My name is Julian Herman, I was born and raised on Martha’s Vineyard, a small island off the coast of Cape Cod. I’m a senior at WPI and studying to major in design for Interactive media and game development. I always admired art and artists growing up, often sketching in black cover sketchbooks in my spare time whenever I had the opportunity. Game design as a medium seldom requires niche workers so it is important to spread yourself over a wide variety of skills when coming into your own as a developer and an artist. Due to my passion for art and my chosen profession, becoming more skilled with the visual language is an important part of growing as a designer and expanding my skill set. For years I’ve worked in both digital and traditional art, taking classes and studying and practicing both. In my free time I often draw digitally using Autodesk sketchbook, usually taking the form of character designs, as a way to relax and creatively express myself. I’ve always wanted to improve my art skills when it comes to perspective when it comes to my 2D art and elaborate and enhance my skills in 3D modeling in general.
I am a transfer from the now defunct Becker College which in its heyday was the second best school in the country for game design. As such, it was very focused on game making and designing when it comes to student led projects. In the past I have participated in many game jams, student projects, and school projects making games ranging from 2D platformers to 3D VR mystery games. While working on these I took on a variety of roles to expand my skills, from artist, designer, writer, voice actor, and video editor, all of which helped to build my skill set.
I gather inspiration from a wide variety of media. A Game series that specifically influenced me and my taste is the Infamous series, a superhero sandbox game series that connected to me due to their perfect tone, presentation, and stories that deal with many personal interests. Another series that I hold close to me is the Gravity Rush series of games due to their wondrous visuals, soaring soundtracks, and gorgeous attention to details found in the lush game world. More than anything however, what inspires me is the idea that every piece of art that resonates with me personally or with a wider audience was made by a person or a team of people. The idea that it is possible for me myself to hunker down and make something that I and hopefully others can enjoy so long as I have the skill and the passion is an idea I often ruminate on for long stretches of time and what helps to push me forward into new creative directions.
Badge: Cute
I love characters with condensed proportions… so small and cute! I had a hard time picking a badge because I think a lot of them can be applied to your art.
Badge: Familiar
It’s cool to see the same characters and similar styles carry over through several projects. It adds a sense of familiarity to your art.
Badge: Quirky
You do a really good job of keeping your art style simple and your lines impeccably clean while giving your characters and world a ton of personality! Great work!
Badge: Striking
I love the pixel art sprites and their animations. Pixel art has always been difficult for me and I’m always impressed when someone is able to do it as well as you. Very unique and striking.
Badge Given: Striking
I find all your pieces have an interesting consistent style to them. I was making my own background music when reading your comic strip, great work!
I think I will go with colorful since a lot of the characters in the comic strip use bold colors associated to them, which I kind of like since it can convey their differences and similarities.
Impressive
I am always impressed by people who can do high quality work over many different disciplines are you are a great example of that. All of your work from modelling to drawing to animation is all very clean and refined and looks fantastic. Really great stuff!
Striking
I actually chose “striking” for its other definition of hitting or punching because I really like the way you animated the hits and strikes in your pixel animations. The smears are done very well and I feel like I learned a bit about how to make my own sprite animations better just by watching yours.
Shiny
I’m a big fan of the fire effects that appear on the attack animations in your sprite animations. The look really good! I love pixel art and sprite animations, so it’s always cool to see someone’s work in motion!
Badge: Impressive
I loved the animation of the duel you did, the movements were fluid and had great impacts. I also liked the sprite animations for the various characters, each with their own set of distinct profiles.
Impressiveļ¼
I and I like your picture and storyboard design, including the characters’ movements. Especially in the confrontation between good and evil, the two in the picture oppose each other. These all demonstrate your ingenuity in the scheduling of the scene and the control of emotions. These will definitely become the basis for your excellent performance in this course.