After seeing this thread over 9 times on my Facebook, I just want to repost my only reply:
I am just curious as to what the expectation is for how many there should be? When I started over 12 years ago I felt like I knew personally everyone that did what I do. So to me it feels like a big number. When I started we would model, texture, rig, and even animate. So I feel not only the number of character artists has gone up drastically there is also dedicated texture artists, riggers, and animators all doing once was one job. I see my job more and more turning into several peoples jobs. Personally I am surprised how many more jobs there are, compared to how few there there were.
Well, when I started this discussion with a friend here in Montreal. We kinda added up the people we knew and the places we knew, and the number was somewhere around 30-40.
We thought that was insanely low for Montreal... which is considered a Mecca of Game Development.
The funny thing is, here in Montreal if a Character Position is opened up, it's usually a local Character Artist that comes in and takes the job, thus creating a vacancy at the place they just left.
So I started this thread more out of curiosity just to see what the number more closely resembled worldwide. (As most Character Artist positions requires AAA Experience, and we just seem to be moving around company to company without a huge injection of new blood).
It's a bit startling to see the actual numbers.
Do you realize The NFL has 1440 Roster Spots?
(32 Teams 45 Roster spots per team)
I'm sorry but this is a HORRIBLY non extensive list. Techland (Dying Light) and Project Red (Witcher 3) are not even on there!!! There's probably 25 or more companies in the UK alone. Where's all the companies in Germany, Japan, China, etc.? Volition isn't even in Chicago, it's in Champaign Illinois because I've been there! lol This is a bad thing to be spreading around facebook. Is it a christmas tree of jobs available? No, but this paints a redonkulously bleak picture that is far from the truth. In my opinion, if you are good, fast, a hard worker, and especially well liked, you will get hired.
Do you realize The NFL has 1440 Roster Spots?
(32 Teams 45 Roster spots per team)
but character artist maps to a game team the same way a kicker or qb or w/e would in the nfl
if we pick 300 as a magic number of character artists, figure theres also 200 weapon artists, 1500 env/prop artists, 500 lighting/vfx artists, 1000 animators, etc etc. those numbers are probably way wrong but i'm saying character art is a specialized role and every team has a few types of specialist role and also quite a few generalist roles. plus each of those is bolstered by ranks and ranks of outsourcers, and outside of that are indie roles. any students or whatever seeing the number in the OP and getting worried that they won't be able to find a job because almost none exist, shouldn't imo. but then maybe that's not the point of the thread?
For some reason in my mind, there were Tens of Thousands of Character Artist positions worldwide.
(Which doesn't make logistical sense), but I'm sure a lot of people thought the same thing.
I at least thought there were more Professional Character Artists worldwide than NFL players.
i know of at least 2 in capcom vancouver although they might have more, but as a related question do you guys see this number expanding or diminishing? i was thinking the other day that compared to tv the general exposure of games is relatively low and i am wondering if you guys think the market will expand much more than its current size
I'm sorry but this is a HORRIBLY inaccurate and non extensive list. I'm working in Poland and there are at least 6 studios hiring here for AAA games, and it's Poland! Hell, Techland (Dying Light) and Project Red (Witcher 3) are not even on there!!! There's probably 25 companies in the UK alone. Where's all the companies in Germany, Japan, etc.? Volition isn't even in Chicago!!! lol This is a bad thing to be spreading around facebook. Is it a christmas tree of jobs available? No, but this paints are redonkulously bleak picture that is far from the truth. In my opinion, if you are good, fast a hard worker, and especially well liked, you will get hired.
Horribly inaccurate? How so? It is all self reported from people that work at said studio or have worked. I don't think anyone is guessing here.
Bad thing to be spreading around facebook? Why? It is great to have the information regardless if it is good or bad. Isn't being educated on things better than being clueless?
Just because we say studio B has 9 positions filled doesn't mean they wont hire a talented person. Just shows how games are made with the little bit of staff they do have.
