ZBrushCentral

A Day in The Life of Character Artists:

Community
#1

Hello folks,

I have a class this quarter that requires me to find out a bit about our dream profession in the game industry. As of now, I’m aiming high for the character artist position. As a result, I’m hoping to find out a bit more about the position. If there are any character artists out there that feel like sharing some of their knowledge, I’d really appreciate it. Here are some question’s I’d like to know more about:

  1. What did you do to get the job?
  2. What sort of portfolio is required?
  3. What’s it like on the job?
    a. A normal day.
    b. Crunch time.
    c. Keeping up with technology trends.
    d. Stress and job security.

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated!

#2

Well… I’m not a top-row artist, but I do work for animation and videogame characters…

  1. What did you do to get the job?
  • Work hard no payment
  • Work harder no payment
  • Work harder a little payment
    I am working with a group of friends at school (we are all professors) and we are getting our first good contracts. I have never worked at a studio, but applying at every studio will give you better chances.
  1. What sort of portfolio is required?
  • Box Modeling
  • Hires Modeling
  • Uv Layouts
  • Texturing
  • Drawing
  • Rigging
  • Keyframe Animation

  1. What’s it like on the job?
    Depending on the place that you are working in… right now i just came to check out my e-mail after playing a little with my friends, but in the morning we couldnt even blink to deliver a character. When you freelance or work by your own, you have to watch closeley the things you are doing.

    a. A normal day.
    Generating Ideas for our new characters and our dreamed videogame, shortfilms… creating some art to practice the softwares. Some training DvD’s and feedback with each other. Working on the characters, animation, developing tools… Meal time, play time (usually hacky sack). Back to the workstations. At night, play time (Usually Gears of war, Guitar hero, Rock band… )

    b. Crunch time. (Is this work time??)
    First of all, planning.
    Second… Planning
    With proper planning of the pipeline, it is really fast and fun to work. The work has always priority, so there are times when we don`t eat or play at all (and we sleep 2 or 3 hours a day :stuck_out_tongue: )

    c. Keeping up with technology trends.
    Internet, Zbrush central, CgSociety, Training Dvds

    d. Stress and job security.
    Stress, a lot. Murphy’s law dictates that the effort to make something is inversley proportional to the time to do it, so, when time tends to zero, the effort tends to infinity :lol:
    Job security… well the wrists always ache… and well… i have never heard of a workstation exploding
    Take care of your eyes! (blink at least one time every 3 seconds)

And the most important:

Enjoy it!!

#3

My advice would be stay away from games for next 3-4 years until software is not so limited. Plus gets boring working on same game for 2-4 years.

Aim higher and go for film, plenty of small studio doing cgi trailers for games/movies.
Character models for games is pretty boring compared to film type work.

Alot of time you find yourself doing pain in ass tasks to just get your character to work in game correctly since first 1-2 years the game engine is ****ed and doesnt support all features you need to do your character models.

I have game studio background in character art, I would only go back to games if it was my last resort.

#4

Hello again and thanks for the replies!

ISK-86, thank you for your detailed response, I’m glad to hear you’re starting to get some good work!

Kravit, honestly, I’m a little apprehensive about getting involved with triple-A game titles, but I want to experience the industry for a few years. What I’d really like to do is form a small-scale company making our own stuff, but I know that’s several years down the road and I really need some industry experience before that.

#5

looks like you have a skill for lowpoly and subd modelling,
film and TV are higher poly than the meshes you show on your site.

There are subtle differences between higher subd lvl and higher rez typologies, especially when it comes to texturing and blendshapes.
Most of it comes down to the way studios work.

1. What did you do to get the job?
train HARD

2. What sort of portfolio is required?
good

3. What’s it like on the job?
challenging

a. A normal day.
get lunch break and weekend

b. Crunch time.
don’t get lunch break or weekend

c. Keeping up with technology trends.
not neccessary to know all the new software, just the new methods.
Depends on role, as a modeller for example not neccessary to explore all apps, time better spent spent advancing other skills, like rigging.
Better theory is better than more software knowledge.

d. Stress and job security.
LOL… you serious! FEAST OR FAMINE.

hope that helps…btw good luck:+1: