Hi! My name is Christa Chandler. 

I'm currently a student at the Academy of Art University studying for my Bachelor of Fine Arts in Animation and Visual Effects. I love art in all its forms. I haven't found a medium that I don't like. Though, charcoal can be frustrating at times. During my time at the University, I am exploring where my creativity, curiosity, strengths, and weaknesses take me. I'm not set on any one position or field. I have found that being inflexible closes someone off from many possibilities. I do really enjoy compositing and lookdev though. So, if I were forced to choose a specialty right now, one of those would be it.

My experience is that sometimes you just need to go with the flow otherwise you can expect some curveballs thrown your way by a pitcher known as the Universe. More on that later. I love telling stories, creating, and making. Let's focus on that for now. I just wanted to introduce myself in a more personal way. I have been working on my resume and portfolio a lot lately and felt stifled and impersonal by avoiding the use of the words I, me, and we. 

I have many experiences that have shaped my life and my perception of the world. I can't wait to share them all with you. I am sure to reference those experiences while sharing breakdowns of my processes, exciting things I have learned, and quick tips and tricks, and new projects I'm working on in this blog. Not every piece of art is going to be the best, so they don't all fit in the portfolio. The learning process is sometimes a messy thing. However, I feel like sharing what I have learned through the process could be extremely valuable to others. So even "ugly" art might be shared there. For example, I was working on this beautiful charcoal portrait of Chloe Bennet AKA Quake on Marvel's Agents of Shield. Mid the process I got new glasses, and yes that changed things by the end. One side is not like the other. Not only that but the Finals Teapot is a splendid example of things going great. The model is one Pixar made available in Creative Commons and my School then made available to the class. Yes, I did the standard assignments, but I also experimented with my own materials, I created on my cell phone. The people from Pixar have a lot of portfolios to review. The portfolio is not the place to breakdown every tiny step I took to create the material. Better yet, now that I know more, what I plan to try next to perfect my technique. But a blog is the perfect place to share those. As well as glimpses of my own back story, what inspires me, ideas I have, stories I want to create, resources, tutorials, and classes I have found. Even FREE ones 🥳!

I'm trying not to be too long winded here on my intro page though. There will be more to come in the upcoming blog section. Be sure to follow me if any of this sounds interesting to you. Don't forget to like, comment, share and subscribe. It's how other people find us artists 😉.

P.S. I really don't like how my picture looks in this layout. So, I screen recorded myself narrating my sway.

Back From the Magical Mayehem, With Plenty to Share

Hi everyone,

It’s been a while since my last post, and that’s mostly because the closer I get to finishing my degree, the more intense everything becomes. I’ve always pushed myself with challenging courses at a full-time load, and I’m the type who can’t stand watching anyone struggle if I can help. My faculty noticed, and I have stepped into a few additional roles: Peer Mentor (Federal Work Study), Undergraduate Student Representative, and at one point I was even club leadership for Legends of Visual Effects.

At the end of Fall 2025, I only had six classes left. Because of veteran benefits, it made more sense financially to split them evenly: three in the Spring, and Three in the Fall. I could have done four in Spring and two in Summer and graduated early… but something about walking before I was truly finished didn’t feel right. So, it was three-and-three.

I thought this lighter load would give me more time for my portfolio, demo reel, and blogging, but one of those classes was Producing for StudioX, where I served as Producer for five projects and the CG Department’s Production Assistant. That role consumed my free time, but I now have a deeper understanding of the entire pipeline. So here I am, finally on summer break, catching my breath and updating everyone on what I’ve been learning.

What I’ve Been Up To

Since my last post, I’ve completed every Look Development and Lighting course available to undergraduates in AAU’s Animation and VFX program – including some cross-listed graduate course all the way through StudioX for LookDev and Lighting. So, please ignore my very old post about how to create materials. I have come a long way since then.

One of my favorite discoveries has been texture painting in Substance Painter. It brings me right back to being six years old, experimenting with crayon pressure to create highlights and shadows. That same joy is still there – just with more layers, masks, and render engines.

I’ve also taken courses across:

• Traditional Art Fundamentals: Analysis of Form, Color Theory
• Film: Cinematics, Producing, Real-Time VFX in Unreal Engine, StudioX Production
• Animation: Hand-drawn, digital, stop-motion, Feature Animation Training
• Visual Effects: Matchmoving, Compositing, StudioX Compositing Lead, Python for VFX/Rigging
• CG General: Photoshop, Maya modeling/rigging
• Games: Construct3, Unity, Unreal Engine, PyGames

It’s been a lot – but in a good way. 

It’s time to turn more attention to my goals. My final semester, Fall 2026, I will be only serving as a Peer Mentor while I finish up my last three courses: StudioX CG Artist / TD, Art History through the 19th century, and Senior Portfolio Review. I can’t wait to be back into StudioX as an artist. I will be surfacing live action assets for VFX shots, lighting, and building tools to help the various artists in the pipeline. I have learned some really cool stuff in Python, and I can’t wait to share it with you and put it into practice in a real studio environment.

Why I’m Blogging Again

Now that I’m finally on break, I’ve had time to breathe and process everything I’ve learned over the last few years. I’ve also been applying for internships and jobs, but because most of my professional work is under NDA, I don’t have much I can publicly show yet. Only one project has been released, and even that must be password protected.

So, I’m returning to blogging for a few reasons:

• To share what I can talk about.
• To break down my process using simple geometry when I can’t show real assets.
• To fill the “NDA gap” so recruiters can still see how I think.
• To document the technical challenges, I’ve been exploring on my own.
• To keep learning, experimenting, and growing during the Summer.

Like I said, much of my work is still protected, so if I sound vague at times or use cubes and spheres to demonstrate ideas… you know why. But I hope these posts will still be helpful, interesting, and maybe even inspiring.

I’m excited to share more – and maybe cause a little creative Mayehem along the way.

Best Wishes,

Christa “Maye” Chandler

Hi everyone!

At the close of the Spring 2024 semester, I discovered new skills I enjoy doing, and was able to narrow down my emphasis even further. 

At the start of my program, I was just going for a BFA in Animation & VFX with no emphasis. At the end of my first semester, VFX was added as my emphasis. I originally wanted to stay open for employability reasons. As I learned more about the 3D pipeline, I grew even more obsessed with color and texture though. I will continue to learn all I can about the 3D animation and VFX pipeline, but now I'm going to focus as many classes as I can toward Lookdev and Lighting.

I just finished the Introduction to Lookdev and Lighting class. This class was originally a graduate level course, and I was taking it in my third semester. I hadn't even taken Introduction to 3D Production B yet. I was taking them concurrently. To say this was a challenge is an understatement of the year. Did I get frustrated at times? Yes. But the funny thing is, I found the challenge thrilling. I wanted to spend all my time in that class. There was always a new puzzle to solve, or a challenge that needed a solution. I learned soo much about creating realistic looking textures and lighting. Painting realistic dirt and rust on cars and campers using Substance Painter. We worked on the assets for one shot and the shot itself the entire semester. I gave a car, camper and their luggage, colors and textures. I textured the character and city. Learned about transferring textures to rigs, turning animations to alembic cache, importing everything for use in the scene for an animated shot. Creating believable lighting with cinematic effects using tricks of the trade. Compositing and color grading and other effects in Nuke. How to create a 3D Geo Cam in Nuke to change out between night and day skies. We even learned how to turn our realistic looking renders into toon renders easily. We learned multiple ways of creating each effect. Our feedback was given each week as a class, like a studio does dailies. We were expected to troubleshoot any issues and fix them. We were graded on how well we accepted and applied feedback, our growth as artists, and the technical application of our textures. Also, I was learning visual node-based coding in Maya and Nuke, making my own shelves and buttons utilizing Mel script in Maya. I loved it! I can't wait to do Advanced Lookdev and Lighting! However, there are a few more core classes I need to take care of before I head into that class though. I also found some other enjoyable things to do in my other classes. 

In 3D Production B I worked on an outdoor environment and an indoor environment. I had to beautify the outdoor environment utilizing paint effects to add animated trees, grass, and flowers. I then had to add a water surface and give it fluid dynamics utilizing Bifrost in Maya. Then I animated a toy boat on the water utilizing curves to match the waves generated. Then I utilized nCloth and constraints to make a flag blow in the wind and gradually rip. On the indoor scene I had to import footage and animate a 3D Character according to the reference. I also had to animate the camera cinematically. I then learned how to create my own Skydome by importing an HDR with lighting information to make the scene lighting match the sky more accurately. Once that lighting was done, I added my own interior lighting and rendered a 3D Character animation scene. I really enjoyed this class; everything came very easily to me. Which is surprising to me because this time last year, I knew absolutely nothing about 3D. 

I really enjoyed Cinematics for Animation and VFX. I found film critique to be very intellectually pleasing. I especially loved learning how to edit footage for film, color psychology and how color grading and camera angles are used to enhance the story. 

I always try to add my own personal touch to my homework assignments. Like finding stickers to project onto the car, camper, and t-shirt that enhance the storytelling. Or, adding my own sky from one of the many photographs of beautiful skies I took. Coincidently I found the importance of compositing. As there were always power lines to remove or images to merge to enhance the image result in Photoshop.

Though I will be training on all things 3D and VFX, I will be focusing more closely on Compositing, Lookdev, and Lighting. I will be updating my portfolio with my projects and updating this blog post with pictures, video, and links to the projects. I might be a little slow at it though because during my break I'm staying productive by going to Indiana Filmmaker Events, participating in an animation contest hosted by the Carmel Film Forum, helping an author start up an animation and gaming project based on their book, and participating as an extra in a film. Some people might think that's a lot of work, but I'm doing it all with my kid that just turned eighteen. They are just as fascinated with all of this as I am and I wanted to do fun things with them this summer, you know, before they run off to be all grown up and everything 🫣🤭. 

I love the work of Mary Blair (classic Disney), Kent Davis, Amy Brown and Lisa Frank. They continue to be a true inspiration to me. I also love Epic (2013), Disney's Cinderella (2015), and lately I've been taking a deep dive into Star Wars. All of these works just truly fascinate me. I truly found a love for critiquing films in my cinematics class! My instructor was really impressed with my work too. So I might start sharing some of that work via this blog channel as well.

PBA = Pixar in a Box Activity via Khan Academy

If I was stranded on a deserted island, what three films would I take with me? Why? How are they the same? How are they different?

Whoa, this is going to be so revealing.

1. American Tale: It would remind me I'm never truly alone. Even when feeling alone, someone else in the world does too. Fievel helped me when I was a toddler. I remember being torn from my Grammy very vividly. After hours of car travel half way across the state, I woke up in my first foster home. They were great people, don't get me wrong. It still didn't change the fact that I felt lost, scared, and alone in my feelings. That is, until I watched this movie. Some how Fievel shared the burden of my feelings and confusion. So if I was all alone on a deserted island, sad and all alone, I think he could help me cry it out. 

2. Epic: It would be a good reminder that you can find a friend in all creatures and to remember to take time to look at how beautiful everything is. There are many hummingbirds in my neighborhood. They like my lilies and gladiolus flowers. Every morning, in the summer, when I'm drinking my coffee on the back porch they come up and hover right in front of me. The bark as if they are saying hello. I respond with, "Good morning my little yard fairies." They happily chirp and turn slowly as if waving good bye before zooming off to go to the flowers. Sometimes they even stop after they've had their fill as if to say thank you. I really feel BlueSky Studios turned my little morning ritual into an epic adventure. It would be a nice retreat from the daily duties of survival.

3. Brave: This would remind me to be brave. Meredith's hair reminds me of mine when I was younger and let it grow it. It has always been so big and so curly. The way she is always fussing with her curls including blowing up to get them out of her face is too relatable! Yet she is a bad A girl who isn't going to take anything from anybody. She is a girl on a mission. It kind of reminds me of how I was in the Navy. Plus the fact that soo much of my family tree is rooted in Ireland helps too. Also Meredith is not like the other princesses. It's a good reminder that sometimes you have to be different to get stuff done.