I don't care if it's self reported or not. Because not enough people are reporting then. Not to mention the 3 companies we use as outsourcing in Germany and 2 more in China, nor the subsidiary companies of just this individual place building another game in Germany and another in Warsaw. It's like the same threads that get trashed by the mods at CGtalk. This bleak forboding belief that there are no jobs available. It's simply not true at all. There's at least 4-5 AAA game companies in Poland alone.
If you can make characters, you can make props, environments, whatever. No need to sweat it.
Exactly, even more opportunities. We had guys switching at this game studio from character artist to props and back again. We even had some guys move over to animation and vice versa. It's just far more complex than a list of jobs made up randomly from people on this board or website or what not.
I don't care if it's self reported or not. Because not enough people are reporting then. lmfao.
Then instead of laughing your fat ass off, get off of it and report the numbers.
I also forgot to mention, the deep dark secret character artists don't want everyone to know. If you can model environments & props, you can make characters, DUN DUN DUNNNNNNN!
Then instead of laughing your fat ass off, get off of it and report the numbers.
I also forgot to mention, the deep dark secret character artists don't want everyone to know. If you can model environments & props, you can make characters, DUN DUN DUNNNNNNN!
I don't know the numbers (ok I guess I could look them up), the places I've worked at list jobs on their webiste but that's not how the hiring process works at all. Even when we were staffed full, they would have 2 new applicants come in a week because they were talented. The numbers just don't tell the story at all.
I'm sorry but this is a HORRIBLY inaccurate and non extensive list. I'm working in Poland and there are at least 6 studios hiring here for AAA games, and it's Poland! Hell, Techland (Dying Light) and Project Red (Witcher 3) are not even on there!!! There's probably 25 companies in the UK alone. Where's all the companies in Germany, Japan, etc.? Volition isn't even in Chicago!!! lol This is a bad thing to be spreading around facebook. Is it a christmas tree of jobs available? No, but this paints are redonkulously bleak picture that is far from the truth.
It is inaccurate depending on your definition of AAA. If AAA is defined as high budget next-gen console projects, then the number of AAA character artist positions worldwide is closer to 150 - 200.
The figure of 400 includes big-budget PC and MMO games.
There are lots of options outside of AAA, of course.
In my opinion, if you are good, fast a hard worker, and especially well liked, you will get hired.
Assuming 10% average annual turnover, that means about 40 openings worldwide every year. Out of those 40 openings, you will be eligible for a fraction of them depending on the countries' labour laws, your academic degrees, language skills, etc.
I also forgot to mention, the deep dark secret character artists don't want everyone to know. If you can model environments & props, you can make characters, DUN DUN DUNNNNNNN!
That I kind of find not so true. A good humanoid character artist is pretty rare. Many that haven't taken traditional art figure and sculpture courses can be phenomenal at props like weapons and vehicles and make freaks for characters. Just go over the cgtalk or cghub and look at some of the gallieries.
It is inaccurate depending on your definition of AAA. If AAA is defined as high budget next-gen console projects, then the number of AAA character artist positions worldwide is closer to 150 - 200.
The figure of 400 includes big-budget PC and MMO games.
There are lots of options outside of AAA, of course.
Assuming 10% average annual turnover, that means about 40 openings worldwide every year. Out of those 40 openings, you will be eligible for a fraction of them depending on the countries' labour laws, your academic degrees, language skills, etc.
Very true. How detailed are we getting here? hehehe I mean I was counting any type of big budget game for consoles and PC's as well. I apologize if I missed that part.
I also forgot to mention, the deep dark secret character artists don't want everyone to know. If you can model environments & props, you can make characters, DUN DUN DUNNNNNNN!
well this is not exactly true but whatever, you could say that about someone that has knowledge of anatomy and regularly practices modeling characters but you cant really expect environment modelers to become character artists in an instant if they don't have the basic of anatomy, proportions, etc.... but that's my opinion though.
