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3dTotal: Hey Antonio! I’ve just been whiling away some time on your site http://www.budathome.com/, and I can see a lot of amazing images but not much detail about the creator! So can you tell us a bit about yourself please?
Antonio: Well, I was born in Cádiz (a very nice place in the south of Spain) 33 years ago. My growth as an artist is very similar to many other artists; I started to draw at a very early age and soon after I was playing with my father’s oil colours (he’s a traditional painter). My relationship with digital art - specially with the game industry - was late and, in fact, accidental. In 1999, I created a company called Nebula Entertainment, together with a few friends. We developed a game called Resurrection: The Return of the Black Dragon for the Spanish company Dinamic Multimedia.
Some years later, I moved to Madrid and joined Pyro Studios, where I worked on Commandos Strike Force with my friend Daniel Moreno (who was interviewed in issue 30 of this magazine). Currently I’m working as a character modeller for the company Mercury Steam, creators of Clive Baker’s Jericho game.
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3dTotal: So you created a company and made you own game! That’s an impressive start to a CG career, was it a success?
Antonio: Well, beginnings are always difficult, specially in countries like Spain where the video game industry is not as consolidated as it is in the United Kingdom or other European countries.
Besides, we began developing video games with a very modest budget and with very few staff (just note that the associates were all artists and business administrators at the same time ...) So to sum up, we were quite far away from the AAA productions.
If you take this into account, it was not bad at all: especially in the graphic aspect. The most positive part for me, apart from the experience itself, was the chance to introduce myself to the video game industry (as well as the chance to train myself as a professional). It was a very hard road to run, because most of my training was self-taught. I can remember in those days, we had no access to the huge quantity of useful information we have now (i.e. video tutorials or forums, where many issues can be solved). You could say that I learned the hard way and in that sense, it was a total success. |
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3dTotal: You list a lot of software packages in your skill set. Why have you mastered so many applications (XSI, Maya, 3ds Max, Silo and Modo) when some would say they can all achieve a similar result?
Antonio: Well, the first reason is fun. I love testing 3D software packages. To be honest, I’m not an expert in all
of them. In my work I used 3ds Max,
Photoshop and Zbrush as combo programs. On the other hand, my personal works are made, mainly, with XSI or Maya. I do this as a way to learn, as well. I think the use of several programs opens your mind. It gives you the chance to find new tricks or general solutions that can improve your artistic and technical skills.
3dTotal: Do you find yourself saying all the time “I wish this package could do this” or “This feature is nowhere near as good as in another”?
Antonio: Yes of course, but those defects are compensated for by some other virtue of the software. While it would be great to find it, the “definitive” program simply doesn’t exist. There will always be certain features that one program will do better than another.
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However, if you’re determined then you can learn how to use lots of different programs and therefore be able to access all of their best features.
3dTotal: All of your characters look like they have had sculpting details added, which must be where ZBrush and Mudbox come into your toolset. Can you tell us more about this part of the process?
Antonio: I find that focusing on details, in a baroque or preciosist way of working, is really satisfying. Most of the time that I invest in the whole process is spent on the detailing and I also consider it the most important aspect as I don’t elaborate the base mesh too much. I work with ZBrush3 now, but I have used a lot of Mudbox as well. Both are terrific; it’s just a matter of choice. As I have said before, I normally start with as basic a mesh as possible, including good loops, topology and distribution. Next, I centre on subdivisions and details, using every subdivision up and working from least to most until I finish the model.
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