Alric Voon | Knowledge through Visuals

Middle of The Desert

3d software is becoming commonplace in the industry. Especially with how accessible it is getting. With 3d software, one can get the maximum amount of finishing with the minimum amount of time. It provides accurate lighting and perspective which gives artists more time to figure out the design aspect of things. In these pieces, I am using Blender to try and get as far as I can before going in and editing things in Photoshop.

With these pieces, I really wanted to capture how grand the buildings were and how vast the area was. However, I could not render out a scene in Blender that really conveyed that in a short amount of time. So, I threw the piece into Photoshop and added the proper color and saturation of the mood. Photoshop is just alot better in getting those tiny value, color and saturation changes.

The interior of the mosque. I wanted to paint a mysterious picture yet show the beauty of the complex interior found in mosques. For this, Blender really made this easy and simple to achieve.

GeneSix

GeneSix, the group IP that I was a part of with my friends Lian Wei How, Rekton Fung, Hui Jing, Stevie Choo and Nygel Long. Over here, you will only see my part of the project. If you want to see the whole thing, you can check out my friends entries.

GeneSix is about the life of people who crash landed on Mars in a future where Earth has been destroyed because of Nuclear Warfare. In their lives, they go through hardships in the form of food shortages and raiders. In their attempts to solve the food shortage issue, they plan to cultivate a plant that is able to grow on Mars.

Space-X Suit

This was the standard suit given to all the people going to Mars. It was manufactured to handle Mar's atmosphere and it connects to the PLSS to keep the pressure and oxygen levels in check. It retains its black and white simplistic design in the the final design  following Space X's IVA suit.

Infantry Unit- Raider

Many people were selected to travel to Mars. However, upon arrival and in the face of multiple problems, not everyone retained their morals and some people even reverted to looting and killing. Among these people, are the raiders who have banded together. They have their hierarchy and at the bottom of it, stands the infantry unit. They serve the higher classes of raiders. They specialize in traversing Mar's rough terrain and serve as baggage carriers.
I thought that doing an ant inspired design would make sense as their roles are really similar. I incorporated the ant silhouette for the body and tried to keep an ant's head with the Infantry Unit's modified helmet.

R(0-4)CH Solar Rover

The solar trailer is an unmanned remote controlled vehicle built for the sole purpose of gathering and harvesting solar energy. They are equipped with a wide top lined with solar panels allowing for maximum exposure to light. The final design is a more lightweight version of the body since the body in the sketches were getting too bulky. The lighter body would allow for easier traversal on Mars.

The Crash

In the story, a stranded ship crashes into orbit, getting the attention of the remaining people on Mars. They all rush waiting to loot possible supplies or to obtain the research materials on the ship. This is the shot of the ship after it has just made contact on Mars.

Keyart

"Main Character is stuck in between pushing forward with his best friend or saving a mother and her child".

I started with this phrase and broke them down into their keywords before expanding on each of them visually. With that, a strong composition came into mind where you could do the moral thing but go down (literally) fighting or, you can push towards the goal (the light at the end of the tunnel). For this, I played with the values and the placement of the objects in the scene.

One thing to note is that the designs of the characters were not locked down yet in this scene, therefore, there may be some differences in the final character concepts and the character designs in this illustration.

The Deep

In a not so distant future, some ancient ruins were discovered underwater and some expert military divers were sent to explore it in hopes of treasure. However, what people did not know was that deep below, things other than treasure lurk.

In this IP, I design a character and a creature and then try change their genders. The challenge was keeping the same elements but changing up enough to match their counterparts.

For the Male Creature, 

I initially thought of giving the creature a gimmick like camouflage or squirting ink, but with more research, it seemed more likely for prey to have gimmicks rather than a predator. So, I ended up beefing up the Creature by giving it more muscle, harder scales, sharper claws and scarier teeth. 

For the Female Creature,

I followed the rules of female lizards where they are usually longer but smaller than their male counterparts. I extended the tail and changed the creature to a slightly more defensive creature since it would have to protect itself while bearing eggs.

Underwater Ruins
Here is a shot of the underwater ruins that the characters are trying to explore and the creature lives in. It was challenging approaching this piece as I was trying to tell a story and introduce depth but the more research I did, the more I found out that it would just be pitch black underwater. So, I made a decision to ignore that while rendering this piece.

The West

and my studies...

At a certain point, I was happy with neither my designs nor my environments. Therefore, I decided to do start an IP to relearn and reestablish my fundamentals. That IP was The West.

To start it off, I bought and watched a couple of Eytan Zana's tutorials. This taught me a lot of new things and techniques I could use in my work. I learnt about shape balance in Environments among other things. You can see in my virtual plein air studies.

Character Design

I wanted to design a jaded hunter in The West with a dark past.
In this design, I wanted to metaphorically show that his past was clinging to him and for that, I used maggots growing out of caterpillars as a motif. I put that into his left arm, his right shoulder and bits and pieces around with the bullets.
I also wanted to convey the weight of his past on his shoulders, so he has a heavier silhouette around his torso compared to his legs.

Keyart

Closing Text