A beginner with a great portfolio can earn a chance at a internship or a junior position in a studio with enough talent and networking, I have hired several intern and junior level people with little to no experience as in-house artists.
Experience does help, if you never had a studio gig, Indy development workshops and freelance are always a plus. What studios need to see is that you understand the game development pipeline and that you are able to contribute efficiently in a project.
Anything that shows that you can make work that is usable in a game, just zbrush sculpts will not be enough. Make the studio believe in you and make yourself the best that you can be.
not sure if this questions has been answered since i didnt get a chance to read the entire thread.
I always wondered if such recruiters only looked for in-house positions only ? I been contacted by many recruiter contacting me specifically about certain positions, most of them in USA and some even in Germany, UK and France and few from Canada too. None of them have ever been freelance or off-site contract work positions. Do such recruiters ever look for off-site contractors ever ? If not, why not ?
i can relate. i also receive requests from recruiters and pretty much always for onsite/full time employment, often half the world away. my impression when working inhouse has been that it is not unusual at all for companies to welcome freelance and/or remote work but that this only ever happens if you have the inside connect. you'd think there should be a market for recruiters posing as talent agents, representing freelancers. more so with the emphasis on contract work these days.
Few studios are open to remote work, but as you have experienced so far, most teams only want people to join their organization in-house.
A big reason why studios require employees to work in house is because a company does not only hire you for your technical skill, it also hires you so you can actively provide your creative knowledge and insight to the team.
Another reason why studios prefer to have employees in-house is that software licenses are a cost prohibitive issue, the cost requirement is high and the sharing of studio proprietary tools, programs, and documentation makes working remotely a technical and legal hassle that they would prefer to avoid.
Keep up the good work Mashru!
Hi, I think you misunderstood my question. i was talking about my experience with recruiters, not studios. i worked with many studios big and small, local and international. I did not ask about studios looking for inhouse only because that is clearly not the case in my experience. I was curious why recruiters only look for inhouse positions. I know for a fact that lot of studios need off site freelancers now and then and I have worked with many such studios because of that. However, for such work I have almost always been contacted by the art lead, art director, producer or manager but rarely by their HR/recruiter. Even at times the first work inquiry from studios has been the CEO. Only rarely have I been contacted by the HR of the studio regarding freelance work. HR/Recruiters seem to be only involved with inhouse positions. This has been my experience and I am curious why it is the way it is. To me it seems like the HR could also expand their duties as an outsource recruiter of some sorts. Thomas' point hits the nail of the head. Recruiters could be sort of talent agents (commissioned by studio or even the freelancers) with a roster of freelancers and connecting them to different studios according to their work needs. It seems like an areas where there is room for exploration and it could benefit both parties more if recruiters could expand their communication and act like agents between contractors and studios to expedite production.
Currently the structure of HR Recruiting in many companies has Recruiters primarily focused on in-house opportunities. Also in truth, this is an aspect of talent acquisition that Recruiters are not normally a part of as they are already busy enough just trying to fill the high priority in-house opportunities. When it comes to outsourced opportunities such as the ones you speak of, it falls onto the Art Director or Leads to reach out to artists who they know will deliver the small assignments given to them. Freelancing is built on trust, chances are that if the studio needs a freelancer, the team already has someone in mind.
In truth, both you and @thomasp have inspired me as there is indeed a deeper market for representing freelancers, also as the industry is depending on high quality freelancers more and more, it would be very wise to have personnel that are able to dependably meet short term project needs.
I would like to research this much further, tell me if I have responded your question properly.
My question would actually be how do recruiters (and if you have any experience - inhouse recruiters) approach applications when it comes to what they look at first - portfolio, resume or CV - and when do leads actually get involved? Now I know everybody says portfolio is the most important part, but we as a team lost at least one good artist as our HR rejected him based on CV and her opinion on the portfolio, without ever showing it to the team (we only knew he applyied because I was in contact with him). He was by far the most talented artist that applied back then (6 out of 6 team members wanted just him). I must admitt some of the blame has to be put on our team lead, who was a programmer and not diligent enough in this case, but still I wonder how it works in other companies and with recruiters. So how does it normally work? Does the HR/recruiter do the first sorting out based on typos in CV and on paper experience before passing it on to the team leads because they trust on anyhow having enough good portfolios with perfect paperwork or do they go just based on portfolios and point out the mistakes in CV & coverletter to the leads?
