Khalid Al Muharraqi, Muharraqi-Studios
March 22, 2007

Based out of Bahrain, Khalid Al Muharraqi's work has spread like wildfire over the years and can be seen throughout the CG industry. From architectural visualization to fantasy illustrations, his work truly shows he is a master of his tools. We recently had the opportunity to speak with Khalid about his studio, Muharraqi-Studios, and to find out more about this talented artist.

Can you tell us a little about yourself and your history with 3D?
I was born in 1972 in the Kingdom of Bahrain, a small group of islands in the Arabian Gulf. I was born into an artistic family and started with art when I was 7 years old. I have always been around my Father, a painter, observing him work and getting his guidance and advice. Computers came much later in my life at The Art Institute of Houston when I was forced to use computers as it was the standard medium for visual communication at the time. The first CG software I used was Photoshop version 2.0 and I have been using Computers ever since.

How were you first introduced to LightWave 3D?
Well, I first saw LightWave’s software with the M&M characters on the box at a software reseller in Houston, Texas in 1996. I bought it (version 5.5) but after installing it I didn't understand how to use it and I gave up in a day, so the box stayed on a shelf for a few years. Coming from a Mac background It was too PC-like, and I did not try it again until 2002. I was in Syria on a business trip and a friend of mine gave me a demo version of 6.0, which I installed and immediately fell in love with. I liked the feel of the tools and felt like I had to learn more about it so I could use it for my work. I remembered the 5.5 sitting collecting dust and contacted NewTek Europe who said that version 7.5 was out and I could easily send the dongle in and pay the upgrade fee to get it. I was happy to be able to get the new version immediately. I must also say that the LightWave artist community gallery got me hooked to the amazing work that LightWave helps artists create. Today we have 3 Dongles and a full render farm both Mac and PC platforms in the Studio.

What feature of LightWave do you like most?
The feature that I like the most in LightWave is the one that other users of different 3D software complain the most about, and that is LightWave Layout vs. Modeler. In many 3D apps, the modeling, the animation and rendering is all in one layout. I find that it is very helpful to me that NewTek has always separated these applications with only a bridge linking them. In my opinion, this allows the artist to switch to the mode that he wants to work in as I find that modeling is a world unto itself and as are animation and rendering. This separation allows me to focus and to deliver a much more refined product at each stage of my work. I wouldn’t want them joined, although I use applications that do everything in one environment, it actually slows me down when I see everything in the same layout.

Are there any plug-ins you use on a regular basis?
I have a few plug-ins that I could not do without. They are; Worley's FPrime, Sasquatch, Polk, Taft and Disgust, WTools3D's LWCAD, DB&W's Infinimap Pro, Polas' Tree Designer, Grass Generator and Random Cloner, and Evasion3D's Spectrum, X-Fod and Shadow Designer.

How did you come to start Muharraqi-Studios?
Since leaving the advertising industry a few years ago, I formed a new company called Muharraqi-Studios which I manage and run with my partner, Rashad. It is a very small company but we have had the privilege of working on some very big projects. I am a self-taught CG artist and because of my interest, I basically do everything from modeling, to texturing, to rigging, to lighting, to animation and rendering. When I was at school, my teachers always wanted me to focus on one thing and specialize in it, but I was always a rebel! :)

What are some projects you've worked on recently?
We try to split our time in the studio between development work, creative work and paying work. It has always been a great honor for me to work with developers and helping them to define the next generation of tools for artists. And as an artist, first and foremost, it is important for me to create my visions and share them with others who appreciate the work and effort that goes into creating a CG art piece. Finally, in order to pay for the above, we take on a number of commercial assignments that are mostly related to Architectural Visualization. Our work is used in a wide variety of applications and many of them are are not even made public because of the confidentiality requirements of the projects. These are usually massive real estate developments and can take many years to complete. A selection of the projects that have been released can be seen on the 3D Architecture section in the Gallery on our website.

How does LightWave fit into your production pipeline?
Well, how can I say this... LightWave umbrellas all other products for me... it could be the first product I use when I start, but surely the last one that I will render to, so I would have to say that it fits perfectly. Well, I have to think differently, but when it comes to the work, I feel it is perfect for both, especially with LWCAD tools, Modeler has just been reborn again in my opinion!!! I would say the only weakness in Arch Viz work would be the Global Illumination, but even that will be adjusted soon by the NewTek team as I've heard. ;)

How does Arch Viz work differ from more traditional creative work?
When I put it all together, I do think totally different than my traditional way of creative work, the words that I always say to my clients are, "architectural visualization to me is like boxes with great environments and lighting..." If you think like that you will be able to do it, humble words coming from some one with an artistic background ;)

Which type of 3D work do you prefer?
Easy one!! For sure, creative. If architectural work was not done in 3D, well how can I say this... not much of a drive for me.... Well, maybe for a lot of money. I love to create concepts, art work, non-commercial, dreamy concepts, Just going wild with my imagination, and thanks to all the developers, today most of the 3D applications work well together, they could import and export with ease, this is a new step to the future, the days of the Mac vs. PC are gone, so I do thank all the developers from hardware to software on helping create not only better products, but products that work together with other products, the future will just get better from here on for artists.

