New job as 3D generalist, any advice?

electronic-fox

Hey guys n' girls.

I've just landed a new fulltime gig as a 3D generalist which will be starting in a few days. I'm pretty confident that I can do the job, but up till now I've always worked as a freelance artist (and this job kinda came out of nowhere).

Now Im just not sure what to expect for the most part, so I was hoping some experienced people here could give me some tips or some stories about their first jobs in the field. I'm both excited and nervous about this job.

I'll be working remotely, so all my work will be on my own PC, and since this job offers a substantial raise on my usual income I'll probably look into upgrading that too (some recommendations on hardware around £700-900 would be good too).

So I guess I'm just wondering if theres anything I should be looking out for, any practices I should develop, perhaps some tips on an efficient workspace, ways to get the most out of this opportunity etc.

Kevin Albers

Try to avoid accidentally checking out the entire project in Perforce/Alienbrain.

electronic-fox

That sounds like a painful thing to have to learn through experience.

hmm_rock

It sounds like this isn't your first rodeo since you've been freelancing already, but I've found a time tracking app to be incredibly helpful when working from home. It can help point out where you may be spending too much time in your pipeline and help you optimize. Alternatively, the data of hours-logged can be reassuring when things get overwhelming. I've used RescueTime in the past, it runs in the background and sends you summary emails.

electronic-fox

hmm_rock said:

It sounds like this isn't your first rodeo since you've been freelancing already, but I've found a time tracking app to be incredibly helpful when working from home. It can help point out where you may be spending too much time in your pipeline and help you optimize. Alternatively, the data of hours-logged can be reassuring when things get overwhelming. I've used RescueTime in the past, it runs in the background and sends you summary emails.

I have been freelancing for a couple years, but this was usually on smaller projects with small teams at best.

Time tracking sounds like a good idea. Both for optimizing where I spend my time, and making sure I dont overwork too much (I think we all know what its like to be so focused on a project that its the early hours of the morning before we realise we havent eaten or gone to the bathroom).

JedTheKrampus

Kevin Albers said:

Try to avoid accidentally checking out the entire project in Perforce/Alienbrain.

Also, don't check in your entire filesystem. A web dev friend of mine had a new coworker who was about to commit every file on his computer to Git, but luckily said friend was able to stop him.

skyline5gtr

Wear pants, don't be a dick

electronic-fox

skyline5gtr said:

Wear pants, don't be a dick

Pants optional, I'll be working from home.

RyanB

Don't plant the corn too early.

Ged

Ive been a bit of a generalist at a mobile games studio for a while now, about  6 years in fact and its really good! The variety is good fun but also challenging at times. Sometimes I was working on different aspects of 3 projects at once, in game art in one project, ui art for another, vfx for another etc. You've gotta still put in the effort learning these different aspects of the job just to be jack of all trades. Downside is you might not fully master any one aspect quickly being a generalist. Just be positive and do your best with any task you're given, try to get a good understanding of how the task you are given works with the rest of the game so that what you create is what is desired. You're on a team now and its great when you all work well together, if youre on a reasonably small team you may end up helping define what the game is to some extent, which is pretty cool too.