Jordan Guibert: Selected Works 2024

Bonjour ! 

My name is Jordan Guibert, an aspiring FX and Compositing Artist. I am passionate about creating stunning visual effects and telling compelling stories through my work. I enjoy diving into each part of the pipeline.

This year has been challenging for many reasons, but it has also helped me question my work and grow as an artist.

So I decided to select some of the work I did this year. I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed creating them.

                                                                                                          Waterfall

Inspirations

This is my latest project in Houdini, inspired by the waterfall scenes in Pixar's "Brave." I began by analyzing the elements present in the scene and the composition of the shot.

 Environment Setup in Houdini

I utilized Heightfield in Houdini for environment creation, optimizing polygon count and generating UVs. I conducted research on efficiently generating UVs for large landscapes and found a highly informative video by Adrien Lambert on YouTube. I extend my gratitude to him for sharing such valuable insights.

I created the textures in Substance Painter, incorporating Megascans rock textures for added realism.

Simulation Optimization

Developed a simulation quality management node to optimize simulation time and quality.

Waterfall Simulation

I executed a basic FLIP simulation for the river segment. I decided to separate the river and the waterfall to optimize the simulation and have more control over each one, both in terms of artistry and quality.

For the waterfall, I created a custom airfield that provided a more artistic simulation with better movement than the original solver.

Meshing and Rendering Preparation

I cleaned up the river mesh to render it in Karma and then blended both simulations together. I had to move the points towards the surface between the two simulations to hide the line created due to using different fields. I did the shading in Karma using the basic water and whitewater shaders.

I did the color correction in DaVinci Resolve and the compositing in Nuke.

About this project:

This project allowed me to explore terrain creation in Houdini and learn how to optimize simulations. I wasn't fully satisfied with the color rendering directly in Houdini, so I took the opportunity to use DaVinci Resolve for color correction, which helped me learn more about color grading using the ACES workflow. Cleaning the mesh to achieve the desired result took some time, and while it works well, there's room for improvement. In terms of enhancements, I believe I could improve the overall environment to better showcase my simulation.

Terre D'Hermes Advertising Breakdown

This school project gave us the freedom to choose a topic, with the requirement to represent a brand. I chose to create a shot for an advertisement for the Hermès brand, focusing on incorporating natural elements. This approach aligns with Hermès' perfume ads, which often emphasize the natural scents of the perfume's ingredients.

Modeling and Texturing

I did the bottle modeling in Maya and textured it in Substance Painter.

The stone came from Megascan.

For the rain, I created a simple POP simulation with a slower time to achieve the "slow motion" effect.

For the shape of the rain, I started with a simple sphere and deformed it to look like a droplet.

For the particles, I used a sphere that is drive by a curve to drive the particles in the simulation. By computing the velocity and doing some math to smooth out the abrupt movements, it creates a more natural effect for the particle movement.

The particles can be artistically directed directly in the simulation, allowing control over whether the particles should closely follow the base points or have more freedom of movement. It is also possible to control the speed at which they catch up with the main group of particles.

I did the compositing in Nuke. I transformed the daytime scene into a nighttime because I believed it better suited the overall atmosphere. Additionally, I incorporated some smoke to enhance the mysterious ambiance in the darkness. I did some rotoscoping to introduce a glow inside the bottle, aligning it with the particles. Initially, I attempted this process in Houdini but was unsatisfied with the outcome.

Conclusion: This was not a very complicated effect to achieve initially, but I wanted to explore further the utilization of math in Houdini and the power that these techniques can bring. It served as a good introduction to math in Houdini. I also worked on some small projects outside of this one. I hope to utilize these techniques more in the future to add variation or achieve other creative effects, as I have seen that the possibilities are infinite.

Erosion Effect

The project was created as a submission for a challenge hosted on a Houdini server.

The primary inspiration for the project came from the artistic styles of Daniel Arsham and iammaskarade, particularly their work featuring erosion effects.

Crystal Infection: I developed a simple infection solver using VDB growth, multiplied with an attribute paint to drive the path.

For the erosion, I utilized a solver and a basic VDB Advect , along with some noise to introduce variation.

For the shading, I applied noise to the crystals to add texture and variation. Everything done with Karma render.

The model come from  @brainstation on Sketchfab

In conclusion : Despite the time constraints and challenges encountered, this project was an immensely enjoyable endeavor. It provided me an opportunity to explore a more creative and artistic direction than I am used to.