Interview With Maxence Fleuret

Character Artists

  • So Maxence, tell us where you are living these days.

    I'm currently living in Grenoble, France and i will be moving next month for Los Angeles, CA

  • Are you currently working for a company or doing freelance work? Tell us about the work you have been doing recently.

    Currently i'm freelancing for ARH Studio and private commission digital sculpture in order to be printed, based mostly on historical figure and superheroes, and in october i will start as a character artist at Insomniac Games.

  • You are clearly a master at the work you do! Our readers will want to know how you becomes as good as you are. Have you and any formal training? Or go to school to become the artists you are today?

    I went to school at ARIES ESI in france during three years which was a generalist 3d formation (modeling/texturing/compositing/animation etc..) And then i wanted to specialize myself into character modeling, and so i continued to refine my knowledge on the human anatomy and to understand as much as possible how the masters are working in several forms of art like Vfx, makeup artists, traditional sculptors, comic book artist, concept art, video games, movies ... 

  • Can you tell us about some of your past professional work. Are there any particular projects you are proud of and would like to talk about?

    Right after school I worked for a video game company in france (elb games) as a junior character artist during two years  on a couple wii/ps2/xbox360 and ps3 games learning video game limitation and team work. After that I moved to belgium for a couple of month at AMA studio, an other video game company. And finally I wanted to discover the canada and rapid prototyping so I moved to montreal during six month freelancing for Arh Studio and building up my portfolio, in the same time I tried to find a full time job in a company as, for me teamwork is really important for a couple a things: mostly learning and sharing ideas/techniques/opinion/tips etc.. and of course, the social aspect of it. And so, I'm really glad to be a part of the Insomniac Games team, a completely new life for me, I just can't wait to start ! and so I guess my biggest pride is to be able to work for such a wonderful company full of artists that I respect.

  • How about the exciting personal work you have done. Is there a piece you specifically fond of?

    I don't know, every time that i start something new i like it more than the previous but certainly less than the next one ^^ and that's pretty great to see that every time you grow a bit, so keep keep keep practicing.

  • What tools do you use in your work?

    I started to work with 3dsmax and photoshop during my first year at Aries and a year later I discovered ZBrush 2.0 and boom, something changed, I knew I wanted to work mostly with that tool and characters creation. And so, nowadays ZBrush, Maya and Photoshop are my main tools.

  • You are clearly a professional with lot's of industry experience. But I bet you can remember a day when you were just getting started. Do you have any tips or insight you can share with our readers who are interested in a career in CG/VFX?

    Always have a goal ! and never give up if you feel down. Do everything to get what you want, and be interested in a lot of different form of art, study a lot, gather as much references as you can, try to post on the internet in order to get replies/critics and publications (even if your are not a really forum person), at least post your art on sites such as cghub, and if you can win some awards etc.. it really can help you in your job hunting and visa application process ! Be patient, dedicated and of course, have fun and do what you like. Everything is possible with hard work and time, no pain, no gain!