How is it to work in the industry?
polycounter lvl 3
Hi!
I know this might be a stupid question because every studio is different but hang on.
I would like to hear your experience with things such as work hours, income, is it as great as you expected etc...
Pardon if there already is a thread like this, i have searched and found nothing.
Cheers
I know this might be a stupid question because every studio is different but hang on.
I would like to hear your experience with things such as work hours, income, is it as great as you expected etc...
Pardon if there already is a thread like this, i have searched and found nothing.
Cheers
Replies
I've been a level designer, a programmer and now an artist. I love that I can move around like that within the same company.
The thing I try to impress upon people who want to get into the industry is that it IS a job. There are deadlines, there are requirements, and sometimes there are crappy tasks that need doing. It's not all fun and games.
But when it's on .. it's ON. I love it.
I'm not going into details in regards to income, but for a 22 year old still living at home with no major expenses, I would say it's pretty great. I guess it could vary depending on your situation.
So far the job is better than expected, I've heard horror stories about the industry but it's been awesome. Obviously very limited in my experience, but there you go.
Overall I love it. I like learning new things and being challenged, there's pretty much no shortage of either in this industry. I think it's a very very specific kind of job, you either like it or not. But if you do, you really do.
Relating to some of your questions:
- Studio typically have fixed hours per day (8 hours a day). Most of the time you have flexible hours. You can come a bit earlier and leave a bit earlier for instance. The range changes for each studio. sometimes it's 30 minutes, sometimes it's 1h30. 9 am to 6 pm could be 10 am to 7 pm for instance.
- This is only the core hours though, overtime hours are expected (and never paid). Some studios pride themselves in doing no overtime at all, but that seems quite rare. It's mostly expected that you will organize yourself and work on your own, but some studio will enforce crunch time (2 days per week mandatory for instance).
- Expect to be exploited at first, trainee are vastly underpaid (and are often not really trainees since the competition is so high to get any position). It gets much better after a bit, but that's still not really the best job to become rich. It also changes a lot from studios to studios, some pay a lot more than others. Some offer a lot more promotions and pay rises than others, ...
- Expect to move a bit. Fixed contract are common at the beginning. And sometimes it seems like moving to another studio is the only way to get a better job (not necessarily money).
- There's usually quite a lot of nice benefits when you work in a triple A studio (health care for you and your family), gym membership, pension scheme, ...
- The industry is unstable. This also varies a lot from studio to studio, but it's not unheard of to be fired for no real professional reason... That sucks of course.
- Studios are usually located where it costs a lot of money to live (I work in London though, I might be biaised ;p).
- Efficiency is key. You're not going to spend an awful lot of time on everything like you do on your portfolio. This job comes with a lot of pressure and a constant need to speed things up, organize yourself, pick your battles, ...
- You don't create a game alone. A fascinating aspect of this job is to see the effect of other people on the game and your own work. Sometimes you just place the meshes, and then see the transformation after the lighter and the VFX guys do their magic. It's really quite something.
- You can't tell your mom/girlfriend what you do at work. Your flatmates will think you're a spy.
Overall, there's always new challenges and new things to learn. I know that I'll be better at what I do in a month, and that's an amazing feeling. No denying there's some bad things in the industry, but I really love the job and can't imagine doing anything else.
I can only speak for Epic Games here, but ... typically, we work 8 hour days until there's a need for more and then we might crunch some.
Most people work 10+ as a habit but 9-5 is totally possible.
We have flexible time so the only requirement is that the company wants 8 hours a day out of you ... whether that's 9am-5pm or 9pm-5am, that's up to you. You don't even need to do it all in one block. Come in for 5 hours, leave for a few, and come back to finish up after dinner. Whatever.
The exception that gets in the way of this is required meetings. You need to be an adult and schedule around those as necessary.
One last question, when you get a job in another country, whats the process? It must be a long one, getting job permission, finding a place to live etc. Asking because there aren't exactly a lot of game studios in Norway..