The other question would be how recruiter handle connections that somebody has in a company he applies for? If employes are mentioned in the cover letter that the person knows, do you first try to reach out to those people before you finish your review? I am now in such a situation as I am looking for a new job and wondering if I actually should even mention those persons I know or just leave it to the recruiter to see my connections on LinkedIn.
Final question - I know that part of the screening may include screening of the online activity of the applicant (like LinkedIn or related discussion boards like this one). How important would you judge those? Especially things like recommendations and skill approvals?
With all those questions I know that it all depends on situation and person and what not I am mainly trying to understand what formalities and minor things already can handicap you when applying - as it seems there are far more 'Do Not's than 'Do's
Ah, and a final question that I forgot - is it ok to reach out on LinkedIn to recruiters in the studio to ask if the appilcation has been recieved?
Thanks for your time and all the effort you are puting in
How bad is it if you're "not ready" for a phone interview? I got a possible phone interview from a recruiter at a AAA studio. I was still pretty much asleep at the moment but I told him I was ready to go but I had woken up a little while ago. He said that he would call back in 10 minutes and never did. I called back twice in the following days but he gave no reply at all. If I had been awake for maybe 10 minutes or so I would have never said anything like "I woke up a while ago." But then again why would he just tell me he would call back in a little bit only to never do that? Is this typical amongst recruiters?
One thing us recruiters should always ask at the beginning of the conversation is "is this still a good time for you". It is essential that us recruiters understand that we are all human beings and will not be perfect even at the time of a pre scheduled interview.
I can not begin to tell you how many times I have spoken to a candidate who was strugling with their words and excitement, not wanting to mess themselves up and stumbling over themselves to make themselves sound better than they can be. Life happens and just because you are not super sharp at the time of the conversation, does not mean that I can judge your entire personal ability from that interaction.
In my opinion, empathy is how the best teams are made.
Now I must have the benefit of the doubt for the Recruiter as well, it is essential to follow up with everyone, and sometimes mistakes are made.
I am also certain that there will be other opportunities for you in games, it is really important to keep yourself fed, to keep striving to be better than yesterday, and to keep the dream alive.
I've got a resume question: If I were to apply to a character artist position, would it be worth it to leave out an environment lead position from my resume (I can't show any of my work from that project in any case). In the interest of brevity, my current portfolio only contains 7 character projects, so I'm wondering if I should apply this same way of thinking to my resume.
Thank you for reaching out and asking me a question, also I am looking forward to your Hunter S. Thompson bust as it is coming along well.
In respects to your resume question, my opinion is the following:
You should tailor your resume to the company you are applying for, but you should also be truthful to how you have spent your time in the industry. For example, we do not need to see a retail side job you had to take because times got rough and you needed money.
Resumes can be longer than one page and your portfolio speaks louder to your ability to do the work. There are many times that I have hired an artist that previously specialized in environments but wanted to follow the character art path and had the portfolio demonstrate their ability to do the work.
Thanks! The bust has provided a good chance to brush up on my hair and cloth modeling skills.
I appreciate your insight. It's sometimes tough to pick and choose which portfolio pieces are best to show off if the position isn't strictly a character art job. Though with a resume I should probably show a more complete history of industry experience.
Hi Alejandro, I hope you are still answering questions in this post
I would like to know:
1- If it is recommended to contact recruiters personally to ask about what they are looking for specifically to better tailor my application to a specific company.
2- If sending open applications to companies is a waste of time or if it is worth it, I've lost count of how many open applications I've sent to different companies and I would be good to know if recruiters even take the time to look at those.
Hope you are well and thank you for reaching out on this thread! I am always open for more of these. You will find my answers in line below:
1- If it is recommended to contact recruiters personally to ask about what they are looking for specifically to better tailor my application to a specific company.
It is always great to reach out to recruiters and show enthusiasm for the company and the job opening, many recruiters would love to take the time to help someone better fill one of their job openings. Now I would also encourage you not to wait on recruiter or hiring manager feedback for you to tailor your portfolio, get moving on it and use their insight if it becomes available. Possibly ask other artists within the studio for their feedback if the recruiter is unable to get back to you. A question you should always ask yourself is if your work meets the quality bar of the studio.
