Texture and shader study

Some more tests of the portrait study. For the lighting setup, I used 3 Area Portal lights linked to mia_blackbody along with  physical sun and sky and an environment sphere. And for the shader setup I used a mix of misss_fast skin shader linked to an mia_material_x shader to control the specular and reflection maps for the character. 

I finished the model, sculpt and texture on the character. (Modeled & UV'd in Maya, Sculpted in Zbrush, Textured in Zbrush, Mudbox and Photoshop, rendered using Mental Ray.)
I am working on the lighting, render and comp, so another work in progress.

NURBS

Ambient Occlusion(AO) render of a scene built using NURBS in Maya using a photo of an old kitchen by Kurt Langland as reference. 

AO render  using Final gather in Maya

More work in progress..

Some early sketches for a fish-human hybrid creature that thrives on flesh. It can usually be found waiting for it's next meal lurking around the shadows on playgrounds. It also has a thinly veiled love for cloth masks, capes and costumes.

Lost

Lost  (work in progress)

I doodle, sketch and paint characters in between my 3D work. Switching between painting characters and building them in 3D helps me explore different mediums and one informs the other. My character sketches so far are experimental and largely driven by studies of different textures- skin, soft fur, metal, rust etc. Earlier this month, I attended a workshop by Pixar Director Mark Andrews. His talk on narratives and composition made me re-evaluate my approach to these character sketches. This painting was started before I attended the lecture. I am currently reworking the painting with pointers from the workshop. I'm excited to see what I can come up with!