Midnight_Stories is our artist of the month for April 2021. This artist has been a member of Renderosity since 2006. He has over 350 followers. No wonder, since his gallery is quite larger and filled with striking, original scenes. We love his depictions of characters from Frank Herbert's novel DUNE along with other Scifi themes.

Midnight_Stories wrote quite an amusing and fun bio for his artist page. We are including it here, along with a brief interview and video gallery (see above).

Bio:I began my computing life on a commodore vic20 and I started playing with 3d ray tracing programs in 1984 on an Amiga 500. In these days I run on Windows7 64-bit with an i7 and 12 gigs of ram and 1.7 gig 295 GPU video card. My programs of choice for 3D is Poser7 Pro, Carrara 7 Pro, Vue6.5 infinite, Lightwave 8.5, Modo 401, Z-Brush 4, 3D Coat3.5 . For the 2D stuff CS2, Painter 10, Particle illusions, Apophysis206_3Dhack . So as you can see I have a huge arsenal of programs to get the job done. One thing I do believe in is being able to model and customise your own stuff, and creating your own textures, if you can't then you are at the mercy of other peoples thoughts. I never stand on the one spot for long I âm constantly developing different technique and styles from 2D to 3D I want to learn it all, and my best advice to people is knowledge is you best weapon, in being a better artist. If you have to pay for good tutorials do it, live on the forums this is the best free source you can get, and never give up. Where did the name Midnight_stories come from? Well I grew up reading comics like eerie and creepy I love the darker things, and evil fascinates me. I wanted to produce comic like those, ones that made you think. So I named myself Midnight_stories.

Interview with Midnight_Stories

Renderosity: Your bio goes into detail about how you got involved with Poser and became a digital artist, is there anything you'd like to add to that? How has your skill in using Poser grown over the years?

Midnight_Stories: Digital comics really got me started in poser, and a set of material called Olivers toon shader did a great job of cel shaders. I found I needed to make stuff for the comic more and more, so I learned how to model and rig for that

You seem to have a particular interest in science fiction and prehistoric men/creatures; where did this interest come from?

I've been a sci-fi buff for years. Star Wars and the Alien series were a factor plus some of the old horror comics like creepy eerie and Tales from the Crypt, filled my head.

What is the typical workflow on a project from inspiration to finished model/scene?

Usually, I do a lot of research first and gather a lot of image reference, then it's straight into ZBrush for the modeling, I use dynamesh for my base mesh creation then Zremesher for the topology, and UVmaster for the UVs then the detail sculpting begins then export the normal maps and base mesh, so you can see ZBrush is heavily used and material I use substance painter. I do all rigging in DAZ Studio then I can export to poser after that and finish the rigging and mats there. So that would be my standard workflow

How has Renderosity made a difference in your life as an artist?

Renderosity gallery has something no other gallery has, and that's a soul, people always welcome you and leave positive comments, no matter how good or bad you are, It's like the Facebook of galleries without the ads. So this place is a great place for artists to get started!

Anything you'd like to add before we close?

Never stay in the same place, always strive to do better, try things you're not comfortable with, and it will help you to grow. Stick to your own ideas and don't let other people direct you where to go, and just be yourself!

Visit Midnight_Stories Gallery