Names of the Muscles and Studying Anatomy

Asked if it is important to know the names of the muscles of the body when studying anatomy.

I say when in a relationship and you get to know the person. It is the name first and foremost you must remember if the relationship is to go any further. And then you realize the name means nothing if you do not go any deeper.  A person’s background, history, tendencies and life goals would define that person. 

The same analogy applies to studying the human figure. At first I was also mesmerized by skin pores, muscle detail and fancy latin names. But then comes the realization that studying anatomy is all about skeletons and bones. Like being in a relationship, its what underneath that defines the person, in the case of the human figure, the skeleton defines where the form of the body. Knowing the origin and insertions of the bony landmarks are very helpful when lost while looking at the figure..

I do not claim to be an anatomy expert although I wish to be one someday.

And then comes the trap where everything I do becomes a modified ecorche’

Study more!

Also I find it very annoying when people try to say this muscle right here this muscle right here, right there. geez

Part 2: A reflection into getting that first game-industry job.

I have a thesis due in December 2011. I just finished my internship at Float on the month of October 2011. I hath learned much, but not everything, not yet, in a batman voice.

I took 2 really hard classes in AAU by my teacher, Shon, it was extremely hard balancing internship monday to wednesday only to be bombarded by critiques on my homeworks thursday-friday usually ending up in doing the entire homework asset all over again. (modeling, re-uving, texturing,) x 2 classes and being taunted constantly on how I should have not taken two of his classes at the same time, lol i was pretty sure i would have failed his second class but apparently the tin man has a heart.

Oh and I was made lead artist/producer in a pretty cool game prototyping class, producing is not for me, I can’t handle the egos of other people and I realized in that moment that I cannot be made responsible for other people, production is not for me, i really am not a fan of social interaction when it comes to creating game assets.

Which leaves me 2 days to complete my thesis from September-December 2011.

Those two days I wasted playing smash brothers, starcraft 2 and league of legends. I could have finished my thesis on time but I didnt, I had to have fun. Such a fool I was.

But i didn’t only play those games, I also focused on skill development at that time! I watched all of 3dmotive’s environment tutorials, i hath learned how to blend two tiling textures via heightmap, tiling modularity, modular tiling assets in UDK, I nearly forgot all of the material creation things already but learning is fun, too fun that I forgot to do my thesis. I focused too much on skill development. Skill development that would eventually let me finish my thesis in 1 month from scratch. It was a big gamble. Although I could have finished my thesis if the hours i played playing league, starcraft 2 and smash brothers. And what the hell was I doing studying environment techniques when I want to be a character artist lol.

It wasn’t until the month of november 2011 a month before my final review that I actually started working on my thesis lol. I got it into 60 percent completion. 

But i’m done with school units all I have to do is to fix my portfolio, get a job and represent to the final review committee. But F my life I only have a limited amount of time before my OPT expires.

Then I got a call from my former lead artist/mentor from Float Rich Larm about a character artist position for me at nWay after I graduate. I was like hell yeah. I didn’t even update my website, apply for the position or stuff like that. I met with the founder and showed him some game asset renders and a little bit of stuff from my previous work on my iPad, Float wanted me back but they sent their request a tad bid too late.

A solid reputation is big in this industry, and they were impressed how I am able to retain so much detail from 60 million polygon particle generated booleaned meshes to 200-8000 triangle game meshes, oh the magic of mirrored uvs/normal mapping. I also knew my aesthetics as an artist is very limited. but as a technical game modeler, i think i am pretty up there, my low poly will make your low poly look like a zbrush subdivision level 2. but I knew from a Da Vinci quote that poor is an artist who’s theory is greater than practice. lol i know i’m a limited artist but hey part of getting better is learning where you are weak at and working on it!

But the unsung heroine to my story was my frenemy, we worked together on the school game prototyping project, while I got a recommendation from Rich, I also got a recommendation from her to one of the engineers there despite the fact we fought everyday while at school. She and the engineer hath worked together previously in a company in Korea. I am forever grateful to her, i think she will do very well in the industry as she studies like there’s no tomorrow. I think she will smoke everyone in the AAU spring show watch out.

Oh yeah and they said they will fix my visa.

I won the lottery, hurray for +3 years in the US.

Now I have 3 years to get to a level of a sculptor/painter.

But I can’t seem to stop playing League of Legends as Ashe, it’s very hard to stop playing LoL when your playing only one character.

I love playing Ashe it gives the enemies despair. Those frost arrows slow the enemies down giving them hope that they can actually escape. There can be no true despair without hope for escape. I wanna give them despair. It is so gratifying watching them make a run when they clearly have no chance of running from me.

But really I should study instead of playing LoL

I should study instead of writing this blog. 

But instead of studying I should actually make something. 

I like turtles.

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