Featured Pro Portfolio: Sergey Grechanyuk
Sergey Grechanyuk is a concept artist at Plarium based in the Ukraine. Passionate about sci-fi, he also works creates work for his personal IP, Kepler Project, on the side. Becoming an ArtStation Pro member was a no-brainer for him because he needed to create a professional portfolio website for his work and was able to do it quickly, all while supporting the ArtStation community.
Check out Sergey’s ArtStation-powered website.
In this interview, he dishes the details on his IP and talks about the obstacles of learning with limited opportunity.
Tell us about your Kepler Project.
The Kepler Project is a personal project that I started nearly 2 years ago. I started it as an dream project to work on as if I were a concept artist on a large production. I’m a fan of science fiction and huge fan of the Ridley Scott’s Prometheus movie so I decided to make something inspired by it. I came up with a pretty simple story and thought about what key frames I would want to see. That’s how the project started to grow piece by piece. I sometimes think about one day making something based on this project but for now it is just a section of my portfolio. It actually resulted in few jobs offers so it already did a lot for me.
How did you get your start as an artist?
After school I was very serious about becoming traditional artist. I painted and drew in all kinds of mediums and was doing portraits, still-life and landscapes for commissions but 2D Computer Graphics later became my new passion and I got job as UI/2D artist at small company. It wasn’t the most exciting job but it was a good start. All my free time I spent studying and building my portfolio. Eventually, I left this job to study full-time for nearly a year and got a job as a concept artist at a Video Production Studio so it worked out pretty well.
What is the best art advice you’ve ever received?
I guess this is corny but it is true: Never stop learning and be open minded. That is why I love my job. It is a learning journey that never stops. It’s also hard so you need to love what you do.
What is one of the biggest obstacles you’ve faced in concept art?
For me and many others artist in my country, I think the biggest obstacle is luck of education in the Concept Art Field. Where I’m from, this kind of education does not exist so I was studying everything from all kinds of sources and it was’t organized at all. That is what makes it hard. Now, artists are luckier that there are a lot of artists that provide Mentorships and help aspiring artists.The ArtStation and Gnomon Masterclasses are helpful too. Great insight from working professionals in the field used to be almost impossible to get when you are not working alongside them.
See more of Sergey’s work on his portfolio website. To learn more about ArtStation Pro websites, click here.
