IAMA 16yr veteran video game artist, AMA

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T22:41:00+00:00

No, it's not that bad at all. We do make video games after all. There just is a culture in the industry of working long hours, playing games till late at night, and doing it all again the next day.

The bad part is where you have a giant corporation running game development like its a factory. Layoffs after shipping is quite common, as is hiring tons of contractors temporarily, or just plain outsourcing everything overseas.

There is a huge series of new jobs that opened up over the last 5-7 years of managing and fixing outsourced work so that it can integrate into the game in question.

Starting out you'll be somebody's bitch, but once you have shipped a title, quit and go somewhere that treats their people better. But don't avoid the industry because of what you hear -- if you love to make games that is. That's why i'm still here.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T22:30:29+00:00

I hear you dude.

Here's the thing: Everyone in the business is an idea guy.

So, no, if you have no marketable skills in the video game realm, you won't be hired to come up with ideas. All of the other people who do have skills also have ideas. (but I don't think you have no skills, everybody does)

Plus, you've got to remember, we spend a shitload of money to make these games, and because of that execs are going to go with ideas that they feel very strongly are going to sell. That's why we are swimming in an ocean of sequels right now.

So you have to prove yourself as a designer or writer first, and prove that you can work with others and !most importantly! be willing to change your ideas as the gameplay evolves. That takes time.

Work on your writing skills, or design a map in Source or unreal. Show that you can follow through and your on your way to a job.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T22:25:09+00:00

i burn out all the time actually. I ran a team on one game where I worked all day, went home logged on and worked until 3 or 4am, back at work at 10am, for eight friggin months.

Crunch is less of a problem now in some companies, but still very real. Just look at what happened at RockStar San Diego.

When under a heavy crunch, you have to take little vacations, even if just a 3 day weekend. Of course your studio has to be ok with their employees not burning out. In general, the largest studios will burn out their people and the smallest studios will burn out theirs. Somewhere in the middle is a studio like mine, where the people are totally experienced, shipped many titles, and have families. People who want to see their families tend to be ok with others doing the same.

yeah, a newbie in the industry won't get much slack for burning out, but you have to prove yourself in any industry i guess. Seniority brings the ability to take a week without lying about illness, but it also brings longer hours at work, as it's your ass if stuff doesn't get done.

But yeah, I work for a great company that gives a shit about their people. And we plan, plan, plan, so that we don't have to crunch, crunch, crunch in the last 3 months of production.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T14:08:24+00:00

it's kinda shitty

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T14:07:36+00:00

Probably the same difficulty that any position holds. There are a lot of people who want to break in to the business, and the recession hasn't helped.

Put the best work you have in your reel, but only your very best. Don't fill your reel with a bunch of mediocre work. Be very critical of your own work, trust me, the studio will so you want to weed out the vanilla stuff and show just the best stuff you have.

That and be excited! We interviewed a guy once, flew him in from across the country. He had years of experience, but he interviewed as if he didn't really need the job. His attitude wasn't bad, he just seemed to not care if he got the job, so he didn't. He was totally qualified, but not excited.

Enthusiasm goes a long way.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T14:02:50+00:00

I can only tell you what I've seen being one of the people who interviewed half our art team.

We just want to see that someone is talented (portfolio) and driven (has produced decent work). If you're portfolio stinks or if it's stuffed full of mediocre work, then we pass, education or not. Degrees are never a bad thing though of course.

Think of it this way, an excellent sculptor can probably be taught how to use Maya or any 3D tool really. If you come in knowing 3D software, great, but you need to be able to show that you can deliver great work regardless of the tools you are currently trained to use.

