Questions and Answers...

HARDWARE

 

Which computers do you use?

Griff: I use Macs and PC’s. I have used Apple Macs Macintosh’s ever since they were first launched in 1984, and Apple II’s a great deal before that. In fact, I have used computers just about all my life. The  first computer my high school ever had was one I designed and built (Intel 4040, then 8080). Yes, I was there at the beginning with the ‘build you own boards - Z80 and 6502’, COSMAC 1800, S100 card systems, then Commodore PET, NASCOM1-II, TRS-80’s, Northstar Horizon’s... Really fun days. Just getting a ‘computer’ to boot up from you own boot-strap ROM was miraculous, the sense of achievement was huge. By comparison, everyone has it pretty easy these days...

 

I suppose I have to admit it, I am a computer nerd! Computer geek if you will. I’ve always loved computers; using them, designing them, building, programming, assembling, collecting, adapting. They changed my life. I don’t care what make or type, and I don’t care who knows it...

 

I have worked in just about every aspect of the computer industry, until illness forced me to change direction. I am now doing what I wanted to do when I finally retired. When I left school, and having to make directional choices at college, I had quite a few choices: maths, electronics, mechanical engineering, music, art and illustration. But, it was no good, computers had me by the jugular. Strangely, I’ve stayed in touch with all those choices to some degree.

 

Anyway, I do most of my 3D/photorealistic work on PC’s... Since Apple have started employing Intel CPU’s some have called into question; what is a PC? Let’s say then that I use Windows based PC’s for my 3D work, I use Adobe CS3 on both Windows and Apple Macs...

 

When I can, and the weather is nice, I like to work in my garden using a fairly powerful laptop. It’s fine for modelling, CS3, and general business work. Modelling is what takes up most of my time. I have a render farm which takes care of the seriously processor intensive tasks. Overnight, most of my computers are pressed into render service, running remote render batches which I set up during the day. Some of the render nodes run for days and in some cases weeks just on one project.

 

I mainly use my Macs for Adobe CS3, Web and business work. Also producing documentation, but I use either really. I’m not an Apple or Windows zealot - I just use whichever is best suited to the task at hand. I love using both, feel comfortable with both. Both platforms have their strengths and weaknesses...

 

For some strange reason, I have not yet really ventured into Linux/UNIX. Don’t ask me why... time I suppose.

 

What PC hardware do you use?

Griff: I tend to build my own systems, all except the render farm, which is rack-based. I do beta test some hardware for certain manufacturers (mentioning no names). My two main workstations are both Intel quad-cores, overclocked to 3.2Ghz with 4GB really fast Corsair memory. The video cards vary as again I beta-test certain cards for both the main contenders, but are all high-spec.

 

Living on a small island, nearly all my systems run off or through a few MGE Pulsar Revolution UPS’s which I have found to be superb.

 

Which human interface products do you use?

Griff: I use Logitech mice - currently an MX Revolution (truly awesome mouse), and also an MX1000. Various Logitech keyboards - really like the S510 and the diNovo Edge at the moment, as they don’t get in the way. I have quite a few others. I use Wacom A4 and A3 tablets - simply the best for feel, response, sensitivity etc. I’ve tried most things, and nothing comes close. I have started using a couple of 3D input devices, but after all these years, frankly I still prefer mice/tablet combinations.

 

SOFTWARE

 

What is the main software you use?

Griff: Adobe CS3 (Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Flash, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, Acrobat, etc.). Caligari trueSpace, Lightwave, Maya, Cinema, FormZ, and loads of utility software.
 

Which operating system/s do you use on your PC’s?

Griff: With the PC’s, I mainly use XP Pro, although I do have one workstation that uses Dual-core 32-bit Vista, and another Quad-core PC that uses 64-bit Vista. I experiment all the time with new hardware and software combinations, as I need to keep moving with the times. I don’t have too much time to tinker, so I use a fairly structured and iterative approach. It’s a pain though, as keeping all my computers going and in top form takes hours out of my time. I am not a fiddler though, and my motto is: “If it works, don’t fix it!”

 

You mentioned that you have written some plug-ins and special software?

Griff: Yes, in a past career I used to do quite a bit of programming. I have written and continue to write PS compatible plug-ins, quite a bit of Python, and I’m really into Java. The big problem is time, so I have to be very disciplined about my schedule.

