Ben Merrick
Ben Merrick
Principal Technical Artist, Stellar Entertainment
Surrey, United Kingdom

Summary

I am a Principal Technical Artist / Art Lead with 15 years 3D industry experience, having worked on 5 AAA games, on a feature film, VR and Advertising.

I am currently working at Stellar Entertainment on an unnanounced AAA title, having previously released Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered and Need For Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered.

I also teach Environment Art at Vertex School.

Previously I worked at DPS Games (formerly Wargaming UK/Edge Case Games) on an unannounced title, NVizage, at Longcross Film Studios, working on Previs and VR on the Artemis Fowl Disney feature film, using UE4, Maya, Substance and ZBrush. Previous to that I worked in the advertising, VR and rides industry at Framestore for 18 months, after working in the games industry for 5 years at Lionhead Studios (Microsoft), Rare (Microsoft) and Frontier Developments, on the beautiful games Fable Legends, Kinect Sports Rivals, Kinect Disneyland Adventures and Kinectimals, respectively.
Aside from my games experiece I freelanced on TV advertisements and 3D visualisations for 2 years.

I have a Masters and Degree in 3D Arts from the University Of Hertfordshire.

I am very experienced in a wide range of art programs and specialise in: Maya, 3DS Max, Unreal Engine 4 and 5, ZBrush, Substance Designer and Painter, and Photoshop.

Thank you for taking the time to look at my work. Please check out my CV, Linkedin or send me an Email.

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Skills

3D ModelingEnvironment ModelingTexturingPBR Texturingmayareal timetechnical artunreal enginevrue4optimisationorganisation

Software proficiency

Unreal Engine
Unreal Engine
3ds Max
3ds Max
Maya
Maya
Photoshop
Photoshop
ZBrush
ZBrush
Substance 3D Painter
Substance 3D Painter
Substance 3D Designer
Substance 3D Designer
Quixel Suite
Quixel Suite
Marmoset Toolbag
Marmoset Toolbag
SpeedTree
SpeedTree

Experience

  • Principal Technical Artist at Stellar Entertainment
    Guildford, GB
    March 2024 - Present

    As the company has grown I have moved between different roles to help where we have been short of experience.

    I currently work as Principal Technical Artist on an unannounced AAA game.

  • Art Outsource Manager at Stellar Entertainment
    Guildford, GB
    January 2023 - March 2024

    As the company has grown I have moved between different roles to help where we have been short of experience.

    During this period I worked as Art Outsource Manager on an unannounced AAA game.

  • Environment Tutor At Vertex School at Vertex School
    Online
    April 2022 - Present

    I teach Environment Art to students to help them learn and develop skills to the level required to work in the industry. I then guide them with their CVs, interviews and finding a job.

  • Lead Artist at Stellar Entertainment
    Guildford
    April 2020 - January 2023

    Lead Artist

    Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered (Playstation 5/Pro and PC), Stellar Entertainment Software, Guerilla Games/Sony, 2024

    Lead Artist

    Main responsibilities:

    Guiding the Stellar visual team on: New lighting and ambience, clouds and updating robots and landscape assets.

    Personal work: Along side Leading the team I worked on Reflections/GI and some lighting.

    I had the pleasure of working on Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered as Art Lead at Stellar Entertainment.

    As a team we took the original game and original engine with the aim of bringing it in-line with the art and technical quality of Horizon Forbidden West.

    We worked closely with Guerrilla Games, Nixxes and Weasletron to complete this project with each team focusing on different areas.

    At Stellar Entertainment we primarily focused on remastering the lighting and ambience, clouds, robots and landscape assets.

    My primary role was to Lead the talented team of Stellar artists, of various diciplines, and also worked on reflections and helped with lighting.

    It was an amazing experience seeing how the, beautiful, original game was made, learning their techniques and workflows and helping to improve it with todays technology.

    ---------

    Lead Artist

    Need For Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered (Xbox One, Playstation 4, Switch and PC) -

    Guiding the visual team on: performance/optimisations, lighting, UI, new models and textures, etc.

    Personal work: environment modelling, texturing, lighting, planning, management, legal and marketing.

  • Senior Environment and Technical Artist at Edge Case Games / Wargaming UK
    Guildford, United Kingdom
    July 2018 - March 2020

    Senior Environment Artist/Senior Technical Artist

    Prototyping/Fractured Space - UE4/Max/Maya- modelling, lighting, textures, materials/shaders, performance, blueprint scripting

  • Senior Environment and Technical Artist at Nvizage (Disney)
    Longcross, Surrey, United Kingdom
    October 2017 - June 2018

    Senior Environment and Technical Artist

    Disney’s Artemis Fowl film - UE4/Maya- Previs, modelling, lighting, textures, materials/shaders, performance, blueprint scripting

  • Senior Environment and Technical Artist at Framestore
    London, United Kingdom
    April 2016 - October 2017

    Senior Environment and Technical Artist (Generalist TD)

    Unreal Engine 4 VR and installation - Modelling, lighting, textures, materials/shaders, performance, blueprint scripting

    Unannounced Film/Ride- Modelling, lighting, materials/shaders, layout

  • Environment and Technical Artist at Lionhead Studios (Microsoft)
    Guildford, United Kingdom
    February 2014 - April 2016

    Environment and Technical Artist

    Fable Legends (Xbox One and PC) - Level prettying, performance, optimisations, models and textures

  • Environment Artist at Rare (Microsoft)
    Birmingham, United Kingdom
    February 2013 - February 2014

    Environment Artist

    Kinect Sports: Rivals (Xbox One) - Foliage, rocks, vehicles, other models, textures and optimizations

  • Environment Artist at Frontier Developments
    Cambridge, United Kingdom
    May 2011 - January 2013

    Environment Artist

    Kinectimals: Now With Bears (360) - Foliage, lighting, environments

    Kinect Disneyland Adventures (360) - Environments and props

    HoloLens - Early content development with new technology

  • Freelance 3D Artist at Various Post Production Companies
    London, United Kingdom
    October 2010 - March 2011

    Worked freelance at various companies such as Nexus Productions and Mediastation. Using 3DS Max, Maya and Zbrush.

  • 3D Concept Designer at John Lewis
    London, United Kingdom
    October 2009 - October 2010

    3D Concept Designer creating 3D visualizations of shops and fixtures.