I'm sorry but this is a HORRIBLY inaccurate and non extensive list. I'm working in Poland and there are at least 6 studios hiring here for AAA games, and it's Poland! Hell, Techland (Dying Light) and Project Red (Witcher 3) are not even on there!!! There's probably 25 companies in the UK alone. Where's all the companies in Germany, Japan, China, etc.? Volition isn't even in Chicago, it's in Champaign Illinois because I've been there!!! lol This is a bad thing to be spreading around facebook. Is it a christmas tree of jobs available? No, but this paints a redonkulously bleak picture that is far from the truth. In my opinion, if you are good, fast, a hard worker, and especially well liked, you will get hired.
OH I am not trying to paint any kind of picture at all. (The title of the thread is a QUESTION), and In the original post, I asked for people to tell us the studios they know of that employ full-time character artists.
I don't want to include outsourcing houses, or freelancers.
I simply started this thread last night to see if we could fill in the blanks.
Can you please tell me of the studios you know of, and how many Character Artists they employ?
I also forgot to mention, the deep dark secret character artists don't want everyone to know. If you can model environments & props, you can make characters, DUN DUN DUNNNNNNN!
I'm sorry but I just find that off. I'd put being an excellent character artist is considerably more difficult for mastery than a prop artist. Just look around any of the galleries, and you'll see some absolutely ridiculous environment artists and then suddenly flip to their characters and they are freaks of bad proportion, anatomy, etc. oftentimes. I can see almost any character artist going to props but vice versa is much more rare and difficult in my opinion.
OH I am not trying to paint any kind of picture at all.
I started this thread last night to see if we could fill in the blanks.
Can you please tell me of the studios you know of, and how many Character Artists they employ?
I think I came in in a huff and puff stage after I saw tons of students saying they were going to give up on their dreams after this thread spread like wildfire on facebook. Honestly, I don't know the numbers. I know the studios if you want :People Can Fly, Project Red, Techland, CI, Epic, and I'm forgetting one or two still....I'll find out later and post. I know that most of these places have 2 or 3 games going at the same time, and many are hiring if the talent is right regardless of what's actually officially posted. They say they aren't hiring anymore but they would if you rock.
Aiming for the high end triple-a studio character jobs is a final goal comparable to an actor wanting a leading role in hollywood productions, it shouldn't exclude every other actor job there is :P
I'm sorry but I find that way off. I'd put being an excellent character artist on the order of 5 times harder than a prop artist. Just look around any of the galleries, and you'll see some absolutely ridiculous environment artists and then suddenly flip to their characters and they are freaks of bad proportion, anatomy, etc. I can see almost any character artist going to props but vice versa is much more rare and difficult.
i sort of agree but i don't think characters are specifically harder than props, or vice versa. different tasks share common fundamentals but have very different specialized knowledge. often when character artists try to make weapons or vehicles, their work is much worse than specialists in those areas because they don't have a mental library of forms and function for those objects and they aren't used to modeling and baking such mechanical subjects. vice versa, oftentimes when hardsurface guys crank out a character they don't do as well because they don't have such a deep understanding of anatomy and sculpting.
if you're extremely good at one subject, yes, you can probably make any other type of object as Meisse was saying. fundamentals do exist. but you generally won't do as well as a specialist in that field. one field isn't inherently tougher.
Aiming for the high end triple-a studio character jobs is a final goal comparable to an actor wanting a leading role in hollywood productions, it shouldn't exclude every other actor job there is :P
Situation does look a little less grim that way!
I also agree with this. People get magnetized by the shiny bright objects of the huge studios when they are forgoing thousands of other character art jobs that could be just as fulfilling pay wise, less stress, hours, etc. I'm actually trying to get out of AAA game work as I get paid pretty mediocre and I've been worked to the bone this past year. Give me a nice paying arcade or mobile or ipad games job that pay more with less hours any day at this point.
i sort of agree but i don't think characters are specifically harder than props, or vice versa. different tasks share common fundamentals but have very different specialized knowledge. often when character artists try to make weapons or vehicles, their work is much worse than specialists in those areas because they don't have a mental library of forms and function for those objects and they aren't used to modeling and baking such mechanical subjects. vice versa, oftentimes when hardsurface guys crank out a character they don't do as well because they don't have such a deep understanding of anatomy and sculpting.
if you're extremely good at one subject, yes, you can probably make any other type of object as Meisse was saying. fundamentals do exist. but you generally won't do as well as a specialist in that field. one field isn't inherently tougher.