I usually work 8 to 9 hours a day with 1h lunch in-between. I rarely encountered overtime in the last 5 years. Never had to crunch in my career. Although I take interesting work home when I want to tinker around.
I have never worked in a place with much flex time though. It's usually just -1 or -2 from the core hours - no coming late, but you can be early. I'm an owl though, so bad luck
never had a problem with money though, although I never stayed in one place. I was prepared to move, as long as job and pay are good.
Since you're in Norway, there are a couple of Studios in Sweden. I didn't have a problem getting to Norway as EU citizen and I think it's not a major hassle the other way round either. Usually your employer will sort out legal stuff and then send you wherever you have to go to get everything bureaucratic sorted. If you work in the EU the worst that you have to do may be getting a tax ID and register your place of residence, kinda like you do in Norway.
Also +1 what WarrenM said. It often is just a job, but it's the damn best I can imagine
Part time at Tapzen my Senior year in Culver City, and then a gig till July 2014 with them. Another gig with Martin Brinkerhoff Associates from August 2014 till Novemeber 2014. Right now unemployed, trying to find my first freelance gigs, and looking for studio positions somewhere I'd be willing to move. Even looking into nongame art jobs since I need an income to support myself. Hard to wake up knowing I'm not earning my keep at my parent's home.
I have done all-nighters only under an intention that I wanted to be there. Besides that, have spent some, not all, late nights working on the games I was on. But it didn't bother me. Only time I would be really particular about doing 8 hours a day would be when there was an event I needed to get to that day.
All in all, I have credit in 5 to 6 games if you count a mobile title and not including unreleased titles.
Right now I'm anxious. I hear the advice from above me about the tenuousness of what we do, and it's clear to me I like making games with people. But I'm really young, I don't have a lot of guns under my belt, but I've been God-blessed enough to this point to have the experience I do given my age.
Still waiting for the real moment where I get pushed through the ringer. But with good friends and colleagues, it tends to be a darn good run through inferno.
High moments for me include the following:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mA4M4kOPGw&feature=youtu.be&t=3m23s
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I wouldn't change careers for the world though. yes, it's hard work, but holy hell is it FUN. and as a creative person, it lets me do exactly that... be creative! Even if it is just a job, to me, it never really feels like one. Do something you love, and you`ll never work a day in your life, right?
Sony Online Entertainment, San Diego, CA. AAA, 300+ employee company. Character Art, Summer Student Internship 2011-ish for 3 months. Everquest 2 team. Was paid hourly, somewhere in the $15/hr range. Made cloaks and weapons and stuff. Pretty chill. Worked in a dark office building room in a little cube farm with the rest of the character art team (~10 guys).
Hours: "8hrs/day". I usually got in around 10 or so and worked until 6ish.
Crunch: No.
Layoffs?: Yes. Was not laid off, 3% of the company got the ax.
Avalanche Software (Disney Interactive), Salt Lake City, UT. AAA, 250-person company. Environment Art. Summer Internship that turned into on-going part time (hourly, exempt) for 2.5 years. Started at something like $16/hr. When I was hourly it was higher, around $20/hr or something? I forget. Started on the Toybox team for the first Disney Infinity title. Me and 3 other artists initially. Eventually the Toybox environment art team reached 6 artists total. Had a huge amount of influence on the final product. Pretty much any screenshot of the game has some of my art in it. Got to work with 20+ high profile IPs and multiple studios such as Pixar, Disney Animation, etc etc.
Hours: "Core hours". Had to be in the office between 10am and 4pm-ish. Basically, just be around most of the day so people can schedule meetings and have access to you. I usually got in between 8 and 10 in the morning and left whenever made sense.
Crunch: Yes. Some got away with just a few months. Most had about 5 months. Everyone got comp time afterwards which means after crunch they got 4-6 weeks paid time off to recuperate.
