Eye candy: the world’s best student CG art
The Gnomon School of Visual Effects has been voted School of the Year at the 2014 CG Student Awards, pipping four-time winner Vancouver Film School into second place.
Sponsored by Autodesk and backed by 10 leading international VFX and games studios, the prestigious annual awards celebrate the best work created by students on animation, game design, VFX, visualisation, graphics and computer science courses worldwide, with prizes totalling $230,000.
Six Gnomon graduates won individual awards, including overall wins in the Next-Gen Gaming and People’s Choice categories, and student Mike Zhang received an internship via the CGSA’s Bootcamp Placement scheme.
Below, we’ve rounded up their winning entries: both as a benchmark against which other students can measure themselves – and simply as a celebration of some wonderful artwork.
Student of the Year, Next-Gen Gaming: Servando Lupini
Originally from Venezuela, Servando graduated from Gnomon in January. The winner of no less than four of the school’s Best of Term awards, he is currently an associate 3D artist at Blizzard Entertainment.
See more of Servando’s work in his full contest entry
Runner-Up, Next-Gen Gaming: Chris Gillett
Describing the decision to study at Gnomon as “the best decision I ever made”, Chris graduated from the school in 2013, going on to work at SCEA’s Santa Monica studio. He is currently a character artist at Robotoki.
See more of Chris’s work in his full contest entry
Winner, People’s Choice: Leticia Kao
We first featured Leticia on CG Channel when her work headed Gnomon’s 2014 Student Reel. Since graduating last August, she has freelanced widely, and is currently lead modeler at Loot Factory.
See more of Leticia’s work in her full contest entry
Runner-Up, People’s Choice: Leticia Reinaldo
A four-time Best of Term award-winner, the second Leticia in the People’s Choice category graduated from Gnomon in September 2013. She is currently working as a freelance 3D modeler and texture artist.
See more of Leticia’s work in her full contest entry
Commended, VFX/Animation and People’s Choice: Leonardo Krajden
Having previously studied advertising in his native Brazil, Leonardo graduated from Gnomon in January. He has since worked as a freelance prop modeler for Blur Studio, and is now a junior artist at ILM.
See more of Leonardo’s work in his full contest entry
Commended, People’s Choice: Tyler Bolyard
A three-time Best of Term award-winner, Tyler graduated from Gnomon in January. He has since worked at Psyop and Disney Interactive Studios, and is now a texture artist at Nickelodeon Animation Studio.
See more of Tyler’s work in his full contest entry
Bootcamp Placement, VFX/Animation
The winner of a studio internship in the CGSA’s Bootcamp Placement program, Mike will graduate from Gnomon in June, where he is already a four-time Best of Term award winner. He is currently interning at MPC.
See more of Mike’s work in his full contest entry
See all of the winning entries in this year’s CG Student Awards
Full disclosure: CG Channel is owned by the Gnomon School of Visual Effects.