Athlete Wrestling with a Python

2015/2021
Software (2015): Zbrush, Maya, Vray
Software (2021): Zbrush, Substance Painter, Maya, Arnold, Photoshop

Originally in 2015, I sculpted this statue based on reference images I took of the famous piece of Sir Frederic Leighton’s Athlete Wrestling with a Python, displayed in Tate Britain. The model was watertight and intended to be 3D printed on a desktop printer.

More recently, in 2021 I have decided to dust off this project and use the sculpture in some new work. For this however I had to update some of the parts that were lacking in the original: I completely resculpted the face and adjusted the overall composition to better match the original work of Frederic Leighton.

Then the whole thing was transferred into Substance Painter, I added a bronze shader, set up lights and camera in Arnold and created new renders. Minor retouch was done in Photoshop.