 

You use a number of 3D applications. Which is your favourite?

Griff: Yes, I have used most of the 3D applications out there. I use Caligari trueSpace, FormZ, Lightwave, Maya, Electric Image, Renderman and Cinema.

 

My favourite by far is trueSpace from Caligari. I love using the immersive interface. Personally, I don’t like or even really appreciate the CAD approach to three-dimensional art. To me, creating and manipulating objects using CAD methods is akin to those wacky scientists in those old sci-fi films awkwardly manipulating objects with those clunky mechanical hands behind glass screens. I prefer the real time ‘immersive’ feel of trueSpace. When I discovered trueSpace it was a breath of fresh air, and has given me new vigour and interest in producing artwork.

 

I use a combination of 2D and 3D, and I would be disappointed if a someone looking at my work could tell which package/s I have used to create it.

 

With trueSpace, I didn't even have to read the manual; it just seemed obvious. I find the trueSpace user interface intuitive, easy to use, and logical. I just love the ability to create, immerse, and lose myself in trueSpace's real-time workspace. I have read that a number of 3D artists out there have struggled. I am not sure why this is. I have the hugest respect for those guys at Caligari... They’re awesome!

 

Of all the work you have done over the years, do you have a favourite?

Griff: I suppose my favourite project tends to be the one I am working on at the time. Each piece tells a story, and just looking at any one of them takes me back instantly to what was happening at the time. There are always deadlines... deadlines... deadlines.... and I tend (but not always) to work on a few projects at once.

 

The project I am most pleased with is the triple engine project (Jet Ski, Snowmobile and Motorcycle). The client needed three engines that had to be fictitious, yet visually and mechanically plausible. They were to be used in product marketing for printing products.

 

The deadline was seven days! At first I thought it would be impossible, but I like a challenge. I spent a day researching the three engine types, and then just got stuck in to the work. I locked myself away, put the coffee machine on maximum, and didn’t really look up until it was done. The client was very happy, and so was I. Well relieved...

 

That project was great. I don’t mean that in a big-headed way, but because I achieved something that I thought was just completely impossible.

 

What do like least about software, what’s your biggest bugbear?

Griff: Mmm... Don’t get me started! To be honest, nearly all software is a great achievement. I think if most people knew the blood, sweat and tears that goes into any software application or utility, they’d be amazed, and a little more grateful about the miracles that we all take for granted today. Also, it’s easy to criticise the big software companies, but their work has changed the world.

 

No, the thing/s that I hate the most today are viruses, SPAM, and computer and Internet related crime. The authorities just are not taking it seriously, and sweeping under the carpet. The newspaper and media headline bank robberies, and commercial thefts, yet 100 times those amounts are being stolen from under the publics nose, and no one is doing anything about it. It’s BIG ‘business’ if I can call it that, and the big banks never admit to it in public. The thin edge of the wedge is your average SPAM that hits your inbox. But, it is fraud and theft! ...and ought to be treated as such. Huge amounts of money and time are being stolen from naive and innocent people.

 

I have known good honest businesses ‘go under’ due to SPAM and Denial of Service attack, viruses, and all such like. People have lost their employment, income, houses, and security due to this. Virus hackers ‘get off’ on what is the next ‘great hack’. Not in my book. I was a hacker in the truest sense when I was growing up with computers. A hacker was an experimenter, an explorer in a thirst for knowledge. Not a vandal, fraudster or thief. Organised gangs are getting in on the act, that’s what scares me.

 

It all disgusts me. I help anyone I know to protect themselves, which is increasingly difficult.

 

Okay, touched a nerve there. What do you most like about software?

Griff: It’s so clever, malleable, logical, creative, and the tools are getting better everyday. If I’d had the tools available today when I was programming, I’d probably still be doing it for a living.

 

PERSONAL

 

What are your favourite projects to work on?

Griff: Well, I think anyone who sees any of my work can see very quickly that I have an unrelenting passion for all things mechanical, aeronautical, mechanical symbolism, and electronics.

 

For instance, to me a beautifully designed PCB is a work of art. I have some amazing examples framed on my office walls. There is beauty in the logic, the form and the function. I can read them like a book - they can have a beginning and an end. I know most of the chip sets by heart, and know their function/pin-outs, and can imagine and trace the pathways in my mind. I count the cycles, and almost visualise them running like a mechanical clock.

