I try to tinker with Blender whenever I have time. For those who don't know, Blender is a free 3D software package. It also runs on my mac, which is great. I There is a lot of good resources online for learning, but I've found blenderguru.com to be very useful. You can find many great tutorials on his website. The one I used for this image, you can find here. If you want to try to make your own beer, all the resources you need for this are free!
I think I ended up with a pretty looking render, but my beer had no brand. I am not sure if Tony Yates has a brand or not, but he sure knows how to brew some great tasting beer. Unfortunately, I live far, far away from Tony. But in a parallel universe, I am frequent guest in his awesome microbrewery, sipping some damn tasty beers.
Teaser trailers for Nattergalen
I have produced two trailers for the upcoming book series authored by my better half. I've had a great time using After Effects and Premiere again. They are both great softwares, but After Effects is really cool. Sadly, I rarely use it, as my projects usually doesn't requires it. So I have to re-learn a bunch of stuff every time I open it. Maybe this time around, I will have more time for it.
The trailer started as a piece of music I wrote in Garage Band on the iPad, being inspired by Ida's script. I added a simple sidescroller with some words and sketches. It was only meant as a little gift to her. But our response from her publisher was really good, and we decided to refine it, finish it and publish it.
Her publisher also asked if I could produce a shorter version that was better for marketing. So I re-composed the music, re-edited the footage, changed a few things around, and ended up with this.
I am quite pleased with how they both turned out. Ida illustrates her own books, and it is her artwork that is being featured in the trailer. Personally, I am quite pleased with the music I wrote. It is not something I really do, and I wouldn't know how to use any other music software than Garage Band. I just found it very intuitive. I probably should have used better speakers than my earplugs, cheap headphones and internal speakers on my hardware. But you use what you got.
Hopefully it will not be too long until I have a new project I can use After Effects for. It is a program I would love to get a deeper understanding of.
To nye serier, og Flere illustrasjoner i Serieromaner.
Tiden flyr og bloggen burde vært oppdatert mye oftere. Jeg har lagt ut noen flere illustrasjoner under Serieromaner i dag. Det er to nye i Anna fra Røros, to i Morgensol, og tre i Over Skyene.
Jeg har også lagt til to nye serier jeg illustrerer. Nattlys av Salmund Kyvik, og Papirslottet av May Lis Ruus. Salmund er også forfatteren av serien Mørketid, som jeg hadde gleden av å illustrere. May Lis står bak Nattmannens Datter. Papirslottet er også satt i Bergensområdet, noe May Lis har dyp kjennskap til.
Oppdateringer i Serieromaner.
Heisann,
Jeg har lagt ut en del nye illustrasjoner i nevnte galleri: Anna fra Røros har tre nye illustrasjoner. To til i Hvite Hjerter, samt to til i Morgensol. Over skyene er en ny miniserie av Jorunn Johansen, og jeg illustrerer den samt har gjort omslagsdesignet på. Tårnhuset har også vært ute på markedet en stund. Det er en ny serie av Aud Midtsund som jeg illustrerer og har laget omslagsdesignet på.
Det skjer stadig noe på serieromaner, men foreløpig må jeg holde det hemmelig. Det eneste jeg kan røpe er at det er mye å glede seg til fremover for leserne.
Mvh Kjetil
Röki fan art
My friends Tom and Alex took a big step earlier this year. They decided to co-found their own game studio, Polygon Treehouse! And in April, they revealed their project:
Röki is a point and click game based on Scandinavian folklore. I've had the pleasure of acting as a consultant on Scandinavia for them. But they don't seem to need much of my help. The keywords for their game is adventure, bravery and MONSTERS! They got a nice design, a cracking storyline, and a very slick art style. I am really looking forward to play it.
Röki's art style really inspired me. In fact, it inspired me so much I went ahead and created some fan art for them. So I sat down and did this painting, and I hope they don't mind.
Röki is planning to be released in 2018. I can't wait to play it!
