MechWarrior: Living Legends

Name: Chris (Owtdor)
Age: 33
Position: 3D Modeler
Past Projects: Operation Anubis, Branching Fate, Black Hammer Mercenaries (All mods)
Ties to Mechwarrior: First played Battletech in 1989 and in high school I built a 3D board to be used with miniatures that was the size of a half sheet of plywood. (I think it is in my Mom's basement still). Some of the best times I had growing up were playing the game.
Other commitments: Work obviously. I travel frequently for work, my availability is erratic and I leave on short notice. I also have a little one on the way in November (my 2nd actually)
SAMPLES: My portfolio is here: http://www.azlakso.com/portfolio/main.htm
(I know I need to update it)

About me: I work for a litigation support company in Phoenix AZ. What does this mean? I go to court with a team of lawyers and I bring documents and video up on the screen when the lawyer asks. When I am not in trial I work on the cases that are going to trial soon. This includes creating full-motion 3D animations to be used to demonstrate concepts and scenarios to juries. (My biggest project helped our side win over $160 million) Unfortunately a lot of my work is not available for viewing due to settlements, court orders, or the confidentiality agreement I signed when working for a defense company.
I graduated in 2004 with a bachelor of arts in Multimedia, specifically digital animation and game design, from the University of Advancing Technology (uat.edu)
While in school I was senior modeler on the Operation Anubis mod of Battlefield 1942. I built ALL tanks, about half of the planes, and many of the ships. After I graduated, I helped out with two more mods doing whatever modeling was needed, and helping teach the younger artists.
I can supply more art to the moderators here, but can not post things publicly.
My time is short, but skill is high. I use 3DS Max versions 4-11 (2009) and Photoshop versions 7-CS3
Why did I choose to not go into the game field? I make more doing what I do today, and every project is different.

Thank you for taking the time to read this and I wish you all the best with the project. 

Very impressive portfolio!

Nice work, what engine was that WW2 mod in?  Looked like the Battlefield1942 engine (maybe 2 hard to tell really.)
Do you have any experience working with cryengine2?  If on the team you will likely be implementing (in part) some of your assets as well.  As far as props and such goes this is a opretty easy and straight forward task so its nothing to worry about.

Yes the Battlefield 1942 engine was used for that mod. We used the Unreal 2 engine for th other 2 mods.
Unfortunately I do not have experience with the Cryengine. Even in our mod classes we (artists) never had to actually implement anything. THat was a programmer job. I would love to learn this engine, but I assume I will need to get a copy of the game first....

Nice work you have :D

Some website criticism though:  It's a little "Web 1.0" :P

I agree the site needs work. I only learned HTML in school and things have passed me by. I wish I knew flash, that would make it look so much better.
Any suggestions to improve it would be greatly appreciated though.

Thanks!

Just a warning: Everytime you say "Web 2.0", god kills a startup (http://ars.userfriendly.org/cartoons/?id=20060731).
No shit.

owtdor,

add me to your MSN (Windows Live Messenger).

aidanmw@msn.com

Added. I typically use AIM via Trillian, but I have added you to MSN my email is my MSN tag.

You could look into this:

http://www.squarespace.com/

I've never used it but only heard about it on a podcast I watch.  It's apparently a very good WYSIWYG website editor thats easy to use.  Just watch the video on the front page and I'll let you draw your own conclusions :)

I will have to look into that. I took a class in Dreamweaver but it was an online class so I did not learn as much as I would have liked to. I also had a javascript class, but programming is definitely not my thing.

Flash for websites is overrated. Totally.
Just check out all the fuzzy stuff you can do with CSS and some Photoshop skills.
If you want to get closer to "2.0 compatibility", start digging into AJAX.

Holy smokes, impressive video scenes there! I would love to see those boards inside a 'Mech .. and when the cockpit starts blowing into pieces you see them flying around! :D Great stuff man, great stuff.

Thanks, I appreciate all the good reviews. I know it shows that I am better at 3D than I am at designing web pages though. I love to model, but things have been slow in the 3D department at work lately so I am itching to build something.

Is there anything small that I might be able to build to help out?

Our lead is currently getting settled after a few days of rest and vacation (read: we couldn't take their whips on our backs any longer and sent them out in the sun where they kept strolling around without orientation for several days) and should get in touch with you shortly. Please be patient.
Your helping hand in this project is most likely wanted very much.

He is currently working a small static for me.

Thanks Aidan for chatting with me this afternoon. I look forward to getting some work in on this project.

No problem. I look forward to seeing your work.  :)

My regrets on not getting this model out sooner, but I have been very busy at work. I will try to get it out before I leave town on business this week.

Well it's done. I FINALLY had a chance to get it finished. I actually lost my texture data and had to start over. How should I send this to you?

You can email it to me, jmrichey@live.com.  I'll take a look at it and see if its game ready or what needs to be done on it then pass it off to Aidan.