Hmmm, I just find the background work up of traditional art to become a superb character artist is far more extensive in time and knowledge base. I took sculpture courses, figure drawing courses, studied anatomy and proportions books, and had to make 20 characters before I was even close to decent. I made a sweet gun in 2 months of starting 3D art. I'm just sayin...
Hmmm, I just find the background work up of traditional art to become a superb character artist is far more extensive. I took sculpture courses, figure drawing courses, studied anatomy and proportions books, and had to make 20 characters before I was even close to decent. I made a sweet gun in 2 months of starting 3D art. I'm just sayin...
it must be wonderful to absorb specializations so quickly, but i think for the average human, it takes time and effort to reach a competitive and professional level in anything.
it must be wonderful to absorb specializations so quickly, but i think for the average human, it takes time and effort to reach a competitive and professional level in anything.
I never said I was at a professional level when I built that item. I'm just saying it took me years to be at a level that I could even show somebody my digital character work and only months with props (modeling wise...ok texture painting took me a long while). The software does half the work for you with prop modeling. Not so with designing an amazing character in zbrush or mudbox.
I never said I was at a professional level when I built that gun. I'm just saying it took me years to be at a level that I could even show somebody my digital character work and only months with props (modeling wise...ok texture painting took me a long while). The software does half the work for you with prop modeling. Not so with designing an amazing character in zbrush or mudbox. Go and download a video of a prop modeling tutorial ~3-6 hours depending on what it is. Then download a character one off zbrush workshop ~25 to god knows how many hours lol
a given prop artist on a project will produce many, many times more assets for it than a character artist will produce characters, often varying between hardsurface and more organic forms, often working to a tighter spec, etc. being able to rapidly turn out those diverse types of asset is essentially the specialization of the prop artist, and regarding that skill as negligible is dismissive imo.
people who specialize in complex hardsurface assets like weapons or vehicles are often given longer timelines closer to those of character artists.
nobody's software does their job for them, although certainly everyone should be taking advantage of their software to automate as much as possible. character artists use stamps, hardsurface artists use procedural modeling techniques. knowing when and how to cut corners is part of the expertise.
edit: i apologize to anyone who considers this tangent to be a derail. i do think it's an interesting conversation to have, at least.
a given prop artist on a project will produce many, many times more assets for it than a character artist will produce characters, often varying between hardsurface and more organic forms, often working to a tighter spec, etc. being able to rapidly turn out those diverse types of asset is essentially the specialization of the prop artist, and regarding that skill as negligible is dismissive imo.
people who specialize in complex hardsurface assets like weapons or vehicles are often given longer timelines closer to those of character artists.
nobody's software does their job for them, although certainly everyone should be taking advantage of their software to automate as much as possible. character artists use stamps, hardsurface artists use procedural modeling techniques. knowing when and how to cut corners is part of the expertise.
edit: i apologize to anyone who considers this tangent to be a derail. i do think it's an interesting conversation to have, at least.
I absolutely agree with the first part, it does take many times as longer for the character artist to pop out a character from zbrush than the majority of game assest props (excluding buildings..yowsers). hahaha But if his job is not harder then why is he making twice as much as me right now? Another thing is most character artists HAVE to make props as well for their characters (clothes, shields, shoes, belts, feathers, exoskeletons, hats, etc.), so they are usually well versed in prop creation also. This is not the same for a prop environment artists like myself. I never had to suddenly build a character.
Well, this thread is seemingly on the verge of flying off the rails.
But to the original topic, at Zindagi, I believe there are five full-time character artists (a bit unsure because I just started there recently). A few of those guys, myself included, share a tiny bit of the load of props/environments when needed.
Also, Zindagi may not fit into the definition of AAA.. not sure. But regardless, they have a relatively nice-sized team of dedicated character guys.
