Creating Key Art Illustration for Film and Games

Alex Nice’s tutorial video tackles a striking scene from The War of the Worlds.

Alex Nice shows in Creating Key Art Illustration how he crafts a piece of key concept art: something he’s done for a succession of Hollywood blockbusters. His tools of the trade are a familiar selection: Photoshop plus 3ds Max and ZBrush. But it’s how he uses them together that makes this video so good.

There are several reasons why a concept artist might integrate 3D renders into their 2D painting. The apparent time sink of making a 3D model from scratch can repay its investment if you use the model several times in the scene, as Alex does here with the Martian tripod he makes. It’s also helpful if you’re attempting a complex lighting set-up.

Whatever your reasons, Alex’s workflow feels particularly organic compared with others we’ve seen. It’s not just a one-way street of bringing 3D render passes into Photoshop: you’ll get plenty of tips for taking 2D elements into 3D software to help you build your model.

While the section where Alex models a Martian tripod in 3ds Max and ZBrush is helpful, it’s the Photoshop sessions that bookend the video that offer the most compelling insights. Alex shows you how to make selections quickly to photobash some visual elements, and goes into great detail as he polishes the artwork, explaining how he achieves a sense of richness, depth and movement. Separating elements in his scene into distinct layer groups, he plays with colour temperature, interior illumination and image noise to achieve precisely the results he wants.

Alex is very good at explaining what he’s doing and which tools he’s using. This is a skill that isn’t as simple to develop as you might think.

3D elements like the Martians take their places in the final scene as Alex starts on his final piece. Brought into 3ds Max, Alex’s sketch of a Martian tripod enables him to assess how well his 3D modelling is coming along. A smoke-filled sky enables...