Layoffs? Yes. Was not laid off, probably 1% of the company got the ax.
Inverted Axis, Corona, CA. Indie, 6-person company. Environment Art/general 3D art. Full-time for 1 year. $75,000/year. We had a great client who was funding us so we were highly unusual since we were an indie with salary and benefits. Slowly, gradually developing independent projects on the side on nights and weekends, we were working on an online browser game for our client. Client due to personal issues ended up breaching contract and our funding dries up overnight. We crunched to put together some prototypes and pitched them to Sony, Nintendo, et al, but publishing deals take months to broker and we only had enough momentum to last a few weeks. Company closed.
Hours: 10 hour days, and you had to be in in time for the morning meeting at 10am. 4-day work week (3-day weekends).
Crunch: Yes in a fight to save the company. Spent nights at the office.
Layoffs? Yes. Entire company closed. Collected unemployment for 2.5 months. Unemployed for the holidays.
Avalanche Software (Disney Interactive), Salt Lake City, UT. AAA, 250+ person company. Environment Art. Full-time. Salary in the $48,000-$65,000 range, benefits, free park admission, etc. Didn't burn any bridges and was invited back. On an art team of 4 working on unannounced stuff.
Crunch: Not yet, but probably soon.
Layoffs? No (knock on wood).
I think as long as you live in the Schengen area you don't need a visa for the UK. If you want to move to the US that would be a lot harder.
Let me know if you have any specific questions about the moving process.
As for my experiences so far, I've been working here since June and it's been great. I couldn't imagine doing anything else. The hours are 9-5:30, with flexitime coming soon (hopefully). Not much overtime except in crunch and that's usually paid for. Good benefits as well. Though it's not always fun and games, it is still a job and I still hate waking up on Monday mornings. Wages here are lower than in the US ( can't complain though) but I've heard there's more benefits and better job security.
1. Do AAA studios hire new graduates ?
2. Do they let new graduates to work on their big projects? or main characters? (I'm a character artist)
3. Should new graduates choose AAA or indie studios?
Was it worth it?
Well... that depends, where am I now?
Well, after about 3 years of hard work since graduating, and after 2 pretty solid game jobs, I am currently being flown out to Seattle this Sunday for my final interview at one of the worlds largest game companies.
So again... was it all worth it?
Well... yes. But it could have gone smoother had I been smarter.
Here are some random assorted tips for making the best of your journey, colored by my own experience since graduating school.
1) If you have problems, getting a game job isn't going to magically solve them.
This was a huge one for me. I thought finally landing that game job was going to solve everything for me. But in reality, it is a job. At the end of the day, a job is a job. Its work, very very hard work. Once you hit that goal of getting a game job, make new goal and keep striving.
2) Make the best of where you are working, no matter how small or insignificant you feel.
Its REALLY easy to say "yeah... I work at so-and-so, and its okay... but I REALLY want to be working here or doing this." Yes, it is okay to aspire to bigger things, but also appreciate where you are at the moment and make the best of it. If you adopt this attitude, you will ALWAYS be unhappy, because that desire for bigger and better things will kill you if you let it. Just... take a minute to stop and smell the roses sometimes.
3) Always work your hardest, because anything worth doing is worth doing well.
This speaks for itself. Not working hard is the fastest way to get a bad rep in this industry, and trust me.... people DO TALK. I know about some of you out there, yup, we've talked about you. I avoid lazy people like the plague.
4) Don't neglect yourself or those you love, just for the sake of making it big.
Sacrifices do have to be made if you want to reach your goals. But be realistic, and don't fool yourself. Put in time for your folio, but also make time for your loved ones and friends sometimes as well. At the end of the day, you can't work if you aren't healthy, and your family and friends are the people you will depend on when the bottom falls out.
5) Just because you "just got hired" doesn't give you immunity.
