3D Rigging Reel
DOWNLOAD SHOT SHEET HERE.
And check out my Project Breakdowns:
Illustration Work
3D Rigger Resume
About
Dara Insixiengmay (they/them pronouns) is a professional 3D artist and rigger based in Los Angeles, originally from a small town in West Virginia. They have worked in VR game development, film/TV, advertising, and more - working with Tender Claws, Barnstormer Media, and the National Park Service. They graduated with a B.F.A in animation from the Savannah College of Art and Design in 2021.They have an incredible passion for experimenting with 2D and 3D mediums, blurring the boundaries between the two. Their goal as a rigger and artist is to push stylistic aesthetics beyond the boundaries of 3D through the deformations and setups they build and through passion film projects.Aside from making art and talking about themselves in the third-person, they find enjoyment from playing video games, listening to tons and tons of music, and hiking in the mountains of their hometown. They take influence from their everyday occurrences, absurdist fiction, and surrealist concepts.I'm open for full-time, part-time, and contract opportunities in 3D artist (generalist) or 3D rigger roles in game development, animation, or adjacent industries! Please reach out to me at darainsixiengmay @ gmail.com :)
Website Pages
Film Links
Interviews & Panels
UPCOMING: Asians in Anim: Spotlight on Animated Short Film Festivals on February 23rd, 2024.
Sid Reddy, "Conversations with Dara Insixiengmay" Posted September 9, 2024.
Vekonda Luangaphay, "Dara Insixiengmay," The Lao Project. Posted 2022.
Production Management
Below are the productions I've worked on where I was tasked with production management. Additionally, you can find my production management resume HERE!
Pirate Lesson dir. by Sofia Azpe
Role: Producer, 3D Rigger, Look Development
Released: 2022
Pirate Lesson is my senior thesis film project about a fierce pirate caption who teaches his son how to drive in the midst of a pirate battle. This was my third production in production management as well as my longest project. Due to the 2020 COVID-19 Pandemic, the majority of our production was remote up until the last few months where we switched into a hybrid in-person/remote set-up.
Our production utilized Google Sheets primarily along with the rest of the Google Suite and Flow (formerly Shotgun/Shotgrid).My production management responsibilities included:
Creating a detailed production spreadsheet to keep track of all aspects of the production including a shot list, asset list, naming conventions, crew contact information, and festival applications.
Conducting outreach for outsourcing talent during different stages of the production through means of email, phone, and flyers.
Creating a new file management workflow that involves "mounting" our production drive to your local computer, to ensure a smooth workflow between asset and shot handoffs.
Taking thorough notes during meetings and creating agendas and actionables for the team
Creating documentation for production workflows
Applying and researching festival applications for the film's festival run
LEGS
Role: Producer, 3D Rigger, 3D Generalist
Released: 2020
LEGS is a 3D short film about a caveman artist, frustrated by his lack of inspiration, finding an unexpected muse from the sea that sparks something new within him. Although this project did not have a clear director, I was designated producer of this project and led production management for the crew.LEGS was my first ever 3D production as well as my first role as producer.
Our production utilized Flow (formerly Shotgun/Shotgrid) in additional to Google Sheets to learn production management industry standard software and workflows. We covered deadlines, timelines, assets, shots, and tasks within this software. In addition to creating the production spreadsheets and keeping Flow up-to-date with the latest statuses, I checked in with each team member regularly to ensure we were meeting internal deadlines.
A Dog's Tail dir. by Sofia Azpe & Dara Insixiengmay
Role: Producer, Director, 3D Generalist
Released: TBD, slated for late 2024
A Dog's Tail is a 3D animated micro-short made by myself and Sofia Azpe for Hot 30's micro shorts. Despite an informal and short production cycle AND juggling art tasks of creating the film, I still found it beneficial to organize the film's production to keep us on track for the delivery deadline.For production management, I primarily used Google Sheets to organize animation shots, assets, and naming conventions for file organization. I also created the project file drive (on Google Drive) and its hierarchical folder structure.