They also deserve credit for doing a great job with their website! It is really worth a visit. Their blog is a gold mine of interesting articles, tutorials and information. I've learned quite a few handy tricks from their posts.
I wish Polygon Treehouse best of luck with their project. I am very excited to see what they are coming up with.
News in Norwegian - Nettbutikk!
This post is only valid for norwegians, so the rest will be in Norwegian.
STORE NYHETER!
Er dette årets julegavetips?
Er du en serieleser, eller kjenner du en serieleser? Da kan dette være en fin julegave for de som allerede har "alt" fra før...
Jeg har med jevne mellomrom fått forespørsler om man kan kjøpe plakater av romanseriene jeg har illustrert. Derfor har jeg laget min egen lille illustrasjons-nettbutikk. Herfra kan du kjøpe postere produsert i høykvalitets digitaltrykk. Du kan finne den i menyen under webshop, eller du kan klikke på denne linken. Foreløpig har jeg lagt ut forsider fra Maria av Svaneberg, Misteltein og Trollkvinne. Men jeg vil legge ut mer i løpet av de nærmeste dagene. Send meg gjerne en mail om ønsker eller forbedringer.
Siden det er ganske mye jobb å lage en nettbutikk, må jeg begynne i det små og bygge meg opp. Derfor har jeg bare lagt ut noen av romanseriene til å begynne med. I tillegg selger jeg kun i Norge. Men jeg planlegger å legge ut flere av arbeidene, og kunne sende til andre land også. Har du spesielle ønsker, kontakt meg gjerne. Leveringstiden skal ligge på ca. 4-5 dager.
Ønsker alle en fin førjulstid!
On the road
This year turned out very different than expected. It has thrown some very heavy punches that threw a spanner in the works for my plans for this blog. It would be wrong to focus on it given the circumstances. But today I got inspired to do this painting as we drove along the Hungarian countryside.
And I intend to use this painting as an excuse to let you know there are some updates under the "serieromaner" category. Two new illustrations for "Anna fra Røros" can be found here. There are also two new illustrations for Hvite Hjerter. I posted two illustrations for a new book series called Morgensol, where I also did the cover design. I also posted my cover design work for a book series called Aurora. I think that's it… If romance novels isn't your thing, maybe you prefer this wizard fella I posted a while back.
I hope you all are having a great November so far.
Remembering Trygve
Most of what happens in life is beyond your control. And some times, bad stuff happens. Our beloved Trygve passed away on the 29th of July, suddenly and unexpected. We were looking forward to finally spend time together as a family instead of living away from each other in different countries. Only four days before our arrival, the universe had other plans.
Trygve was Ida's older brother. Only 6 months separated them. I met him very soon after we became a couple. From the first second, I instinctively liked him. He quickly became a very good friend. In fact, one of my best friends.
I could say so much about this wonderful man. One of his striking characteristics, was his deep love for all living things. And he surrounded himself with life. There was always a dog or a cat in his presence. His garden was full of beautiful flowers and plants, herbs and fruits. He had a fish pond where not only fish, but snakes, frogs, and even a turtle had found refugee. Chickens were walking around freely. His dogs were always stray dogs, abused and abandoned creatures whose owners had left to die. Trygve took them in. He gave them proper care and found new homes and families for them, often in Norway. Many dogs owe their life to him.
Everyone I know liked Trygve. And for good reason. He had a warm personality, a great sense of humour, a big smile, and an infectious laughter. He was a well informed man, and I had many good conversations with him. He had a broad range of interests, and there never was a dull moment with him. Instead of getting worked up over issues, he faced them with a smile. "-Kill cruelty with kindness", he said. And he did.
Life is not fair. It never was. Time only goes in one direction. Once our loved ones are lost, they are lost forever. No matter how unfair, we will never get Trygve back. But we can learn from his example. And we can honour his memory. I believe he wanted us all to be happy. And even if it still hurts, and will do for a long time, we need to be happy for the time we have together with those who matter to us. Because you do not know it is the last time you spend together, when it is the last time you spend together.
