This shot is one of the few where I worked exclusively as a Lighting & Compositing Artist, without being directly involved in the animation, which was created by the talented Ecuadorian 3D animator Nicolás Mejía. It is part of the Animation Mentor Student Showcase 2026, featuring some of the program’s best student work.
This project brought together Animation Mentor and The Lighting Lab, and since I’ve studied at both schools (and the shot looked incredibly fun), I didn’t want to miss the opportunity to participate. The project was directed by Brendan Gottlieb, who has worked as an Animator at Walt Disney Animation Studios for over 10 years, and I learned a great deal from his feedback throughout the process.
For this shot, I built a relatively simple environment in Maya. The director requested a park with green grass, shallow depth of field, and a dreamy camera bloom, and also provided a specific color palette to follow. I explored a few variations and ultimately assembled the environment using a combination of Kitbash3D assets.
For the grass, I used MASH instead of a texture. I wanted it to be actual geometry generated procedurally, allowing the dog to physically interact with it. This allowed the paws and the Croc to sink slightly into the grass, adding a layer of realism.
Once the environment was established, I focused on shading to reinforce material definition: the dog’s short fur, the plastic quality of the Croc, and ensuring each object felt integrated within the same world.
Lighting and rendering were done in Arnold, and the final step was bringing the different AOV passes into Nuke for compositing, where I performed final color adjustments and pushed the image toward a more cinematic look.
