Can I Specialise In Texture Art ...

Cluly

So, I'm 32 now. I've messed around with art/cg ever since I had a C64 in the 80's but my life took a different path in my late teens and early 20's and I've never completely focused on my art, that's changing now and I find myself in a possition where I where I want to focus on something and make a career happen. I've digitaly painted, modelled and textured for a while now but I would really like to focus as a texture artist, is this still plausable in the industry these days? Or will I have to focus on a more generalised area, Enviroment art/Character art? I'm lost as to where to focus my effects and could do with a prod in the right direction.

Thanks,

Cluly

Edit: Deviantart Link (Variety of examples there.)

Xoliul

Yeah i've seen it happen now and then.
But:
You better be amazing at it.
You should know the other aspects of the process as well to a considerable degree.

Torch

I think its more common in VFX, but am seeing a few more positions like this open up in games. I think Ready at Dawn had a similar position advertised a while back for primarily just texture art? ... but yeah as Laurens pointed out, you have to be feckin good!

WarrenM

Yep, basically that. You can, certainly .... but you have to be among the best.

almighty_gir

there are maybe a handful of game studios in the entire world that have teams for specific parts of their pipeline, and even they have strong cross-overs.

if i remember correctly, Epic have some guys who sculpt characters, and leave the texturing to others. whether texturing is the only job of those other people though, i'm not entirely sure.

Cluly

I understand a lot about game development and I've touched on most aspects of it including programming, the only thing I've avoided heavily is animation and audio. I doubt I'll be among the best if I focused soley on texture art. Maybe modelling and texturing is the way to go then? I guess that comes under prop artist?

almighty_gir

nope, it's just what comes under "artist".

WarrenM

The main thing to remember is that artists these days are expected to be able to do multiple things. Like, prop artists should be able to high poly/low poly/bake maps/texture their own stuff. If you can only do one of those things, you're less valuable than someone else who CAN. Because it means the studio has to have 2 artists doing the job of, ideally, 1 ...

Cluly

Thanks Warren, that makes a lot of sense. I can tackle baking etc and I understand all of that, I'm confident in my texturing but my high poly modeliing needs work. Thanks for the help guys, really appreciate the input as it's helping my put together what I need to focus on.

EarthQuake

To be a texture artist you'll need at min. some high, low, and baking experience. Even to create tiling textures and stuff you'll want to know how to knock out sci-fi shapes with traditional sub-d modeling, some scrulpting for organic stuff (rock, bricks, etc).

MagicSugar

http://www.naughtydog.com/site/careers/environment_texture_artist2/

Responsibilities:

• Sculpt and paint textures required for rendering physically based game environments
• Construct shaders using a proprietary in-house material editor
• UV layout for tiling and 0-1 mapped textures
• Match art styles defined by the art director/concept art
• Collaborate closely with 3D modelers and game designers
• Work with graphics programmers and technical artists to support the development of new systems and techniques
• Work with the tools team to convey your needs and generate tool requests intended to improve artists’ workflow
• Manage texture and shader efficiency

Requirements and Skills:

• Strong traditional drawing/painting skills
• Ability to sculpt and paint highly detailed 3D and 2D images
• Proficient at sculpting surface details and controlling shader features that represent a wide variety of material types
• Ability to create proper UV layout and tiling textures for games
• Working experience with shader networks
• Working experience with baking textures from high res meshes
• Strong Maya skills
• Strong Zbrush skills
• A solid understanding of procedural texturing techniques

Mask_Salesman

Depends what you define as texture artist?

- Making tiling textures and modular atlas sets by sculpting/hardsurface 2 texture. Then I'd say Yes, but that's still a minimum requirement of that kind of role. Shader knowledge is usually integrated into this role.
- Just making diffuses from other peoples highs & lows. Then I'd say Extremely unlikely even if your awsome, unless you find a niche in a smaller studio that does an oldschool style.

FelixL

It totally is a valid role, check the portfolios of the naughty dog texture/shader artists. They mainly sculpt tileable surfaces in zbrush and make textures from it, and then texture environments with it.

Having a dedicated guy for texturing props/weapons/characters is more rare, as far as I know.

If you are serious about it, I would:

- Get really good at zbrush sculpting and texture creation
- Get good with a projection painting program like MARI or Mudbox (for film VFX gigs)
- Get a solid foundation in 2D art and illustration if you haven't already

Chimp

As others have said, textures these days are a lot more than textures. If you are to find a job where your sole job is in that region, it will likely involve materials, shaders, textures and sculpting. You do need to be the absolute best there is - you wont get hired anywhere half decent if you aren't 100 times better than anyone else as it's such a specialised role. You can't be put to work elsewhere when things are quiet, so you need to be top-top notch

Cluly

The whole art pipe line and texturing seams to be changing, this is why I was asking really. PBR seams like its on the cards now in that respect. Great info guys, thanks.