First two years of 3D at school - Antoine COGREL

Hi everyone !

My name is Antoine and I am currently a second-year 3D animation student at the ESMA school in France.

Diving into the world of 3D was for me an unexpected and exciting revelation. It all started with a simple curiosity, a desire to understand how the captivating images and animations I saw in movies and video games were created. But this curiosity quickly turned into a true passion. As soon as I started exploring modeling software and creating my first shapes and textures, I was captivated by the endless possibilities offered by 3D. Each project became a new adventure, a creative challenge where I could bring my imagination to life. To discover 3D is to enter a universe where art and technology meet, where each polygon, each texture, each light can be sculpted to create breathtaking works. This new passion opened up new horizons and gave me a new way to express myself and share my vision of the world.

This post gathers my most accomplished 3D projects that I have completed during my first two years at school. I hope you will enjoy them!

Microcosmos

Pre-production

To build the drawings of my insect, I relied on a rich array of image references, drawing my inspiration from the fascinating diversity of nature. I first studied in detail various photographs analyzing their complex anatomies, textures and color patterns. Looking at the colorful shells of beetles or the elegant silhouettes of religious mantis, I was able to understand the structures and elements that make up these creatures. Then, I synthesized these observations to integrate them in a coherent and innovative way in my own drawings. By fusing authentic features with imaginary elements, I created a unique insect that, while fantastic, remains credible and grounded in biological reality. This approach allowed me to conceive a being both original and realistic, while paying tribute to the beauty and complexity of the natural world.

Modeling/Sculpting

As it was my first organic and realistic 3D living model that I made, I have some apprehension about the whole process of modeling an insect. But, thanks to the drawing and research I did before, I managed to dive and model my creature successfully. One of the constraints to consider was the topology of the mesh: it had to be dense enough to facilitate sculpture and allow flexibility of movement. After finalizing the basemesh in Maya and unpacking her UVs, I just had to import it into ZBrush to work on its organic appearance. I really enjoyed adding complex details during the sculpture.

Texturing/Shading

Rigging

This year, I also learned the basics of rigging. An insect is a good exercise to put into practice what we have learned in class, especially for blendshapes or Iks. I really enjoyed editing my insect from A to Z and I learned a lot.

Animation

After the rigging stage comes the animation part. I had to determine the liveliness of my insect, time I wanted it to be slow because of its weight, or fast. Finally, I went on a slow insect. I have collected some references of ants walking and others, to learn how an insect moves in real life. I really enjoyed animating my insect and also learned a lot about the alembic workflow, like how to export my animation and apply grooming and shaders on it, to integrate it into the final scene.

Lighting/Rendering/Compositing

 I chose a daytime mood to clearly distinguish all the elements of the plan. The warmth of golden and orange tones envelops the insect in soft, natural light.  I wanted to create a contrast with a warm and acceuillante light with an insect that does not evoke kindness. I used Maya and Renderman for lighting and rendering. One of the major parts of the work for this project was in compositing. The challenge here was to grade the elements that make up the shot to convey a specific lighting intention in this macroscopic view, and ensure the proper integration of the background. The compositing was made in Nuke.

Timelapse

This is my very last project that I completed at school. The aim was to take an object and make it evolve through time. 

Pre-production

I decided to go on a pocket watch from World War II. This watch belonged to a young man who went to war. We can see the transformation of this one from the front war until years later. 

As always, we start by learning about the object and looking for references.

Modeling/Texturing/Shading

The goal for this project is to make an object evolve through time, so I had to texture two versions of my pocket watch : a "young" one and an "old" one. I made the totality of the textures in procedurals in Substance Painter and I used Photoshop for the aging of the photo. I intended to make this photo more horrific than realistic to reinforce my intrention.

Propagation

To make evolve the pocket watch from young to old, I had to generate propagation maps, using Nuke. One of the most important things here was to have an evolution synchronized with the movements of the camera. The propagation maps are built in black and white, by the use of Renderman’s PxrLayerSurface shader, I can connect my map as a mask for my texture layers.