Are there any projects that have been particular favorites?
Every project I do is practice for me. Why? Because every time I open LightWave I learn something new, so challenge is always there... Saying all that, I would think the most fun I had was with Durrat project, it was lots of fun and very challenging, especially since the architects thought that we could never pull off the project, since I had never really done any architectural work before, but the most fun part for me was when I got to rig and animate the fish. LightWave helped a lot from A to Z, it was easy for me to export light and camera animations from one set to the other with ease, this helped me to change sets and the subject matter and re-render them on our farm, then it would go into the post part of the production. LightWave helped me to go from a 10,000 polys animation set to a 4 to 5 million polys animation set... no problems.

How do larger development projects compare to traditional Arch/Viz?
It is exciting for me!! I love the sea, and I love to build it. It is much more complex to build man-made islands on the sea than the traditional installations of architecture on the ground. I need to go through serious planning before I start anything. When recreating a master plan for a sketch from an architect or big CAD plans, some of my thoughts are, "Are satellite images available? Are they big enough? How much PSD painting will I have to do? How will it move if there is animation on the ground... or in the Sea? How many buildings should there be? How much detail should they have?" Budgeting the polycount vs images, some of these locations will require over 1 to 2 GBs worth of images, a plug-in to use here once you really run out of memory would be the amazing Plug-in InfiniMap Pro.

How do you think the final product compares to your visualizations?
In the case of Durrat, it is a 1.5 billion dollar project that reclaims land from the sea. When I first saw it on Google Earth with a good friend from California, he looked at it and then said, "Man... It's a great honor to know a man that has artwork that could be seen from outer space!" that just said it all to me there... I was shocked on how close my 3D representations were to the final, even though I have never flown over that area, I was happy that I could achieve such an impression almost a year before they even started. As a matter of fact, I know that I saved the architects millions once I put the camera down for the first time, they found problems that were not visible from altitude. And no!! I wasn't paid the millions they saved. ;)

What are the inspirations for your creative work?
Well there are so many, it is difficult to say. I guess the first one would have to be my father; he has taught me all that I know and I am following in his footsteps. I was also exposed to all the different artists from the books my father had, so would get into artists like Frank Frazetta, Boris Vallejo and the Creepy magazines all the way to the original Mad magazines, and many, many more. Finally, I am always inspired by nature, life and all God's creations as well as the people around me. Basically everything and anything can be an inspiration.

Can you give us some background on the images at left? (top to bottom)
World Trade Center Bahrain: Having seen Bahrain's name in the news repeatedly at the beginning of last month for the start of the Formula 1 season, these two buildings are now the unique structures on the island and were meant to create a landmark going into the future, not only on the skyline but also in terms of the use of renewable energy and construction techniques. All of this went off without a hitch and on schedule. it's the World Trade Center Bahrain due in a few months more this year, this is a building that is part of the developments put together for His Highness the King of Bahrain. I'm proud to say that I recreated the first images ever seen for the future downtown of the Kingdom.

Concept development for a proposal: Project for royalty in the heart of the northern islands. This is one of last year's concept design for a city in Bahrain, the files were over 3.5 million polygons on screen, and with images that exceeded the level that PCs could handle, we had to use a plug-in called Infinimap, designed and developed by a good friend Mr. Wolf in Germany, interview with Dagmar here: www.db-w.com/content/view/51/79

We created the 3D visualizations for the entire Kingdom of Bahrain and the proposed master plan for the next hundred years: Last year, we had been hired buy SOM Chicago to work on recreating their visualization of 10 new towns for the kingdom. In this challenging process, I had to rebuild and attach all the maps that were a few GBs worth of data and put them in a 3D world exactly as it is, then insert all the new development in it; for confidentiality reasons we can't display it.

Project in UAE: This development was spread over 10 km and was completed in a record time of 4 weeks! It included over 4,000 villas, shopping malls, mosques, schools and much more. This is a much more detailed drop down of the residential clusters in the Master Plan proposal. The detailed models of trees, villas, cars and people are shown here.

