Jake Schatzman | Surfacing Artist | Generalist

Hi! My name is Jake and I am a Surfacing Artist who recently graduated from the Animal Logic Academy UTS.

I have chosen 4 projects to show that were pivotal in my learning and development as a CG Artist.

ALONE (Student Shortfilm)

During my time at ALA UTS, I was fortunate enough to be the only dedicated surfacing artist (model and art students did some surfacing). This gave me the opportunity to work directly with the leads to achieve the overall look for the surfacing, also doing each of the main characters, and some hero props/sets. I also had the opportunity to teach others about surfacing and run small workshops, this was invaluable to my own learning/development.

Fukuoka | Train Station (Unreal Engine 5 Project)

This project was a dive into real-time asset creation, focusing on optimizing the models and textures. I learnt Zbrush to create details that were baked into a low poly model with restricted texture map sizes. Zbrush is now a program I use daily for my work, and knowing how to exhaust every pixel for detail on lower res models has also helped a lot for my daily work. 

Robo Pet | Hermy (Weekly Drill Project)

From concept to render, I completed this little guy in one week. I used this project to learn and develop my stylized texturing, as well as how to push a simple model with basic textures. This was very much a concept piece that I had to pull from my head and bring to life in 3D, and had to manage my time well to execute the task. 

Class 48 | Diesel Locomotive | Monthly Project

This was a mammoth of a project. At ALA UTS we had monthlies where we chose a project to execute within a month to learn and showcase our development. My goal for this month was to recreate a realistic train, working my way from modelling to comp and everything between. This project I am most proud of because I learnt how to model properly and efficiently, with proper topology and UV unwrapping. I learnt how to push my texturing and look dev skills to create realistic materials with an emphasis on imperfections and variations. I learnt how to light my scene to show off the surfacing and modelling, incorporated VFX (smoke sim) and rendered passes that were composited for the final look. The most valuable part was seeking feedback from my peers and leads to help push the project even further then I had anticipated a the start.

Thankyou for taking the time to look through my work! I appreciate any and all feedback, and I'm happy to share my processes and give feedback for your own projects. (can contact me on LinkedIn - Jake Schatzman)

If you would like to see breakdowns of these projects, I have some simple breakdowns on my main Rookies page.

Thankyou,

- Jake