Jeff_Mottle
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Jeff_Mottle - Australian Association of Architectural Illustrators (AAAI) 
| Jeff Mottle Interview
| The man behind the screen…
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| In this three part series, Jane Grealy talks to Jeff Mottle, the founder and President of CGarchitect, the most popular and influential website for the architectural visualization industry.
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| | What is its current reach, audience?
| Based on Google analytics we get around 200,000 unique visits every month – historically we’ve had visitors from every single country bar two or three.
| It would have to be one of the most prominent sites in the industry?
| There are a lot of other general CG sites in the industry that might happen to cover a CGarchitect type piece, but most of their coverage is geared towards the entertainment and gaming industry When I started CGarchitect I realized that the sites I was going to were centered around entertainment and gaming and there weren’t any sites specifically for architecture – so that certainly did guide the direction. A lot of my friends are the owners of all those other sites – some of them were mentors to me when I started the site and they provided a lot of guidance to me.
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| In Part 1, “Chasing a Challenge”, Jeff describes his first experiences with a computer, how he got into the industry and what prompted him to start CGarchitect. From its conception in August, 2001, CGarchitect caught the crest of the new wave of digital architectural visualization that has swept the world and dramatically changed the profession of architectural illustration forever.
| Jane Grealy has worked in the architectural illustration industry for over 30 years, has been President of both the American Society of Architectural Illustrators (ASAI) and the Australian Association of Architectural Illustrators, and is currently Website Editor for both those associations.
| Chasing a Challenge
| What was your first experience with computers?
| When I first used a computer it was in elementary school - we were using the Macintosh computers and these little robotic turtle things that we could program and move all over the floor, but even then, I don’t think I really thought about going into computers at the time.
| What did you think you wanted to be (career) when you were young?
| I think the earliest I ever remember thinking about wanting to do something specific was in junior high when I thought I wanted to be an architect or aeronautical engineer.
| What is your educational experience? Do you come originally from an architectural background?
| I went to a technical college here in Calgary, a polytechnic school called Southern Alberta Institute of Technology where I took a drafting and design program, which was 2 years.
| When did you realize that you had a career ahead of you in this industry (digital visualization)?
| At the end of the program there was in internship and I went to work for a month or two for a local estate home builder, 2-3,000 sq foot range, to help him design and draft up the plans. When I finished school, I went to work for him full time and was designing all of his houses and doing client revisions. I was there about a year and a half when he started a condo development which he wanted to visualize in 3d. We bought a copy of 3D Studio Max DOS 4. He gave me the copy and said “ go for it”. So I had to teach myself 3D. I don’t think there were any training courses back then - of course there was no internet. So I was self-taught and did that for 6 months before I left to go to another company called SMED. I worked for them for about 7 years. They did big commercial office interiors – the company I worked for sold all of that - floors, walls, and lighting - the whole 9 yards. I helped run the visualization department where we would create renderings.
When I was in school I thought I really wanted to do architecture or drafting but after doing it for a year I realized that I probably had enough drafting to last for an entire lifetime. So I segue-wayed into those other jobs – it was definitely more interesting.
| “Chasing a challenge”?
| Yes, absolutely. Through my whole career I tend to get bored quickly so
| I like a lot of challenges and variety in what I do.
|  | Jeff hiking up Castle Mountain around 8500 ft
| Do you still see yourself primarily as a digital artist, or as a commentator of the profession?
| After I started to work full time doing 3d, I would have considered myself a digital artist, but, moving more towards business development and managing my own company CGarchitect, I consider myself more in the management and community building and those types of initiatives rather than as an artist. It’s been 4 or 5 years now that I’ve done any production work so I don’t know if I would consider myself a working artist anymore though I certainly enjoy the artwork and enjoy looking at other peoples’ work. I still do a fair bit of photography.
| Because you see so much digital illustration you must have become fairly sophisticated in your tastes?
| I like to think I can spot talent relatively quickly. On an average day I see 30- 50 new images in our gallery every day. I can usually spot and rank an image in 2-3 seconds.
| How did CGarchitect start, a blog a newsletter?
| You’ll have an exclusive if you publish this…
Most people think I started up CGarchitect as a community building exercise. I worked at SMED for about 7 years or so when I finally left and around year 5 or so I was starting to get bored. I had gone through all the different projects and tried different things,so I was looking for something new.
At the time I thought there were probably only a few dozen people in the world doing digital architecture at that time and I had no idea where these people were, other than the peer group I had of fellow Lightscape users – because that was the application that I was using. So I thought I would start this website and once a week and I would post news. I had interviews with all my friends with my fellow Lightscape users, but most importantly, I’d have a job board and in theory everyone would post their jobs and I’d see them before anyone else and I’ll apply for these jobs! So that was really how CGarchitect started, but its evolved into something much, much bigger than I had ever anticipated – in a good way as well. It certainly has! Every job and opportunity I have had since, working for Smoothe over in the UK a local architecture firm and VisMasters - all of those were a direct result of the work I did with CGarchitect.
| Is CGarchitect still your “baby”?
| Yes it is. I have a full time sales person who does all the advertising/sales for CGarchitect but all the rest is still me.
| How has CGarchitect been shaped by outside forces?
| Trends in the industry definitely guide coverage that I’ll have for on the site. New features, articles I am planning, directions that I plan to go in, are certainly driven by trends in the industry. The site, at least the forums anyway, tend to be fairly Autodesk centered, though I have no preference to cover them specifically. It just so happens that is what most people in the industry use. So by virtue of that, it tends to be fairly centric around those types of products and add-ons that work with those products.
