Why and Discoveries

Why did I decide to do a blog? To show off my work progress, rants, and share my discoveries during my journey.  I'm working towards my BS degree in Game Art and Design. I already have two degrees from previous colleges - Veterinary Technology and Visual Communications.

I learned about the 3D software, Maya in 2006. I've dabbled a little bit learning about it, and recently started to get more educated and discovered things that I wished I've known for years.  Maya itself is a wonderful and very powerful software, but it can also be very intimidating, because there's endless things you can do with it.

I'm not much of a modeler. I do try my best, but I've discovered that I'm a slow and tedious modeler. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing...we'll see. :-) I really enjoy UV unwrapping though, and I would say that's my favorite thing to do.

My strengths would be textures, dynamics, and particles. There's still a lot that I can learn.  Softwares that I frequently use is Maya 2011 (I could get Maya 2012, however my laptop's graphic card cannot handle Viewpoint 2.0 nor High Quality view, so I'm stuck with Maya 2011 for now) and Photoshop. I know it's a plus to learn how to use Mudbox/Zbrush.  I may learn a lot more as I get further down during my Portfolio weeks, but I highly doubt that I'll ever come out with a great high poly model.  I may implement a high poly model onto a low poly model to give it the details. Character designs and creation are my weakest, not my style.

Things I've learned so far:

• Google Images is your best friend
• Create your own library of textures and references - no matter how small. You'll find inspiration all the time.  I have around 2 GB of stuff. Organize your library, and make backups.
• BACKUP your work!  Out of all my years at school, I've only lost one, but very important to me, file that I wished I backed up.  I *can* recreate it, but it took me a long time. Why didn't I back up? Well, I had a thumb drive that fried on me - backed up everything else EXCEPT for that one damn file. 
• Learn EVERYTHING you can, and implement it! 
• Accept criticism as a good thing. There will ALWAYS be someone that hates your work and will rip it apart. If you see a lot of criticism from people that are saying the same thing - fix it, it's obvious something is wrong. 
• Your teachers can be your greatest assets.
• There are no stupid questions - except perhaps this one: "I pressed a button, and my vertexes turned into different colors and when I moved one, all the others moved with it! I'm so upset!!" - SERIOUSLY DUDE?! It's called Soft Selection and you pressed 'b'. This is a great tool to use, and I've used it frequently. I've seen this questions asked SO many times on various forums, especially new people who are lazy to use the search button. 
• F1 is your friend
• Use search buttons on forums.
• I talk too much.

I've said enough here to start off with and during my progress more and more tips/tricks will be revealed.