2- If sending open applications to companies is a waste of time or if it is worth it, I've lost count of how many open applications I've sent to different companies and I would be good to know if recruiters even take the time to look at those.
Please do not sent open applications, it is a fast track to pass town or as one of my manager would say… it is a "CLM" (career limiting move). Hiring managers and recruiters only have minutes to review your portfolio and resume, if it does not read like the job description, they will most probably not know what to do with you and quickly press the pass button. In addition, if your portfolio is not tailored and targeted to a specific studio’s aesthetic, your chances will be gravely diminished.
Good luck dude! let me know if you have any more questions in mind.
Thank you on the great advice Alejandro @adrxzero !
I have a follow up question regarding messaging recruiters, I messaged a couple directly trough linkedin and only one replied showing positive interest in my portfolio but then after I sent him a second message, a week later I'm still waiting for a reply.
Is it better to contact them directly trough email or social media? also I can imagine that recruiters are busy going trough hundreds of applications so what is the average response time before I can assume that they are never replying an move on and try with someone else?
Recruiters are a breed of human who are always busy having to source new people and maintaining an unending candidate pipeline, so getting feedback from them can sometimes be troublesome if your work is not a slam dunk for them. I recommend also reaching out to artists in the studio and asking for portfolio advice or a critique if they are willing. If you do receive feedback, you better follow up on it and knock it out of the park.
For visibility, I recommend reaching out using email for sure. A big part of our craft as recruiters is managing our emails and ensuring that the candidate experience remains positive and that means looking at every email we receive, which is why tailoring your emails to the company is very important.
Replies
you'd think there should be a market for recruiters posing as talent agents, representing freelancers. more so with the emphasis on contract work these days.
I did not ask about studios looking for inhouse only because that is clearly not the case in my experience. I was curious why recruiters only look for inhouse positions.
I know for a fact that lot of studios need off site freelancers now and then and I have worked with many such studios because of that. However, for such work I have almost always been contacted by the art lead, art director, producer or manager but rarely by their HR/recruiter. Even at times the first work inquiry from studios has been the CEO. Only rarely have I been contacted by the HR of the studio regarding freelance work. HR/Recruiters seem to be only involved with inhouse positions. This has been my experience and I am curious why it is the way it is. To me it seems like the HR could also expand their duties as an outsource recruiter of some sorts.
Thomas' point hits the nail of the head. Recruiters could be sort of talent agents (commissioned by studio or even the freelancers) with a roster of freelancers and connecting them to different studios according to their work needs. It seems like an areas where there is room for exploration and it could benefit both parties more if recruiters could expand their communication and act like agents between contractors and studios to expedite production.
Currently the structure of HR Recruiting in many companies has Recruiters primarily focused on in-house opportunities. Also in truth, this is an aspect of talent acquisition that Recruiters are not normally a part of as they are already busy enough just trying to fill the high priority in-house opportunities. When it comes to outsourced opportunities such as the ones you speak of, it falls onto the Art Director or Leads to reach out to artists who they know will deliver the small assignments given to them. Freelancing is built on trust, chances are that if the studio needs a freelancer, the team already has someone in mind.
I would like to research this much further, tell me if I have responded your question properly.
Hu
My question would actually be how do recruiters (and if you have any experience - inhouse recruiters) approach applications when it comes to what they look at first - portfolio, resume or CV - and when do leads actually get involved? Now I know everybody says portfolio is the most important part, but we as a team lost at least one good artist as our HR rejected him based on CV and her opinion on the portfolio, without ever showing it to the team (we only knew he applyied because I was in contact with him). He was by far the most talented artist that applied back then (6 out of 6 team members wanted just him). I must admitt some of the blame has to be put on our team lead, who was a programmer and not diligent enough in this case, but still I wonder how it works in other companies and with recruiters.
So how does it normally work? Does the HR/recruiter do the first sorting out based on typos in CV and on paper experience before passing it on to the team leads because they trust on anyhow having enough good portfolios with perfect paperwork or do they go just based on portfolios and point out the mistakes in CV & coverletter to the leads?
