TIGAER-DESIGN.COM_.v5 – Digital Art by Christian Hecker

FOUNDATION

What we have here is a picture that I would consider a quickie. A mashup of my earlier Scifi cityscape pictures. It still took a while to get it done but the general composition was set very early on and kept throughout the making. Normally I tend to sometimes drastically change elements of a picture even within the making. Always depending on how good things work out. Sometimes you have to work out things and look at them, to fully understand if something in a picture works or not. Had not to do this hassle for this one. Instead I did a lot of finetuning, especially in the front parts. The city I kept rather basic without investing too much time and detail on it. Just wanted to keep the background more rough. Slammed some textures and lights on it. Does the job and creates enough depth for what I wanted. Something that works really nice is the sense of business that a city like this would generate I think.

Technically it’s, as usual, Vue to create me a base picture to work on. In Photoshop I added quite a load of textures and made them fit somewhat nicely within the scene. I added masses of lights to suggest even more detail. The lights required some time to place them good in the scene. Then I tried to add a little more depth with some atmospheric glow and haze. Overall it works good enough for what I had in mind for the picture.

The docked ship in front was originally a concept drawing I did a while ago. My french Luminarium colleague Sebastien Hue managed to create a nice 3d model from my rough drawing. So a big thanks to him! Pay him a visit here. You’ll see some variations of that ship in future works soon, that’s for sure.

6000 wide – Vue – Photoshop

Regards

THE ELLENSHAW CORRIDOR

This one could be seen as a sister project to my ‘From Here I Can Almost See The Stars‘. I basically used the same city scene, along with a few changes. Originally the picture was created to work out some material, I could use for chapters on a German workshop DVD (more info), I got invited to do. The energy spheres and ship engine trails for example. I previously used energy spheres, as a detail in my work, and really liked how it turned out. On the other hand I wanted to experiment with a darker toned atmosphere. Work with harder contrasts. Which turned out rather good in this picture.

You could say it’s another generic scifi cityscape scene. Nonetheless I hope the lighting and perspective is at least something that stands out in this one. As usual I used Vue to create a base of operation. Several separated renders helped me to get in all the elements I wanted. A lot of Photoshop then helped to get in the details, that make this picture look alive.

It does look like a place you can easily get lost in. And our guy there is probably thinking the same. But I’m sure he knows his ways around this place.

5000 wide – Vue – Photoshop

If the German language is in your skillset, here is some info about the workshop.

Print Detail

Creation History

The artwork on:
Deviantart – Artstation – Drawcrowd – CGSociety

Regards

THE MOEBIUS PASSAGE

This is a picture I started a long time ago. It started as a little experiment and turned into something bigger than I intended. I also wanted to use this picture for a little training exercise, working in that format/aspect ratio. I haven’t done so in quite a while. I must admit that I did myself hard finding a good enough composition. First when I played around with tilted camera views I found a suitable setup. That made the pic come to life for me. Added quite a nice and dynamic feel.

Technically it’s less a digital matte painting approach than a digital painting style. I did not want to strangle myself with trying to go as photoreal as possible. I just wanted to play with this one. Again the layout of the scene was done with Vue. In Photoshop I reworked quite some parts and added textures here and there. The overpainting was fun to do. Additional renders helped to implement more ships and the foreground elements. I really enjoy the view here but I doubt it is something for people with fear of heights.

When I was in the last stages of the creative process I heard that the fabulous Jean Giraud aka Moebius passed away. I admit that I don’t know too much about the person, but I can clearly see how his art influenced tons of Scifi movies. And me… well I’m influenced by these movies. That’s for sure. So I did not have a title for the pic and decided to dedicate this one to Jean Giraud. His art will definitely live on and keep the memory alive.

5000×3333 – 300dpi – Vue – Photoshop

The artwork on:
Deviantart – Artstation – Drawcrowd – CGSociety

Wallpaper Pack contains two wallpaper versions in 1920×1200 and 1680×1050.