Stranger Things VR by Tender Claws
Role: 3D Artist / Animator
Released: February 2024
Stranger Things VR is a virtual reality narrative game by Tender Claws based off of the hit Netflix television franchise, Stranger Things.Despite my 3D artist and animator role, I still kept myself and my work organized with internal deadlines and spreadsheets. The main programs we used for production management included Asana, Trello, Notion, and Google Spreadsheets.Additionally, I created my own personal spreadsheets to keep track of tasks, deadlines, and assets. I also took detailed notes at every production meeting, which was most helpful in having clear objectives and feedback written down as well as keeping track of the team's internal deadlines.
The Rockin' Dead
Role: Producer (Tech Art & Assets), 3D Rigger
Released: May 2020
The Rockin' Dead is a 3D animated bumper short created for SCAD Savannah Film Festival. This film production had a unique situation where no directors were in charge of the project, but four producers, including myself, ran the production.The main program we used for production was Google Sheets and Google Drive. Our organization and management tasks were divided amongst the producer team and each of us were in charge of a department - for me, it was technical art & assets. We kept the crew accountable with internal deadlines, gave daily reports to our supervisor, and took thorough notes at every meeting. Additionally, I was in charge of music composition outreach and coordinated outsourced help for our project.The film was one of the first from SCAD that was created during the 2020 COVID-19 Lockdown and our entire production was remote.
Pirate Lesson
Pirate Lesson is my senior thesis film project, directed by Sofia Azpe, about a fierce pirate caption who teaches his son how to drive in the midst of a pirate battle. Due to the 2020 COVID-19 Pandemic, the majority of our production was remote.
My responsibilities for Pirate Lesson includes:
PRODUCER: Created standard naming conventions for all parts of the pipeline, scheduled crew meetings & dailies, created spreadsheets for production scheduling and tasks for team members, organized Shotgrid (formerly Shotgun) for production management, created documentation, and outreached for additional help
RIGGER & TECHNICAL SUPPORT: Created the facial rig of the main character "Father," body rig of the "Kraken" and its separate tentacle limbs, and props like the Steering Wheel. In addition, I have aided the Technical Director by troubleshooting rigs/tools and optimizing assets.
LOOKDEV: Presented with the problem of making a 2D-painterly style film without relying on third-party renderers, I helped create a solution using the "outershell" method.
LEAD LAYOUT ARTIST: In charge of directing and translating the 2D animatic into 3D previsualization. I organized our layout team and held multiple feedback sessions.
Other additional roles include 2D animatic editing, visual development, textures, animation, and 2D effects.
RIGGING
For Pirate Lesson, my main art role was in rigging alongside the technical director. I was tasked with creating the facial rig for the Father, a body rig for the Kraken and its separate tentacles, and additional prop rigs.
My thesis work was mainly focused on the Father's facial setup. The rig is a joint and blendshape hybrid setup that utilizes a Ribbon setup for the lips and is flexible on all parts of the face (nose, cheeks, lips, eyebrows, etc). Seeing the rig animated to its limits was the most rewarding aspect of the process, so I am very thankful that the animators on the project made my rig look so good!
I also worked on rigs for the Kraken & its Tentacles. They are separate rigs as the models were constructed separately and the tentacles have more of a spotlight in the film than its actual kraken body. The tentacle rig setup is custom and comprises of an FK/IK setup, sine deformers and custom attributes, and the rig is scalable and deformable. The Kraken rig is a simple custom rig that has an FK/IK spine and blendshapes for its expressions. Compared to its tentacles, it is more simple to match its needs as it had less screen time.
