The Art of Denis Loubet

By Type:

• Cover Art
• Concept Art
• Interior Illustrations
• Animations
• Promotional
• 3D Graphics

By Company:

• Art I've done for myself
• DrawMyCharacter
• Origin Systems Inc.
• Steve Jackson Games
• Portalarium
• Daylight Productions
• Illusion Machines
• PixelMine Games
• Midnight Studios
• Genesis LPMud

• Wacom Graphics Tablets
  I got a Cintiq last year, and I haven't looked back since!
• Corel Painter 2015
  I use this program to create the raw art. Its imitation of traditional media is uncanny. I do my sketches and painting directly on the Cintiq.
• Adobe Photoshop CC
  I use this to finish my art. It's the best for color balancing, titling, and layering effects. The monthly fee helps you avoid the initial investment required by an outright purchase.
• AzPainter2 and AzDrawing
  Barely translated from the Japanese, these two small art programs pack a major punch, especially when you consider they're free! I've used AzPainter2 for inking because it has a line smoothing tool that helps prevent line wobble. That's something neither Painter nor Photoshop have.
• Sculptris
  Speaking of free, Sculptris is an awesome 3D modeling package that handles very much like clay.
• ZBrush 4R6
  What can I say, the ZRemesher feature alone is worth the price of admission in this amazing 3D software.
• 3D Studio Max
  My go-to software for 3D modeling, texturing, rigging, animating, and rendering.

I met Richard Garriott -- aka Lord British -- at Steve Jackson Games while I was serving there as a bad typesetter. Both Richard and Steve were in the Society for Creative Anachronism, a group of medieval re-creationists, and Richard was showing Steve, the local Baron, his new computer game, Ultima. Richard liked the artwork I was doing for Steve, and roped me into doing the cover and the start-up screen for his game.

That start-up screen was my first piece of professional computer art, and was done on an Apple II with an Apple II graphics tablet. The tablet was a metal monstrosity with a tethered pen that rattled like it was about to fall apart. As I tried to draw the lines of a heraldic lion, power spikes created actual spikes in the lines I was drawing, forcing re-draw after re-draw. It was a challenge. But after that, I was Richard's go-to artist.