Stefan Groenewoud
Stefan Groenewoud
Technical Artist @ Bend Studio
Bend, United States

Summary

After completing the Game-art course and two internships in a professional production environment, Stefan has started out his professional career as 3D-modeler and Texture Artist. In the meantime he also grew an interest for the more technical aspects of game-development and picked up programming and started to create shaders to eventually become a Technical Artist.

Editorials/ Interviews:

Working on Horizon Forbidden West as a technical artist:
https://80.lv/articles/working-on-horizon-zero-dawn-as-a-technical-artist/

Good material design:
https://80.lv/articles/stefan-groenewoud-on-good-material-design/

Material Design Approach:
https://www.artstation.com/blogs/stefangroenewoud/46XO/material-interview

Skills

Digital SculptingEnvironment ModelingTexturingUV MappingPhotographyRetopologyProgrammingPhotogrammetryPBR

Software proficiency

Maya
Maya
Photoshop
Photoshop
Substance 3D Painter
Substance 3D Painter
Substance 3D Designer
Substance 3D Designer
Unreal Engine
Unreal Engine
ZBrush
ZBrush
TopoGun
TopoGun
Marvelous Designer
Marvelous Designer
Quixel Suite
Quixel Suite
Python
Python

Productions

    • Video Game
      Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores
    • Year
      2023
    • Role
      Technical Artist
    • Company
      Guerrilla Games
    • Video Game
      Horizon Forbidden West
    • Year
      2022
    • Role
      Technical Artist
    • Company
      Guerrilla Games
    • Video Game
      Horizon Zero Dawn
    • Year
      2017
    • Role
      Shader artist
    • Company
      Guerrilla Games
    • Video Game
      Gears of War: Ultimate Edition
    • Year
      2015
    • Role
      Environment artist
    • Company
      Splash Damage
    • Video Game
      Dirty Bomb
    • Year
      2015
    • Role
      Environment Arist
    • Company
      Splash Damage
    • Video Game
      Killzone: Shadow Fall
    • Year
      2013
    • Role
      Intern 3D Asset-Artist
    • Company
      Guerrilla Games

Experience

  • Senior Staff Technical Artist at Bend Studio
    Bend, US
    May 2023 - Present

  • Technical Artist at Guerrilla Games
    August 2017 - April 2023

    Responsible for creating, optimising shaders and authorising PBR corrected textures for other departments. Developed and implemented tools/scripts as a member of an eight-person team, to make the workflow(s) more efficient and robust.

  • Shader & Texture Artist at Guerrilla Games
    September 2014 - August 2017

    Researching, creating, optimising and delivering shaders. Producing textures in a photorealistic style for Horizon Zero Dawn, which had a wide variety of materials. To ensure shaders were used in an orderly fashion by different departments, we provided documentation for a seamless hand-off. On multiple occasions provided support (with different tasks) to several departments during the pre-production and polish.

  • Environment artist/Lighting at Splash Damage
    December 2013 - September 2014

    Creating, dressing, polishing and/or lighting environment art from block out to completion (for Dirty Bomb and Gears of War Ultimate Edition). Mentoring intermediate Zbrush users, investigate new workflows, write and maintain internal documentation for new starters and colleagues.

  • Freelance 3D-artist at Freelance
    October 2012 - October 2013

    Model and texture environmental assets or props for AAA projects based on briefings (E.g., The Witcher 3 as credited).

    Besides working for triple A studios I've had the chance to work closely with Gametextures.com for whom I did individual textures which are now being sold on their website.

    Responsibilities: High/Low poly modelling, Texturing, Uv-mapping

  • Intern 3D Asset-Artist at Guerrilla Games
    September 2011 - March 2012

    As intern Asset-Artist on Killzone: Shadow Fall, I was responsible to model High and Low poly assets to improve visual fidelity for the PS3 to PS4 transition, create shader and textures that matches the photorealistic style of the project. In addition, we did our own research on material expressions or technical functionality.