Portfolio quality, game/showcase

Alex262

What's better to have in your portfolio between:

-low polies optimized for games cutting details (less geo) in areas that are not visible for the player (e.g. a relatively complex grip for a gun) these areas are clearly visible in portfolio shots and look bad, also in this case I just slightly redesign some details to end up with less geo on the lp

or

-low polies that have more geometry which is consistent around the entire model and no compromises regarding the details/complex shapes that normally are avoided for game models?

Obviously for a presentation I would go with the second option but I'm not sure hence the reason why I'm asking here. Is the triangle count so important or nobody really cares and it all comes down to the final quality? Or it's something in-between and if so are there any guidelines for current gen?

Also I'll specify that I'm not talking about wasting geometry, I'm talking about using more so that the model looks good from any angle. For games however this can be considered a waste but that's the point we're talking about portfolio quality here.

If it's possible I'd like to know what applies for each area like indie, freelance/contract and studio.

I'm mainly doing hard surface stuff and rendering in Marmoset, no plans for game engines currently.

BradleyWascher

My personal opinion has always been you're being hired as an artist. You need to show first and foremost that you can make assets look amazing. Now this doesn't mean thrown optimization to the wind but thinking about it practically, its easier to hire an awesome "artist" that has a strong idea and you know makes clear artist choices rather than hire someone that is strictly optimized to the point where its actually diminishing the art work. You can't tell if they knew they were compromising the art or if they actually didn't understand it didn't look good.

You will have to crush your art in a production environment but when it comes to an art portfolio worry first about just creating the best looking pieces you can rather than showing you're the best optimizer.

Amsterdam Hilton Hotel

I think it's fine to use a higher level of detail than most games, but no matter what spec, optimizing away less important geometry is good. Even with a higher polygon budget, distribute it according to where it will have the most impact.

Joshua Stubbles

Best thing would be to look at other portfolios and see what other artists do.

In general these days, it's showing off the high poly/sculpt, then a baked/textured asset, maybe some texture sheets. You don't need to show LODs or anything.

Say you made an air compressor. If it's not intended to be a physics object, it doesn't need a bottom, so don't model that. But that's not something you need to explicitly show on your folio. Don't be showing images of where you deleted geometry, heh.

It's pretty much a sure thing that if you're good enough to make great artwork, you can also optimize it.

iconoplast

My first art director made a point of telling me (with real life examples) that the most important thing is to be a good artist. Absolutely everything else can be taught on the job if necessary.

JordanN

It varies by game by game basis. Keep things lower poly for open world games or mobile.