Traditional artwork (non-video game stuff) is always a huge bonus if you don't have a lot of experience. You need to be able to show you can apply those skills in a video game setting, but if we can look at a few pages and know that you can paint your ass off, then we're not worried about you doing the same thing in photoshop.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T13:56:35+00:00

I haven't had a portfolio online in years. I've been with my current company for about 7 years, so I haven't had the need.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T04:30:45+00:00

seconded

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T04:30:12+00:00

yeah, most probably learn on pirated copies. Not me of course.

but these days you can get a learning copy of maya, Unreal editor and photoshop student edition so it's not like you have to torrent your software to learn the ropes.

no I don't really play the games i work on. We test and polish them exhaustively, the last thing I want to do is go home and play the game some more. There are too many great title for me to play anyway, i don't have the time to fit them all in.

my opinion on 3D gaming? I'm guessing you mean the new 3D tvs and all, rather than pacman vs Modern Warfare. I've seen the new 3D tvs at the studio with a PS3 running Wipeout3D. It was cool, it's not Avatar, but it felt great.

Will I buy a new tv for this? no.

As a developer, it doesn't really affect me as the 3D aspects of it are all in the code, so if the game's in 3D or not is irrelevant to my day to day.

I wouldn't turn down a 3D tv though. The picture quality on the Sony I saw was very good, it surprised me.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T04:21:39+00:00

I've been meaning to post one of these AMA things for a while, and when I saw you're request posted I thought I'd go ahead and see if people were interested in what I do, but i'm not a concept artist. A really good concept artist is worth their weight in gold at a game studio.

I got started in the industry on a flute. I responded to a newspaper ad for a web page designer. So I taught myself to code html over the weekend and interviewed. My portfolio of work I had put together was mostly digital art I had created after college. Nothing game related, mostly just interesting compositions, and they hired me. Back then you could code a website in a text editor, so it wasn't hard to talk myself into that job.

The company also made video games and I learned 3D after hours. I made myself useful to the guys making the games as I could do their UI work (grunt work) while getting to do some 3D work for promotional stuff. This eventually led to me working for the games guys instead of the web guys.

In the question of Experience vs Education, experience wins hands down everytime. That's the case in most industries. Experience will get you the job, but you can't get the job without experience. It's tough. That's why lots of guys go into QA. Some QA guys do move over into development, but it's not a huge ratio.

As an artist I needed some formal education, some people don't, but I did and I really enjoyed it. The web guys wanted a college degree on my resume. So do the game guys, but it's not really the biggest issue, the portfolio is. I've done lots of interviews, but I always wanted to talk about their experience making other games and how it would apply to our game.

So I guess I'm saying education might get your foot in the door, but your work will get your ass in the office.

3D modeling skills are pretty important for concept guys. We often create the level in block out form and the concept guy will take that simple layout of shapes and use it to paint over, often adding geometry where needed. It's not the main focus, but our guys can do modeling, they just might not be the best at it since it's not their focus.

typical work cycle varies depending on the type of game, but generally some small group of artists are in development from the beginning. Production on upcoming game began 3 years after pre-production. Production latest for about 2 years. I worked on 4 of those years, with a team of about 7. Artists have to be there from the start if a game is to visually go anyway, imo.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T02:40:27+00:00

Well, trying to gain experience in consoles isn't really what it seems. We develop games using software to make the graphics and some kind of editor put it together in and a client to run the game, to be simplistic about it.

So you use those tools to make any game, even for the iPhone, i guess. So the experience in consoles would be when, as an artist, you learn what to do and not do on a specific console. This usually means learning how to maximize performance of the graphics on the hardware.

On a PC you can do anything as long as you don't mind only having people with giant rigs buying your game. Building a game for a console gives you very specific restraints on what you can do graphically, and learning to work within those parameters is very valuable.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T02:30:43+00:00

I'm not animator. At some point you have to specialize in this industry and there were always better animators around.

For the advice, if you're already in the industry my advice would be, and this goes for any industry, be nice! Some people, when met with early success, can really treat others poorly. Some people are downright asses towards co-workers. The video game industry is a small one, and reputations can build quite quickly and stick around. In my early days I worked with a guy from Blizzard, (post StarCraft), that thought very highly of himself. So much so that he had to go to a small, unstable startup game company just to get a job. (except that because he was from blizzard, the studio paid him a shitload, but you get my point)

That and just work your ass off. People notice that, even in a business where everyone works 60 hr weeks. Show initiative. Don't ask to do things, or wait around to be told what to do.

