The other half of the Starving Artist experience: Homeless Artist
polycounter lvl 13
Things have... not gone well, long story short. So I figure I'll ask around here for those of you who have maybe dealt with this before or might have some suggestions, or leads, or anything.
Everybody knows or has been the starving artist. The other half of the Starving Artist experience is the Homeless Artist. I've done starving... but I always could scrape up enough to pay for a roof. Not so much this time.
Basically, I had a narrow window of time to grab another gig after rolling off my most recent 1 year contract. It didn't happen. Now, I'm looking at either pulling a miracle out of my hat and landing something between now and the end of the year when basically no one is hiring, or not being able to pay rent or bills (any of them) after December when my unemployment runs out, and having my place-of-permanent-residence privileges revoked.
Difficulty: married, can't move out of area (wife works for local school district), kid in 4th grade.
If it was just me, I'd have a slew of options. But not so much with a family.
Before anybody asks, my portfolio is an out-of-date mess and that is entirely my fault; I had an hour commute each way to the studio for the last year and with that plus significant overtime plus family needs at home, I barely had time left to eat, pee, and sleep. I'm working on fixing it right now, and adding Forza 5 stuff to it since the track I worked on was just revealed publicly, but as of this moment it's not a huge help.
Since as a parent and a husband I have to plan for worst case scenarios - they seem to find me a lot - has anybody else been through this part of the Artist Life wringer, and do you have any words of wisdom or hard-earned experience, or pretty much anything useful right now? I could use something. Anything, even something small.
Everybody knows or has been the starving artist. The other half of the Starving Artist experience is the Homeless Artist. I've done starving... but I always could scrape up enough to pay for a roof. Not so much this time.
Basically, I had a narrow window of time to grab another gig after rolling off my most recent 1 year contract. It didn't happen. Now, I'm looking at either pulling a miracle out of my hat and landing something between now and the end of the year when basically no one is hiring, or not being able to pay rent or bills (any of them) after December when my unemployment runs out, and having my place-of-permanent-residence privileges revoked.
Difficulty: married, can't move out of area (wife works for local school district), kid in 4th grade.
If it was just me, I'd have a slew of options. But not so much with a family.
Before anybody asks, my portfolio is an out-of-date mess and that is entirely my fault; I had an hour commute each way to the studio for the last year and with that plus significant overtime plus family needs at home, I barely had time left to eat, pee, and sleep. I'm working on fixing it right now, and adding Forza 5 stuff to it since the track I worked on was just revealed publicly, but as of this moment it's not a huge help.
Since as a parent and a husband I have to plan for worst case scenarios - they seem to find me a lot - has anybody else been through this part of the Artist Life wringer, and do you have any words of wisdom or hard-earned experience, or pretty much anything useful right now? I could use something. Anything, even something small.
Replies
A friend of mine (who is also one of my great team members on a project we're working on) was in a situation like that. He was an awesome particle effects and texture artist but he couldn't find any work and he has to support himself, a wife, and his 5 year old son.
He decided to look for non-art related work (he's a construction worker atm I think, he's making about $22 an hour).
He tries to get art stuff done during his limited free time. It isn't the best solution since you'd ultimately want to do the work you enjoy the most, but I suppose you don't have the greatest amount of options.
Whatever you do, good luck!
I work in audio and 3d but the industry is so shit here right now that I had to just take a shipping job for a hvac company to make ends meet.
I don't know what your typical contracts state, but every full-time game-industry contract I signed prevented me from selling my own work while working for an employer. This would limit my opportunities to smooth out the dips of income because I couldn't have a second stream of income from my work.
Working a job outside the AAA industry lets me make more money per hour, sell my own work on the side and have 100% ownership of my work. Every month, I get paid for work I did even if I did it 2 years ago. I only work 40 hours a week at my full-time job, so I have plenty of time to spend with my family and work on my own projects.
What is your job outside of AAA?
Full-time electrician, part-time artist. Most of my income comes from electrical work but artist income helps pay the bills.
Former full-time game artist, 10 years in the industry, 12 titles, 11 published, mostly AAA.
It something wrong with artist job. It takes so much effort, time, talent and passion to get into the industry.
And it seems that it doesn't pay back very well at all.
I sometime think that being a game artist is so dangerously close to being a looser.
I really wish topicstarter luck.
At the risk of derailing - there's a reason I keep hearing everyone say not to get into game art unless you _love_ doing it. Unless you're a rockstar in the industry, pay will be okay at best, job security non-existent unless you work for Blizzard or 2/3 other companies that don't lay off with every cycle (even then it's still not always secure). But then you'll already be competing with everyone else to work at those few companies, so, again you'd need to be part of the elite best-of-the-best club. Meanwhile companies can take advantage of the fact that there's not enough jobs for everyone by underpaying, overworking, laying off, etc. - just generally perpetuating this whole situation.