You can be let go at ANY TIME. I worked at Funcom for just a handful of months when I got laid off. If a company isn't doing well and can't afford to keep you, it doesn't matter how long you have been there. But if you find yourself in that spot, take it with grace; you never know when those people will be vouching for you in the future.
6) Lastly... and this may be hard to hear for some of you but... if you don't LOVE this stuff, like ABSOLUTELY love it... get out.
Get out right now and never look back.
One of the reasons I am still going is because I love 3D Art. I love to work, I love to study, and I love the community . If you do not however, you are setting yourself up for MEGA failure on so many levels. You will be unhappy at work, unhappy at home, and overall miserable.
These are just some of my experiences so far, but overall I must say that I do love this industry despite the pitfalls. I have been lucky though. None of the jobs I have had had any major crunch and everyone at both studios was always reasonable. All of the people I have met have been really great, on both the art and administration side and I can't speak highly enough about all of the artists I've had the pleasure to work with.
Good luck to you and all of those with an interest of getting in though, its quite the journey! Just know all the downsides and pitfalls before you start, make peace with it, and you should be golden!
Yep
This. Mainly this. And work hard. Keep working hard, work on projects at home as much as you can. Do it only if you have a deep love for the field.
I work right next to a college where 3D is teached and every year i see a few people who will succeed (You can see it in their eyes, these people are motivated, and tired lol) and a lot of people who just think their degree will give them a job.
This job is for passionate people.
I haven't had any experience in a big AAA studio yet, but at the moment i'm working at a research center where i have the chance of being the main Character Artist for 2 1/2 years now. This opportunity is crazy, especially since i got hired just when i got out of college, like 3-4 months after or so.
So far i saw layoffs, crunches, overtime. Though, the layoff were necessary (2 people, nothing crazy) and all the overtime we did, we were given compensated time (Paid vacation for every hours you work overtime).
I'm fairly well paid for someone who is just starting his career, especially since it's really cheap where i live. I won't say my precise salary but artist overall vary from 30k to 45k CAD as far as i know. People i know with my experience fits this salary estimate. I started at 15$/month as intern for 4 months then it raised pretty fast.
I had the chance to develop 3D scanning pipelines, work on really complexe animal anatomy, supervise projects, work on stuff all around.
I'm still working there. I landed a gig as a contractual too with thesetales GmbH and since my schedule is pretty flexible it's really fun. Enjoying doing both at the moment.
Most of the time we can work whenever we want as long as we do 37,5h a week. Most people will work between 8 and 6. Some people start at 8, other at 11, nobody cares as long as you are there when there is meetings etc.
We have insurance, retirement plan, i have 3 weeks paid vacation + holidays, we get paid to go at events (MIGS, i went to L.A. for a week a year ago, Pixel Challenge, Siggraph, etc.).
Never regretted my choice so far. Best job ever.
Some companies lay off people, some companies start working on the sequel (or DLC or Extension) straight away.
Companies with a good management usually have another project already in pre-production and ready to welcome the work forces of the finished game.
Some companies are so big that they have several other games in production and you just change the project you are working on.
What ng.aniki said.
Also some big companies simply have two kind of contracts: fixed and permanent. The permanent team moves on to DLC and then the next game, the fixed contract team simply leaves. If the project is extended, the fixed term contract is extended too to match the new end of the project.
Nothing in your portfolio is finished except the "Repopulation" stuff. Which is a shame because if your textured the gun and carousel chair you'd have 2 nice props.
And don't forget to post wires and flats, it's very important.
I hope it helps and well, let's get to work!
Really? Does that 4 years include school? If it doesn't, I don't see how you were focusing on 3d with what you have in your folio. I'm not gonna call you slow as I am not a fast artist at all but a dozen assets anywhere from 30-70% done in 4 years? I think that's your problem right there. Regardless of whether you work full time, go to school full time, you need to pump out higher quality assets faster if you want to land a solid gig. I would say spend the next year making industry standard, high quality, PBR assets. Then apply again to studios. Also, putting an untextured asset(unless you are the king of hires modeling) shows you are lazy and don't finish things...as opposed to someone thinking your model looks good enough to hire you. I realize this is harsh but you gotta look around and see what you're up against.
