Project Statement
This was made over my first four months living in Montreal after graduating from Ringling College. It references textures and locations found on the city’s Metro system.

The creative process was driven by play, starting small in scope, then growing until it was portfolio ready.

Credits
Direction & Animation: Océane Fairbanks
Sound Design:  Chris "BØLT" Bolte

This project started by trying to recreate the Nickelodeon Slime material using Blender. A professor from Ringling showed us the material he created for Nickelodeon using Arnold, so I wanted to challenge myself by making it in Blender.

The light path settings outside the shader are cruicial to nailing the watery goo.

After animating the first shot, I concepted the second shot as a way to integrate a product modeling component. Using Sub-D to create a base to scuplt from, I used the Hard Surface Sculpting course from Blender Secrets to scuplt and retopologize a chunky sneaker. 

With the finished model, I decided to try texturing it using Substance 3D Painter. Given the shoe was modeled from the MSCHF Super Babys but the overall project was for Nick, the shoes feature a MISC. brand spoof.

Since Substance Painter was so intuitive, I wanted to try making something in Substance Designer. Already having an understanding of Blender shader nodes gave me a leg up on designing these metro tiles. 

I started this project by trying to replace industry standards with open source alternatives, but over the course of production, I learned to supplement Blender using industry standards made for more specific tasks.

Blender’s tools are great for making shaders, but Substance’s tools are specialized for making textures.

Going forward, I’m excited to learn more industry conventions.