In Spring 2025, I was in a class called Studio Projects. In this class, we were grouped into small groups and tasked with creating a 30-second short film. We were given complete creative freedom to decide what we wanted to make and how we wanted to execute it. My team chose to create a CG short film.
Environment
For the rocky outdoor environment, I knew I wanted something dramatic, with varying levels of altitude so the tiger could climb down to pounce on the girl. I took inspiration from the sandstone quarries in Utah, designing the environment with those natural formations in mind.
I spent a lot of time working on the composition of the environment. While designing it, I considered how the sun would interact with the arches to cast dramatic, cinematic shadows.
I started by blocking out the rock shapes in Maya, then brought them into ZBrush to sculpt and refine the details. I used alphas to apply realistic rock textures, then baked the high-poly details onto the low-poly models back in Maya. After that, I textured everything in Substance Painter and brought the final assets into Unreal Engine.
Characters
Responsible for textures, wardrobe and groom