LOOK DEVELOPMENT
One of the main hurdles our production faced was achieving a 2D-painterly look that closely resembles Sofia Azpe's visual art direction. We did not have access to any experienced VFX help on the team that could assist with scripting shaders or procedural materials, nor did we want to rely on third-party renderers. Our goal was to create the look from scratch and to have a fundamental understanding of that process.Our solution: Sofia and I utilized the "outershell" method, inspired by Tonko House's The Dam Keeper. The Outershell utilizes a duplicate of a character model scaled up slightly to overlay the base model. This duplicate base has a texture cycle generated by an expression that shifts between multiple images of the character textures with slight altercations. In addition, the texture artists erase brush strokes off of the multiple textures, creating an alpha map. These erased brushstrokes are transparent and overlaid on top of the base character model, creating an imperfect procedural brush texture cycle. We use this method on our main characters, the Son and the Father. There have certainly been better iterations of this same idea, but I'm proud of our first attempt in making our DIY look.The outershell rigs is just one aspect of our look development, focusing specifically on the character look. Another huge component of our style is the compositing methods, which Sofia Azpe and Brandon Kolaczewski both did experimentations before production started.Sofia also goes into great detail on the outershell + compositing method HERE on her blog!
VISUAL DEVELOPMENT
I also contributed some concept artwork for the film as an experimentation of shape language and exploration of style. Additionally, the clouds here were used as background assets in 3D space and compositing.
3D Animation
Here's a short reel showing off some of the 3D animation work I did during Pirate Lesson. Since animation wasn't my main role on the film, most of my work here is filling in gaps for background characters or doing simple actions. Despite that, it's still really cool I had enough work to showcase for a reel!
POSTERS
Created by the team with Sofia Azpe's direction.
Motion Graphics - Credits
While working on the film, I was simultaneously taking a Motion Media I course towards the end of production. During that course, one of my assignments was to work on a typography video with After Effects. I used that assignment as an excuse to put together the End Credits for my senior thesis.
Above is my process book that shows off references I'm pulling from, exploration of assets, and storyboards. I wanted the end credits to feel like feature animation credits (like Dreamworks, Disney) and achieved that by concepting a linear story, creating hand-drawn assets, and utilized movement in each slate of the credits.While I did the majority of the compositing and asset creation work, these credits could not have been done without the help of Sofia Azpe, PoHsuan Lin, and Madelin Ahren. Please check out the final results of the credits at the end of the film!
Production Management
Pirate Lesson was my third project in production management as well as my longest project. Due to the 2020 COVID-19 Pandemic, the majority of our production was remote up until the last few months where we switched into a hybrid in-person/remote set-up.Our production utilized Google Sheets primarily along with the rest of the Google Suite and Flow (formerly Shotgun/Shotgrid). Click on the images below to get a glimpse of our production spreadsheet!
My production management responsibilities included:
Creating a detailed production spreadsheet to keep track of all aspects of the production including a shot list, asset list, naming conventions, crew contact information, and festival applications.
Conducting outreach for outsourcing talent during different stages of the production through means of email, phone, and flyers.
Creating a new file management workflow that involves "mounting" our production drive to your local computer, to ensure a smooth workflow between asset and shot handoffs.
Taking thorough notes during meetings and creating agendas and actionables for the team
Creating documentation for production workflows
Applying and researching festival applications for the film's festival run
Stranger Things VR
Stranger Things VR is a virtual reality narrative game by Tender Claws based off of the hit Netflix television franchise, Stranger Things. This was my first shipped game project that I've worked on nearly since the beginning of production, working with a team of 15-30 artists, engineers, QA, and more.
On Stranger Things VR, my responsibilities as a 3D artist and animator includes:
Created custom game-ready creature models & player rigs for combat gameplay
Modeled and set-dressed full environments of the game
Modeled multiple prop assets to be used repeatedly throughout the game
Modified multiple prop assets into crushable forms for gameplay
Optimization of models, rigs, and animation for performant gameplay on VR and mixed reality platforms
Animated multiple creatures, characters, & player hands for combat gameplay and narrative sequences
Familiarity of motion capture, facial capture, and clean-up pipeline- applied to numerous characters and sequences in the game
Stitched narrative sequences within timeline editor of Unity Engine
DEMODOG
[insert model stills]
I was responsible for the model, rig, and all animations.