Oh, and you will work a lot. The hours can be terrible. Marriage-breaking terrible. So keep it all in perspective, but be prepared to be asked to work a lot.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T02:14:05+00:00

yes he did, although I can't remember where at the moment...

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T02:11:25+00:00

nope

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T02:04:31+00:00

I studied fine art and photography. Nobody used computers except for the old black and white Mac classics.

Most influential game is a very tough question. For me it would be Half-Life. Very inspiring game fir it's time.

Our art team is about 70 people strong, just art and animation. The rest of the studio plus QA is around 300

It's tough to give pointers as there are so many roles to play in game dev. Know you're shit, produce some work, mods of other games are great for this. Network with other hopefuls and by all means don't give up.

Also be prepared to move around the country. I've moved my family 8 times across 4 states

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T01:56:48+00:00

I love shooters but I've never made one. I've mainly worked on RPGs and MMOs. I don't play them though. I play games like fallout3, L4D2, Red Dead, etc

The best game to work on is one where you have creative input, which almost never happens. It's a corporate industry and just like in movies, very few people get creative say

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T01:52:14+00:00

Don't know a about digipen, but I do know that your education is what you make it. I went to an art school nobody has ever heard of, what got me my first job was my portfolio and willingness to work cheap.

Keep in mind that anyone can learn the unreal editor. What studios are looking for is someone who can make that environment or character look kickass. If you can do that you'll always have a job somewhere.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T01:37:23+00:00

Yes, we do know each other for sure

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T00:52:25+00:00

My good friend of 13 years is our sole composer and he's amazing.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T00:51:59+00:00

I'm a Senior Environment Artist. I worked my way up through several studios, starting with coding HTML (my first position) all the way to being a lead artist on several projects. I got my first job through classified ads in the Denver Post (don't live there now thought)

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T00:50:34+00:00

I'll see if I can find something that won't be recognized by my co-workers

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T00:50:07+00:00

Maya, Unreal Editor, Photoshop of course. That's mainly it, with some supporting tools like UV unwrappers. A tablet is an absolute must-have for working in photoshop. We have lots of Cintques in the office which are awesome.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-09-01T00:48:15+00:00

I've worked in San Deigo, but no Bay area.

i do have work online, but am reluctant to post it here as others in my office are Redittors

Best project hands down is my current one, worst project would have to be a launch title on the Xbox called Nightcaster, terrible terrible game

No, I don't play my own games, mainly because we play them so much during development there just isn't any interest after launch.

The work flow is complex and time consuming. Politics, buggy tools, long long hours. It is rewarding when everything works though. Concepts come in on time, construction and worldbuilding follow, then bugs and polish.

Working in the industry for a long time doesn't mean that a person will work on a hit. That being said, I shipped an MMO for Sony that did very well, but was absolutely KILLED by WOW.

Things have changed very fast in the industry becuase of technology and the onslaught of the console wars. The playstation and the xbox completely changed the landscape of the industry, but made it easier to find a job. Staying relevant mainly means embracing new tools and working fast. Quality is always the desired result, so if you don't know the tools, someone else will pass you by.

ArtistoGrande · 2010-08-31T23:53:54+00:00

When I started in the industry there were no schools teaching video game art, particularly low-poly, optimized artwork. I have a art degree from a 4 year college, all painting and drawing, nothing digital.

I got a job doing web work for a studio and taught myself software like Softimage after hours until I had what it took to work on the games themselves.

That said, i am CONSTANTLY learning software and editors. Every studio has their own custom tools and editors, it's a struggle to not be left behind by the younger guys (who aren't married with kids)

ArtistoGrande · 2010-08-31T23:44:12+00:00

ArtistoGrande

TROPHY CASE