René Aigner's Sketchbook

[ReneAigner]

More portfolio stuff. Some initial concepts/sideviews of alien spaceships. Normally I'd flush these out in a hurry, but I want some ideation/ concept variation stuff in portfolio that looks halfway decent, so here we go.

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Jackal, thanks alot for the in-depth critique!

Again, have you seen my video? I do talk about all that stuff you mention!

To your critique;
Your points are spot on and crazy as it may sound, I am aware of most of them- it's a really interesting topic as well. I'm finding it really, really hard to divorce myself completely from the form and design language of my "teachers" (meaning people I study), Robertson being one and Feng Zhu another (see the latest image... that's not intentional- the sparth inspired piece was intentional, I wouldn't put that into my portfolio anyway though). I've seen it in the work of many graduates from FZD as well, many look like Fengs work at least in some respect. I've seen the same with people who study with Shaddy Safadi as well. Crazy that you can pick that sort of stuff up only by watching vids and looking at artwork, but it does happen. I guess it just takes time to break away from those influences and build your own voice. I think my illustrations- being more than just bare-bone design- don't betray as much influence as my pure design stuff.
Which brings me to your other point about me not knowing what I want, which is absolutely true. I guess I slightly favour illustration which is why I've mangaged to develop more in that area and break away from teachers' influence, but I also love to build and design forms- plus, most in-house jobs are more about design than illustration, too.
I think that tighter specs are a good idea (although the specs for the vehicles on the last page were petty tight, the concept just doesn't read as intended, will have to revisit that before it goes into the portfolio), but how I'm going to loose all the influence that fast I don't know. I guess one might even construe that in my favour though, after all I'm not looking for a post as a lead concept designer, so emulating a given design language isn't bad per se.
if you have any literature or other resources about that specific topic (finding one's own design language), plase let me know, I've never come across anything like that.

Thanks again!


/edit2 ah yes and a good tip about the URL at the bottom of the images, I'll size that down in future images. It's there because I noticed a while ago that my images were being re-blogged/tweeted etc., often without mention of my name, so I put the URL in the images themselves.
edit3/ actually, that whole topic got me thinking and I leafed through some of Fengs work that he did on design cinema... discovered a feng zhu painting that looks pretty close to this (only much better of course). Must've watched the design cinema episode months, if not more than a year ago and it still pretty much looks like I was emulating it consciously. Guess it's not suited as portfolio work after all. God, this is hard! :D
So, the sureillance vehicles need to be redone in some aspects and the last piece gets thrown out. \o/ :D