Regards

ANCIENT MEMORIES

Holy cow, it’s been a while! Over the past weeks and months I was quite busy and did not have much time. Enough whining! Yes, here we have a new one. Finally. This one was actually done for the latest exhibit of The Luminarium. Its topic was ‘Gaia’, which makes it pretty much a nature theme. I also combined the creation process with a video workshop, that might be interesting for especially the germans. I’m not explaining the whole creation process… but how to implement atmosphere and certain elements into the scene. But more on that later.

I always wanted to try myself on a, by nature devoured, city. Overgrown by trees and plants of all sorts. The picture does not have a particular story. The message I wanted to get accross simply is, that we should be careful with what we do. Right now I have the feeling that mankind is straight on the edge of either ruining it all or finding a way to get it all together. Reading and watching the news says we’re closer to the fail than the success. The city in the pic is a symbol for a hard and painful learning process. Obviously there was a civilization that did not make it. But there is still hope, overall. And that’s the person. She may be a simple explorer or even more specific… an archeologist. Whatever she is, the sight of that city will fascinate her. Will make her go down and explore it. As long as someone is willing, to do the research that may help us to understand the failures of the past, there is a chance of learning. So much for the wishful thinking.

The truth is that the world, now more than ever, is filled with ignorance. But enough preachy talk.

The picture was created with Vue and heavily postworked with Photoshop. Especially within the city, a lot of overpainting and detailing happened. Several Vue renders helped me to extend the scene, even after I started with the post process. Overall the pic was fun to do. All the little details help it to come alive.

This picture is also part of The Luminarium’s 18th artpack release ‘Gaia’. Some pretty amazing and inspiring work there. Info can be found here.

4500px wide – Vue – Photoshop

If the German language is in your skillset, here is some info about the video workshop.

Vue Plate
Print Detail

The artwork on:
Deviantart – Artstation – Drawcrowd – CGSociety

Regards

FROM HERE I CAN ALMOST SEE THE STARS

For a long time now I have a certain image in my head that I still/yet have to make. The picture we have here brought me a little closer to the image I have in my head. The pic I have in mind is something with a giant huge space port/dock structure. And yes, other artists already have made very awesome attempts on that. But hey, I want my own super cool space port! =D

What we have here is indeed a cool space port kind of thing and I really honestly like the result of my attempt here. I really had some fun playing with the colours. I wanted to go for colours I rarely used so far. So this pic will make a nice addition to my portfolio. I’m still undecided if we have a morning or evening scene in this pic. That’s what I leave to the viewers. Yes the scene is artistically nothing entirely new but I think it just looks sort of soothing.

Technically it’s heavy Vue work again. It started, like so often, playing around with objects and atmospheres. Originally I was thinking about creating a space scene. Then I had this great atmosphere that reacted so nicely with my objects that I couldn’t resist to make it another Scifi cityscape. The rendering happened in various steps again. First the city. Then the clouds. And last but not least the flying little ships. Throughout the Photoshop phase I continued rendering out smaller parts to replace some others I wasn’t to happy with. I still love the Multipass options in Vue. This makes it rather easy to exchange elements.

In Photoshop then happened the compositing of all the different elements Vue gave me with it’s renders. A lot of fixing, texturing and overpainting happened in the next stage. The atmosphere got some pushes too. The final result then really became a moody Scifi scene that allows the viewer to dive into.

This picture is also part of The Luminarium’s 17th artpack release ‘Illuminate IV’. Some pretty amazing and inspiring work there. Info can be found here.

I really had some fun with this one and hope you people dig the view as much as I do!

