The Top 22 Gnomon Workshops of 2022

Last year, we saw another 12 months of fantastic learnings, insights, and tips from the incredibly talented artists at The Gnomon Workshop.

Below, we cover the top 22 most popular workshops from The Gnomon Workshop that students enjoyed throughout 2022, featuring everything from modeling to rigging, facial animation, coding, and a selection of powerful real-time workflow tutorials for Unreal Engine.

If you want to start your learning journey with Gnomon, you can start your free trial today and dive into thousands of hours of content from the world’s best and most experienced creatives.

#1

Introduction to ZBrush 2021 – The Ultimate Guide to ZBrush With Madeleine Scott-Spencer

Madeleine’s comprehensive introduction to Pixologic’s digital sculpting tool topped our list of workshops in 2020 and 2021 – and she’s done it again! Congrats, Maddie! The Gnomon Workshop artists keep flocking to Madeleine because she’s a total legend, of course, but also because she knows the ins and outs of ZBrush like no other. Right at the end of the year, Madeleine also released her Intro to ZBrush 2022, so be sure to check that out if you’re just getting started in the world of digital sculpting.

#2
Real-Time Filmmaking in Unreal Engine 5 – THE EYE: CALANTHEK The Making of the Award-Winning Short Film With Aaron Sims

THE EYE CLANTHEK is a sci-fi action thriller created entirely inside Unreal Engine 5 in six weeks by a small team of artists. In this workshop, director Aaron Sims explores the full spectrum of the short's UE5 workflow, from story development to world-building, mocap, editing, Lumen lighting, and real-time production techniques. With real-time promising to open up new possibilities in narrative, this workshop is a must for all hopeful effects-led filmmakers.

#3
Introduction to Maya 2020 – Interface and Workflow with Eric Keller

Eric’s popular Maya overview appears on our top workshops list for the third year running. This isn’t surprising, given how thoroughly Eric put Maya 2020 through its paces over 16 hours of insight into modeling, rigging, animation, shading, lighting, rendering, and more. Eric recently refreshed these tutorials with his Maya 2023 series, which launched just at the end of 2022. A couple of the volumes managed to sneak onto the end of this list, so learn more by scrolling down!

#4
Master Rigging & Python Scripting in Maya – Create Helper Scripts & a Python Limb Rig With Nick Miller

Creative studios working today constantly seek out ways to increase efficiency and optimize production. DNEG’s Nick Miller reveals how you can help contribute to that process via Python-powered rigging automation. So if you’re looking to boost your CV and stand out from the competition, this workshop and the knowledge it imparts will be invaluable in helping you reach the next stage in your career.

#5
Creating a Medieval Castle in Unreal Engine 5Maya, ZBrush, Substance Painter & UE5 Workflow With Phil Stoltz

Unreal Engine can completely alter how you think about environment design, as environment artist Phil Stoltz reveals in this tutorial. Phil takes a medieval castle as an example and shows how you can streamline the process of conjuring up photorealistic, explorable environments in Unreal. You'll receive Phil's Maya and ZBrush files and his Unreal Engine scene file, meaning it's easy to follow along, intuitively understand the process, and then apply it to your next environment build!

#6
Creating Procedural Environments in Houdini with Wojtek Piwowarczyk

Another environment tutorial and (slightly more ancient!) castle from another highly experienced environment artist! Here, Wojtek Piwowarczyk reveals how artists can wield Houdini to generate environments procedurally via a non-destructive workflow, which allows for a much more free-form and exploratory environment creation process. This is a crucial workshop for artists looking to expand their understanding of procedural generation in Houdini.

#7
Character Rigging in Maya for Game Production – Build a Production-Ready Character Rig With Taylor Whitsett

Great riggers aren’t just technically proficient but also team players who understand pipelines and workflow. With that in mind, Taylor Whitsett covers basic Maya rigging principles that can be used and combined to create complex character rigs that animators will enjoy working with rather than throwing them back for endless tweaks and changes! As such, this is an excellent workshop for those heading out on the long (but enriching!) journey to becoming a professional rigger.

#8
Creating Stylized Facial Rigs for Production in Maya – Master Convincing Character Expressions With Hector Abraham Torres

It’s easy to watch an animated film and enjoy the animations at face value (pun intended), but those in the know realize there is a world of work involved in every single frame of a character’s expressive performance. Hector’s extensive tutorial reveals how to build the rigs that underpin those emotive performances and empower animators to create memorable, entertaining, and relatable characters – without audiences noticing the mechanisms at play!