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| | So we could describe the site as the largest most prominent digital architectural visualization site?
| Yes I would say so. I got an email from a friend in China - I have been trying to reach out into that market. He had heard through the grapevine that there were quite a few CG websites in Chinese, but the email suggested that most of them are just like the sites in North America and Europe. They are centric around general CG but also cover architecture so I think there is still an opportunity in China given there is such a huge market to have a site like that.
| Did you understand that it might grow so big?
| I really had no idea how big the industry was, and when I first started, it was nowhere near as big as it is now. In hindsight, if I was really looking to start a business and create an online publication for the architectural CG community, I don’t think I could have started it at any better time. I literally really started at the crest of that wave.
| What was your original vision? Milestones along the way?
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| |  | Jeff sailing on a friends boat in Miami
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| I don’t think there were any large changes that happened along the way – it was just a gradual growth. It just grew organically as the industry grew and given that it was such a prominent website it started to gain a lot of traction and traffic within the industry - it became the mainstay for our industry.
| How would you like your community/members to perceive CGarchitect?
| That is one thing I have purposely tried to do from the beginning - a lot of it, because I am running it, hinges around my reputation. That is one thing I have purposely tried to do from the beginning - a lot of it, because I am running it, hinges around my reputation. I want CGarchitect to be viewed as a very professional community, visited by professionals in the industry, and people that want to become part of that industry. I have been told over the years that the tone of conversation that happens on our website is a lot more professional than a lot of other sites on the internet. So that is something that I am proud to keep that way.
| Has CGarchitect lived up to your expectations?
| Yes, by far exceeded them and I think there is still a long ways to go. I’ve got a lot of other things planned.
| Do you feel the increasing range of 3D software options available in the marketplace has this affected anything in your approach at CGarchitect in recent years?
| There was a much bigger offering in the industry when we first started but now it is becoming smaller as Autodesk slowly gobbles up everything.
Most of the applications that people use are Autodesk products. I think it counts for almost 90% of the 3,000 users that took our industry survey.
| I wonder how CGarchitect has affected the use of such products as Autodesk, - by having community that follows the most successful products?
| I am sure it has played a part. People tend to follow the people they look up to in the industry. Sites like CGarchitect have been able to bring those people to the forefront and have showcased them as the top people in the field. People ask what applications they use – people always ask what software you use, what renderer you used? I always like to say it doesn’t really matter because it’s the artist behind the software. I am sure it has played a part. People tend to follow the people they look up to in the industry.
Sites like CGarchitect have been able to bring those people to the forefront and have showcased them as the top people in the field. People ask what applications they use – people always ask what software you use, what renderer you used. I always like to say it doesn’t really matter because it’s the artist behind the software. Like a painter is not going to be asked which paint brush does they use. In the digital world you tend to see that a lot. It does tend to drive a lot of the software purchases and the popularity of certain packages.
| Do commercial considerations on the site ever clash with your personal outlooks? How important is sponsorship/ advertisements?
| No, I don’t recall ever turning down a company for any reason. Maybe when I was working for VisMasters there may have been one, because I had already signed an agreement with VisMasters that said I couldn’t host another on line store. I never turn down advertisers based on another, I don’t ever sell, or haven’t yet, sold the site exclusively to any one – I am open to anyone really.
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| When you look in the traditional publishing industry, I have heard that there are times when advertorial, or editorial, is contingent upon advertising and I find that practice somewhat appalling. It undermines the credibility of the publication, but it happens. There are times when a vendor will come to the magazine and say “we are thinking about doing some sort of advertising with you, but we would like a really nice review in that issue as well”. I don’t really agree with that. Certainly if a sponsor comes on board, I will definitely review their software but it will be an “honest review”. There have been times when I have reviewed software and it hasn’t been favorable and I have said, “look, these are the issues I have found – am I incorrect in my assessment of this of this software? Are there going to be changes made?” And if there weren’t, then I said, “well are you going to correct those things or I won’t publish it.” I don’t want to slam anyone unnecessarily.
| Have you had any particular strategies that have been successful in encouraging member interaction on the site or has it evolved basically under its own steam?
| It started out with the forums, certainly that was the first foray into building interaction in the membership and speaking to a lot of people at conferences. The competitions helped a lot as well. The reason I started those competitions stemmed from my recognizing there were a lot of talented people out there that weren’t being acknowledged in the industry. You can call yourself an industry expert but if nobody knows you are an expert, then you’re not an expert. If nobody knows you have talent, then your opportunities are limited. My goals with those competitions were to ferret out those hidden gems and bring them to the forefront.
| Following in Part 2, "The Name of the Game" Jeff gives his insights into the profession, the role technology has played in the profession of visualization, the influence of software giant Autodesk, and what the real impact of the economic downturn is.
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| click here to read Part 2
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