 

To me there is real beauty - not appreciated by many! - in printed circuit boards and logical design, or beautifully crafted computer code, all created by the constraints of logic, electronics, quantum mechanics, and mechanical functionality - real poetry!

 

To create my work, I usually scan a prototype board or schematic, and then using either Illustrator, or DrawPlus, I redraw my own versions track by track - with track width, holes, legends, extensive use of layers, and then create my own new overlays.

 

I use grids if appropriate and construct the components chip by chip, SMC, resistor etc part-by-part, using the same techniques I do for my larger mechanical work. I use digital vernier callipers and high power digital optics to measure components to 0.001mm, as well as using the manufacturer's reference books for dimensions, materials.

 

All this can take a long time, but I'm told the results are worth it, and many manufacturers have used my artwork on boxes and marketing materials, and no-one seems to have noticed! All the marketing and packaging seems to be needed with lead-times a long way up front, so at that point normally only breadboards or prototypes are available and they are certainly not representative! That’s where my kind of work sometimes comes into play and why it proves so useful for these companies. Occasionally, I have actually found design faults or problems that I do bring to the manufacturers attention.

 

What advice would you give to those looking to start out in illustration and design work?

Griff: It's vitally important to build-up a well rounded portfolio of artwork that is representative of you. It’s no good creating a portfolio of work that didn’t have your heart and soul in it. For instance, I can do organics, people, architecture, but it’s not really my passion and doesn’t get me in the heart. As a result, I don't put it in my portfolio, as it would be a kind of lie to include that.

 

Without a truly representative portfolio, you will get nowhere. One picture really is worth a thousand words, and can mean a pay-check too!

 

Another thing, almost anyone can produce a great piece of work, but you do have to stop and ask yourself "Can I really do this full-time, on a day-in, day-out basis?". And would you really want to? Remember that hours and hours of hard, solitary work are needed to be successful, hours or research, travel and study. Not many people can spend sometimes up to 18 hours a day doing all this. It has to be a passion, a vocation - not just a job.

 

Stick to the stated deadlines. You are only as good as your last job, as the saying goes. There is always going to be someone better, faster, more talented that yourself so don’t get lazy or complacent. Don't get blinded by a big fee. Big fees only come with a big tasks, and big fees divided by the hundreds of working hours sometimes don't work out to much!

 

Know your skills, hone them, know your weaknesses, and tackle your fears. Work out ways to exceed what you think you cannot achieve, and you will surprise yourself - but don't do it at the expense of the client or you will never hear from them again!

 

Also, technology, either hardware or software, will not always save you. You’re trying to hit a fast moving target with computer software/hardware as it evolves fast… keep up, or one or the other will move ahead of you. Read, learn, understand, be brutal with yourself.

 

Oh and work on the hard stuff first!

 

What about those who already have started in that line of work - what advice do you have for them to further their career, perhaps get more notice, larger jobs?

Griff: Take the time to completely understand what the client is asking for. Read the brief many times (like an exam paper) and try to feel and empathise with what the client is really asking for. Sometimes they don’t exactly know, but they'll know when you've got it right, and will certainly not be scared to tell you when you've got it wrong.

 

Sometimes they may show a previous example of a successful piece, and ask you to emulate that. This is fine if the new piece is for an existing product line, and they need consistency. Sometimes I have done exactly what I've been asked, and they have been disappointed. But, I nearly always say: 'Okay, this is what you asked for, (I may get a deflated or okay that's okay look), but then say: 'but this is what I really think you wanted'! If they smile that smile, Yes! I win, and get to play the game again, next time.

 

How do you get most of your work?

Griff: Call me lucky, but so far I don’t think I have ever contacted a company looking for work. Clients seem to find me through my website, or by word of mouth, email, or my existing or new work out in the public domain.

 

Once you have a piece of work, what is your first step? (pencil sketches, low poly mock ups, straight into the modelling, etc)

Griff: I am extremely visually orientated, both literally and metaphorically, and I can pretty much build and then 'see' the finished artwork in my head in detail before I even start - I think this is something I inherited from my late father. I guess I have a kind of virtual modeller in my head, and can create objects, rotate, scale, color, examine, and model in my head. I spend hours seemingly daydreaming and I am in fact working out details. I never ever make visual notes – other than at client meetings, when I have to show that I have understood a point or concept.

