Daily Inspiration: Meet Russell Griffith-Marlin

Today we’d like to introduce you to Russell Griffith-Marlin.

Hi Russell, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
I am Russell Griffith-Marlin and this is my tale of how I became the artist I am today.

When I was growing up in the 90’s we really didn’t have a lot. Ordering some pizza and a Movie from Blockbuster was the special Friday night growing up for me. My mom supported me, my sister, and my brother the best she could while trying to become a teacher to make a career for herself. But she still found time to get us art books, take us to museums, and always made sure we could learn about anything we wanted. For me, that was wanting to be an artist for cartoons in animation. I never got to learn animation, but we did get me tons of books for drawing and taking every art class at school that I could. My mom has been the biggest inspiration in my life. She would always say everything around me is art and there is beauty to be found in everything!

A lot in my life changed for me during middle school and I know you’re thinking well it did for everyone else too! It was and I had a solid group of friends that I still talk to and hang out with today. Well, I picked up skateboarding and was fairly good at it but after a few short years of it, I injured myself really badly in middle school. I broke my back and damaged my left hip. Everything was falling apart for me… my left leg was losing feeling and it was becoming impossible to move like I could before. My mom was used to me being injured from all the sports I played or being a wild kid playing outside but this time, it was different.

We went to see the doctor about it and after MRI’s and x-rays, we found out I had near shattered my left hip and damaged some of my lower back. Without surgery in the next month, I would lose my left leg because of the nerve damage that had come from the skateboarding fall. We found a doctor who would do the surgery because that was also a thing; being in middle school meant I was still growing, which could cause complications down the road for me, but we found an old doctor who was confident in helping me to walk again. After the surgery, I had to learn to walk all over again over the next weeks and was bedridden for months missing most of my 7th-grade year. My doctor did have me walking again but under the condition, I could no longer participate or perform any kind of physical activity like sports or working out.

I went from being extremely active to putting more attention and time into drawing while dealing with that mentally. It was depressing for a long time, basically all of high school, and nothing ever felt right but over time it all balanced out and I found myself absorbed by movies, video games, cartoons, going to concerts, making music, and making art all day.

Punk rock became an artistic freedom for me as a young lad trying to find myself through high school. I could no longer play sports or do any kind of physical activity other than ride my bike or run a few miles. I still would skateboard but no tricks just riding for the sake of skating. But slowly, I found myself more involved in making music and learning to play bass as my friends wanted to start up a band. So that became my new activity, and we made the best of it we could! Surviving high school and playing shows was a huge step forward in my journey to becoming an artist. I was taking advanced art classes and making music but as my time at high school was nearing an end, we were posed with the endless pressure of going to college and figuring out what we were going to do after high school. Scared of the costs of art colleges and not knowing at all what I wanted to do besides make music and go to shows… one of my friend’s older brothers told me the wonders of being a chef and I went all in for it.

After graduating high school in 2008, I moved from San Antonio to Austin so I could attend Texas Culinary Academy Le Cordon Bleu. As a punk and a young chef, everything seemed to fall right into place. I was free to be myself and not worry about what I looked like, working some desk job or being a normal 9 to 5 worker in retail. Nothing against any of that but none of that was for me. I got right to work after finishing my classes at Texas Culinary Academy in late 2009. I traveled across Texas cooking and training under many amazing chefs! Working at a variety of hotels and restaurants over the span of my eight years as a chef. Having the opportunity to experience life as an artist through the food I made. I’ve worked for restaurants in the Texas hill country or even in the sprawling downtown of Austin. But one day in 2012, only three years into my career, I got a call from a buddy who was working with my dad on a film set in California. My dad had fallen through a roof skylight of a warehouse during a night shoot on set and was being taken to the hospital.

I dropped everything, quit my current job, and went to California to help my father, who was now going in for surgery on his back/injury. While filming, he stepped back, and the part of the roof gave in for him to fall roughly three stories into a warehouse they were shooting the final scenes from the roof of. Thankfully there was randomly a huge stack of empty boxes under where he had fallen through. Falling directly onto the boxes which broke his fall and saved his life from falling right to the ground. He now also needed back surgery and I ended up moving out to California to help him after his surgery. This was my first adventure into a new career.

He taught me about working on set and learning what went into the production side of filming commercials, films, and music videos. I was mostly a PA (Production Assistant) on set but would find myself helping on much bigger sets as an electrician in training. But with that I soon found myself working at a Visual Effects studio in Hollywood and learning the basics of Visual Effects… mind you, my only experience was being a chef so you can imagine how funny that meeting went during my interview with the studio. They went for it and I soon was learning the skills and programs I would need to become the digital artist I am today.

