Portfolio Critique
polycounter lvl 6
Alright, I'm graduating in a few months. However, I see my stuff and I just feel like it isn't going to be good enough (and with good reason). This is why I come to the good people of Polycount for assistance!
Ok here's the site, and then I'll mention a few things: My Site
Now, I currently have a two projects in the works. One is a character and the other is my thesis which is two characters, an environment, and an animation. The progress of those is on my blog and will eventually go on my site whenever they are finished.
More or less, I just need to know what I need! I feel like I can accomplish much more than my portfolio shows, but lack the direction. Any help?
Thanks
Ok here's the site, and then I'll mention a few things: My Site
Now, I currently have a two projects in the works. One is a character and the other is my thesis which is two characters, an environment, and an animation. The progress of those is on my blog and will eventually go on my site whenever they are finished.
More or less, I just need to know what I need! I feel like I can accomplish much more than my portfolio shows, but lack the direction. Any help?
Thanks
Replies
Po-Koro: I would remove the Video. The Environment is good but the Flythrough should be done using an Animated Camera not you flying around in-game. As the music might suit the piece but It doesn't work well for just a fly-through. I don't see any reason to have a download button for the video.
Add more Still Images of the Level & Have larger Images overall. its not good to have each image open a new tab.
Pikmin: Looks all good
Characters: More Images, Poses, front, back, Wireframe, Texture sheets
I think the pumpkin girl looks pretty good overall (if a bit simple texture-wise), but I think the pumpkin itself looks pretty bad. I'm not sure what to do to fix it but the overall shape looks kind of off.
Also I'd probably remove the pikmin scene as it is very low-res (by design, I know) and it contains some very flat textures. I feel that the scene is overall kind of boring as well.
Lastly I also think you really need to re-design your signature thing on the images (with the name, url and all that) as it looks horrible with way too many effects (gradients and shadows) and the logo. Just go with some flat text with maybe a single pixel outline (to separate it from the background) at most instead.
The specowl logo could do with a redesign and/or complete scrapping as well. And finally I'd also go with a more professional e-mail like ryan@ryanchapmanart.com or something.
Keep making stuff man!
As far as more game res stuff...yeah. I'm going to work on retopoing things and doing breakdowns.
Pumpkin lady's head looking bad? Yeahhh. Another case of peers saying something and I was like nahhh it's fine! Guess I should really listen.
As far as the video flythrough, I totally understand what you mean. I think at some point I may make a new video but that may have to wait.
Looks like I have my work cut out for me this weekend!
On your centaur, the hooves should be either a darker brown or black; as it stands, they fade into the legs. I don't think a centaur would wear a saddle, especially not with a sword & shield; perhaps saddlebags would make more sense.
Several of your projects include only a single image, and none of them include either wireframes or texture sheets.
The textures are nice, but seem to include only a diffuse component. The aquatic creature, for instance, could really use a glossy texture for a wet look. (BTW, you didn't include a link to his concept sketch.)
On your banner, I'd lose the colon and move the text after the colon down to the next line.
On your resume, your objective is rather vague. Various entries in the skills section just run together, and the placement seems hap-hazard.
On your blog site, many of the image links are broken. (Not really portfolio-related, but I figured you'd want to know.)
Try to keep a consistent font & size for your menus; the buttons on the main page are much smaller than on the other pages. Also, there's no button to return to the portfolio.
I'm not a big fan of a pure black background; it's better than white, but still rather stark.
The centaur I was basing off of a concept that I linked to. I suppose it wouldn't hurt to change it but I wanted to go with the original concept. So things like color and the saddle I wanted to keep for that purpose.
It seems pretty consistent about the wires and and texture flats, so over the next several weeks I'll be updating my models with those as well as adding new ones that do that too.
Thanks for telling me about the images on my blog. I went crazy on imgr today and deleted several that I probably shouldnt have. I'll definitely relink those tomorrow.
I'm currently working on a branding sheet now that has a cool grey background and some more consistent font sizes and colors. I'm hoping to implement it tomorrow.
The resume is a whole different bear and I will work on that.
I will probably end up removing the aquatic creature and the pumpkin girl simply because I don't think they help at all. I still have my thesis which I'll be sure to have several breakdowns of for the page I put up for it. The centaur I will also be retolopogizing and making game ready so that I may have wires for her (don't worry I have an unposed version)
I greatly appreciate your critiques and will implement most of those changes tomorrow. I will also be spending most of the day in photoshop fixing the branding and making consistent buttons, etc.
The signature looks a lot better now. I'd skip the grey background and just go with the text overlaid on top of the image without any background or at most a very transparent, black background.
Most art directors when looking at portfolios look for things the resonate with the project they are working on. For example, if your portfolio has a few top notch gun models, an AD making a real world FPS game would be more likely to relate to it. If that same AD came across a portfolio with many bright colorful scenes and or stylized concept art, less likely to be into it.
When I look at your portfolio, I have a hard time developing a story for where you would be a good fit. All of your characters are creatures and you only have three, making it hard to tell your level of execution and range. The environments have the same problem.
Currently I could only see you getting low end mobile game work, probably on the indie end. Even then it might be challenging, there are so many artists now.
What you should do is find at least three companies(healthy ones) you want to work for that have games that not only appeal to you, but are maybe close in artistic range and style. Ok, now do some honest soul searching- do you have your heart set on being a character artist or environments? You can do both but honestly, those positions are hard to come by outside the indie/smaller budget scene. Character artists are much more competitive because there are less positions and more people want to do that. Take a look at some working character artists and compare your portfolio. That's where you need to be.
As for environments, I'm telling you this, if you had one incredible scene in your portfolio and little else- you'd get a job.
Alright, so now you have the 3 companies and the role you want to achieve in mind. Create some pieces that could have come from those companies. You don't want to straight up recreate something from their games, put your own spin on it. Try to show some consistency across your work. The pieces should all look like they came from the same game. Show your texture maps, polycounts and wireframes. Give an estimation of time spent. A quick blurb about the thinking and process can be magical.
These pieces will now make up your portfolio. Throw out your old one. Put together your resume & cover letter and send them out.
Glad to see you posting up here specsowl!