ZBrushCentral

Featured Member: g.g. (Gray Ginther)

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Today we’re speaking with Gray Ginther, who’s currently hard at work on “Darksiders: Wrath of War” for Vigil Games. He was kind enough to share a bit about his background as one of CG’s “Old Timers”, as well as what ZBrush means to him as an industry professional. Enjoy!

You’re kind of a hard person to track down much info on. Could you tell us something about yourself and your background?
Sure. I’m the Character Lead here at Vigil Games in Austin and I’ve been here for about a year and a half.

I’m from Kansas originally. I’m 45; doesn’t feel like I’m 45, though. A guy at Insomniac commented one time, “Man, you must be, like, the oldest guy at this company!” I had to laugh. So many of the guys are so young that anything over 30 seems ancient to them. I guess what led me to art was seeing Star Wars and then reading about ILM. Also reading about Rick Baker and his makeup effects. I really wanted to work on effects in film. That was back in the late 70s if you need a time frame.

I started out with a degree in Illustration back before there was such a thing as computer graphics. I played in a few rock bands for more years than I really should have, then went back to school and got a Masters in Japanese Language. Right around that time I discovered 3D software and that got me back into art.

I worked for a game company in Chicago for 2 years, then in the Character Department at Insomniac Games for 4 years. Now I’m in Austin.

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What was it that caused you to leave the art industry before? And what was it about 3D that brought you back?

Well, my focus at the time was illustration and doing drawings for “Atlantic Monthly”; editorial stuff for newspapers. It just wasn’t a good fit – I just didn’t find it interesting. I was living in Brooklyn at the time shopping my book around. My brother called me and asked if I would play guitar in his band and I said, “Yes, I am so out of here!” But after many years of doing a little art here and there I realized I still really loved to do it and the 3D software just totally captivated my interest. Drawing had always seemed such a struggle, but somehow making something in 3D – even though it was just on the computer – seemed so much more fun and interesting.

I guess I’ve always enjoyed making things. My father taught woodworking and we used to make all sorts of stuff from cut offs in his scrap bin. So I suppose making things on the computer was a continuation of that.

What program were you using at that point?

(Laughing) Ray Dream Studio!

So where did ZBrush come into the picture?
We started using it at Insomniac when the PS3 projects got going. I would see the guys working on “Resistance” using it and couldn’t wait to give it a try. I started using it for the “Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction” project.

That was version 2. It was very challenging at first since it was so much different than poly modeling, but I really loved it. Something about the immediacy of working on a model with the sculpting brushes was very captivating.

For the PS3 projects we were making hi-res models and bringing them in to Maya to bake normals onto the game model. All the organic characters would go into ZBrush.

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What were your feelings once you got your hands on ZBrush 3?
When I first saw the UI I thought, “Hmm. It looks pretty much the same as before.” But once I got in and dug around a bit there was so much to discover. I got on the beta shortly before version 3 was released, and was so impressed by all the stuff the beta testers were posting on the beta forum. I’m still finding out about new stuff in version 3!

What are your favorite features so far, and why?
There’s so many it’s kind of hard to break it down. The new brushes are really great. There is such a range of flexibility and they feel so fast and easy to use. Of course the MatCap materials are awesome. People used to stop by just to see models with Ralf Stumpf’s Sculpy material on them. I think PolyPaint has turned out to be one of the biggest things for me. It’s so much faster to paint right on the model, and to be able to export that and bake it out with the normals was really a huge thing for me.

[attach=106233]Jailer[/attach]

How do you use ZBrush in your day to day work at Vigil?
It’s part of the core tool set and I use it throughout my work flow. I’ll use it during the rough model stage and all the way through the hi res to texture.

Our first step is to work out the overall volumes and silhouette on a rough model, so it’s really fast to put together something simple in MAX, bring it into ZBrush and work on it there. It’s easy to go very quickly from large to fine adjustments and it seems so much faster doing it in ZBrush. The high res models all end up in ZBrush. Of course you’ll want to do the organic stuff in ZBrush, but even the hard surface things like armor and weapons will get a ZBrush pass.

Then like I mentioned earlier, PolyPaint makes it very fast to do the texture right on the model.

And it’s not limited by UV’s…
Which is good because I’m so lazy. I could very easily lay out UV’s beforehand but I never do. And actually it’s great to not have to. I just export the model and the texture at whatever resolution I need.

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How much would you say ZBrush speeds up your work? And does it allow you to do things that wouldn’t otherwise be possible?
There are so many modeling tasks that seem to go faster by being able to do them in ZBrush. I have to bring up PolyPaint again because it’s such a great thing for me. I never really was good at just painting on a flat texture in Photoshop and then have it do what I want on the model. I have to be able to see it on the model as I’m painting or it just doesn’t work for me. I also can’t stand lag, and ZBrush is the only tool that lets me paint in real-time and at the resolution I need.