Durrat: One of the major real estate developments in the Kingdom of Bahrain and one of our first 'big' projects. This job received much acclaim in the international press and amongst the CG community and also on News Channels. We are most excited that you can see the images that we have created take shape from outer space.

Al Buraq waits: Al Buraq is the winged steed that carried the Prophet Muhammed (PBUH) from Mecca to Jerusalem on the Night of Isra'a and Mi'raj. This is a holy night for Muslims when the Prophet ascended to the 7 heavens and met with all the prophets before him. The first part of the journey (Isra'a) was from Mecca to the Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem on the back of Al Buraq. The Prophet is said to have alighted here, tethered Al Buraq at Al Haram Al Sharif and rose with the Archangel Gabriel on the second part of the journey (Mi'raj) to the heavens. There are many representations of Al Buraq and I wanted to make my own to reflect some of the amazing things that are said about him. He was not very big but had massive and colorful wings and a tail like a peacock. It is said that he could traverse long distances because he could place his foot on the horizon and in one step reach that point. The shooting star symbolizes the flight of the Prophet with the help of Gabriel the Archangel to the heavens. Al Buraq waits as it is his duty to be there for the Prophet when he comes back to earth so he can return him to his home. I just loved the story and some of the descriptions in it so I had to create a piece that would capture some of the beautiful imagery I imagined.

Little family in the Desert: It's my cartoony looking Arabian Camel family.... posing for the shot!! Created for fun only. It was also part of the 3DTotal composition for best cartoon CG camel.

Silver Unicorn: The "Silver Unicorn", I have always been very fascinated with this beautiful creature, I have created it the way I imagined. The creature is mystical & magical, not seen by man. Here it looks as if it stopped for a second to examine you with intelligence, almost as if it wonders. Again it looks mysterious and almost dark. Again created for fun.

Demon Character: One of my character designs again. We had anticipated a role for the Demon in our upcoming movie project. This model was about 7,000 polys, after normal maps form ZB LW9 rendered this model at 1.5Million polys with, first test for LightWave displacement. Test run animation rendered and animated in LightWave:
muharraqi-studios.com/muharraqi_gallery.php?cat=ANIMATION&id=35

Little Who: this was created for the CG Sphere Challenge just for fun, it was done in about 3 to 4 hours... www.cgsphere.com/gallery/details/?submission_id=880

Have the recent changes in LightWave impacted the way you work?
Yes, most certainly. First, the 64-bit version v9 really made it possible to widen the horizon of what we could do on a job. It allowed me to continue the work flow without the problems that a 32-bit software would have, like being RAM limitations and not able to calculate the gigantic sizes of images we needed to use for the projects we do.

Are there any new features of LightWave v9 you've found particularly useful?
Other than the fact that the rendering is much, much faster (which is by itself incredible), the other thing is the amazing new camera tools and how flexible they are. I never imagined such a big upgrade as Modeler has a bunch of new tools that I love, too. I do wish that Newtek would do more video updates or demonstrations for any new features since a lot of new tools have been added or moved to new locations. This will help people to use them even faster.

Do you have a "LightWave tip or trick" others might find helpful?
A tip would be that LightWave is different than any 3D software I have seen, it’s not the type of software that you would love at first sight, I would say that it’s grow on you type... once it grows you are stuck to it... but you have to keep working on it.

My Trick is for when you work with files that exceed 4 to 5 million polys, reduce the number of crashes that you may encounter by reducing the number of undos on your LightWave preferences!!

What's next for Khalid Al Muharraqi?
We have always been interested in making a movie and have been working on this for quite some time. We would like to take our work to the next level and introduce our stories to the rest of the world in a Middle Eastern theme. I think that there is a lot of good that can come from the exchange of information.

Do you have any advice for someone new to the 3D industry?
Just follow your heart... Do what you love and go full speed ahead. Also, give yourself enough time and accept that you will make mistakes, and when you do, work harder. Don’t be ruled by others and help to motivate your friends or beginners in the industry. Don't worry about the critics as most of them are not even that good but they act as the policemen of the community.

Any final thoughts?
I would like to thank NewTek for the third time on asking me to talk about myself. Ben at NewTek Europe was the first person that ever interviewed me in 2003, every since I have been lucky ;), thanks Ben. I've also found a good home here with the NewTek Team, I've grown with them and their products since 2002. I'm also grateful to know that they listen to their users with an open mind, then develop according to the needs & requirements of the market. It's been a great 5 years of my life with LightWave. If I had to go back, I wouldn't change a thing!!!

Thanks for taking the time to talk to us, Khalid!

To learn more about Khalid and his work, visit his website: www.muharraqi-studios.com