I ’ m inspired , for the most part , by stories . I think of my work as capturing a spin-off story from an idea that I ’ ve consumed elsewhere , whether it be a character from a film or an interaction I had in the grocery store . I take a
QUANTUM FRAME lot from the visual imagery around me , too , and think of it akin to the way I would remix a piece of music : there ’ s a nod in there to the original ( that may only make sense to me ), but it ’ s a standalone idea with a different life . My work is the byproduct of the intention to unsettle the observer ’ s understanding of the physical world ... to combine things that can be understood with things that make little sense and do it in a way that ’ s visually convincing .
Can you tell us a bit about your creative process ?
Story : I have two close friends that I ’ ve known since childhood and continue to see on a weekly basis to chew the fat with . It ’ s a wonderful thing . Invariably , one of us has some stuff going on that ’ s overwhelming , and the other two are there to support . Just like in this alien abduction scene .
My process invariably begins with an idea or an observation from popular ( and unpopular ) culture , or the simple oddities of everyday life . I then develop this into the skeleton of a visual concept and start to build . I can naturally iterate from there as I take so much inspiration from watching the bare-bones of the idea start to evolve into something compelling . After the concept ’ s structure comes together and I ’ ve found the right perspective . This might still be very early in the overall process , but if
Process : Full CG environment with some leaf scans and a photograph of some carpet to use as a displacement map for the floor . The alien ship is a scaled-up CG camera lens . There ’ s also some CG fog in there that saw this render take about 6 hours to finish .
I get a glimpse of the final look , it ’ s relatively plain sailing from there .