P.S. (just to feed the fire a lil :P) I'm in agreement with Justin on this argument over the last page or so. If you can do one thing at a high level, you can do another. It's all about observation of the subject. I find the notion that characters are inherently more difficult to be ridiculous. A slightly different skill-set/mindset, sure, but no more or less challenging on the whole. Before I'd gotten this job, I'd been doing a good deal of environment/prop stuff for the past 2 years... makes noooooo difference, lol.
there are in no way 25 AAA studios in the uk... tho there are quite a few holes still i would guess the number is probably closer to 500-600 in the western world when all is said and done, sad we don't get many Asian studio devs on here to chime in for their part...damn language barriers!
You've got some weird stuff in there Jacques:
Avalanche SLC is some video studio; the US branch of Avalanche is in NY.
I don't know why you're listing World Of Tanks as a studio, but those guys don't have a single character in any of their recent games, the vehicles never have occupants.
I never said I was at a professional level when I built that item. I'm just saying it took me years to be at a level that I could even show somebody my digital character work and only months with props (modeling wise...ok texture painting took me a long while). The software does half the work for you with prop modeling. Not so with designing an amazing character in zbrush or mudbox. Go and download a video of a prop modeling tutorial ~3-6 hours depending on what it is. Then download a character one off zbrush workshop ~25 to god knows how many hours lol
I just randomly gonna quote one of your comments here MrNegative.
You do realize you'r trowing a lot of shit around you right now, right? And with shit I mean a lot of personal opinions presented as facts. Our job is an artistic one, you can't say "it takes this much time to learn this amount of correct". Well you can state something like that, like you did, but it's wrong. There is no right or wrong in how you learn or how you evolve. Character artist or not. On top of that we all have different interests. Getting in to architecture, landscaping or the beauty of natural formations in nature can never be compared to an interest in human anatomy as better.
Character artists tends to have a lot more experience and in some cases more education (more in the sense of been studying for a longer time) the "the other" artist disciplines. Thus rendering a higher paycheck. That does not mean that character artist is a better artist then the guy sitting in the next pod working with environments. The character artist also have a higher responsibility in the sense of how there art will be presented. It's almost always an centerpiece on screen and in most cases something that's in the foreground. You won't be starring at my house or my cliff side for the entire time of game play. Tough you will experience it trough out the game.
There's this underlying idea that every 3D-generalist and especially environment artist have this dream of becoming an character artist. You'r also looked down at, a lot of times at least, when you tell someone that you'r working on rocks and mountains. Like that's something you've been forced to do, couldn't enjoy and that it's pretty much a punishment cause you'r junior in the industry.
This have been the situation for me, pretty frustrating at times. I didn't enter this industry with the neglected dream of becoming an character artist. But that's the ultimate holy grail of 3D artists! Imagine! It will be so awesome cause you forced your self trough that horrible environment art for so many years. People will cheer for me in the streets! OR I fucking love my job as an environment artist.
I to talk from a personal point of view, I'm not stating that's the ultimate truth. Though it's my truth.
There you have it, I officially derailed this completely! But on topic, there's nothing more to it then Jacque asking a simple question for his own and others interest. And also, the reason Jacque have't listed all the UK studios or any of all the others is cause there's no information about them. Some one needs to write something somewhere for it to be red. Fucking settle down a notch. This isn't some government presenting you with "facts from the industry".
There are easily 25 AAA studios in the UK, I suspect the real number may be edging towards 40 and there are perhaps as many as 300 game studios in the UK total, as many are relatively lean and mean operations. It never ceases to amaze me how many people don't realise just how big the UK is with regards to the games industry - hiring around 9000 developers in this industry...
EA have Crytek, Criterion and Ghost (Criterion now a skeleton and Ghost the new studio).
Microsoft have Lionhead, Rare and Soho (and additional games staff in Reading)
Ubisoft have Reflections.
Sony have Media Molecule, Evolution, Cambridge and London
Square Enix have a London studio.
Sega have Creative Assembly, Sports Interactive and Hardlight
Rockstar have studios in Edinburgh, Leeds and Lincoln.
Disney have Black Rock and London studios.
Codemasters have Southam and Birmingham.
