Meet Darrell Abney

Today we’d like to introduce you to Darrell Abney.

Every artist has a unique story. Can you briefly walk us through yours?
My art obsession started as a kid growing up in the 80’s, just outside of Nashville, Tennessee, and later moving to Maysville, Kentucky. This obsession eventually led me to work on films such as Star Wars – The Last Jedi, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Star Trek Into Darkness, and many more. I drew much of my early artistic inspiration from the plethora of amazing 80s films such as Predator, E.T., Gremlins, and of course Star Wars. My two older sisters were into cute things like the Cabbage Patch Dolls, so naturally for me, I was more into scary creepy monsters. I started collecting Garbage Pail Kids trading cards, as well as drawing my own versions of them.

I remember trading them on the school bus in secret hoping the teachers wouldn’t take them away due to their “controversial” art.

My dad had an old dot matrix printer and I would draw Star Wars battles, Godzilla, and monsters on the back of the scrap printer paper. At the age of 7, my family moved to Kentucky, where I grew up skateboarding around the downtown of a small town called Maysville, where I have fond memories roaming around the town with my friends.

Fast forward many years of drawing non stop, perfecting my Mortal Kombat skills, and watching many horror movies like Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street (my parents let me watch them kind of young – thanks for being cool mom and dad!) Eventually I studied Special FX Makeup at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh, where I made animatronic babies and camels, old age prosthetic makeups, and zombies.

I drew a ton of inspiration from the work coming out of Rick Baker, Kevin Yagher, and Stan Winston Studios. Ironically, I never wanted to do computer graphics in college as I enjoyed more hands on art like clay sculpting and airbrushing, like my first job out of college where I was hand sculpting and airbrushing animatronic animals – including a 14 foot alligator – for the Rainforest Cafe restaurant chain.

After college, I worked in Orlando Florida for DisneyWorld as a painter and Universal Studios as a makeup artist. I met my wonderful wife Claudia in Orlando. A friend named J.T. inspired me with his digital art which lead me to get some 3D graphics books and teach myself 3D.

In 2003, I drove across the country from Florida to L.A. with my sister Kathryn.   I didn’t have a job at first, but I knew I could make it work.  I crashed on my roommate Steve’s couch in Marina del Rey, working odd jobs at first such as testing video games (which was actually really fun) eventually I cold-called a 3D scanning company in Manhattan Beach and got my first opportunity to work as a 3D modeler on feature films. After this job I worked for four years for Playstation San Diego on PS3 games.
Over the years I took advantage of the traveling nature of the global visual effects industry and over my 15 year career in 3d graphics – I have worked in Canada, London, Los Angeles, San Diego, and Portland. I am lucky to have a supportive wife who also enjoys traveling around with me, along with our crazy dog Jake.

About five years ago, we moved to beautiful Vancouver, B.C. Where I landed my dream job with a company originally started by George Lucas called Industrial Light & Magic. Growing up, I never thought I would actually get to work there!   They did the special effects for the original Star Wars films that gave myself and millions of other kids so much inspiration growing up.

I built the 3D models of the Porg creatures for Star Wars, which went on to be hugely popular. I also got to 3D model the First Order AT-ST (helmet removed version) and built the digital double model and textures for the silver stormtrooper named Captain Phasma. I also painted all the textures for the resistance transport spaceship fleet.

I currently work as a 3D character modeler for Laika Studios in Portland, Oregon. I am a member of their Rapid Prototype team – a special group that is building stop motion puppets for their next film using 3D printing and many other techniques.

Please tell us about your art.
There are two ways I view my art. There is the art I do at work on feature films, and the art I do at home. I try to separate the two, for my own sanity. Sometimes I get lucky and the movie art aligns with my personal tastes, this was the case when I sculpted the giant Tylosaur and the Karathen monsters (along with a few other sculptors) on Aquaman. Also getting to design the forest demon for American Horror Story Season 3 was one of my career highlights.

My main art mediums are digital, meaning that I use computer software to make 3D models and digital sculptures. Sometimes I draw with pencil or pen on a sketchbook then scan that into the computer as a starting point for an idea, but most of my work is done in the computer (Notice I said in the computer, not BY the computer, there still needs to be an artist using the tools).

