Valve takes their skins ingame over and over again. Their art is astonishing. Everything they do is extraordinary.
But we know nothing about them. We decided we need to fix that.
Here we present you an interview with great guys from the 2Minds studio: Luiza McAllister @luizamcallister and Thiago Lehmann @lehmannthiago
Recently they celebrated the tenth anniversary of the studio.
A tiny reminder. This studio brought us these perfectly beautiful skins “Empress”, “Emperor”, “Justice”, “Mortis” and Bullet Queen and they have more skins in their workshop that we’re waiting for.
– Tell us a little about yourself. How did you meet? And how did you decide to start a studio?
– We studied at the same school but we were from different classes after we both got into college we kind of found each other online and decided to explore some illustration styles together. Before Thiago would draw and I would color, but now both do everything. We have a really good dynamic on directing each other’s work and came up with a fast workflow as a team. When we started 2Minds social media 10 years ago some freelance gigs came up, so we decided to officialize our collaboration as a studio.
– Where do you get the inspiration for your works?
– Pretty much everywhere. We both like to play different games, explore different cultures, watch movies, and series from other countries. We try to surround ourselves with different kinds of art.
– How would you describe your art style?
– Hm… We do digital art, but we don’t have a “signature” style. We are always trying to explore new techniques and achieve unique results.
– What is your favourite theme for art?
– Luiza likes to draw women in her free time, most of them inspired by songs she listens to. Thiago likes to draw creatures and characters.
– What was the most difficult task that you had as an artist?
– We were never afraid of trying out new things, so almost all freelance gigs we got along the years were difficult at first. We learned a lot from this though, gathering a lot of experience in different areas.
– Tell us about your biggest fuckup and your greatest success.
– Fuckups usually happen behind doors, like losing an entire week of work due to lack of backup hahah, We try to keep things as professional as we can. Great success is another mystery. We LOVE our achievements in different areas, like our own comic IP, our work with games (specially CSGO work) and some other opportunities!
– What soft do you use in your work?
– We work with Photoshop and 3dCoat.
– What are your favourite books and movies?
– Hard to pick favorites because we like so many things. For the book we could say something along the lines of Dune (Frank Herbert) and Neil Gaiman’s stories. Films.. Really hard to pick. Different movies have different qualities to them, rather no pick favorites 😛
– Any favorite game maybe?
– CSGO, Overwatch and Path of Exile.
– Do you play CS a lot?
– Not as much as we could. We spend a lot of time with it during work and we like to watch the tournaments more than playing because of the pressure the game puts on you, so we probably watch it more on Twitch than anything else. Working on something 8hrs + a day and playing it in your free time is a bit of a challenge. It’s healthy for us to step away from it a little.
– What is your favourite weapon in CS GO?
– Luiza likes the AWP. It has a really nice space to design on and pretty flat places that are nice to place illustrations. Thiago likes the Desert Eagle.
– And what about favourite maps? Do you have one?
– Dust2 for Luiza, Aztec for Thiago (spent a lot of times in lan houses back in the day)
– Are you interested in CS GO tournaments? And what’s your favorite team if you do?
– Yes! A LOT! We had the opportunity to watch BLAST live here in São Paulo (BR), it was awesome. We are biased for our own country’s teams, we usually cheer for Brazillian teams, like Furia and miBR.
– And back to the art. What are your favourite skins? No matter is it your art or maybe there are some other artists’ skins that you like?
– From our own skins it’s pretty hard to choose. We put our hearts in our work all the time, everything is planned and we develop all skins together. We recently posted our Pantheon collection so Zeus AWP is still fresh in our mind. Feels like its a fan favorite too 🙂
From other artists we have a lot of favorites. We’re specially attracted to styles that we don’t work with, like 3d and graphic design that it’s not focused on illustration. We can mention some special ones we loved to work with like Onilolz, Zaphk and Sparkwire. and other inspirations like DePuiseau, Blossomalex and SLIMEface.
– And if you do play CS then what is your favourite skin in your inventory?
– We don’t really have an inventory on 2Minds account to be honest, most of our time is spent on the workbench haha.
– What do you think of simple skins like Red Line? Do you like them or you think that they are too simple?
– Of course, we do, we think that it’s awesome that CS GO has space for all kinds of designs. The clean ones (like Red Line) are awesome for those who like something that is not flashy and busy – and also perfect for people who like to craft with stickers. Sometimes the best way is a simple and elegant solution.
– When did you start making skins? Are there any other games except CS that have your skins? What game was first? And how did you decide that you want to make a game skin?
– We started making skins in 2017, the first we did was Empress and the Tarot Collection series 1. We actually started making concepts for DOTA2 sets, the 3D part of those were made by the awesome Onilolz and Zaphk.
– How does the skin concept appear?
– The concept it’s pretty much a sketch on top of the weapons base model. We test it ingame to see if all things placed are actually working and after a few tweaks when we think it’s good enough, we start working on it.
– How much time does one skin take you?
– Depends on what style we are working on. We usually take from 3 to 15 days.
– Will we see some easter eggs in your skins?
– Most of our stickers have an alternate “easter egg” design when you scrape it. About weapon skins, probably soon 😡 !!
– Did you like your collaboration with Ana Zahp and OniLolz? Was it hard? Was it fun? Was it both?
– We love to work with both of them, they are really talented professionals and we started making skins because they suggested we try it out. We are actually friends in real life, travelled together, live close enough to grab a bite now and then <3
– Who else you would like to collaborate with?
– HMMMM… We are already talking to other artists 😡 We don’t want to jinx it.
– What was your first skin that was accepted by Valve?
– The Empress!
– Why did Valve take only the skins they did and didn’t accept other gorgeous ones?
– We have no idea how Valve picks the skins. We try to do different art tiers (like from covert to mil-spec styles), but in the end they will choose anything they think it’s interesting for a case.
– What other steam workshops excite you? What artists can you suggest to follow?
– We LOVE DOTA2 workshop, but we only work with 2d art and a bit of texture, so we need some 3d artists to be interested in. We suggest following Hunter (hntrluc), ChemicalAlia, Dr.Robo, and all other artists we mentioned before.
– What are your upcoming plans?
– We are finishing a second part of the Tooth Fairy collection, it will have some mil-specs and a high tier design for the M4A4 .
– What is your advice to those who want to become an artist?
– Don’t be afraid to explore different things. Different styles, media, softwares, it’s all part of the process of creating your own style!
https://2minds.studio/ special for CS.MONEY