Unless you're some hot-shot rockstar designer with a marketable name (i.e. the Kojimas, Suda51s, CliffyBs, Jaffes, etc. of the world) you're part of the nameless mass of programmers, artists, and designers that can get fucked as far as the end user is concerned. Every other industry seemingly has better pay and conditions for equivalent positions (with the probable exception of VFX). You're not gonna get financially rewarded for your passion, except by the intrinsic fact that you get to do what you love, so you better make sure you're in it for the right reasons.
All I can offer to GarageBay is what's been said before - take a crappy menial job if you have to, if at least for part time. It sucks, I've had to do it, and it's apparently what a lot of us have.
As I've been in a similar situation I can give one piece of advice, Don't Stop doing your Art.
I lost my job as 3D artist, and due to poor economics and a iffy portfolio (my own fault) I got stuck in the unemployement train, I managed to last for a year using all my saving but was close to hitting rock bottom.
In the end I finally was able to get a part time job, doing IT support by phone, the hours were poor and the pay is still a crime, but it was enough to get going. But for me the Money issues and unemployment were very tiring, along with personal issues and the lousy working conditions I kinda fell into a rut and let my Artwork suffer because of it.
Only recently i've been able to get things going again but I'm rusty as heck and have to catch up for a lot of lost time.
Long story short, try to get something menial to keep the boat afloat, heck I was looking foor hotel doorman midnight shifts at some point, BUT when you get home hug yer family and keep at that thing that you do. don't stop .
it can be tiresome sometimes but in the end you can look for a new job better when you're home situation is more stable.
Honestly, with it being the holiday season, lots of places will be hiring, and I always gave a lot of hours to people that were happy to be there and wanted to work.
Retail is a dead-end job with terrible pay. It's fine for the very short-term but won't help you in the future.
You're much better off getting into an apprenticeship for a technical trade. You will start out at the same pay level or better, and it will count towards a certification. There are lots of certified trades so you can find something that is suited towards your interests.
The worst thing you could do is assume your circumstances will never happen again. Invest in something now that will help you survive for the rest of your life.
All the best to you man. There are more people than you know that have been in your shoes and are wishing you find your way through this.
Take any job, be good at it, get paid, and do art when you can.
Good luck.
What saved my ass, was I posted here on polycount, looking for tips on my portfolio, resume, and cover letter. I got a LOT of great advice. Job one for me was to lose my blogspot portfolio, and job two was to lose the cover letter. I went with dunked.com for my portfolio, which I updated. I then went to forums.indiegamer.com and posted my availability there.
After a while, and some really frustrating false starts, I got a low paying job. But there was a lot of assets they needed, and they didn't take long to create. So it worked out that I was able to make about $15 an hour, which saved our asses. We're still in debt, and will be for a while, but we're climbing out of the hole we're in.
I feel ya, it sucks hardcore. But find a little 9-5, that'll pay the bills. It doesn't have to be mcdonalds, there's plenty of jobs you can do that pay better than that, and aren't as humiliating. While you're searching for those, take time to put out as many resumes as you can. Something will pop, you just have to keep at it. and keep at it, and keep at it.
I struggled working in the games industry for only 4-5 years (I'd been an animator/illustrator in online publishing previously) and decided to leave a full time gig at a small studio where I was the only artist and got no leave/super entitlements and had no security. I've spent the last 8 months studying to be a teacher and will be registered in just a few weeks (in Australia teachers get payed well). I'll keep my art for myself, earn more and have more time to spend with my family.
If you can't imagine yourself doing this in another 10 years' time, maybe it's time to start looking at other options. Good luck!
I am married with 2 younger kids (8 and 4 now) but things have just gotten stable for me in the last year and some change. Prior to that it was a roller coaster of life fucking me in the ass.
There were times we were actually homeless, all our stuff in storage and crashing at friends houses and family helping out as much as possible. I have done other odd jobs here and there to help make it by, My wife picking up work whenever she could to help out and just finding any way/source to make money to get by.
My family moved all over the place from 2007 on until we moved here in spring 2012. I've thought about leaving games and doing something else but I never did. My wife kept pushing me when I was struggling and when she wanted me to quit I was pushing her to believe in me. It is a hard thing to keep going at times but the best thing you can do is get any job, anywhere you can make some money. Even work you don't want to do. I did construction work for a while and the pay sucked and I was away from home all week but it helped my family survive. Picking up freelance gigs here and there.
Seriously if you have some work and its under NDA. Fuck that at this point. Put it up on a secret page and only share that with places you are applying. Your family and life comes first and foremost so if it's good work use it. Don't wait. Places are still hiring. It may be slower because it is the holidays but I know places are always looking. Freelance. Pick up anything you can. Sometimes a few props here or there is enough to pay the bills.
Anyways man. Good luck with everything, keep your head up and look out for your family. They are what matter the most.