#9
Unreal Engine Complete Material System Overview – Fundamental and Advanced Techniques with Charleston Silverman

The preponderance of Unreal Engine workshops on this list reveals just how important the software has become to the creative industry. In this workshop, Charleston provides a complete overview of the software’s material system, covering various topics such as texture setup, shaders, and much more. Also, be sure to check out Charleston’s workshop on Unreal Engine 5 lighting fundamentals. (Which appears a couple of entries down!)

#10
Creating Creature Hair & Fur Grooms in Houdini – Advanced Grooming Techniques with Kristin Farrensteiner

One for all the ailurophiles out there… and those passionate about advanced hair and fur grooms in Houdini! As a grooming artist at ILM, Kristin is a real pro in this regard, and her expertise shows in every one of the 19 chapters on offer here. Kirstin goes from creating a mesh from scratch right through to setting up grooms in Houdini’s rendering engine, Mantra. So, make your way through this workshop, and Kristin will equip you with a powerful workflow applicable to almost any grooming project.

#11
Unreal Engine 5 Lighting Fundamentals: A Complete Walkthrough of the UE5 Lighting System With Charleston Silverman

A deep dive into lighting in Unreal Engine, from static lighting to fully dynamic techniques using Lumen. A great accompaniment to Charleston's materials system overview — listed above!

#12
Introduction to Creating Facial Blendshapes in Maya – A Complete Guide to FACS Blendshapes Using Maya & ZBrush With Derrick Sesson

Derrick's workshop will impart everything you know about facial blend shapes and reveal how the technique can help to translate the complexity of the human face, even if you have no prior experience.

#13
Introduction to Substance Painter 2020 – From Zero To Hero With Christophe Desse

Christophe is a true artist in every sense of the word. In this tutorial, he reveals how he uses Substance Painter to turn even the most featureless sculpts into models with life and character.

#14
Creating High-Resolution Custom Trees Using SpeedTree: Produce Hero Assets Using SpeedTree & Houdini With Jean-Michel Bihorel

Jean-Michel has to be one of the most innovative and inventive SpeedTree users out there. Here, he reveals how to use technical tools to create beautiful, natural-looking imagery.

#15
Creating Complex Vegetation & Foliage for Games: Intermediate Workflow for Maya, ZBrush, Substance & Unreal With Peyton Varney

Following Peyton’s Intro to Game-Ready Foliage, this tutorial takes a deeper dive into foliage creation and reveals how to create flora of even more intricate complexity.

#16
Cloth Modeling Pipeline with Marvelous Designer with Paul Liaw

An oldie but a goodie. Paul’s Marvelous Designer tutorial continues to prove popular as his workflow remains eminently powerful when it comes to realistically rendering cloth.

#17
Photorealistic Character Look Dev in Maya & Arnold – Lighting, Shading & Rendering a Photorealistic Portrait With Sefki Ibrahim

Sefki’s photorealistic CG portraits of people, both real and imagined, continue to grow more impressive by the day. In this workshop, he reveals how he achieves such stunningly believable detail.

#18
Introduction to Pyro FX in Houdini: Volume 1 – Smoke & Fire Simulations With Alasgar Hasanov

An explosive tutorial from SPIN FX Senior FX Artist, Alasgar. Over 6 hours, Alasgar breaks down the Pyro Solver and reveals how to create a variety of FX sims, including dry ice and large-scale smoke simulations.

#19
Introduction to Maya 2023: Volume 2 – Building & Animating 3D Models in Maya With Eric Keller

Released late in 2022, Keller’s latest series diving into Maya 2023 is an absolute must-watch for anyone hoping to get to grips with the latest in Autodesk’s toolset.

#20
Introduction to Maya 2023: Volume 1 – Beginner’s Guide to Getting Started in Maya With Eric Keller

The place for all new Maya artists to start their creative journey. Be sure to check out Vol 2 (listed above) and Vol 3 to get a head start in Maya and everything it offers.

#21
Creature Rigging for Production with Perry Leijten

A comprehensive, eight-hour overview that covers the technical aspects of rigging and the communication and pipeline considerations that are also required for a workable rig.

#22
Cinematic Production Techniques Using the Unreal Engine Sequencer: Create Production-Ready Cinematics in Unreal, Maya & Premiere With Bill Buckley

And we sign off with yet another Unreal Engine tutorial! Harness the power of UE to create cinematics that will blow viewers away, via a flexible real-time approach to production.

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