I am so very grateful I got to know Trygve.
Finally, a (quick) painting.
Our stay in England is coming ever closer to an end. The days are flying by, and they get quickly filled up by packing, housework, parenting, more housework and more parenting. Meanwhile I try to sneak in some website building. There are a few more projects and sketches to look at in the Gallery, there is new artwork in Serieromaner under Anna fra Røros. And even if I should prioritize other things, I did manage to speed paint this one:
I also found this old concept I did about 7 years ago, hidden on an old, dusty hard drive. It was a lot of fun working on it. I don't believe this project is still alive, but I've censored off the logo just in case. Man, I wish I had seen that project come alive.
Anyway, time to bubble-wrap and pack more stuff. We're not there just yet.
Credit: SpaceX
Liftoff!
That's it! We have a launch. I have also purchased the shiny domain "kjetilnystuen.com". Most non-Norwegians will have a hard time spelling that one correctly.
The site is far from feature- and content complete. But I'll call it a soft launch for now, and keep going at it the coming days. I do think I'll be going for a pint or two this evening to celebrate though. I might not have earned it, but it is a good enough excuse for a drink in the sun.
Learning new software
So there is still lots of packing to be done, but I also need to find time working on my site. I wanted to present the design work I did on my wife's book with some 3D product renders. I need a 3D tool that suits my needs.
3DS Max was the first 3D software I learned, but switched to Maya when I got a job at Guerrilla Games as a texture artist on Killzone. Since I am a Mac user, 3DSMax is out of the question. I did try to install it on a Windows bootcamp. But that interface combined with my Retina display makes it completely unreadable. My eyes are WAY too old to read such tiny fonts. I might go for Maya, but I am not using 3D that much right now. Both these programs are a too expensive for my current usage. But Blender is free, and that is one hell of an argument to go ahead and learn it. So today I have managed to model a box, UV-map it, light it and set up a matte/shadow material using nodes. Learning new 3D packages takes a lot of patience. Nothing seems to do what I want it to. But hey, I did managed to finish what I started, which is better than nothing, right?
I am aching to do some painting, but it will have to wait for now. There's more packing to be done, moving stuff to sort out and diapers to be changed.
House inspection
The last two days has been spent cleaning, packing, and painting. Now we are just waiting for the tenant agency to show up. So it is time for some website work again.
We have sold of almost all our belongings, trying to bring as little as possible. But the real reason for this blog post is to try the Squarespace blog app.
Building a website and attempting to blog
I have not had any need for an online portfolio for many, many years. During my freelance days, I had a set of very steady clients constantly giving me more than enough work to get by. I never published any of their commissions to market myself in any way. I preferred to keep the clients absolutely sure I would not leak any work. Stupidly, I was never very good at saving my work either. So it feels a bit like I am starting from scratch.
The last time I made myself a website, I was using Adobe Dreamveawer. At some point I had a go at using Wordpress too. They were both quite technical. I was looking around to see if there is a simpler solution to my needs, and decided to give Squarespace a try. So far I am very impressed by it. It is very easy to use, and easy to update which is more important. I am toying with the idea of writing a blog about our move in to the unknown. I am unsure how interesting that blog would be to anyone but myself, but Squarespace does offer a great set of tools for the job.
A CHAPTER ENDS, A NEW ONE BEGINS
On the 26th of May, I became a father. Better late than never. And it is true what they say: It was a magic experience. My wife did an amazing job. Seeing my child for the first time was big. Very big. Rosie birth centre is fantastic. What a team they got there. I can't praise them enough. This is NHS at its very finest.
Our daughter's arrival also marked the end of an era. I worked at Guerrilla Cambridge for 6 years, but Sony shut down the studio in January. After thinking for a while, we decided that it was time for us to leave the UK and embark on another adventure. But first we needed Elisa to come out and meet us.