It is an extremely tough industry. Not only to get a job, but to keep one. The majority of us are in this industry because we love games, we love making them, playing them and we love being creative. There can be crazy hours at times, or there can be no work at all. It's ruthless.
Since you asked about income, the salary in games aren't very great when you're starting out. Be wary of people trying to take advantage of your skills. When I graduated there were a lot of companies who were looking for cheap labor; they still are. I remember my very first game job offer (which I didn't take) was a minimum wage salary versus what I make now which has an extra zero on the end.
Working hard, making contacts and being able to go where the jobs are will get you pretty far.
Yeah 4 years includes being in school. Don't worry about sounding too harsh. Any feedback is good feedback! I don't want to make excuses because I hate excuses. Just so you know where all this frustration has come from I, like most people, had no prior 3d experience when I signed up for these video game design courses. I was under the impression I'd be taught the fundamentals of modeling, baking, texturing, the works of everything. Unfortunately, at the end of my tenure there I can honestly say I didn't learn much of anything. I absolutely attempted to learn outside of class. Contrary to what they told me before registering, you really needed to have background in everything. But that's why I came to this school!
Year 3 was more of the same, trying to dabble in everything, comprehending each area of game design. Truthfully, this past year has really been my year of making progress. I don't want to say the other 3 years were wasted because nothing is truly a waste of time....but in this case I wish I knew then what I know now.
I wholeheartedly agree I don't have a lot to show in my folio for 4 years, but the past year is really all about me striving to be where I should have been after 2 years in school. I won't be waiting a year to apply for jobs because that's just not feasible. These next few months will be crucial to my development. I'm on a steadfast mission to have a kick ass portfolio by beginning of summer and I plan on making this happen! My goals are to implement what I have learned about pbr texturing to my gun and chair, model/sculpt this killer concept of a stone well I found, and create a small medieval armory scene based on another stellar concept. I've also started a Fundamental Guide to Learning 3d. It's a guide I wish I had 4 years ago.
At first it seem like a promising career but after all noting more then a slightly advanced handicraft. Like a random job.
When I see my old art school mates , those crazy ones who had a courage to almost starve their wives to death, fight through depression and desperation but finally did something, found a gallery and contracts and now doing their personal actual creative art, not some zbrush routine embroidery, I am really starting to think perhaps I gave up too early.
But then I remember that many of them didn't went through it well and some even couldn't live up to their forty. Life is starting to seems not that bad after all.
I think this is the perfect example of it really needs to be something you absolutely are passionate about and love. If it's a job you`re doing just to pay the bills, ya, you`re really not going to get the most out of it.
But environment art is still a form of art. You're making something visually appealing by applying the skills an artist shoud have and you still get to tell a story, a story that won't stay in a gallery or be sold somewhere, but possibly influencing tens of thousands of people.
I and many like-minded friends only got into art (then art or design school) since we were exposed to something cool in a videogame that made our minds turn (it could have been a part of a game level, or a character, or an event played out with the help of enviro art).
You can still work towards you own game project and in this crowd-funding age is very possible to succed and achieve what dreams of artistic freedom you want, even if they are in a different field than fine art.
Moreover in small companies environment art often includes concept art and you have a lot of creative freedom. Beyond that an environment artist is often hard to replace and once things go wrong you would be a last guy whom they would say sorry and goodbye.
I am not complaining actually and happy with what I am doing. I would rather shoot myself in the head than would try to find a job in commercial 3d animation for example. ok. I know "The Maker" is true masterpiece but working in a random animation studio , brr
But whether I regret the choice. Sometimes I do. Whatever we would reach personally we would still be nobody behind a few companies/project names.