iPhone wallpaper

This took a surprisingly long time for such a small and simple project. I get bored of looking at the same wallpaper very quickly and I had run out of pictures to use in my Pictures folder (there are 9,948 images in there, but I didn't try them all of course) so I decided to try making my own. Three days later I was finished.

As usual I sketched out a simple design and started making it Illustrator. The sketch was almost the same as the above image. The main idea was there would be different levels for each row of apps - an underground cavern for the bottom four, some grassy hills for the next row up, then some clouds, then the rocket, then a planet. The planet looked too realistic and it didn't seem to suit so I got rid of it. Once I was done I transferred it over to my phone and used it for about a day before I started to get annoyed by some things.

The first thing I noticed were the trees. I didn't like the round design and the small fruit was too small a detail for the simple style of everything else. They were also too well hidden and/or too evenly spaced, even though I wanted them to show between the apps. The other thing that annoyed me was that you couldn't really see any of the underground cavern, and the grassy hills were slightly too far down.

Aah, much better. Square trees are much nicer than round ones, and with the fruit gone they suit the rest of the image. I originally intended to have the clouds white or something and the red was just a placeholder so it would show up against the blue as I drew them, but they give off a nice early-morning vibe which I like (even though the sun isn't rising). There's a much nicer blend between the grass, dirt (originally a lame line that looked out of place) and rock. The cavern was still just slightly too low though, so I tweaked it a tad more.

Not a whole lot has changed since the first design, but I like it much more. The little textures in the grass, dirt and rock were drawn in Photoshop, as was the waterfall and the faint diagonal lines.

And here we have it. It's a pity that you can't see the bottom of the waterfall, because I quite like how that turned out. I'll probably get bored of looking at this after a while and make another one. I also have another 3D project in the works, but it's rather a tough one.

Cube Land

Here's another project I challenged myself to do in a small amount of time. This time I was looking through an old sketch book of mine and found what is essentially this, but I redrew it a few times to decide on what should be included and got to work.

I started by modelling the earth and water. I had to do the water a few times because I wasn't sure how I would get the white edges. What I ended up with was one mesh with two different materials assigned to it - one more transparent than the other. I used the same Toon Shading as my previous project, but this time instead of flat colour I used abstract painterly textures. Each surface has two textures created for it - one for being lit and the other for the shade.

The sketches I did had a few different ideas and I mixed and matched to get the final arrangement of things. The skeleton arm, pipe and tree were always there, and at one stage the sign had something written on it. Towards the end I added the lily pads, ladder, grass and rocks. I had a few other things, but didn't want to overcrowd it.

I was going to smooth out the jagged edges of the ground and water, but I liked the low poly look of it. It suits the simple style (even though the smoothed version would probably have worked too) and it kind of reminds me of Nintendo 64 graphics.

I knew I didn't want the outlines, but I thought I should try them just in case. I had them on the underwater grass, but they showed up far too much so I turned those ones off. I think because the water is transparent, it messes with the perspective a bit. The ladder looks like its underwater and out of the water at the same time. I think adding one too many things can really mess things up.

I have a few more ideas for mini projects. I wonder which one I'll do next...

a simple tower

Betteo (also here) is right up there as far as my favourite artists go. His work and style is so imaginative and inspiring. Everything he does is interesting to look at. Some things really make me want to create art, and betteo's a.simple.tower is one of them. Here it is:

I did not draw the above picture!

One night at 11pm I was looking at this picture and challenged myself to see how much of it I could recreate before I went to bed. I decided on the 3D medium and I think by 3 or 4 in the morning I had modeled everything and figured out the basics of Toon Shading and outlines in Maya so I went to sleep. The next day after lunch I began texturing and by 11pm that night I had finished all the small details. Below is the finished product.

The only things not done in Maya was the sky colour, the clouds, the border, the grungy texture and the small horizontal hand drawn line under the castle window (an important detail from the original). Lighting it in Maya was a pain in the butt because I wanted each object to look at least somewhat similar to the original. I had a separate light for the castle, the ground and the smaller objects - each only affecting what I intended. You'll notice that the moon couldn't light the far end of the ground and the near side of the castle simultaneously. I have to say for 24 hours work I am very pleased with the result.

Here is a zoomed out image of the scene rendered in Maya without any of the Photoshop additions (with the exception of the sky colour). It's quite a simple scene really which is what I love about the original.

These small projects are fun and manageable around work, so expect more of them!