Any game designers out there?

[C-Fu327]

Hey guys my name is Charles and I'm going to school right now for Video game art and design online at Westwood College. For one of my classes I need to interview 3 people who are in the video game field. You don't have to be a designer could be anything just as long as it's in the industry.I heard about this site through a class mate. I have about 6 questions to ask and if you could put your full name and job description down or email me at darkhawk327@aim.com I would appreciate it greatly. This is worth a lot for my project in class and I'm kind of in a bind since I've been trying to get help and if anyone can offer a few minutes of there time to fill these questions out I would be very greatful. Answers don't have to be long.

1. Tell me about being a ( name of profession) ?

2. What do you do in a typical day?

3. Which duties do you like most? Least?

4. How did you get into this field?

5.How do most people prepare for this job? What skills are needed?

6.What are the entry-level positions?


Thank you for answering these questions. If you guys want you can just send these answers to my email. Thanks again.

-Charles Fuente-

[blankslatejoe]

Hey there C-Fu327

I'm going to respond to your questions right here, instead of via email, for a few reasons:

1: because some people might not feel comfortable giving you their email addresses by sending you an email
2: to encourage discussion right here
3: to encourage you, in an underhanded way, to come back and visit GA more often!

So here goes:
1: I'm a game artist, I make game art all day. This involves modeling in 3dstudio, zbrush, maya, mudbox, or whatever my bosses give me, texturing and concepting in photoshop, and discussing direction, and techniques with co artists and other departments. You'll have to be more specific with your question if you'd like to know more.

2: 10am - get in, check email, plan day.
10-12, work, modeling, texturing, meetings. usually at one point in the morning we'll get called together to look at how some other game is handling some certain technique.
12-1, lunch
1-7, more work. this varies from day to day depending on whats asked of me. currently it's texturing. last week, modeling, the week before, concepting. I have more variety in my job than most companies allow. At 6 oclock sometimes i take a break and play a game of ping pong against one of the designers, which I usually lose.

3: I enjoy concepting the most, but that's because it's become my comfort zone over the last year. Pushing yourself by doing what you don't enjoy/feel comfortable with, is a way to make yourself improve though.

4: I got into the field by participating in the communities, entering the contests on cgchat.com and similar forums (like this one!) and working hard in my spare time. Art school, while it was fun and I learned a lot, did NOT teach me anythign about game art. You pretty much have to learn that in your spare time.

5:art school will help your all-around art sense, particulaly if you go to a realist school. Finding a good one of those is tough though, and not cheap. The cheapest way to prepare is to participate in as many forums as possible and enter as many comps as possible. That gives you a theme, deadlines, resources/help, and your first contacts. When you begin to get good enough to be hired, people will notice. For my job I needed to know how to model, but more importantly I needed to know how to texture. Modeling is fairly quick to pick up these days, but a lot of artists don't spend the time on learning how to make a decent texture. That being said, a good traditional painting background helps tons

6:entry level positions: junior modeler/texture artist and prop artist are the most common/simplest. Character work involved more complicated modeling (for deformation), and environment work involves a lot more...quirks. Some people will try and start in QA and move into art, but I feel that downplays the importance of QA on the totem pole, which it really shouldn't be.

Anyway, those are my thought!
goodluck!

[C-Fu327]

Thanks a lot I appreciate you answering these questions and taking the time to do so. Sounds very cool thanks again. Now I just need two more people and I'll be able to finish my project.