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Space Airlock
I love science fiction and anything that has to do with outer space. Airlocks have always played an essential role in most all science fiction tales. My favorite airlock is the one featured at the end of the movie Aliens. This one was inspired by my friend Don Creger’s airlock model and the 2009 Star Trek film.

Life Found a Way
Jurassic Park is one of my favorite movies. It was the first film I got up bright and early to stand in line and get tickets for. I was the first person in my area to get a ticket and I got perfect seats in the theater. It was revolutionary! I created the image below with sculpted assets in ZBrush, Paint Effects, and individually crated foliage in Maya. The night lighting is my favorite but I have a daytime image of the scene as well. Click the link to see a larger version of the jungle as well as a daytime lighting rendition of the environment.

Blizzard Castle
The games that Blizzard Entertainment creates have always been apart of my gaming life. I still have and play the original Warcraft. In 2006 Blizzard Entertainment held an art contest. I entered my Blizzard Castle as part of the cinematic environment section of the contest.

I love Lens Flares!
Who doesn’t like lens flares. This environment was inspired by the city Illium in Mass Effect and the great lens flares in Star Trek. Originally built as low polygon placeholders for a skybox matte, I quickly began to build out the environment fully. After adding a bunch of stylized lights and a few post effects, it is now a living and breathing world to explore.

Impact
One night I decided to experiment with planet rendering. I started in the evening after diner and had some promising results. It quickly became time to go to bed but I found that my renders were looking too good to stop. I decided that if I stayed up a few more hours I’d have something worth showing. Early in the morning I achieved this final render and was happy to have lost sleep over such a sweet looking image.

Lost in Space
This environment came about after doing a study using volumetric lighting. Starting out as a pieced together environment from various modular structures I built for previous environments, I added the robots to the scene to provide a story telling element. I think they really add to the environment by giving the viewer a sense of hopelessness and despair.

Zoom Zoom
The design and architecture in this environment is inspired by the architect Calatrava. He is one of my favorite architects due to his unique winged and futuristic structures. Wanting to add dynamic movement to the image I rendered in a futuristically designed car with motion blur. The curves and lines in this piece give the composition a very dynamic feel.

How Gandalf Got His Groove Back
This study came about by experimenting with procedural displacement mapping and sculpted assets in Mudbox. The scene is made up of 5 simple assets that were placed or duplicated to bring life to the environment. Inspiration for this environment came about by playing Dragon Age and watching LOTR way too many times.

The Hive Lair
After attending a Saturday matinee of Cowboys & Aliens the above image popped into my head. I figured if I kept the environment creation focused, I could get it done by the end of the weekend. Inspiration flowing I did just that. On thing I wanted to experiment with in this study was using Camera Tilt and Focal Length for a more dynamic shot. It worked! I plan to use these camera techniques more in the future. Other influences for this environment include Alien, Riven, the Zerg in StarCraft, and the Collectors in Mass Effect 2.

Destination Earth
Symmetry and color played a major roll in shaping this simple Sci-Fi hallway and hologram. I set the camera up accordingly and wanted to utilize some of the symmetrical design elements to light the scene. by doing so I was able to obtain geometric shapes that add contrast. Subtle amounts of green were used for a 3 toned color palette and to help draw the eye of the observer to the projecting hologram. Specific assets like the plants where added to help break up the symmetrical design.

Race to the Finish Line
I watched this movie the other day. I forgot what it was call... Yea right! Who could forget the movie TRON Legacy. At an early age the first film never drew me in. However the latest movie’s art direction was really inspiring. For this environment I wanted to use a dramatic camera angle to showcase stylistic architecture with dramatic shapes. These shapes would be accented with TRON’s signature light outlines. As a quick study I am pleased with the result but also have a new appreciation for what the film achieved. Watching the film again, it is hard to understand just how much talent and epic design went into a film like that without attempting it on a small scale. Cheers to those who worked on the film, the imagery you created will resonate for a long time to come.