For my personal art, I am really into horror and creatures and I am constantly designing and sculpting my own aliens, creatures, demons, and sometimes putting them inside an environment. Depending on my job, I don’t always get to design, so I push myself in my spare time to up my design skills since I am headed in that direction with my career.

I really use art at times as therapy. Putting on some good music and sculpting/painting is one of my favorite ways to spend my spare time. I’m currently doing a digital sculpture and digital painting for a horror movie poster. Sometimes I 3D print my creations as well. I have also completed commissions for collectible companies creating college mascots that were mass produced. It’s awesome to hold in your hands your work, bringing it from the digital world into the real world. I used to work in real clay many years ago but unfortunately, I have somewhat left that behind, I just work so much faster in digital clay. My go to art software packages are Maya, Zbrush, Substance Painter, and Photoshop.

In addition to work and personal art, I also teach an online class once a week. It feels good giving back and helping other young artists grow their careers. It also helps me keep sight of how far I have come so far, it’s easy to lose track and get tunnel vision when working in production with all the crazy deadlines.

Given everything that is going on in the world today, do you think the role of artists has changed? How do local, national or international events and issues affect your art?
I feel the primary role of an artist is to do art for yourself, not others. I don’t worry about what others think while I make my personal art. I just “spill it out on the page” or in my case – the computer screen.
I’m sometimes told that I would get more fans and reach more people if I did more pop culture art or fan art. Every time I try to do something like this I lose steam halfway through because it’s just not my passion to make that type of art. Dark art and horror art is definitely more niche and has plenty of fans, just never as many as let’s say – comic book superhero style art. Don’t get me wrong those are cool too, just not my passion.

I’m not a fan of people who do things with their art only to shock people, but at the same time, it’s almost worse to hold back and water down your art so you don’t offend anyone. I feel art is incredibly important. Some of the only things we have learned about some past civilizations is by unearthing their old art. In some cases, no art = no history, it certainly would be a boring world without art!

National or international events I don’t think directly affect my art. Sure if the economy, for example, were to tank, then I wouldn’t have as much free time to produce art. I would be too busy chasing jobs trying to pay the bills.

I don’t try to politicize my art but I also don’t have a problem with people who do, whatever floats your boat. As my art evolves I am using it more for storytelling. I think it’s great that everyone has their own personality and we have art as a medium to express ourselves. I have been so inspired by other’s art over the years it really makes me feel good when I get a comment that my art has inspired others. I think social media and things like Instagram are great for finding artists and forming artist friendships. It’s so cool to find a new artist with a style you like and you can follow them and see their updates. You can even help promote each other.

Altho I enjoy sculpting monsters, I feel some humans are the real monsters and there is a lot of pain in the world, so I don’t want to add to that by making art that makes fun of or puts vulnerable people down.  As odd as it seems, creating creatures and monsters can be a much needed temporary escape from things.

To be an artist is a blessing and can be a bit of a curse too. It’s hard to find constant artistic fulfillment at work, at times you get it, then you lose it based off the current project, deadlines, or other circumstances. Also, you can get down when you see other art that you wish you were making, on the flip side, this usually inspires me more than it gets me down. Artists are delicate creatures! It is impossible to completely separate yourself from your work, if someone doesn’t like your work, it can be hard not to take it personal at times. Years of conditioning has thickened my skin, but it’s still there a tiny bit and may never go away. Being an artist is sometimes a struggle, but I am very fortunate to be able to make a living doing what I do and I really wouldn’t want to be doing anything else

How or where can people see your work? How can people support your work?
My main showcase for my work is my instagram: https://www.instagram.com/artbydabney/

I am also currently growing my YouTube channel: youtube.com/c/artbydabney

I also have artstation: https://www.artstation.com/dabney

I have an “old school” website: www.artbydabney.com

If you are interested in learning from me, have 3D tutorials available on my gumroad page: http://gumroad.com/dabney

You can see my previous work in the following films and tv shows:

* Star Wars – The Last Jedi
* Aquaman
* Valerian
* Star Trek Into Darkness
* Paranorman
* Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 and 2
* American Horror Story Season 3 and 9
* Hotel Transylvania 2
* Angry Birds

Contact Info:

• Address: Portland, Oregon
• Email: darrellabney@gmail.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/artbydabney/
• Other: https://www.artstation.com/dabney

Image Credit:
Bio Photo Image Credit: Tony Chen

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