Manufato

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My name is Pedro Toledo.
I was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 1973, in a family full of artists.
I am married and I have two wonderful daughters.

Back in 1991 I started my studies at the Graphic Design School of the Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro - PUC-RJ. I have also studied Fine Arts at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro - UFRJ, and at the Art Institute of Florence - Scuola Lorenzo de Medici, in Florence, Italy.

Still during my time at the Graphic Design school I started working as a freelance illustrator, focused mainly at publicity/advertisement works. Initially all the work was done using 2D techniques, a lot of pencil and paper, and a lot of Photoshop and Painter. After a while I began to introduce some 3D elements into my 2D work and, after a while and before I noticed, the 3D work started to get more and more space on my workflow.

Since the advertisement industry never really fulfilled me (I always loved to create characters a lot more than selling products and services) I decided to look for another industry.

That’s what made me target the Gaming Industry. A place with a lot of space for 3d and character creation. So, after a short period experience in a Brazilian game development company named Ignis, I spent some time sending my portfolio to some game companies. Liquid Development was the first one to give me a chance, as a remote, freelance artist. Right from the beginning it was a very good partnership and with them I had the opportunity to work on some AAA games, including: Guitar Hero 2, RockBand, Hellgate: London, Fable 2, Damnation, Brothers in Arms… and others.

It was a fantastic experience, I would have never been able to have so many good titles on my portfolio if I wasn’t working with them, and having these titles on my portfolio has opened a lot of doors.

During this period, I also worked as a teacher at Veiga de Almeida University, on graduation and post-graduation courses, teaching low and high poly modeling, texturing and illustration.

I am now at Bioware, living in Austin, TX, and working on the Star Wars: The Old Republic.

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About Manufato

I’ve been a teacher for a few years.
I am also a moderator on the biggest Brazilian forum focussed on CG, 3D4ALL.

In both places I had the opportunity to deal with people that are just getting fresh into the industry.

One common aspect I’ve seen in many students, and newbies, is the idea that Digital Art is easier than traditional art. People tend to think that you have tools specifically designed to do anything.
I would hear from a student things like “What tool should I use to model a hand?”, “This head doesn’t look right, what do I use to fix it?”, and many more like these…
Some would get really shocked when I answered “Well, you just have to move these verts to the right place…”

For some reason, people think that digital art is just a matter of clicking buttons.

Manufato is a Portuguese word. It comes from Latin: Manufacto. It means: Handmade.

This is just my way to enfacize the importance of seeing this profession as it should be. An artistic process that, as any other, depends on the artist, and not on the tool.