5000px wide – Vue – Photoshop

The artwork on:
Deviantart – Artstation – CGSociety

Creation Progress Plate
Print Detail

Regards

TERRAGLACIES

This one is a failed experiment from 2009. I remember playing with Vue and it’s displacement options for materials. I had no specific picture in mind. I was just playing around. Then suddenly the preview render was showing me a rather cool, kinda abstract, looking landscape shape. It immediately reminded my of my 2005 ‘Astounding’ piece somehow. Then I tried to render it bigger and bam… no chance. I don’t remember the exact time Vue told me but it was astronomical. I started to try my usual workarounds but nothing helped. I guess the material and the dispacement mapping ate up all the memory and when it was full the render just crashed. I managed to get out a, for me, low quality render and worked with that one. Even if I’m not entirely happy with the result I still think the pic has a certain appeal to it. I hope you think so too! =)

Regards

LAETITIA CAELIA

We previously discovered this world with ‘The Undiscovered Country‘. Laetitia Caelia, what means something like ‘joyful heaven’, demanded to be explored a little deeper though.

By exploration I mean the creative process. Originally this was an attempt at participating at this years E-On Software Environment Competition 2011. So I seriously invested a ton of time into creating a scene that looks like something. All Vue… no post work allowed. I had a really hard time being restricted to Vue alone. The resulting scene was ‘something’. But ultimately nothing with a chance to win. However… I learned a few more things when doing this scene. Especially technical aspects of Vue.

No matter how the results of the contest were, I created the pic with the plan to do my usual Photoshop stuff on it anyway. Now I know the winners were much better than my attempt. However… can’t throw all the work and render time away, right? And there was some render time. Phew. At the hottest time of the year. They should seriously consider holding that contest in the winter months. Seriously. I mean my machine was stable all the time! (Which is a true wonder!) But the temperatures it created in my room here were beyond… there’s no word for it. Evil it was. The final render took probably 40hrs.

For the weird rock formations I used Zbrush. These were fun to create. Less fun was it to import them into Vue. Very heavy models. And yeah, absolutely… I’m no modeling expert and don’t know anything about efficient modeling. These models put my machine on the edge but it worked out. Good enough for me. Like I previously said the rendering phase was a pain. In Photoshop then I had quite some fun adding additional textures. The scene already had a great depth and Photoshop helped me to push that even more. The lighting received a nice push as well. Overpainting helped me fixing and extending certain elements.

I had a real hard time finding the right color grading for it. I, in fact, have tons of test versions lying around here. Even with this final one I’m not 100% happy. At some point you have to mentally stop thinking about it though. Or you’re going George Lucas about it… never stopping to change stuff. (Stop to ruin your movies George!)

Again I imagine this picture is showing a world/planet that was just discovered and is now being explored. It must be a great feeling sitting in one of these jets there… just having fun with the environment. Diving through the canyons and enjoying the views no one has ever seen before.

A camera mapping try on this was not planned but done anyway. Quite some time that went into this too. But I refreshed my knowledge about the techniques and again learned a few new things there.

Hope you can gain some inspiration from it all.

Vue – Zbrush – Photoshop – After Effects – 5000px wide

Exploring Laetitia Caelia – 720p/Sound – Video – On Vimeo

Exploring Laetitia Caelia – 720p/Sound – Video – On Youtube

Laetitia Caelia – Quicktime/720p/Sound – Video (50mb)

Regards

LAKE FIREFLY

This picture was a submission for ‘The Luminarium‘ Artgroup. Their topic was ‘Asylum‘. My interpretation of the meaning can pretty much be seen in this picture. It’s a more peaceful approach. Here we have two people on a field trip to find some peace. But the environment looks a little different don’t you think? Of course I wanted to put in a little Fantasy/Scifi component. So our two friends here are either in the future on a distant planet or in an alternate universe. But that’s a taste thing. =D

Technically this picture was the first one I created with the Vue10 release. The random rock creator works really nice and is a good addition to the tool. The huge wing like mountain thingies were created with XenoDream. A very interesting tool that I might explore a little more in fhe future. Of course a lot of post work with Photoshop again. I even played around with creating some alien looking trees there. Maybe that was the christmas spirit coming through a bit. Just a little bit. =D This may also be the last piece of art for 2011 and I think it gives a nice conclusion with its mood.

