An interview with M.J.Ambruso a.k.a. theSea - winner of the Jan 2007 LDP contest

I think that this is a natural outgrowth of my lifelong interest in Fantasy and Science Fiction, in literature, art and film. I've been working with 3D on and off for about 5 years - mostly doing spacescapes in POV-Ray.

If you've never created a scene in POV-Ray using the built-in text editor, I highly recommend it. After the experience you'll truly appreciate tools like Poser and D|S and the way they simplify the process of getting the images you have in your head transferred to the screen.

I found DAZ last March and it was the introduction of a more human element to my work that allowed me to get a bit more serious and start to learn more about the artistic side of 3D.

Positives - 3D for me is a nearly perfect meeting of right and left brain. The technical side of 3D appeals to my left brain - specular highlights and ambient occlusion and light bouncing and tweaking all those dials.

My right brain loves having the ability to 'paint' this way and achieve images that tell stories and convey emotions which I could never achieve using traditional media. Negatives - time and money: there is never enough of either. Thank goodness I have to leave the PC to render once in awhile so I can go get stuff done in the real world!

I'm still mainly a DAZ|Studio user. I own Poser6 and Vue5 and a few other things but I keep coming back to Studio because everything seems easy right up until you reach the limits of the tool. Someday I intend to sit down and really try to learn Poser, it's such a powerful tool; but it seems like the simplest tasks, adding and positioning cameras and lights, are such a headache in Poser that I usually just throw up my hands and go back to Studio.

I'm a lot more willing to take my scenes outside. Having a lighting solution that's going to look great pretty much out of the box has encouraged me to risk going outside because I know it's going to look right.

I've also learned a lot by studying how the LDP works and is put together. I'm a lot less afraid to use a LOT of lights in a scene and I've created some really interesting lighting rigs using similar organization and targeting techniques.

Also, both the LDP and Dreamlight's freebie light set encouraged me to really pay more attention to lighting, overall.

I want to get a copy of Lightwave or C4D and try my hand at doing the whole thing, start to finish.

While I like the ease of use and high quality you get with pre-made content, I have enough of an ego to want to be able to say "I did that. ALL of it." I've got a lot to learn between now and then though.

6. Any last comments?

I did warn you I was long winded - didn't I? Honestly, I'd just like to take this opportunity and thank my lovely wife Dorothy for the inspiration & encouragement and for her support.

/M.J.Ambruso a.k.a. theSea

 

We thank M.J. for his time and this great interview and wish him & his wife the VERY BEST!

Go to M.J´s RO gallery.

Check out M.J.Abruso´s work - all using the LDP for Daz|Studio: