Artist: Ryan Zak

Gallery name: May/June 2009
Ryan Zak’s induction into digital content creation is as unique as his art. “I actually worked as a financial analyst, internal auditing and investigations, for several years, when a friend asked me to help do some animation for a big movie I can’t speak of.” He had considered VFX when he was in his late teens, when he and some friends toyed with making video games. Zak taught classical art (oils, acrylics, watercolor, etc.), but ended up studying finance due to parental guidance toward economic stability. “But when I saw the CG art I'd been a part of on screen for others’ entertainment, I was bitten by the CG bug again and committed myself to the art more seriously. For me to see an idea from my mind or to help someone else realize a vision through my work is intoxicating,” he says. Having also served as a personal trainer and as a nutritionist, Zak has a different appreciation of anatomy, and his love for nature reinforces what he does in 3D when dealing with organics in modeling or animation. He considers himself and his art to be works in progress. “I am very excited to evolve to a point that I can express clearly and unfettered,” he continues. Zak is a professional CG modeler and animator who has worked for Discovery Channel, MTV, and various schools and museums. Most recently, Zak has built his own business in which he supports other VFX studios in helping expedite their work pipelines through the purchase of custom modeling or prebuilt models from the company’s online library. Zak regularly uses such software tools as Autodesk’s Maya and 3ds max, NewTek’s Lightwave, Pixologic’s Zbrush, mudbox, and Adobe’s Photoshop, among other Adobe products and basic compositing packages. “For hardware, I keep it simple and can be found either hiding behind my AMD dual-core laptop or AMD dual-core desktop.” For more of Ryan Zak’s work, visit www.cgsupermodels.com.


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