Environment Design Mentorship call for interest

[Punk-A-Cat]

No gum.. *wails* but what will I throw at the other students, what will I stick under the desks...what will I chew loudly and obnoxiously??? :D

Are you going to do a mass email to let us know when the classes are starting, or should we feverishly watch this space?

[Amit Dutta]

haha Punk. Well, you can annoy your classmates all you want...just don't make me clean up after.

I will be confirming the start date through email, and also in this thread. The 20th is what I am aiming for, but it may end up being a week later because...deadlines.

[vlada]

Oh man, I commend you -- what a huge undertaking. I've had to recently write out a rough curriculum, too, and it's currently being playtested by a small visual development group TIME is a huge issue. Tossed you an app because I would love to learn and to help :D Also, have been lurking your crits and comments for some time, they are always really on point. Thank you!

[Amit Dutta]

Thanks Vlada and welcome on board! You just squeaked in :)

SIGNUPS ARE NOW CLOSED.  We have 46 takers! 
If you haven't signed up you can still do the assignments and participate in the class threads.  
Due to the popularity of the course, I just won't be able to guarantee personalised crits if I take on more. Sorry!

[vlada]

Yes!! And holy cow, 46 people. Awesoooooome.

[Amit Dutta]

Yo yo yo! Time to feel some perspective lovin' up in here! 
Some of you have expressed to me a little trepidation on the whole perspective thing. Not to worry, it really is simple once it clicks.  In my searches for existing resources, I didn't really find any I liked on practical ways to set up 1, 2, and 3 point grids in one place, so,  I made my own. 
Here's a video showing a couple of different methods. It's pretty basic, but hopefully, some of you guys find it useful.  



Resource links are in the video description as well as here:
Perspective Radial Grid: http://paulreinwand.deviantart.com/art/P...-347180826
Download Carapace: http://download.udk.com/Carapace/Carapace%20v1.0.rar

I'm also aiming to produce a few videos in the next week or two on some fundamentals stuff that I think is most useful for environments. These hopefully will be a gentle summary for new recruits and a short refresher for the more grizzled warriors among you.

Enjoy. Hope you guys are doing well!

[vlada]

Whoa, that Carapace demo! Super useful (especially image tracing for studying/stealing), thank you very much, Amit. While I am with S. Robertson in that you need to learn freehanding these first to understand how they work, tools like these are amazing for speeding up workflow.

Good work <3

[Amit Dutta]

Great Vlada, glad it was useful! Yep, I don't want to focus on teaching fundamentals like perspective, there are already great resources out there for that. Most of what I want to look at is how to use and apply them in our work because that's where the magic really happens.

[Punk-A-Cat]

Gah, thanks so much for the perspective tutorial, I might try making some up and printing out so I can lightbox and use for trad work, the carapace ability to reverse engineer is so neat!

[Amit Dutta]

You're welcome Punk. Agreed, I was going to suggest using these to do printouts for trad peoples, but totally forgot to say this in the vid! Duh.
Carapace is a terrific tool, especially for reverse engineering and study. I saw some guy had coded an add-in that does similar things directly in PS, but then that only helps Photoshop users, so boo.

[wasgodx]

Thank you Amita for the perspective tutorial! I'm currently learning it now and sometimes it's kinda hard :) Looking forward!

[Bookend]

Fantastic simple tutorial on practical perspective. Thanks for the tips on making brushes too-- Saves a lot of time in drawing lines out manually. Carapace looks like a great program to use as well! Really like how you can use it to take existing, professional pieces, and breaking it down to the perspective.

I'm looking forward to supplementing your program with perspective studies from NMA as well.

[Amit Dutta]

Thanks wasgodx and Book! Glad it was useful.

I recorded a very short discussion about the fundamental principles of art and design, with respect to enviro design. It might sound pretty basic, but hopefully some insight in there for all levels.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh0kwBIW2Hw

About the course, I will be sending out an email in the next couple of days to confirm, but it looks like I will have to to postpone the start date by 1 week, due to how busy I am at the moment.  So we are looking at a start date of the 27th instead for the first posted assignment.

I will still run an intro stream session this Sunday 20th around 10am New Zealand Standard Time where I will run through a bit of my own development timeline as an artist, so feel free to come hang out for a bit and we can get to know each other a little bit, you can ask me any questions you like. I might even paint a random demo for fun. Hope to catch you guys there!

[wasgodx]

Yehay! I am so excited! I think for me it is at 22.00 on the night, with all the timezones and everything :P

[Amit Dutta]

Haha, I'm excited too! This should be a blast :)

Ok peeps, I am now going to call this thread closed. Everyone who signed up should have received an email about the new start date and some other stuff. Let me know if you haven't received one.

I have created a thread in the classes section called "Environment Design Rocks". I will now transition over to that thread for anything that is related to the course once it gets going in a week or so.

Catch you guys soon!

[Mayenla]

I should be set for the intro stream, I'm in Aus so the time works out well!

I'm getting married on the 25th so I'm not sure how interrupted my first week will be! D:

Anywho, can't wait for this to kick off, I'll have to dust off the wacom.

[Cyprinus]

Got your E-Mail, Amit! I'm really excited for everything to start. Thank you so much again for doing this! Unfortunately I'm a bit unlucky with the time zone so I don't know if I can drop by in person, but I might try once in a while!

[Olooriel]

Got the mail alright, and I'll try to make it to the stream, I believe that's midnight for me...

[Richie]

Will they be recorded for later watching?

[Amit Dutta]

No worries if you can't make it guys, all the streams will be available to watch later!
@Mayenla, congrats, you just enjoy the day! In terms of workload, the first week won't be so heavy, but things will really get cranking in the later weeks.