Vue – Photoshop – 5000px wide

Print Detail
Plates and Parts

Regards

THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY

“I’m 29 years old and was born on board of a colony ship that is now on its course for 75 years. It’s heading to a planet that we think is inhabitable. It must be. There is no turning back since our homeworld is dying. No, it’s not our fault. It’s just nature’s course. And our species… in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was the biggest endeavour ever taken to create the biggest colony ships to date. I’m one of 25.000 people on board of one of these ships. A lot of precious resources went into these ships. Not everyone was for it. It caused a lot of uprising. But it was important to keep the hope of our species alive. There are more ships. But all heading to different destinations.

We just now reached a good enough distance to our target planet to efficiently probe it. One of the first probes we sent took about 5 years to reach the planet. When they ship wide published the results my first thought was ‘We’re Home!’. All the readings looked perfect. There even was a photo. Man! I can’t wait to get there! It looks like paradise! It looks like heaven!”

This pic was originally a concept art commission I did a few months ago. It got rejected for reasons I can’t exactly understand… since I followed instructions from the Art Director. Weird weird thing. However. Instead of leaving this nice piece to slowly fall apart on my hdd, I decided to do something with it. Much like my ‘Hades’ duo from 2008, this is the first of two pics showing pretty much the same place. This pic was fun to do and certainly looks cool… that’s at least what I think.

Technically it’s a Vue 3d render for the base and some Photoshop to get details and atmosphere right. The weird rock formations were done with Zbrush. Experimenting with that stuff lately. Creating rocks and alien looking formations is pretty easy with Zbrush. And that’s all I’m able to do with it. It can do so much more. However. This Zbrush excursion helped me to learn a few things and will hopefully lead into some more exotic looking landscape pics in the future. We’ll see that…

for now I hope you enjoy the view as much as I do.

Vue – Photoshop – 5000px wide

Plates and Parts

The artwork on:
Deviantart – Artstation – Drawcrowd – CGSociety

Regards

SKYHIGH

My god I cannot even tell how old this picture already is. Now I guess it’s finally time to release it into the wild. The creation of it started late 2010 and even today I did a few smaller fixes on it.

Originally I just wanted to create another futuristic cityscape picture but soon thought that I already had done quite a bit in that field. The original intention was it to create yet another different perspective on my ‘Hadley’s Hope‘ cityscape series. When I finished the city part I left it alone for quite a while. Then I dug it out for an EvE Online Spaceship contest on Deviantart for this: ship. I needed a background for the presentation of that design and the city was perfect. Naturally I did not win anything on Deviantart. Later though I submitted the same entry to pretty much the same contest, with the difference that the contest was held by the EvE Online people themselves. There it was one of the winning designs. That was a surprise. And the presentation of the design surely did its part.

Now I did not want to waste that city and do something with it. So I sat down again and tried different ideas. The one that stuck then was something I wanted to do for a while. Adding some skywalk where people could look down to the city. Something that would really create a nice feel of scale. I couldn’t exactly tell if the pic now shows a viewing plattform from a building or a ship that is approaching the city. I leave that to your imagination. However, I like the idea of a ship.

Technically I recycled the city I used in Hadley’s Hope. Nonetheless I did quite some modifications on it since we’re looking at it from a totally different point of view. Creating the atmosphere wasn’t an easy task. Especially getting the clouds right. A lot of trial and error to get things right. The clouds in the render didn’t look very good in some parts to there was some Photoshop required to make it look right. Otherwise Vue did a nice job with the lighting and atmosphere and delivered a nice plate to work from.

Last but not least I must admit that it’s again one of the scenes I would love to see for real. Slowly gliding above that massive thing of a city. Watching the smaller transporters and gliders zipping through the clouds and canyons of buildings. Very StarWarsy but I find it cool.

Vue – Photoshop – 4000px wide

Plates and Parts — Print Detail

Regards