Those are just some of the publisher owned studios - there are a lot more big studios, some of which have already been named; Climax, Frontier, Headstrong, Ninja Theory, Splash Damage, Rocksteady, Warner, Rebellion, Sumo and Traveller's Tales are good examples.
I think I came in in a huff and puff stage after I saw tons of students saying they were going to give up on their dreams after this thread spread like wildfire on facebook.
This should motivate them to work harder not do the reverse thing, seriously if you put time and effort into becoming a good artist work will find you. If they plan on giving up its because they know they`re not putting in enough effort
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Ubisoft Qu
I am just curious as to what the expectation is for how many there should be? When I started over 12 years ago I felt like I knew personally everyone that did what I do. So to me it feels like a big number. When I started we would model, texture, rig, and even animate. So I feel not only the number of character artists has gone up drastically there is also dedicated texture artists, riggers, and animators all doing once was one job. I see my job more and more turning into several peoples jobs. Personally I am surprised how many more jobs there are, compared to how few there there were.
We thought that was insanely low for Montreal... which is considered a Mecca of Game Development.
The funny thing is, here in Montreal if a Character Position is opened up, it's usually a local Character Artist that comes in and takes the job, thus creating a vacancy at the place they just left.
So I started this thread more out of curiosity just to see what the number more closely resembled worldwide. (As most Character Artist positions requires AAA Experience, and we just seem to be moving around company to company without a huge injection of new blood).
It's a bit startling to see the actual numbers.
Do you realize The NFL has 1440 Roster Spots?
(32 Teams 45 Roster spots per team)
if we pick 300 as a magic number of character artists, figure theres also 200 weapon artists, 1500 env/prop artists, 500 lighting/vfx artists, 1000 animators, etc etc. those numbers are probably way wrong but i'm saying character art is a specialized role and every team has a few types of specialist role and also quite a few generalist roles. plus each of those is bolstered by ranks and ranks of outsourcers, and outside of that are indie roles. any students or whatever seeing the number in the OP and getting worried that they won't be able to find a job because almost none exist, shouldn't imo. but then maybe that's not the point of the thread?
^_^
For some reason in my mind, there were Tens of Thousands of Character Artist positions worldwide.
(Which doesn't make logistical sense), but I'm sure a lot of people thought the same thing.
I at least thought there were more Professional Character Artists worldwide than NFL players.
Horribly inaccurate? How so? It is all self reported from people that work at said studio or have worked. I don't think anyone is guessing here.
Bad thing to be spreading around facebook? Why? It is great to have the information regardless if it is good or bad. Isn't being educated on things better than being clueless?
Just because we say studio B has 9 positions filled doesn't mean they wont hire a talented person. Just shows how games are made with the little bit of staff they do have.
Exactly, even more opportunities. We had guys switching at this game studio from character artist to props and back again. We even had some guys move over to animation and vice versa. It's just far more complex than a list of jobs made up randomly from people on this board or website or what not.
Then instead of laughing your fat ass off, get off of it and report the numbers.
I also forgot to mention, the deep dark secret character artists don't want everyone to know. If you can model environments & props, you can make characters, DUN DUN DUNNNNNNN!
I don't know the numbers (ok I guess I could look them up), the places I've worked at list jobs on their webiste but that's not how the hiring process works at all. Even when we were staffed full, they would have 2 new applicants come in a week because they were talented. The numbers just don't tell the story at all.
It is inaccurate depending on your definition of AAA. If AAA is defined as high budget next-gen console projects, then the number of AAA character artist positions worldwide is closer to 150 - 200.
The figure of 400 includes big-budget PC and MMO games.
There are lots of options outside of AAA, of course.
Assuming 10% average annual turnover, that means about 40 openings worldwide every year. Out of those 40 openings, you will be eligible for a fraction of them depending on the countries' labour laws, your academic degrees, language skills, etc.
That I kind of find not so true. A good humanoid character artist is pretty rare. Many that haven't taken traditional art figure and sculpture courses can be phenomenal at props like weapons and vehicles and make freaks for characters. Just go over the cgtalk or cghub and look at some of the gallieries.
