almost Beta
Rodolfo Silva cover
Rodolfo Silva

Environment Artist | Technical Artist & ZBrush Expert @Maxon

Portugal

Intermediate

Prop Sculpting - Organic
Prop Sculpting - Hard Surface
Software Training

'Technical Artist/ ZBrush Expert' @ Maxon | '3D Environment technical artist' & 'Game Art' instructor w/ Fine Art experience.

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Biography

- ZBrush Solutions Expert/ Technical Artist at Maxon
- 3D Environment Technical Artist (UE5) for Games and Animation;
- THU Advisory board (Community spokesperson and Curator)
- https://allmylinks.com/rodolfo-silva-artist

I'm a ZBrush expert/Technical Artist at Maxon, streaming Game Art production workflows on ZBrushLive & a mid level Environment Tech Artist in Games (Unreal Engine 5) to bring new and incredible storytelling experiences to the world.

Videogames are my biggest passion ever since I was a kid. I've played games my whole life since my dad was a software engineer and a game collector and connoseur and stimulated my appreciation for the technology and art of videogames from a ver early age.
It was later in my teenage days, after playing the Original Fable, Halo 2 and Doom 3 that I really started to obssess with how games were made. I was stunned with the creative possibilities of the medium and spent hundreds of hours just staring at textures at an angle( if you know what I mean :D)
When I finally got my hands on Maya I never let go of 3D for games as my biggest passion.

As the ZBrush Expert in Europe, I lead Training (Studio support), technical development (Develop new features in ZBrush) and community outreach. But I'm also a key part of Development of any Game Art related tools and features across all of Maxon due to my experience wiht Game engines and pipelines.

Besides videogames, I'm very much into fine art (worked as a classical fine artist for 7 years too), board games and collectibles.

I also adore reading books ranging from classical literature (big Tolkien fan) to comic books and novels, traditional sculpting, oil painting and photography. Even though I was already working with Unreal since UE3 /UDK, I Graduated from an MA in 'Game Art' at Escape Studios in 2022/23 where I further developed my technical "know-how" and sharpened my portfolio into more technical art roles and environment art for games. I also won the "Best overall performance" prize and a "Distinction" grade for my final project at Escape Studios. I'm currently running a few workshops and was a guest lecturer at Escape Studios for Game Art (ZBrush, Substance and Unreal) I usually post my 3D work with detailed breakdowns and my tutorials on artstation, Instagram and on ZBrush's socials, so be sure to check those out. :)

 

Skills

Roles

  • Mastery
  • Mastery
  • Mastery
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Intermediate
  • Intermediate
  • Intermediate
  • Intermediate

Technical Skills

  • Mastery
  • Mastery
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Intermediate
  • Intermediate
  • Intermediate
  • Intermediate
  • Intermediate
  • Intermediate
  • Intermediate

Software

  • Mastery
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Intermediate
  • Intermediate
  • Basic
  • Basic
  • Basic

Soft Skills

  • Mastery
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Intermediate
  • Intermediate
  • Basic
  • Basic

Languages

  • Fluent/Native
  • Fluent/Native
  • Conversational
  • Basic
  • Basic

Other Skills

  • Mastery
  • Mastery
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Advanced
  • Intermediate
  • Intermediate
  • Intermediate

Work Experience

2026 – Present day

Lecturer (Freelance)

SAE Institute (Remote)

Delivering a production focused ZBrush workshop covering environment art, game-ready asset creation, Hard surface and modern real-time workflows. Topics include: high-to-low poly workflows, retopology, UV workflows, trim sheets, tileable materials, Substance 3D Painter integration, Unreal Engine pipelines and production optimization.

2026 – Present day

Intermediate - ZBrush Solutions Expert - Technical Artist (Full Time)

Maxon (Frankfurt, Germany)

As a ZBrush Solutions Expert / Technical Artist at Maxon, I collaborate with professional game studios and cross-functional Product, Engineering and QA teams to improve digital sculpting workflows by translating real-world production challenges into artist-focused features, production-ready tools and workflow improvements.