All three movies are stories of hope and resilience. All three movies are very relatable, I can see myself in the characters of each.

American Tale is different in it's medium and value. It is a hand drawn 2D traditional animation. Most of the movie is very dark. It has many very sad themes. It not only deals with lost children but also the challenges of immigration.

Epic is different in that it is a CG 3D animation with extremely realistic textures. I am obsessed with textures and I have not seen better dandelion fluff since. It has some dark areas dealing with decay but it is a mostly colorful film.

Brave is also CG Animation but with some amazing dynamics in how her hair moves realistically. Trust me I have experienced this kind of hair, it's pretty accurate. Also it's a pretty bright movie. I mean just look at how bright her hair is. 

That's all the activity was. I am feeling pretty venerable and exposed now. Your turn. What three movies would you take on a deserted island and why?

PBA=Pixar in a Box Activity

Update: I felt I should try again. Here is version 2:

I got the idea to start a story telling journal from Pixar in a Box on Khan Academy. I think it's a great idea to post it here because every thing starts with an idea and a story. This is especially true in the entertainment industry. The first activity was to think of a vivid memory and express the story in several ways. I already told the story to a staff member at my university and she shared in my excitement. Next is telling the story in written format. Then using only line and shapes express the emotions of the story. I was only able to share the written portion in the Pixar in a Box site. Here you can see the image that goes with my story. Perhaps this will show my growth as an artist. I tried to remember all the line psychology I learned in fundamentals class last semester. Also I learned how to use my new school supply, a Wacom for this drawing. So if it's not perfect, just know I am a growing artist and things will get better. At least your getting to know me better. 

What do you feel when you see this image? Please comment below.

My son turned 18 last Sunday. He is still in high school though, so I don't have to worry about an empty nest just yet. He's always spent a lot of time in his room creating things. He makes amazing music, and has been making 3D models and scenes since he got his first computer. I think he was about 10 when he asked how the games he played were made and we researched free softwares for him to explore. Now Blender, Unreal Engine, and Ableton are his creative outlets. He is to the point of creating his own fluid simulations and rock generators from scratch in Blender. He has always struggled in school though. Music made math click until Algebra. Modeling made Geometry click for him. Transforms got him through Algebra 2. So I have to say I think my encouragement and support in the arts really helped him get through school. He is what they call a kinesthetic learner, meaning he will learn better if he can interact with the lesson content sort of hands on. He's in his last semester now and due to graduate this summer.  I'm so excited!

I have always told him he could get a great paying job doing any of those things, if he would just entertain going to college.  Up until now it has been priority #1 to get him through high school and graduated though. He has went on college tours and read through the programs offered and none of them really appealed to him. 

So I started going to college over the summer. When I was looking at programs I could tell why he wasn't enthusiastic about what was offered locally. We were looking at local first because it would be tuition free because of my disabled veteran status. None of them really appealed to me either. I chose an Animation and VFX program half way across the country  and started going online. My only hope was that I would understand some of his 3D language a little better and that I would inspire him to go to college. If I could work at an awesome studio then even better. Then I thought maybe if I built my own studio he could work for me. Any of the above would make happier than anyone could imagine.

I even talked with one of the staff members about all of this recently when we were discussing my goals. She was very easy to talk too, and come to find out she has a son with learning challenges too. I hate the term learning disabled. They are learning capable, it just takes time to try different methods. So of course I had to tell her when my son told me his amazing news!

On Monday morning he came into my office and told me that he wants to go to college! I guess the fact that he was an adult now sunk in a bit over night. Not only that, but he is following his dreams! I've told him soo many times to choose something he loves doing so that it's easier to get through each day. The more he likes something, the less it will feel like work. Well he listened! He said there was one condition though, it had to be my college. I asked him why, and he said he likes all the projects I've been doing, and if I could learn so much in two semesters, he feels like he could accomplish great things there. Also he is just as excited as me when we look up my new instructor's IMBD credits and profiles each semester. YAY! I DID IT! I inspired my son to follow his dreams! Wait, there's more.

