Seeking portfolio critique and career advice
Hello guys, I am new to the forums and I will try to keep this short as I have quite a number of questions to ask and pieces to post. Will really appreciate any advice you guys have 
I have been job hunting just over 2 months (in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia) and there has been a decent amount of 3D jobs in both games and animation studios but was rejected by some and had no reply from most of them. Some advice I have been given and been working on is to have more wireframe renders, better topology, creating content for a whole game rather than many separate pieces and to show renders using the game engine.
What I'm unsure of is whether I should start learning how to create proper textures rather than using stock images or poly painting over my UVs in Zbrush. Is it a skill a studio seeks if I am just applying for a 3D modeling job? Should I focus instead on improving my modeling skills? What else will increase my chances of employability?
My 3D skills were self taught as the games course I went to contained a lot of media/general subjects like cinema studies and web design; there wasn't a proper structure to my education and I've learned bits and pieces of preparing game ready models from youtube. I did however get to make two games you'll see below.
Fenry the Fox (4 months uni project)
In-game screenshot
We Go Fourth (Final year project, 8 months+)
I made some enemies and the characters had a different design in the first 4 months of production but my laptop crashed after the project and I didn't have backup renders of them. if any of you are interested, the game can be downloaded at http://goblindarts.com/
The game was showcased at a PAX Melbourne 2015
3D poster I made for uni:
Some of my personal work:
Bloodrights, a personal project used to practice stylistic consistency and game ready assets.
Pinnochio
Wild west level assets (WIP)
Other personal work:
Sorry for the long post, hope you guys made it to the end and can help me out
I have been job hunting just over 2 months (in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia) and there has been a decent amount of 3D jobs in both games and animation studios but was rejected by some and had no reply from most of them. Some advice I have been given and been working on is to have more wireframe renders, better topology, creating content for a whole game rather than many separate pieces and to show renders using the game engine.
What I'm unsure of is whether I should start learning how to create proper textures rather than using stock images or poly painting over my UVs in Zbrush. Is it a skill a studio seeks if I am just applying for a 3D modeling job? Should I focus instead on improving my modeling skills? What else will increase my chances of employability?
My 3D skills were self taught as the games course I went to contained a lot of media/general subjects like cinema studies and web design; there wasn't a proper structure to my education and I've learned bits and pieces of preparing game ready models from youtube. I did however get to make two games you'll see below.
Fenry the Fox (4 months uni project)
In-game screenshot
We Go Fourth (Final year project, 8 months+)
I made some enemies and the characters had a different design in the first 4 months of production but my laptop crashed after the project and I didn't have backup renders of them. if any of you are interested, the game can be downloaded at http://goblindarts.com/
The game was showcased at a PAX Melbourne 2015
3D poster I made for uni:
Some of my personal work:
Bloodrights, a personal project used to practice stylistic consistency and game ready assets.
Pinnochio
Wild west level assets (WIP)
Other personal work:
Sorry for the long post, hope you guys made it to the end and can help me out
Replies
You have a huge body of half or badly finished work, when you'd be in a stronger position with fewer well finished pieces.
Thanks for the feedback!
I would loose all the goblin darts stuff, it looks really amateur (no offense)
this piece was my favorite by far
Also, try to to figure out what type of work you'd like to do, for example if you have a portfolio that is of Pixar style art, don't be applying for Blizzard type of jobs
hope this helps!
At this stage echoing what Almighty_Gir said, you're work at this time is extremely unpolished.
If you want to do characters you need to raise your work to the level of what you see in current games and film.
If you want to do environments and props... Same thing raise your work to the standard you see current in entertainment.
You seem to know the basics which means you're off to a good start, but now you need to step back figure out where you want to focus and really push yourself.
none taken. thanks for picking a favourite piece, it gives me motivation. Thanks for the advice, I'll be sure to practice a particular style until I can mimic that studio's style.
@MrHobo Thanks for the advice. I'll hone my skills to the industry's standard before applying for jobs.