CGNetworks
Artist Profile :: Philip Straub –Digital Painting Master The
Universe of Philip Straub
Lisa
Thurston, 30 August 2004
Welcome to the vibrant universe of Philip Straub –filled
on the one hand with meticulously detailed visions of the
bizarre, dreamlike, and unimagined and on the other with
though-provoking contemporary works. From these to concept
design to imaginative illustrations and fantastically-lit
digital paintings, Straub's work is rich and stunning. Lisa
Thurston interviewed Straub to find out more about the
mind behind the art and the strategies behind his career
success.
Philip
Straub is a highly successful commercial artist whose work
has included concept design for upcoming movies and games,
illustrations for games such as Vivendi Universal's Jurassic
Park series, and commercial art, which he exhibits
in various east-coast galleries in the United States .
Apart from his exhibited work and concept design, Straub
has created illustrations for over 30 children's books
and also has licensed a range of designs for home decor
products such as wallpapers, stationary and other decorative
accessories. As a result his work has been widely published
in art books, magazine and numerous websites. Straub's
most recent freelance venture has been creating two in-depth
digital painting tutorials and critiquing a collection
of digital paintings in the freshly-launched digital art
book d'artiste:
Digital Painting.
Concept
Design
Straub
currently works as Senior Concept Artist at Electronic
Arts where he primarily focuses on the visual
development of gaming environments. What does concept
design for entail? Where does an artist start and
what are the keys to designing a concept that works?
We asked Straub.
“I
work with the team to help define the worlds of our
products and create an immersive experience for the
user. When creating production concept art I concentrate
on defining the palette, lighting and mood of each
environment and character. I use color and light
to help define the story line or visual progression
of the game. I look for the little details that will
help 'sell' an environment to the player. It's the
little things we all tend overlook during our day
to day experiences that help make the worlds we live
in feel so real. I'm constantly trying to understand
and capitalize on the character of what makes up
the world around us, so I can effectively skew it
for a specific project.“
The
Last Stop is
one of my favorites. It's really just a quick
sketch I did after getting home late from work
one night. 'The Last Stop' is an environment
concept sketch for my book project done in Painter
and Photoshop. Click to enlarge
CGN:
Before EA you worked at Vivendi Universal. What was
your role in the games production there?
“I
worked on three Jurassic Park titles for Vivendi
Universal Games as a background and texture artist.
The coolest thing about that project was doing the
textures for all the dinos. I was Lead Background
Artist during my time at Vivendi where I oversaw
the development of the environments for most of the
games we did. It was challenging because we regularly
would be working on a few completely different licenses
at once. So, I'd be trying to get the team to master
a couple different styles at one time, while working
with the Creative Director and Producers to help
define the style further. We worked on a ton of kids'
licenses including, Disney, Fisher Price, Mattel,
and the highly successful children's educational
software brand Jumpstart. Those were fun times for
sure.“