The staff member told me about their precollege program for high school students. We got him signed up and registered for the classes! As if that wasn't enough, each class he passes equals a $1000 scholarship to help with his first semester! This has been a truly exciting and amazing week. I'm so touched, grateful and excited I can hardly bare it!

Could you feel any of these: excitement, carefree, confusion, worry, stability? Please comment below. 

It is important for me to know if I am connecting with my audience or not and where or how I can improve. All comments are appreciated.

Please disregard this post! There are better ways to create materials!

This continues to stay in my blog as a reference to demonstrate my growth.

Minimum Starter Guidelines

1 - Final project video for Introduction to 3D Production A.

The above project can be found here.

View this blog post in Sway.

The 3D model was provided by my instructor. All I did was add my own material and add provided shaders and bump maps in Maya. I adjusted the shaders to match my material.

The material I used was one I created many years ago using my cell phone. It serves as a starting point to teach you the process of creating your own materials and exporting them for use on 3D models in your 3D program of choice. Some of the best art is inspired by real life. Why not use real life materials?

What You Need:

• A smart phone or tablet
• Adobe Creative Cloud App
  • There is a free version with 1TB of Free cloud storage
  • Available on iOS and Android
• Free Adobe Capture App
  • Available on iOS and Android
• A cloud service you can send files to your PC with:
  • Personally, I use Microsoft OneDrive.
  • Make sure you have that app installed on your phone for an easy transfer

Warning! The Creative Cloud will NOT serve our syncing needs for this purpose! You must use an app that allows you to drop files onto your laptop or PC. You will need to drop files into your 3D program project files.

Photographing Your Material

• Find a material you love.
  • It could be a stone, crystal, rock, plant, or your favorite blanket.
• Open the camera on your phone:
  • Find the best resolution setting for your phone camera.
    • You will want a 1:1 ratio if possible.
• Take a picture of your material.

Pro Tips:

• Adobe apps work best under bright but diffused lighting conditions. So, think of a bright but cloudy day.
  • This helps ensure all the colors are easily seen without too many reflections or shadows.
    • You will have your own lighting and ray tracing or path tracing in your 3D program, so you want to avoid reflections and shadows as much as possible at this stage.
• Avoid shadows covering the material.
  • Place yourself on the other side of the light source or behind it.
• Would you be interested in learning more about photography and lighting? Answer form.
• Clean your material.
• Try to fill your camera frame with as much material as possible.
  • It's ok if you have a little background showing you just want most of the frame to be a clear shot of the material. 
  • The closer you can get without your camera losing focus, the better. 
    • This will result in more detailed material.
  • Using a tripod and a time delay, remote, or any no touch method will help ensure there are no issues caused by camera shakes.

2 - The image I used for my teapot material. The image is of a tiny Botswana agate crystal. I love the colors and pattern of this crystal. Picture taken before I knew the pro tips above.

Sometimes the best teacher in life is experience. You must try things and make mistakes before you learn what will produce the best results. As Mr. Beast and my instructor Van Phan said, "Fail Fast and Fail Often." You will learn faster. They also say that teaching others is a fast way to learn. So, this blog helps me as much as it does you.

Now that I know more about photography, lighting, and how the Adobe Apps work; there are things I would do differently to improve my results. Creating even better materials. For example, I would adjust my white balance in Adobe Lightroom for more accurate colors, and I would remove my background using Photoshop.

3 - The same material with white balance adjusted the scratch and background removed.

Would you like to learn more about how to achieve the same results? Answer form.

Capturing Your Material:

4 - A video walk through of how to use Adobe Capture to turn your images into materials you can use in your favorite 3D program. This is my first video tutorial. Please excuse any obvious nervousness.