I think it really is the nature of ZBrush that it encourages a playful approach to the work, and the response is immediate so it’s very easy to try out different ideas and home in on whatever you’re trying to achieve. The short answer: it’s very fun to use, that’s what’s kept me hooked.

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So is there anything you can tell us about your current project: Darksiders?

It’s been a very cool challenge to bring some of Joe Madureira’s characters into the game, learning to translate his style into 3D. He and the other concept guys have come up with some great character designs and the guys in the Character Department have been working very hard on them. There will be a lot we’ll look forward to showing on ZBrushCentral once the game comes out.

We look forward to seeing it! Anything else you’d like to share or say while you have our attention now?
Just a thanks to the folks at Pixologic for creating a community like ZBrushCentral where anyone can show their work, and a thanks to all the folks who continue to share their work there. There’s so many people to learn from and I continue to be amazed and inspired by all the stuff people are doing there. Thanks everyone!

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Thank you, Gray! It was definitely nice to finally learn more about you!

Be sure to also check out our many past interviews, which can be found in the ZBrush Artist Interviews forum.

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Jailer.jpg

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WOW !!!
amazing…Man you rock …

Very cool interview! Can’t wait to see more of the character art from Darksiders! Great stuff:+1: :+1:

great artist and interview !
i love your works man ! about the Age…i think the Life Is Node Base ! who know where is the end of our timeline ?..Rick Baker, on of my favorites…EXPERIENCE is your bonus item ! its very expensive !

awesome interview and work man!
about the age i agree 100% !

keep it up!

-Raf

Awesome work guy! thnx for sharing
some of your story :smiley: :+1:

Just great works.

Cheers

Ralf Stumpf

Super Cool Works Gray!!! Bravo! :+1: :sunglasses:

The work is amazing. Darkseiders looks like it has an awesome art team. From the art direction all the way to the textures, models, and FX. Seems like they have a team of Aces working there and I’m sure we will see a lot of awesome games from them. Gray your work is awesome… it must be great to bring Joe Madureira’s art from the paper into the final game model.

Thanks for sharing!

Talk about the right guy for the job! Man I must say I am rather (very) impressed at how well you translate the 2D MAD style into real 3D art. It’s a beautiful thing!

Thanks for sharing with us all!

Peace-NickZ.

Great interview and work, cant wait to see mroe artwork.

thanks for the kind replies everybody!

ivar_sn: glad you like the work, although it’s been a while since I’ve rocked. :wink:

TyShelton: Thanks! We’ll be looking forward to showing more Darksiders stuff sometime soon.

skulll_monster & grassetti: Thanks for the encouragement! Actually I usually don’t give my age much thought, but now I guess I can add “CG Old-Timer” to my Linked-In profile :lol:

Super Glitcher: thank you for taking the time to read it!

Stumpf: Thank you Ralf, I’ve been a fan of your super-clean models & great presentation for a long time.

piz: thank you so much!

art3DNRG: There are very talented folks on both teams at Vigil, although sometimes it’s a bit like herding cats around here :wink:

nickz: thanks Nick! It’s fun to work on Joe’s stuff, fortunately he gives me a lot of help getting it into 3D.

aesis412: thanks, we’'ll try to get more stuff up before too long.

thanks again everyone!

Great interview G.G.!
Amazing sculpting work you did with the Jailer! I love it!
Can’t wait until Darksiders comes out to see more of your work here! :slight_smile:

Great interview Gray! That Jailer is still one of my favorite characters from Darksiders. You have been a real inspiration for me and I can’t wait to see what comes out of the DS character department next!

  • BoBo

that’s an awesome interview once again
i can see a great style make a great game
u guys at VIGIL really translated the style successfully
can’t wait to see the final game :smiley:
take care
Jason

Great interview. Love the variety in the work. I think the blue alien fella is awesome. haha.

Ratchet and clank was an amazing game :+1:. I look forward to darksiders.

cheers.
Brett

Mind Symbion: Thanks very much. I’m looking forward to seeing Darksiders finally get out the door myself. :wink: Still lots to do. . … .

Bobo: thanks buddy. it’s great to have you on board here, your enthusiasm is a real shot in the arm!

Kupo: thank you!

brettSinclair: thanks Brett! Talk about a blast from the past, the blue alien is one of the first Zbrush models I ever made. :o

Wonderful interview once again. Thank you for the information! :+1:

Great interview …
wonderful work Gray, love it !

Lucky

Fantastic interview! Its always great to learn about other artists and how they came to be. The work they doing over at Vigil Games is amazing. I love Joe Mad and its awesome to see such talented artists bring his drawing to life. :smiley: