Alex Roman
| Alex Roman | |
|---|---|
| Born | Jorge Seva Alicante, Spain |
| 🏡 Residence | Madrid, Spain |
| 🏳️ Nationality | Spain |
| 💼 Occupation | |
| Known for | CG artwork |
Alex Roman is a filmmaker, photographer, and CG artist. He was born in Alicante, Spain, in 1979. His birth name is Jorge Seva. “Alex Roman” is an artistic alias for publishing commercial work. Before he worked in the CG visual effects industry, he was trained in traditional painting at a few academies, and he discovered this other world called CG at an early age of 14.[1] In 2009, after Alex Roman released his first short film, *The Third & The Seventh*, it received many positive comments, which attracted a lot of attention in the areas of film making, CG, and architecture. The *Third & The Seventh* video has been watched over 500,000 times and has inspired a lot of commentary. After his first film, Alex moved on to his next advertisement, *Above Everything Else*. It’s a spot for kitchen countertop manufacturer Silestone, which is a stunning one-minute of slow-motion images that are pure CG.[2] In 2012, Alex Roman released his book “From Bits To The Lens,” the purpose of which is to break down all his previous works. Now he is working on his second narrative short film.[1]
Early life
Alex Roman was born in 1979 in Alicante, a city in Spain. After being trained in traditional painting at a few academies, he discovered this other world called CG. After school, he moved to Madrid and began working at a visual effects company. That stint did not last too long due to the lack of demand for visual effects in the Spanish market at the time. It was then that he switched into the VIZ (architectural visualization) business.[3]
Career
He has been working for several companies since until he established a brand new company himself: “The Third & The Seventh S.L.”. After that, he took a sabbatical year to work on an “already-built work” visualization series, which are now stitched together into a short animated piece: “The Third & The Seventh.” Leaving behind these architectural years, Alex decided to redirect his career to ad commercials and film direction. He won a Cannes Film Craft Gold Lion in 2011 for the Silestone brand commercial: “Above everything else.” As well as the Prix Ars Electronica – Computer Animation / Film / VFX prize in the same year for “T&S” short film. In 2011 he also supervised more than 20 vfx shots for the acclaimed David Fincher’s feature The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Alex’s work has been featured in Motionographer, FilmPro magazine, Filmnosis, and FXGuide, among others. Now he has just released his first book, “From bits to the lens,” which is a book that breaks down all his previous CG artwork, especially *The Third & The Seventh*. He plans to use the funding from the sales to make his second short film.[1]
Main artworks
The Third&The Seventh
A FULL-CG animated piece that tries to illustrate architecture art across a photographic point of view where the main subjects are already-built spaces. Sometimes in an abstract way, sometimes surreal. After publishing, it received a lot of positive commentary. Noah Harlan writes, “This is the most breathtaking work of pure CGI (i.e., it’s 100% CGI) I have ever seen – including Avatar in IMAX 3D. And this was all done by one guy. The 3D modeling, the rendering, the coloring, even the music. It’s slow, it’s not really a good film, but as a work of art, it is breathtaking.”[4] "A beautiful, architectural, short film made with Vray and 3DStudio Max. The sense of depth and space in this is really amazing. The shallow DOF and diptychs really make this piece shine. He includes some making-of and composite shots below for all of you “That can’t be 3D!” people out there. Makes me want to learn Vray."[5]
Above Everything Else
This is a 60″ slow-motion spot for Silestone kitchen worktops. The spot features fruit, vegetables, quartz crystals, and other objects in slow-motion flight – some even shattering – intercut with scenes of a kitchen. Most of the objects were created as 3D models with photographs projected onto them.
“Realism was my main goal here,” says Roman. “I firstly thought of shooting some live-action, but after studying carefully the budget and deadline I realized that CGI was the only way I could do it. The most important part for me was to deliver a beautiful and very visual commercial and keep the viewer focused on the commercial itself, not the fact that it was a CG piece: the photorealism was the only option I had to achieve this.”[6]
From bits to the lens
In essence, this is a book on digital art. It compiles a host of high-resolution computer-generated images taken from the scenes and spaces contained in “The Third & The Seventh” short. Plain and simple. Each chapter delves into thoughts, procedures, and theoretical principles. This essay largely aims to transmit knowledge and experience, focusing primarily on helping the artist read, understand, and appreciate both basic and advanced concepts related to pictorial, photographic, and synthetic art (taken as a separate discipline and final process).
External links
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 http://thirdseventh-book.com/contact/
- ↑ http://filmmakermagazine.com/16205-new-from-cgi-genius-alex-roman/#.Urgbq9xhB8E/
- ↑ http://motionographer.com/2009/08/16/alex-roman-thethirdtheseventh/
- ↑ http://filmmakermagazine.com/4531-movie-art-and-architecture-alex-romans-the-third-the-seventh/#.UrgY9dxhB8F/
- ↑ http://greyscalegorilla.com/blog/2010/01/thirdandseventh/
- ↑ http://www.fxguide.com/featured/3D_or_Real_Above_Everything_Else/
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