2024 – 2026

Intermediate - ZBrush Expert / Trainer (Full Time)

Maxon (Frankfurt, Germany)

- Main representative of ZBrush in Europe. - Training AAA Studios and helping them improve and optimize their pipelines (ZBrush or otherwise). - Part of the development team (ZBrush, Cineware -UE5) pitching ideas for new features and colaborating directly with Engineering and Product Development for new upcoming features for Zbrush, Game art oriented features for C4D and Cineware (Unreal 5)

2024 – 2025

Senior - Game Art Instructor (Freelance)

Escape Studios (London, UK (Remote))

Invited to deliver the ZBrush module for the MA in Game Art, teaching production-ready workflows used in modern game development with a focus on digital sculpting, optimization, and real-time asset creation.

2023 – 2024

Official ZBrushLive Streamer

Maxon (Remote)
Streaming Environment Art workflows for real time asset creation using ZBrush Regular stream: "Building worlds" Presentations and events: "Demistifying post- production - Halloween" "Wacom North"

2023 – 2023

Intermediate - 3D Environment Technical Artist (Freelance)

Driver Studios/ EDH animation (Remote)

Creating stylized environment assets, procedural terrain and overall Unreal Engine technical specialist. Mentoring Junior 3D Artists in production workflows, pipeline integration & was in charge of Optimization of Environment art.
Worked closely with the Lead Technical Artist to create and instruct the team on Optimization enhancing workflows for Unreal Engine 5 and source control management/implementation (Perforce).

2020 – 2022

3D Art instructor

LSD- Lisbon School of Design (Portugal)
Teaching Maya, Zbrush, Keyshot, Substance and Unreal pipelines for Animation and Games (Prop and Enviromnent creation)

2018 – 2021

3D art Instructor

ITA- Institute of advanced technologies (Portugal)
Teaching 10-12th grade (15 years and older) the tech basics of 3D art for games (Box modeling, Sculpting, UV mapping, texturing in Substance, presentation in Marmoset and Unreal Engine fundamentals.

2018 – 2021

Drawing instructor

Colégio Luso-Francês (Portugal)
Teaching children the fundamentals of figure drawing and anatomy

2018 – 2019

3D designer

Ferespe (Portugal)
Did numerous pieces for a company in the railway and construction industry using CAD software (Rhino, Creo PTC and Maya). Worked side by side with the casting and 3D printing team for mass production.

2012 – 2012

Junior - 3D Artist (Freelance)

Bigmoon Entertainment (now Saber Porto) (Portugal)

Level Art (set dressing)

Mesh clean up (retopo, LODing, mipmapping manually in Maya, Photoshop and UE3/UE4),

Optimization work for the WRC franchise back in it's 3rd installment( WRC3 and it's port for iPad "WRC: The Game").

Education

2022 – 2023

MA - Masters in Game Art

Escape Studios

Game Art

Studied Environment art and VFX for Videogames at Escape studios to enhance my technical / artistic skills and portfolio .

2014 – 2022

Continuous Drawing workshop (life drawing and anatomy)

Porto Atelier

Traditional Drawing

Been drawing from life since 2014. had no experience whatsoever prior to that. practicing Anatomy, perspective, form drawing and old masters techniques of art making.

2021 – 2021

Substance for environment art

CGMA

Texturing and baking

Took and intensive course in Substance for Environment art focusing on node based, non destructive workflows for texture creation

2021 – 2021

Zbrush for concept and iteration

CGMA

3D modeling & texturing for concept and production.

Took an individual online course with Michael Pavlovich on concepting techniques for hard surface and character design/ creation using Zbrush.

2021 – 2021

Advanced Digital Sculpting

Gnomon School of VFX

3D Digital Sculpting

Did an individual online course with Paul Gaboury on Advanced Zbrush techniques for hard surface and character concepting

2018 – 2018

Figure Drawing (the XIXth century approach)

Florence Academy of Art

Traditional Drawing

Intensive classical drawing from life courses on charcoal. Won the 3rd and 2nd place at the Florence Academy of Art international competition and they offered me free on site courses in exchange.

2013 – 2017

BA in Sound and Imagery

Universidade Católica Portuguesa

Digital Art; Fine art; Screenwriting

A fairly generalist degree, with a number of extra credits on Screenwriting, traditional drawing and oil painting. That, however fed me with a tremendous appreciation for the old masters.