Mentorship case study · 3 months

Jwalin Adhyaru

Tropical bay in Unreal with Houdini, SpeedTree and PCG

~~18 months of applications~~ Hired

Houdini
SpeedTree
Unreal Engine
PCG
Substance Designer

The whole bay — From higher up the whole bay reads at once: dense palms along the beach and sparser growth climbing the hillside.

Challenge

Jwalin started Houdini and SpeedTree from the basics, with one goal: an environment that brings them together inside Unreal.

Approach

We built a tropical bay in Unreal, combining Houdini, SpeedTree and PCG, with a Substance Designer material study alongside it.

Outcome

A finished Unreal environment, a reworked portfolio and, after an 18-month search, a job. Today he's Production Lead at Knownsense Studios.

The work, step by step

01
The shoreline
At beach level, the water, the sand and the scattered pebbles carry the foreground. The headland and the small islet give the shot depth.
02
Through the palms
Palms and broad-leaf plants frame the bay. Mixing tall trunks with low ground cover keeps the vegetation from reading as one flat layer.
03
Inside the undergrowth
From inside the vegetation, the dense ground plants in the foreground test whether the scatter still holds up right in front of the camera.
04
Presenting the work
We also worked on how to present a piece: a circuit-board material from Substance Designer, shown on a clean cylinder with its texture maps laid out beside it, the way studios like to see a material breakdown.

In Jwalin's words

Mario was my mentor for 3 months, he taught me Houdini, speedtree from basics and gave me career guidance with portfolio review as well. I used to feel overwhelmed approaching Houdini but Mario’s teaching style makes learning new feel like piece of cake. He tries to understand students mindset and goals before teaching, this is very rare and one of the reasons why others mentors didn’t work for me. It’s still funny how I think SpeedTree is very easy software because the way Mario taught me. But in reality it’s actually very complex and I might have had never learned SpeedTree. But we learn new things to get forward in life, which was also an issue for me. I was looking for a job since 1.5 years but couldn’t land. Mario prepared me for interviews, curated my portfolio, helped me setup linkedin . This actually helped me land a job after 1.5 years ! So thank you Mario for everything and I would recommend everyone who is new, intermediate or some pro looking for fresh view to get mentorship from Mario.
Jwalin Adhyaru

Mentor's note

I worked with Jwalin as his mentor for three months, and it was great to see how much he grew in that time.

He approached Houdini, SpeedTree, and Unreal with curiosity and determination, even when things felt overwhelming at first. He takes feedback well, asks the right questions, and steadily improves by applying what he learns. It was especially nice to see his confidence grow alongside his skills.

Original recommendation on LinkedIn

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