Unfortunately, life had other plans for me after living in LA for a little over two years. I worked at the studio for two years, it is now the beginning of 2015, and I got a call from my grandmother… my mom was hit by a drunk driver head-on and she’s ok but she’s in the hospital and so I went back home to San Antonio to help my mom during her now needed surgery while also helping out to take care of my little brother so she could heal and dealt with everything from the recent accident. All of a sudden back to working in the service industry so I could help with bills and keep my family afloat during this rough time. My mother now needed back surgery, she has also had complications with her spine from the wreck.

We did the best we could and faced many struggles over the following years. Some days we could barely cover rent and other days were battling the depression of not knowing when things would go back to normal for us. I at this point was at a restaurant working every position I knew how to do. Waiting tables most days, cooking Back of House for lunch/Sunday brunch, and bartending after hours to keep making what tips I could to keep money coming in during that time. My mom couldn’t work as she was in severe pain and barely keeping up with doctors’ visits for many years trying to just get into surgery and battle insurance.

When things began to calm down after four years, I started to figure out what I wanted to do with my life. I wanted to be an artist but more than just that. I wanted to work in film and games as an artist. Using my previous skills as a chef and dedication to the craft, I began to seriously learn 3D and digital art in my free time from the previous experiences working at the studio that gave me the opportunity to learn the foundations to these skills.

My father had just finished working on reshoots for an Avengers movie in 2018 and offered to pick me up on his drive back from Atlanta to Los Angeles. I was 28, lost in drinking, overworking, and just mentally exhausted from life. I found the courage to go back to LA with him and began taking the steps to learn about what I needed to do to become the artist my younger self always wanted to be. With the support of my family and friends, I found my way in talks with Gnomon School of Visual Effects, Games, and Animation to attend school for a BFA in Game Art. By 2019 I was taking individual classes at Gnomon, learning the basics of being a 3d artist while working on set as a PA truck driver to keep myself afloat while I built a portfolio to apply for Gnomon. This was also an opportunity to see if this kind of work was even for me! There were no guarantees as I found out that my work needed to be approved to get into Gnomon. So taking a few more single classes to show my interest and using that work to get together a portfolio I was soon wrapping up some freelance work and my first-ever portfolio as an Artist.

So, I made it into Gnomon, but the pandemic lockdowns hit right as my first term started in 2020 for my 3-year journey into becoming a 3D Artist. It was weird but I was prepared to make it work no matter what it took. There was a drive I had never felt before during this time. Suddenly, my passion and hard work during my time as a chef were beginning to pay off in ways I never imagined. Having a foundation in culinary arts and applying my previous experience to my time learning as a 3d artist helped to create a very successful time at Gnomon. In all my training and time learning I found out this was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life and was able to look back to my younger self for the inspiration that had once been lost in the chaos of life to be that cartoon animator I wanted to be growing up. Helping others escape a hard time, inspire future artists, and hopefully inspire others to never let go of their dreams. Growing up I was just a sponge taking in everything I saw but never noticed that every moment in my life held beauty just like my mom always told me.

Being surrounded by so many talented artists and having the opportunity to learn from industry professionals, I found every day to be awe-inspiring. Some of my teachers even worked on stuff that I had grown up playing the game of or watching the movie they worked on. Everyone that I was able to learn alongside and be inspired by has pushed me to focus on my new career in the digital arts. It’s time for me to break out into an industry I once thought could only be a dream to work in. My younger self is so proud that even through all the tough times and being lost some days, I was able to find my way to what I always wanted to do. Inspire future artists the same way I was. Creating films and games to emphasize change in the world or telling stories to inspire others.

I hope to continue down this path as a 3D artist from everything I’ve learned growing up and throughout my life to inspire others as I once was. Now a graduate of Gnomon, I’m currently looking for work in the games industry and loving every moment of it. Like everything else in my life and through the struggles, I tell you my story to hopefully inspire you to never give up. I’m Russell Griffith-Marlin and I hope somewhere in this, I can inspire you to continue chasing your dreams.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
I would love to say it’s been a smooth ride leading up to this point in my life but in the very least, it’s been a fun and wild ride.

Having to face so many challenges through family issues like all of the surgeries and the struggles of finding your way to being the person you hope to be was no easy journey. I found myself countless times wanting to give up after all the pressures of family struggles and how life has a way of presenting things to push you to no end.

