Portfolio Critiques for Job Searching - PBR/Hand-painted Crossbreed Work

KellyJohnson3DArt

Hello!

This little thread will be for revamping my website/setup so that I can find work in the industry.

I teach myself all on my own and I am wanting to study being a generalist (I think). Basically that means props, textures, environments and characters.

I have no preference in type of studio work (mobile, next-gen, etc). I'm basically looking to just be well-rounded and marketable to each game market.

I am willing to study both next-gen Substance Painter/Designer and go hand-painted textures. 

Anyway! Please join in on my journey as I push farther in my work to make it.

https://kellyjohnson3dart.artstation.com/

artofmars

I would remove the filtering, I dont think that it really adds anything presentation wise. I would also make sure that only your best pieces are being showcased. 

Hope this helps 

Asura

Your work is pretty solid. I'd try to keep out any WIPS and only show finished pieces. Also from what I've heard/ seen around regarding making a folio to help you break in, you may want to have a focus instead of generalizing.

Generalization although possible, makes things harder on you since you have to be at junior-mid level for multiple disciplines. And most companies want their Juniors to have the skill of a mid - senior person just with a lack of work speed. 

just my 2 cents. 
I like your work though

Carabiner

Hi Kelly! I agree with @Asura that your work is looking solid -- and also that it'd be a good idea to remove WIP work from your portfolio.

You mention that you want to be a generalist, but it seems like you're actually focusing on character art to me. You've got the crate and then this environment, which is basically some (very nicely textured) walls and a cool organic prop. I think if you really want to sell yourself as a generalist, it'd be a good idea to show that you can do a larger environment at a high level.

In addition, your portfolio could use some copyediting -- I know we're artists, not writers, but when I'm reviewing portfolios, it's always a plus to see that an artist can write well about their work. For example, in your Smite piece you say "My water dragon fish god following the Smite character pipeline process but still sticking to my own concept and design." To improve your sentence structure and wording, I'd change it to something more like "I created a water dragon god following the Smite character pipeline, but using my own concept and design."

Also, to be honest, I'd advocate that you remove the Anmagala TCG section, since it's not relevant to a game industry job.

Alemja

I agree with @Asura and @Carabiner do not generalize, specialize. I had to tell several students this at GDC, some who were essentially spinning their wheels for years being mediocre at everything. You have to give yourself focus on both what you want to do and where you want to go, especially when you are just starting out and trying to break in.

I think you have some good low poly models and decent hand-painted textures but you really need to focus on making your models cleaner, Particularly the Little Demon and the Fish God (which I gave you a critique on) suffer from some poorly allocated geo. Your PBR textures on the Little Demon also need some more work, it doesn't feel like a whole lot more was done other than use some procedural generators. We also don't need to see the textures on the Aristocats since it looks like they are just sculpts, unless I'm mistaken and they are actually low poly models.

I think you have a lot of potential, but you really need to find your focus and most importantly: stick with it. It feels like you are trying to spread yourself too thin by trying to do multiple things at once. Best of luck!

KellyJohnson3DArt

Hey guys thanks!!! Been taking tests. I'm wanting to study just like 1-2 environments and focus mostly on characters so that I have a market that  reaches to everyone. Honestly though my WIP's have gotten me calls before a couple of times. I'm trying to only have finished solid pieces and make more work. It's extremely hard to make a solid portfolio. Takes soooo much time.

Basically my goal is to push farther with new stuff and take out weakest piece as going along!!! Thanks!!!! (Took time to get back to this. I'll make adjustments and keep pushing!!!) 

When I have another piece or two done I'll bump this thread so can get feedback on progress as going along. Thanks!!!!!!!! As far as generalist I want to specialize characters but I also want to have the market so that I can be hired on as an environment/prop or texture artist if need to. Or PBR/hand-painted studios. 

KellyJohnson3DArt

Also yeah my English suckssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss! Big time! I'll look into edits online. Thanks!!!