[insert model turnaround]
[insert lod models]
[insert rigging demo]
DEMOBAT
[insert model stills]
I was responsible for the Demobat's model, rig, texture/surfacing, animations, and support for enemy combat systems & compute swarm shaders. This includes making optimizations to the model & rig during production, creating LOD models, and creating custom animations for cutscenes, combat, and swarm tech.
[insert lod models]
Compute Demobat Swarm (WIP) using my Demobat rig & flying animation by Julian Kantor
Compute Demobat Swarm (WIP) using my Demobat rig & a mix of animations by Julian Kantor
ANIMATION
Most of my animation work was enemy creature gameplay and cinematic narrative cutscenes.
[insert stvr animation reel of presentable things]
Hands
[insert hand stills]
I was responsible for the model, texture & surfacing, rig, and all animations.
Environments
I was responsible for some of the environments in Stranger Things VR. I modeled and textured the environments and its assets with Maya & Clip Studio Paint, then set-dressed the space in Unity Engine.
Rainbow Room as seen in Chapter 4.
Hopper's Cabin as seen in Chapter 7.
Castle Byers, used in multiple chapters of the game.
ART ASSETS
In terms of art assets, I was responsible for making characters, props, set-dressing, and more as needed. This involved modeling, texturing, surfacing, rigging, and sometimes animation. All models shown here are my own.
A Dog's Tail (2024)
A Dog's Tail (2024) is a short 3D animated film, co-created by Sofia Azpe and Dara Insixiengmay. Originally created for Hot 30 Microshorts, it is about a dog who loses its tail in a series of art paintings.
CREDITS:
Co-Creators: Sofia Azpe & Dara Insixiengmay
Sound Designer & Composer: Brett "Frenchy" Francois
Additional 2D FX Animation: Aly O'Neal
On A Dog's Tail, my responsibilities included:
Created & brainstormed concept & story alongside co-creator
Production Management: tracked assets & shots, created naming conventions, file hierarchy structure, delegated tasks weekly
Modeled all 3D prop assets and some texturing/surfacing
Modeled the Dog character, rigged it to be flexible in biped/quadraped form
Animated a few shots
Lighting
Compositing
Dog Model
The above video is a turnaround of the Dog model with his different textures (done by Sofia Azpe) and his props. All models in this video were done by myself and the animation here is done by Sofia Azpe.The dog's model comprises of detachable arms, legs, tail and two separate heads for an open and closed mouth expression. This was meant to support a 2D-leaning style of animation.The dog character was designed by Sofia Azpe and I used her turnarounds (below) as a base for my work here.
Dog Rig
The Dog character was the only asset that required rigging. Since the short was required to be less than a minute long, I sought to create a custom rig that was both flexible but fast to make for our quick turnaround.The Dog rig features detachable FK/IK limbs, a tail that has a Ribbon/FK setup + sine deformers, the ability to change between different heads (open & closed mouth expression) and props, flexibility to work as a biped and quad rig, and on top of all that- it is scaleable.
lighting
Sofia and I both handled lighting in A Dog's Tail. The below photos show a breakdown of pre-rendered animation to lighting to the final composite.
We rendered the film with Maya playblasts so our lighting was based around Maya's viewport. I focused on color gradients and strong rim lighting in the shots I lit.
compositing
Sofia and I also shared the compositing workload. She worked out the compositing style of our film and I followed under her art direction. We used Adobe After Effects for our compositing process. In particular, we utilized layer styles for fake rim lights, displacement maps, and cycling brush overlays. Below is a compositing breakdown video of the shots I worked on.
Production Management
For production management, I primarily used Google Sheets to organize animation shots, assets, and naming conventions for file organization, which was really useful as a quick overview on the status of each task.I also created the project file drive (on Google Drive) and its hierarchical folder structure. Using a mounted system with Google Drive allowed Sofia and I to share the exact same file hierarchies, which was crucial to sharing and loading up Maya files without broken references. It sped up our workflow and thus, we did not spend any time troubleshoot where to find files or fixing references in Maya.