Very true. How detailed are we getting here? hehehe I mean I was counting any type of big budget game for consoles and PC's as well. I apologize if I missed that part.
maybe, but will you be good at it?
well this is not exactly true but whatever, you could say that about someone that has knowledge of anatomy and regularly practices modeling characters but you cant really expect environment modelers to become character artists in an instant if they don't have the basic of anatomy, proportions, etc.... but that's my opinion though.
OH I am not trying to paint any kind of picture at all. (The title of the thread is a QUESTION), and In the original post, I asked for people to tell us the studios they know of that employ full-time character artists.
I don't want to include outsourcing houses, or freelancers.
I simply started this thread last night to see if we could fill in the blanks.
Can you please tell me of the studios you know of, and how many Character Artists they employ?
I'm sorry but I just find that off. I'd put being an excellent character artist is considerably more difficult for mastery than a prop artist. Just look around any of the galleries, and you'll see some absolutely ridiculous environment artists and then suddenly flip to their characters and they are freaks of bad proportion, anatomy, etc. oftentimes. I can see almost any character artist going to props but vice versa is much more rare and difficult in my opinion.
I think I came in in a huff and puff stage after I saw tons of students saying they were going to give up on their dreams after this thread spread like wildfire on facebook. Honestly, I don't know the numbers. I know the studios if you want :People Can Fly, Project Red, Techland, CI, Epic, and I'm forgetting one or two still....I'll find out later and post. I know that most of these places have 2 or 3 games going at the same time, and many are hiring if the talent is right regardless of what's actually officially posted. They say they aren't hiring anymore but they would if you rock.
Aiming for the high end triple-a studio character jobs is a final goal comparable to an actor wanting a leading role in hollywood productions, it shouldn't exclude every other actor job there is :P
Situation does look a little less grim that way!
I dunno, I got into the polycount recap with it and then got hired as a character artist :P
if you're extremely good at one subject, yes, you can probably make any other type of object as Meisse was saying. fundamentals do exist. but you generally won't do as well as a specialist in that field. one field isn't inherently tougher.
I also agree with this. People get magnetized by the shiny bright objects of the huge studios when they are forgoing thousands of other character art jobs that could be just as fulfilling pay wise, less stress, hours, etc. I'm actually trying to get out of AAA game work as I get paid pretty mediocre and I've been worked to the bone this past year. Give me a nice paying arcade or mobile or ipad games job that pay more with less hours any day at this point.
Hmmm, I just find the background work up of traditional art to become a superb character artist is far more extensive in time and knowledge base. I took sculpture courses, figure drawing courses, studied anatomy and proportions books, and had to make 20 characters before I was even close to decent. I made a sweet gun in 2 months of starting 3D art. I'm just sayin...
wow, what an honor :poly131:
people who specialize in complex hardsurface assets like weapons or vehicles are often given longer timelines closer to those of character artists.
nobody's software does their job for them, although certainly everyone should be taking advantage of their software to automate as much as possible. character artists use stamps, hardsurface artists use procedural modeling techniques. knowing when and how to cut corners is part of the expertise.
edit: i apologize to anyone who considers this tangent to be a derail. i do think it's an interesting conversation to have, at least.
I absolutely agree with the first part, it does take many times as longer for the character artist to pop out a character from zbrush than the majority of game assest props (excluding buildings..yowsers). hahaha But if his job is not harder then why is he making twice as much as me right now? Another thing is most character artists HAVE to make props as well for their characters (clothes, shields, shoes, belts, feathers, exoskeletons, hats, etc.), so they are usually well versed in prop creation also. This is not the same for a prop environment artists like myself. I never had to suddenly build a character.
Also, CW and Marks are on different teams. So I think thats 10 altogether for CA (6 on CW's team, 3 on Marks, 1 on mine).
But to the original topic, at Zindagi, I believe there are five full-time character artists (a bit unsure because I just started there recently). A few of those guys, myself included, share a tiny bit of the load of props/environments when needed.
Also, Zindagi may not fit into the definition of AAA.. not sure. But regardless, they have a relatively nice-sized team of dedicated character guys.
