Bingxuan Tan explained how 3D tools help in making concept art, showed how to create digital art that looks like a real painting, and shared a breakdown of one of their works.
My name is Bingxuan Tan. My artwork has won awards in leading industry competitions, including the Creative Quarterly Magazine Illustration competition and the 7th Annual Landscapes Art Exhibition Competition. I am also a two-time winner of the Society of Illustrators achievement award in 2020 ('The Witch') and 2021 ('Fallen'). I have worked on the upcoming Netflix/Legendary animated series Kong: Skull Island at Powerhouse as a background artist and I am currently working on Netflix's original anime Blood of Zeus. Before I found my interest in the entertainment industry, I worked on a successful illustration project for the fashion and professional sport industries as well.
I recognized my passion for drawing when I was a kid but only thought of it as a hobby. I loved to watch Japanese anime and read manga growing up, Berserk and Studio Ghibli's animation had a huge influence on me. As a kid growing up in the 2000s, I witnessed the development of technology and so many great video games being released. My skills have been rewarded with top projects, which allowed me to continue and achieve success for not only the clients I worked for but for myself as well.
3D tools allow the quality of work to rise significantly, and top clients and corporations prefer these methods for their efficiency and effect. Some of the top tools I use are Blender, 3DCoat, and Nomad.
Blender is one of the major tools for concept artists or any 2D production in most studios. Because of its high performance and low cost, I think it is a must-learn software nowadays for a concept artist.
With the help of 3D space, designing a scene or architecture is way faster and easier than drawing it from scratch. Normally, I would build a scene in Blender, then paint over it in Photoshop, and I no longer need to worry about perspective or lighting or guess the scales of my objects, I just need to focus on design. And I can always reuse the assets I built in other projects. It is beneficial if you want to work more efficiently.
I normally only use Quixel Megascans for its impressive library, it has such a large realistic assets collection, it is extremely useful when I'm creating realistic scenes. I would use the rock and terrain assets to quickly block out a scene for a start, it can really boost the speed of my workflow.
Naming your files and putting them in the right folder definitely come first when I'm thinking about efficiency. Usually, when you have a large collection of assets and works, it really saved me a lot of time since I adapted this habit.
When I start a new project, I normally look for kitbashes or model a kitbash myself, this is one popular workflow in the industry. After I gathered enough references, I would start a few loose sketches in Photoshop just exploring the shapes. Then, I'd start modeling my kitbash in Blender. For example, if the project is creating a Victorian city block scene, I would start with modeling individual parts of a building first, like pillars, doors, windows, walls, etc. Every asset created needs to capture the Victorian characteristic. With all the assets I modeled, I could start putting them together, trying out different compositions and playing around with the scale. Just have fun! Explore!
Also, using pre-built models or online model libraries is really time-saving, reusing the assets from the previous project is also good for speeding up the workflow. There are quite a lot of very powerful add-ons I can find online, many of them aren't free, but it's totally worth it.
Here is the design breakdown of my painting "Ancient Entrance":
I love to make my paint-overs look painterly, I have tried many methods to do it, here are some best tips I think would help someone who wants to achieve the goal of making their digital art more painterly:
For these two pieces down below, I used a Mixer brush when I was finishing the painting to break the edges. I normally would like to use a Mixer brush in the background to push the atmospheric perspective a little further.
I think I would definitely tell the younger me to prioritize one specific subject matter, like the environment only or the character only. I think this way, I could focus on getting better at one thing first, then worry about the others.
Art fundamentals are important for sure, perspective is the hardest but most important skill to have. I would also tell the younger me to start learning 3D earlier, most of the Concept Artist jobs out there require at least some 3D knowledge. Besides that, 3D can boost your work speed and efficiency. With 3D, you can focus less on the drawing and more on actually designing.