Paint
Oil on canvas. Large-scale portraits and narrative work, shown and awarded.
Painting · 3D · Film · Systems
Pursuit of flow through creativity.
A creative practice that runs across oil paint, 3D, filmmaking and the systems that hold them together — documented in the open. Along the way I built the tools I needed: a second brain for Obsidian, and a free plugin to drive it.
Scanline VFXBrown Bag FilmsGiant AnimationRHA Gold Medal 2015MFA · NCAD DublinOil paintingBlenderUnreal EngineDaVinci ResolveObsidian
Why this exists
You're not scattered.
You're refracted.
If you paint and model and edit and write, you've probably been told to pick one. That advice assumes the disciplines compete. They don't — the painting teaches you light for the render, the render teaches you composition for the frame, the frame teaches you patience for the canvas.
What actually breaks a practice like that isn't a lack of focus. It's that nobody teaches you how to hold it all together — so the references scatter, the projects stall, and starting again feels heavier than continuing.
Build
3D environments and characters — a decade of production work across film and animation.
Film
Documentary and narrative. Shot, cut and graded — the whole chain, solo.
System
The workflows underneath it all, and the tools built because nothing else fit.
The films
The Art of the Journey.
A documentary series about making things — paintings, films, tools — and what it actually takes to keep a practice going. Shot, cut and graded solo.
What I've built
Three things. One system.
A vault you can buy, a plugin that's free, and a membership for the teaching. Take one, take all three, or just watch the films.
Coming soon · founding list open
Polymath Vault
The second brain I actually use, prepared for Obsidian — structure, templates, libraries and guides, with Prismathic configured to drive it.
Explore Polymath Vault
Free · coming soon
Prismathic
The Obsidian plugin behind it — a hub, project dashboards and PRISM working lenses over the notes you already have.
Meet Prismathic
Membership · opening later
The Studio
Tutorials pulled straight out of real projects — the files, the early cuts, and a vote on what gets taught next.
See The Studio
The practice
It starts at the easel.
Oil on canvas is where all of this began — large portraits and narrative work, shown and awarded. The 3D, the films and the systems grew out of trying to keep that going alongside ten years in VFX.
Who's behind it
Darragh Dempsey
Irish artist and filmmaker. Ten years in VFX and animation — Scanline, Brown Bag Films, Giant Animation — while keeping a painting practice alive alongside it.
I built these systems because I needed them: a practice spread across oil paint, 3D, film and research kept falling apart between tools. The Polymath Journey is that rebuilding, filmed as it happens.
RHA Gold Medal 2015 · BA & MFA, NCAD Dublin
Senior 3D — Scanline VFX · Brown Bag Films · Giant Animation
Come along
Follow the journey.
New episodes, progress notes, and first word when Polymath Vault opens. One email when there's something worth sending — no launch theatre.
Free, through Substack — unsubscribe any time. Or subscribe on Substack ↗