P.S. (just to feed the fire a lil :P) I'm in agreement with Justin on this argument over the last page or so. If you can do one thing at a high level, you can do another. It's all about observation of the subject. I find the notion that characters are inherently more difficult to be ridiculous. A slightly different skill-set/mindset, sure, but no more or less challenging on the whole. Before I'd gotten this job, I'd been doing a good deal of environment/prop stuff for the past 2 years... makes noooooo difference, lol.
also, the number of character artists per studio is only relevant if you also have the number of environment artists and concept artists as well.
Avalanche SLC is some video studio; the US branch of Avalanche is in NY.
I don't know why you're listing World Of Tanks as a studio, but those guys don't have a single character in any of their recent games, the vehicles never have occupants.
I just randomly gonna quote one of your comments here MrNegative.
You do realize you'r trowing a lot of shit around you right now, right? And with shit I mean a lot of personal opinions presented as facts. Our job is an artistic one, you can't say "it takes this much time to learn this amount of correct". Well you can state something like that, like you did, but it's wrong. There is no right or wrong in how you learn or how you evolve. Character artist or not. On top of that we all have different interests. Getting in to architecture, landscaping or the beauty of natural formations in nature can never be compared to an interest in human anatomy as better.
Character artists tends to have a lot more experience and in some cases more education (more in the sense of been studying for a longer time) the "the other" artist disciplines. Thus rendering a higher paycheck. That does not mean that character artist is a better artist then the guy sitting in the next pod working with environments. The character artist also have a higher responsibility in the sense of how there art will be presented. It's almost always an centerpiece on screen and in most cases something that's in the foreground. You won't be starring at my house or my cliff side for the entire time of game play. Tough you will experience it trough out the game.
There's this underlying idea that every 3D-generalist and especially environment artist have this dream of becoming an character artist. You'r also looked down at, a lot of times at least, when you tell someone that you'r working on rocks and mountains. Like that's something you've been forced to do, couldn't enjoy and that it's pretty much a punishment cause you'r junior in the industry.
This have been the situation for me, pretty frustrating at times. I didn't enter this industry with the neglected dream of becoming an character artist. But that's the ultimate holy grail of 3D artists! Imagine! It will be so awesome cause you forced your self trough that horrible environment art for so many years. People will cheer for me in the streets! OR I fucking love my job as an environment artist.
I to talk from a personal point of view, I'm not stating that's the ultimate truth. Though it's my truth.
There you have it, I officially derailed this completely! But on topic, there's nothing more to it then Jacque asking a simple question for his own and others interest. And also, the reason Jacque have't listed all the UK studios or any of all the others is cause there's no information about them. Some one needs to write something somewhere for it to be red. Fucking settle down a notch. This isn't some government presenting you with "facts from the industry".
There are easily 25 AAA studios in the UK, I suspect the real number may be edging towards 40 and there are perhaps as many as 300 game studios in the UK total, as many are relatively lean and mean operations. It never ceases to amaze me how many people don't realise just how big the UK is with regards to the games industry - hiring around 9000 developers in this industry...
EA have Crytek, Criterion and Ghost (Criterion now a skeleton and Ghost the new studio).
Microsoft have Lionhead, Rare and Soho (and additional games staff in Reading)
Ubisoft have Reflections.
Sony have Media Molecule, Evolution, Cambridge and London
Square Enix have a London studio.
Sega have Creative Assembly, Sports Interactive and Hardlight
Rockstar have studios in Edinburgh, Leeds and Lincoln.
Disney have Black Rock and London studios.
Codemasters have Southam and Birmingham.
Those are just some of the publisher owned studios - there are a lot more big studios, some of which have already been named; Climax, Frontier, Headstrong, Ninja Theory, Splash Damage, Rocksteady, Warner, Rebellion, Sumo and Traveller's Tales are good examples.
The UK has a lot of significant studios.
^this
edit, just had words with a ubisoft reflections friend and he says they have 2 character artists.
This should motivate them to work harder not do the reverse thing, seriously if you put time and effort into becoming a good artist work will find you. If they plan on giving up its because they know they`re not putting in enough effort