Written Adobe Capture Instructions

• Open Adobe Capture on your phone.
• Click the blue image button in the lower right hand of your screen.
• Choose camera roll from the list that appears.
  • Other options include images from:
  • Your Creative Cloud
  • Lightroom
  • Adobe Stock
• Choose the image of your material.
• Swipe right to get to the beginning of the options list which is where "material" is located.
  • Here you can choose to edit the material properties:
    • Roughness
    • Detail
    • Metallic
    • Intensity
    • Frequency
    • Repeat (tiling)
    • Blend Edges
  • You can also choose which material preview you want to display:
    • Standard material sphere
    • Cylinder
    • Cube
    • Plane
    • Shopping bag
  • You can also crop your material more if you want.
    • Do not crop too much!
      • You will lose the beautiful details of your material. 
      • It's ok to have some background showing.
      • You can place your model on just the material by editing the UV Map in your 3D program.
• Once your material looks like you want it to, click the blue arrow in the upper right-hand corner of the screen.
• Name the material. 
  • Mine is a Botswana Agate crystal so I named it Botswana_Agate_001.
    • Some programs don't like spaces, so I use _.
    • This allows me to create more materials from the other sides of the stone and keep things organized in the process.
• Save it to your library for use in other Adobe programs. 
  • I love making materials! So, I have a library for each type of material to keep things organized. 
    • For example, my Botswana_Agate_001 will go into my Crystals_Gemstones_Rocks library.

Congratulations you have just created your own material using your phone or tablet!

Would you be interested in learning more about UV Mapping in Maya? Answer form.

Adobe Capture: Other Asset Uses

• Adobe recommends other assets based on your image. 
  • These can be useful in other programs.
    • Adobe Illustrator uses SVG graphics.
    • Photoshop: the shape resembles a displacement map I once made. It uses patterns, gradients, and color swatches too.
    • Many programs use gradients, color themes, and patterns.
• This is just a great phone app for any Realism artist. Or anyone who gains inspiration from the world around them.

Export Material

• The three dots on the material card offers many options which are useful. Here you can:
  • Edit
  • Rename
  • Duplicate
  • Move to
  • Delete
  • Share
  • Export As
  • Save to Device

• We want to "Export As"

  • Then click "Material"
  • Then choose your cloud service
    • Mine is OneDrive
  • Choose where you want to put your zip folder on your PC or Laptop

Note: The Creative Cloud is not sufficient for this purpose.

• Creative Cloud (PC or Web) will only let you move the material to a different library or delete it.
• "Save to Device" only saves the thumb nail image.
• You must export the material, as material, to a cloud storage service that you can access from your PC.
  • I use OneDrive because it does a fantastic job of synchronizing fast.
  • I was able to export directly to my desktop.

On Your PC or Laptop

• Go to the folder you exported to or
• Download the zip file from your cloud service
  • Mine is on my desktop:
• Right click

Extract All

Browse

Choose your 3D program's "Project" folder location.

Choose the Project you want to use the material in.

Choose the folder your program uses for source images, materials, or textures.

Your materials are in your project now!

You can use these maps on any model in any scene in this project now.

When you open your 3D program and create a new scene make sure you set your project to the one that has your new materials in it first.

Notice:

Update 01/26/2025: This post serves as a good starting point for creating your own materials. However, this process won't create the best materials possible. I have learned much since the original post and will be making future posts with more detailed information on how to make better materials.

Future You Will be Happy if You

• Use good project management and naming conventions.
  • Always follow the file management system used by your 3D program.
    • Save assets, files, and images in the proper project folders.
    • This will prevent your project from breaking when you send it to others. 
      • No one else has access to a picture on your desktop.
• To save time when rendering:
  • Set up your projects on a separate hard drive or flash drive.
    • This frees up your C: drive for running all the programs you use and is less taxing on it.
    • A drive that synchronizes to the cloud will tie up resources slowing down your render time.
  • If you don't have a separate drive to use, pause your sync service until you are done rendering.
    • This will prevent temporary files from synchronizing unnecessarily. Which almost doubles your render speed.

Would you like to learn more? Would you like to request a tutorial? Answer form.