Capturing the real world and imperfections that make people individuals is what inspires Tempesta3d to create her art. With her hometown in Venice, Italy, inspiration literally walks past Tempesta3d’s doorstep.

"I am lucky enough to live in a touristic city full of art and beautiful people of any age and ethnicity visiting it," she said about what inspires her most. "When I walk around I love to look at every detail on those faces: wrinkles, freckles, small imperfections... I love real things in life: fresh food, pets and hugs and most of all real people with all their baggage of smiles and tears and authenticity. I like to reproduce those real humans into my work. They maybe are not the ones with perfectly Botoxed skin or the cookie cutter smile."

But for the past for months, Tempesta3d has been quarantined with her family to help slow the spread of COVID-19. As of Tuesday, April 14, Italy had experienced 162,488 confirmed cases and 21,067 deaths. The Veneto region, where Tempesta3d lives, has seen 14,251 confirmed cases and recorded 882 deaths, according Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center.

Throughout her isolation, Tempesta3d has shared the art of others, like when Italians sang together form their homes and when a young man played music for his town, as well as created art of her own.

Tempesta3d usually creates high-def textures from photographs of real skin to produce a high level of realism.

But she is limited to her imagination during the quarantine. This time she dreamed up Dario, a new character for L'Homme.

"I was inspired by the old classic male figures. He can be also a modern warrior, an urban paladin, or the guy next door even. He was done with Poser, a program that I adore because had me started this wonderful 3D adventure," she said.

Tempesta3d took some time out of her schedule to answer a few questions about what makes her art unique and how it is keeping her sane during the global pandemic. 

How long have you been designing and why did you start?

Tempesta: It is now more than 10 years that I am involved in the amazing 3D world professionally. I started several years before, for fun. I loved to create small animations for family and friends. Slowly I got passionate about the character-creation process. I then studied anatomy combined to various programs like the aforementioned Poser and Zbrush and Corel and many others that would allow me to achieve what I envisioned.

How long have you been quarantined? How long do you expect it to last?

Tempesta: Veneto is the region where I am and it was, together with Lombardia, between the very firsts to be hit by the virus diffusion.

Luckly it's also a region that is testing a lot from the very beginning and the lockdown activated relatively faster than in other places, this helped to contain the spreading of the virus. Imagine the huge crowd of people that usually populates my town, Venice! That could have been a true human disaster.

I am inside my house from the last 10 days of February, I self isolated as a precaution the moment the virus started to affect the cities in the North of Italy. Soon the government started to close more and more places until the very total lockdown affecting us all now in Italy.

Just today some very strict rules where lifted: until now for example I could only move no more than 200 meters, which allowed me to just walk my dogs or throw the garbage. I was able to buy the groceries online but only in the last two weeks I can finally find more items, although something is always missing here and there. Now they are starting what they call "Phase Two" where things will restart slowly to open, people will exit, but we need to keep distances between each other and wear always masks and gloves, or we are not even allowed in closed spaces like stores or pharmacies.

Who are you quarantined with?
Tempesta: We are five people sharing the house, even a family very loving and united like ours is often struggling. To me was easier to adapt, partially due to my shy and cat-like nature and because I already worked from home. For my family isn't soo easy, the biggest toll is on my baby nephew: he is just 8 years old and is suffering a lot because of boredom, this sense of fear to lose who we love, all the friends and sports and school that for now he cannot frequent.
I fear it will last a long time, I am hoping a vaccine will finally create the immunity for us to go back to our old lives. Until then, being a science lover, I doubt it would be safe. People assume that this is a lethal disease only for those who are already very sick and old. First I say that we all know and love someone old or sick, they deserve protection. Then that assumption of possible lethality is not totally true as we personally know some people who were actually rather young and healthy, and they are no longer with us now, due to this virus.

What are you doing to stay sane during this time?
Tempesta: What do I do to stay sane, you ask? Who told you I am sane? I was rather nutty before this, imagine now. 

Jokes aside, this definitely is affecting me in so many ways and I hope that, by sharing our experiences, we can help each other to cope in the best way possible. I started to picture this scenario back in January already, when I realized how fast the coronavirus was spreading, the way people traveled all over, the way this virus is slow and sneaky on hiding inside us for weeks before unleashing his potential and the fact that, living in Venice, we were approaching Carnival time and so millions of tourists packed all together. That sort of prepared me to think of anything to ease the stress that could have helped in case this will be what has become now. This helped a lot with practical things, the emotional roller coaster is another story!

Even with all this I feel often lost and confused and some days it's hard to focus on things like work or basic stuff like making a meal. Some days I just want to crash on my sofa and cry, looking at the grim news and this sense of unknown on how it will be next for us all.

But I always find strength and will the moment I look at my family. We are all helping each other and what is making us function is to try to keep a scheduled day, like nothing ever happened. We keep consistent with the things we did before, with obvious changes. I find it important to talk a lot between us, to ease the solitude and fears, to have plans in case things go worse, to look at each other's moves when we enter in contact with possible infected items, we follow rhythms almost like if we are on a space station or a ship.

So yes, what is helping is supporting each other, having a routine, keep busy and try to do anything we enjoy to help our souls. It can be drawing, cooking, meditation, gym, video games, reading books and pets, pets, pets! My cats especially are teaching me to be calm and patient, something hard for a hyperactive woman like myself.

This horrid situation will end one day. It will surely change the way we think of ourself as humans, I am still hoping we will all use this event to become better people, more respectful to each other and especially to Nature and to those who are weaker and alone. Seeing how fast our lives can be turned upside down can give a different perception of how important it is to live the life at its full potential and enjoy every little thing.

Renderosity and the 3D world is a huge help right now, a safe place to be, with friends and art to keep us all entertained and hopeful. I have noticed that, no matter in which corner of the world we are, we are all sharing the same feelings and kind of lives now. It is for me sad and beautiful at the same time, it shows me how wonderful we can be when we are together, even if at a distance.

What inspires your creations?

Tempesta: I am lucky enough to live in a touristic city full of art and beautiful people of any age and ethnicity visiting it. When I walk around I love to look at every detail on those faces: wrinkles, freckles, small imperfections... I love real things in life: fresh food, pets and hugs and most of all real people with all their baggage of smiles and tears and authenticity. I like to reproduce those real humans into my work. They maybe are not the ones with perfectly botoxed skin or the cookie cutter smile.

Art allows me to use the fantasy to create a better place, I like to encourage my nephew to open his heart and follow his wildest dreams and always remember to keep alive the lil child within, even when he will be a beautiful young man and I will be an old lady with gray hair and wrinkles.

What projects have you been working on? I saw that you released a new product at Renderosity? Tell me about that and the inspiration behind it.

Tempesta: I cannot be more grateful to be able to work on new projects! It's not always easy (again, five chaotic people and so many pets in this wonderful family!).

My latest one is a male character called Dario, based on the figure L'Homme. I was inspired by the old classic male figures. He can be also a modern warrior, an urban paladin, or the guy next door even. He was done with Poser, a program that I adore because had me started this wonderful 3D adventure.

I am usually inspired by real people I see, mixed with fantasized people I find interesting. I am attracted by the unusual. These days it's a bit harder to get inspired, I used to walk through Venice and look at all these faces surrounding me, now I am only relying on my fantasy.

Right now I already threw myself on a new project.