 

I have always been able to do this, even before I had even heard of 2D/3D. I do have a math background, and can ‘see’ equations, numbers and lists as though on paper in my head. I used to conceive computer architectures, code, designs and systems this way. I guess it may sound unusual, but that’s how I work. I do all the ‘experimentation’, and concepts in my head, and then when I'm happy I then use trueSpace to make them reality.

 

What is your workflow once you are in the main body of the work?

Griff: I honestly think my workflow is different for every client I have. Some like to micro-manage, and see progress on a very regular basis, whilst others just want to be wowed, and then wow their audience! Whatever the customer wants is fair enough.

 

As an example, on asking one of my clients how much involvement he wanted, he said this: "Griff, it's like a horse race. I'm not interested in all the little details of the race like who fell off, who stayed on. All I want to know is that we're the winner. Give me a winner, that's all I want - and by this Friday! If we win, you get to ride again, and again!"

 

I am a hopeless perfectionist, and tweak and adjust all the work I do, sometimes even after the work has been signed off just to satisfy my own drive! Alterations in texture, reflectancy, lighting... really tiny changes that make huge differences.

 

I do not like 'tarting up' an image in a package such as Photoshop, and rarely do this unless I have run out of time. I prefer all my work to stand on its own.

 

80% of my work cannot be used for anything except for the client who commissioned it, so I get very little reuse from the work I do. One beauty of applications such as trueSpace though is that that I do not have to start from scratch each time - I have built up a massive component library, which is especially useful with electronics modelling, with over 2,500 parts in it now!

 

On a hardware level, I use two workstations, one is personalised for modelling, and the other personalised for assembling, and each has two screens. I use Logitech MX1000 and MX Revolution laser mice and keyboards and also Wacom A4/A3 tablets linked to both systems with a switch. For storage I use a large RAID/NAS with a common linkage to all the systems, Macs, printers etc.

 

How much artistic license do you get with most of these designs? Or is the look, style, angle of view, etc, pretty much controlled by the client?

 

Griff: This largely depends on the client, and how well we know and trust each other. I have built up some great working relationships with clients over the years,  so I have some who send me the info and just trust me to get on with it.

 

If there's time, I always send in at least three versions. If they've left some information out, it's usually because the design is not finished yet, and in that case I either extrapolate the design, or wait until they have the information necessary and integrate it later, or even choose views that work with the missing parts of the piece - never spoil a great story for the sake of the truth!

 

The best projects though are the ones when I am given complete artistic license – and this does happen quite a bit. For example, I was recently asked to create three plausible engine illustrations that had to look convincing even to design engineers, and yet had to be quite fictitious with no part possibly connected with a known example or manufacturer. This was great fun!

 

For me this is the kind of ‘dream commission’ that comes up every once in a while. The real icing on the cake was the fact that the commissioning agency was happy first time, and the actual client signed it off without any modifications at all. Now that for me was pure elation, and another reason why I love my job!

 

 

A LITTLE HISTORY

 

With a background as a computer software engineer, Griff previously worked for a number of large computer companies as both a hardware and software engineer. He's used both 2D and 3D computer graphics in his work "pretty much all my career." During school and college, Griff also studied music, art, and illustrating, and feels that "this background put me in a good position as a technical illustrator." He has no formal graphics or 3D training, but did study fine art and art history, specializing in ancient Egyptian art and Renaissance art. He now works "creating art and images for companies, collectors, galleries, and museums using traditional and modern techniques."

 

Griff often works in series, creating multiple versions of an image from different angles or with different colours, styles, lighting, etc. In order to create his meticulously precise models, he spends as much as 60-70% of the time devoted to a project on research. Many of his pieces are based on subject matter from museums or on products that don't exist yet, so Griff is careful to understand the entire mechanism before he begins a project. His research ranges from "spending days in libraries to travelling to see the objects" so that he can gain a thorough understanding of "how one part interacts with another," an aspect that he finds "is crucial to illustrating."

 

"I really enjoy working out new ways of doing things, of finding new techniques or shortcuts to achieve an effect."

 

 

Griff’s interests include mathematics, logic, chess (has played at national level), space science & astronomy, Gerry Anderson TV series (especially UFO), Renaissance art (especially Leonardo da Vinci), engines, jokes, music, animals, and fine restaurants...

 

Griff now lives on a very small and beautiful island somewhere east of the Atlantic...