Working as a chef and under some of the most intense people. If you have seen the Bear then you have seen a glimpse of what I mean. Fantastic show by the way! It really does a fantastic job of explaining the nightmares I still wake up to in a heat flash of panic, like I just dropped a tray of food on guests. Or the ticket machine… I still wake up from dreams of the orders not stopping. Tickets and orders reaching the floor as me and the team fall farther and farther behind. Having very real and dangerous conversations with chefs that are so unhinged they threaten to strike you with a hot pan.

The overall time I’ve had cooking was amazing but for every great time, there is an even greater awful moment. Regardless of all this, it shaped me to be a professional person that is thoughtful and caring to everyone around me. Everyone deserves to be treated equally and fairly but it requires new minds and others to want the same.

Learning that life isn’t fair. Having my mom’s life destroyed from a drunk driver who walked free because of “Great Insurance” and “Great Lawyers” he managed to walk away from ruining everything my mom worked so hard for. She lost her fully paid for car, can’t work a regular job due to the severity of her injuries’, and could no long afford her home while she was trying to repair it from mold damages but could no longer afford it and is now back to renting after losing her home. With one single person’s decision to drive drunk, another’s was ruined. I helped her through the thick of it to make it to surgery, but nothing will be normal for my mom again, and as she’s the person who pushed to inspire me this is the most devastating thing I deal with mentally every day that I wake up. I hope to create a better life for her now, having the option to work a good job and really support those close to me.

Thanks to my mother and father for giving me what opportunities they could even with how limited money or time was. Because of the support from my close family and best friends, I was able to overcome these hardships and become the artist I wanted to be growing up. I hope to pave my way through my struggles and help other artists achieve their dreams while being able to support and assist my family the best I can.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
Well as a Chef, I specialized in French and Italian cuisine. This provided some unreal opportunities working for the top restaurants in San Antonio, Austin, and Dallas. Learning how to craft delicious baked goods or grilling up your favorites I was able to cook some wonderful dinners for my friends and family to bring everyone together at the dinner table.

As a 3D artist in my recent studies, I trained as a 3D Generalist for Game Development and Art. My focus is in Rigging and Animation Tech. So my focus helps me to build systems that help 3d characters and objects move in 3d space. Essentially I put the bones into the characters that animators use to create the animations you see in games or film!

It really has been the dream achieving an understanding of these skills. Using everything I’ve learned I use my skills to help artists bring their ideas or creations to life!

Something I think that sets me apart from other artists is the time I spent as a chef. I genuinely feel that time in the kitchen taught me how to work in a team space, communicate clearly, and how to handle stressful situations. As someone who cooked, waited tables, and bartended these skills shine through when presented with a project or handling a task in a timely manner. I’m extremely focused and driven to do my very best as every project presents new challenges and opportunities to learn while developing my current skills as an artist.

Can you tell us more about what you were like growing up?
Growing up, I was a hand full. My mom and grandma had to leave bells on the doors cause I would just go outside to skateboard, to play, or make plans with friends in the neighborhood and just run out to go play as soon as I got home from school. One thing that got me to sit still was cartoons. Watching cartoons was my jam. I loved all of the classics and modern stuff! I grew up on the Flintstones, Tom and Jerry, and Birdman. But thanks to my little brother, I was able to keep up to date with shows like Adventure Time or Regular Show.

I was lucky to play sports and participate in things like Basketball, football, and hockey but after I broke my back skateboarding, that all went away quickly. Soon after surgery and going back to school, I was focused more in drawing and making music. Learning to play the bass or spending some free time playing Halo on Xbox with my friends.

At school, I kept to myself, one of the quiet students, and mostly drew all of the class period. Any trouble I got into was from drawing on tests or getting grief over the dress code. Otherwise, I spent my time making songs and learning stuff like cameras, painting, tabletop gaming, and so on. Most of the usual nerdy stuff while making it a point to attend as many punk shows I could! My friends and I always supported other local bands we knew or played with so on the weekends, if we weren’t being casual stoners at parties we were out playing a show or watching another friend’s band play!

We always pitched game ideas or came up with cool stories. Growing up in the Texas Hill Country of San Antonio we really had the freedom of running around playing paintball or airsoft in the wilderness by someone’s house. Spent plenty of time making short films that made no sense or playing tabletop games we barely understood.

Contact Info:

• Website: r3drigs.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/r3d.rigs/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/r3drigs/
• SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/objktv
• Other: https://www.artstation.com/r3drigs