The other question would be how recruiter handle connections that somebody has in a company he applies for? If employes are mentioned in the cover letter that the person knows, do you first try to reach out to those people before you finish your review? I am now in such a situation as I am looking for a new job and wondering if I actually should even mention those persons I know or just leave it to the recruiter to see my connections on LinkedIn.
Final question - I know that part of the screening may include screening of the online activity of the applicant (like LinkedIn or related discussion boards like this one). How important would you judge those? Especially things like recommendations and skill approvals?
With all those questions I know that it all depends on situation and person and what not
Ah, and a final question that I forgot - is it ok to reach out on LinkedIn to recruiters in the studio to ask if the appilcation has been recieved?
Thanks for your time and all the effort you are puting in
I am also certain that there will be other opportunities for you in games, it is really important to keep yourself fed, to keep striving to be better than yesterday, and to keep the dream alive.
And when in doubt, watch Ryan Kingslien.
I've got a resume question: If I were to apply to a character artist position, would it be worth it to leave out an environment lead position from my resume (I can't show any of my work from that project in any case). In the interest of brevity, my current portfolio only contains 7 character projects, so I'm wondering if I should apply this same way of thinking to my resume.
Thank you for reaching out and asking me a question, also I am looking forward to your Hunter S. Thompson bust as it is coming along well.
In respects to your resume question, my opinion is the following:
You should tailor your resume to the company you are applying for, but you should also be truthful to how you have spent your time in the industry. For example, we do not need to see a retail side job you had to take because times got rough and you needed money.
Resumes can be longer than one page and your portfolio speaks louder to your ability to do the work. There are many times that I have hired an artist that previously specialized in environments but wanted to follow the character art path and had the portfolio demonstrate their ability to do the work.
I appreciate your insight. It's sometimes tough to pick and choose which portfolio pieces are best to show off if the position isn't strictly a character art job. Though with a resume I should probably show a more complete history of industry experience.
I would like to know:
1- If it is recommended to contact recruiters personally to ask about what they are looking for specifically to better tailor my application to a specific company.
2- If sending open applications to companies is a waste of time or if it is worth it, I've lost count of how many open applications I've sent to different companies and I would be good to know if recruiters even take the time to look at those.
Hope you are well and thank you for reaching out on this thread! I am always open for more of these. You will find my answers in line below:
1- If it is recommended to contact recruiters personally to ask about what they are looking for specifically to better tailor my application to a specific company.
It is always great to reach out to recruiters and show enthusiasm for the company and the job opening, many recruiters would love to take the time to help someone better fill one of their job openings. Now I would also encourage you not to wait on recruiter or hiring manager feedback for you to tailor your portfolio, get moving on it and use their insight if it becomes available. Possibly ask other artists within the studio for their feedback if the recruiter is unable to get back to you. A question you should always ask yourself is if your work meets the quality bar of the studio.
Please do not sent open applications, it is a fast track to pass town or as one of my manager would say… it is a "CLM" (career limiting move). Hiring managers and recruiters only have minutes to review your portfolio and resume, if it does not read like the job description, they will most probably not know what to do with you and quickly press the pass button. In addition, if your portfolio is not tailored and targeted to a specific studio’s aesthetic, your chances will be gravely diminished.
Good luck dude! let me know if you have any more questions in mind.
I have a follow up question regarding messaging recruiters, I messaged a couple directly trough linkedin and only one replied showing positive interest in my portfolio but then after I sent him a second message, a week later I'm still waiting for a reply.
Is it better to contact them directly trough email or social media? also I can imagine that recruiters are busy going trough hundreds of applications so what is the average response time before I can assume that they are never replying an move on and try with someone else?
Recruiters are a breed of human who are always busy having to source new people and maintaining an unending candidate pipeline, so getting feedback from them can sometimes be troublesome if your work is not a slam dunk for them. I recommend also reaching out to artists in the studio and asking for portfolio advice or a critique if they are willing. If you do receive feedback, you better follow up on it and knock it out of the park.
For visibility, I recommend reaching out using email for sure. A big part of our craft as recruiters is managing our emails and ensuring that the candidate experience remains positive and that means looking at every email we receive, which is why tailoring your emails to the company is very important.
Good luck with your inktober pieces!