Environement

The scene takes place on an army desk with books and papers. I already wanted to start creating atmosphere with the textures by going in the same saturation tones and the same color ranges.

For my lighting I wanted to dig a passage of the day to a very bluish night that would come to marry well with the gold of the watch. The addition of orange bombs brings a warm/cold contrast to my sequence.

Lighting/Compositing

For my lighting I wanted to dig a passage of the day to a very bluish night that would come to marry well with the gold of the watch. The addition of orange bombs brings a warm/cold contrast to my sequence. At compositing I mainly brought the ancien atmosphere by adding scratches film and adding glow.

Hero's lair - Jack Sparrow

This was a summer project for school, where I had to create the living place of a hero of my choice, in 3D. I chose to create Jack Sparrow’s lair to capture the adventurous and chaotic essence of the famous pirate captain. The lair, a mixture of hoarded treasures, maritime relics and junk found during his countless journeys, perfectly reflects the eccentric and unpredictable personality of Jack Sparrow. In designing this space, I wanted to immerse the viewer in the rich and tumultuous universe of piracy, where each object tells a story of naval battles, hidden treasures and marine legends. In creating Jack Sparrow’s lair, I sought to pay tribute to the free and daring spirit of the character, while offering a captivating and memorable visual experience.

Modeling

The complexity in the modeling step for this project is more on the number of the objects composing the scene.

Lighting/Compositing

One of the instructions for this project was to create two different lighting setups: a daytime lighting and a nighttime lighting. I decided for the day scene to create a main source of light that passes through grating located on the ceiling. It is a strong and warm light that highlights certain elements. For the night scene, the main light source again passes through pebbles located on the ceiling. It is a strong, hard and cold light. The other sources of light are orange and come from candles. These lights are saturated and diffuse. This hot/cold contrast brings an anxious and mysterious atmosphere. The dark and mysterious atmosphere, enhanced by strategic lighting and detailed textures, creates an immersive atmosphere, transporting the audience into the fascinating world of the Pirates of the Caribbean.

Back shop

Here is my first year final school project. I had to create an back shop 3D scene in two weeks and half. I chose to represent Car parts shop in Bangkok, in Thailand.

Pre-production

One of the most significant parts of this project was the pre-production work. I started by learning about Thailand, architecture, lifestyle, the atmosphere that could emanate and objects of course. After that I could start my research of composition of image in drawing.

Modelisation

As with the hero's lair project mentioned above, the main challenge in modeling for this type of interior scene lies in the number of objects to create and the number of references required. My shop wanted me to create a bazaar and a pile of objects. I managed to produce multiple objects that I could then duplicate.

Lighting/Compositing

The scene takes place at nightfall. Two artificial light sources illuminate the room. A large greenish neon stayed lit in the back room. It is quite saturated and hard. Another source of light, orange, from the street lamps, infiltrates through the door leading to the shop. This lighting is saturated and raw too. A warm/cold contrast brings an anxious mood with cinematic lighting. In terms of compositing, the main focus was on enhancing these contrasts with vignetting to refocus attention on the right place.

Breakfast

Finally, an other project from my first year. We had to make breakfast as realistic as possible with imposed objects like a cup of coffee, an open honey jar, bread, etc.

Modeling

Like for all the project I take a lot references for each objects to help me make the rendering as realistic as possible.

Lighting/Compositing

For this project one of the biggest difficulties was to do the bread shading where I had to use several layers of displace. Honey too was not simple, it was necessary to succeed in perfectly adjusting the subsurface.

Thank you very much for watching my projects. I hope you enjoyed them! I am thrilled to have the opportunity to study in this exciting field of 3D, and while I look forward to making it my career in the near future, I am eager to start new projects and learn a lot along the way.

Thanks for reading!

Antoine

My Linkldin : www.linkedin.com/in/antoine-cogrel-9476181b      

My artstation : https://www.artstation.com/antoinecogrel