

That said, if I don't have an existing collaboration, then any attempt to improve my portfolio, using my own inferior designs and ideas, will fail, which is kind of the issue I was having when I started this thread. Any advice about that?

[RyderSK]

Sure :- ) Don't discuss peanuts, but the primary subject. Have you ventured into architectural library/shop yet ? Looked into some books, even those coffee table types, what projects do they feature, how are they photographed by top photographers ? Forming some relationships with friends who studied architecture, engulfing in their culture slightly. The connections you can form with clients. They don't care how I build my shaders, but greatly appreciate that I know how to place focus on the place, and merging their needs with their given clientelle.

 

Regarding design, we're not (in most cases) aren't asked to design anything, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't understand design. The affinity to that comes somehow naturally, but can be improved tremendously even through self-study. Again, so many websites (not this one obviously), magazines, books exist on market. I do suggest to start first there, not torpedo your efforts with non-sensical vizualization of non-sensical architecture from headstart.

[miroslavhundak]

That's sound advice, but I've heard it before. If I was that socially apt, I suspect I wouldn't be here in the first place. I hear people talk about the "comfort zone", but I don't really know what that is. And that's not something anyone here can help with.

 

I'm not ready to remove these renders from my portfolio just yet, but if in the future I get a chance to make something less nonsensical, I'll consider that option.

[hrvojelicitar]

I've finally had time to complete one of the two personal projects I mentioned in previous post. The building itself is kind of ugly, but that's just because I designed it and not anyone competent. There's couple of renders under my profile here on CGarchitect, but there are more and they are best viewed on this link: http://on.be.net/1yNXlbG

 

So now that I have that, what would you recommend as the next stage of building a portfolio? Concentrate more on interiors, or different exteriors? In terms of design, should I focus more on classical or modern?

 

Thanks.

 

That's not ugly at all - that's crazy! I love it! The feel, the design, everything!

pozdrav

[RyderSK]

Look, first thing architect sees, is not (bellow) average render. He sees completely wrong proportions of weird structure resembling nothing he would like to commission for visualization. He doesn't have time nor interested to educate you during job. It doesn't help you in slightest. It's not that I care but you wanted opinion of it.

 

And I definitely wasn't commenting on social apt or whatever. But to understand them mentally enough to be able to be on same boat/same page. This comes very easily for people who spent few years in architectural college (and actually belonged there..).

 

The easiest thing you could do, is simply go to archdaily.com. Do you see anything like your building/render ? Then why run if you can't walk.

[miroslavhundak]

I appreciate your opinion and you give good advice. I do feel, though, that you're reading too much into my little project. It was only ever meant to be a display of technical CG skills, not much more. I've even set up the entire presentation in a light and funny note, so that it's not taken seriously as an actual attempt at design, because it's not. I haven't advertised it as such either.

 

I'll try to improve, certainly, but this is the best I can do by myself at this moment.

[RyderSK]

No it's in good faith, I really wanted to originally simply reply to post I did, not yours topic, not directly :- )

 

But you still separate those things (CG&Design) in very opposite meant manner. From my understanding, you want to build portfolio, that would attract potential clients. If so, then why present anything else.. ? Even on such topics as portfolio, essays could be written, it's greatly missunderstood. Most people simply present some skills they have, in any fashion possible, which really doesn't help their cause. Portfolios needs to only show the very best crop of your work, with clear focus on what it should represent.

 

No clients browse portfolio looking for good Vray skills (example), they're looking for something that resemble what they want. And they're not looking for people with design skills, but people with understanding for design, you still misquote me in here, it's two very different things. Design skills are big plus, but understanding design is crucial must and as such, must be shown in every work that has intention to attract the correct crowd.