Advice for a self taught artist?

TheSurgeon · Mar 2019

Hello all, I'm new here, hows everyone doing? Anyways, I've been modeling for about a year now and I'm trying to take myself to a professional level. Specifically in creating environments/weapons/vehicles for video games. I work full time and I do this in my spare time before work. However, this is something I really enjoy and am very passionate about. Does anyone have any advice on whether or not it is worth it to go to college for this? Is it better to keep teaching myself? Are there better opportunities for those with degrees? Am I wasting my time trying to bring myself to a professional level? I feel like I'm progressing but its taking a lot longer than I would like, I'm also not too sure I'm learning everything I need to learn that's related to game design (I learn a lot from YouTube and Udemy however sometimes the videos are for architectural renders and such which apply (I think, I could be wrong) different methods). I feel like there are a lot of gaps in my current working knowledge, I've been trying to plug those holes but when I do another one pops up. I really love modeling, and will continue to do so ad infinitum. I want to work my way towards a job in this field; the road is long and arduous any and all advice would help me see a distant light at the end of my very long, and extremely dark tunnel. If there is anyone who has been through these same trials and tribulations and has any advice to offer I would really, really appreciate it.

I searched for rules on the forums, and for some reason I could not find any, so if external links are not allowed I sincerely apologize, but here is a link to my current "portfolio" and what I've accomplished in a year, its not much, its really sparse, but I'm banging my head against a brick wall in terms of trying to figure out what I should do.

https://mylestaft.crevado.com/

Sincerely,
That One Guy Over There

poopipe · Mar 2019

You don't need a degree, you just need to be good (and also not an arsehole

)

Some wisdom....

1. You need to actually look at your reference and understand why things look the way they do. Every mark has a reason for being there and every object has a history. This is why real world references are good and refetences from games and film are bad. It's also why just slapping a procedural dirt generator on something looks at least 25% shit.

2. Pick small tasks and finish them - even if it's not going well you need to power through to the end and get yourself a fully textured and rendered asset. You learn more from a finished asset than you will from anything else

Alemja · Mar 2019

I guess the first thing to consider when getting a degree is "where are you from?" The industry in general doesn't look for people with degrees and you can get a job without one. However there are a few instances where a degree might be useful or worthwhile getting:

if you are in a country that is not a game development hub and will need to travel internationally.
Or the country you live in provides a college level education at little to no cost to you
If you live in the US and have a scholarship or other means to cover college and not take on a lot of debt.

If any of those things are true for you then maybe you should go to college, and know that you don't have to get a game dev specific degree, really anything will do. An art, architecture or industrial design degree will probably treat you better in the long run than a game dev degree because most of the schools that offer them are not great. I'm an Art Institute Alumni and my school just went defunct a month ago so trust me I know lol.

If any of those things aren't true but you still feel like a course like structure would be help for you, luckily we live an age where you can learn the skills you need at a fraction of the price of a school or for free. Here are a listing of a few places:

As for going slow, I feel that and in reality your situation is not uncommon. Most people have to have a daily hustle and do things on the side, even if you do go to school it could be years of continued work before you break in. Again I can relate to both of these, it took me 3 years after I graduated to get my first job and I had to do portfolio stuff every day after work to keep on improving. These days I'm in the industry but not doing much of the art at my job so to expand my portfolio I have to do it on my own time and projects that would take a month full time are taking months on my own time. No matter which way you slice it this is a skill that takes time, and there is so much to learn and such a high fidelity to get to. It's a marathon not a sprint.

However there are ways to shorten your time:

Actively seek out feedback, Polycount is a great place for that there are also discords you could try to find
Give yourself well defined goals on what you hope to achieve for a project
Keep a project's scope small so you can focus on quality
Browse Polycount, Artstation and Twitter to find art that you aspire to and want to make, that is your quality bar. You can also tailor to specific games or companies.
Take notes for anything and everything: what you learned on a project, next steps, small details you noticed on reference etc

Links are allowed here as we're all about seeing and growing that portfolio.

I hoped this helped though, best of luck to you!

Two Listen · Mar 2019

If you haven't read through it already, I'll refer you to this polycount wiki section for some good reading, specifically the summary and information under "Education":

http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Game_Industry

I don't like to comment on the college thing specifically since I think it really just depends on what kind of person yo uare, but I will say - do not underestimate the value of money, or the burden of debt.

Don't really know if I'm qualified to give the advice, but at a glance regarding your portfolio specifically I'd absolutely get rid of your 2D work - it doesn't sound like that's your goal and I think those pieces are hurting your portfolio rather than helping to show any degree of versatility. I second the advice that you need to work on finishing pieces. I don't know that I agree with focusing on quick ones... I think maybe more accurately it's important to consider scope. Take as much time as you need to learn as much as you can, just don't like, go do something so ridiculously beyond your bounds. Experiment. Redo shit until it seems right. How can you hope to learn to do things quicker, or more efficiently if you haven't managed to do them before at all? So take your time to do it, even if it's not quick.

And regarding this:

TheSurgeon said:

...I feel like there are a lot of gaps in my current working knowledge, I've been trying to plug those holes but when I do another one pops up.

That's pretty much forever buddy. The more skilled you get, the more problems you'll be able to see. When I was 17 I thought I was getting close to where I wanted to be. I'm now drastically better than I was then, and I mean... lol I'm farther from where I want to be. Probably both because I'm able to see more of the issues in my work (or have been forced to encounter them through more projects), and also because my definition of what's awesome now isn't the same as what was awesome to me when I was 17.

Alex_J · Mar 2019

I'll mention one thing additional to the great advices above - although this is only applicable for persons living in america and may be a no-go for variety of reasons, but it's something worth considering :

if you want to buy yourself some easy-living time to just grind on your portfolio/skills, look into something like the national guard. You can choose some easy-peasy, no-brainer MOS, go through bootcamp, and then like one weekend a month you go to go do some drills. What you get in return is the GI bill, which will pay you a living wage to go to school. So then you can take whatever degree will be easy -- maybe one of these art institutes or whatever you feel like, and basically you get school paid for plus 1,500 to 2k a month for living. Pretty low-effort way to get a couple years of focused study time without having to worry over the bills.

Won't be an option for many people, but if you can definitely check it out.

TheSurgeon · Apr 2019

@poopipe

Thats one thing I try to be careful about, the more recent images I have on my "portfolio" (if it can be called that) were of a project that was going to be a cyberpunk black market/backroom surgical unit/augmentation repossession. However, I am not very skilled so doing stuff that I don't have an active reference for was too difficult. I tried to create concept art for it but as you can all see on my portfolio, I'm not too great at 2D art haha. So at the moment I'm creating a cell from alcatraz, perhaps a whole block, since all the cells are the same. I tend to choose projects that are over ambitious and thats one of my downfalls. Thank you a lot for the advice, I will try to do better to keep that in mind. I'm also very critical of my work, so when something doesnt go my way for more than a few hours I have a tendency to give up instead of trying twice as hard to make it work, or even remaking whatever it

@Alemja
I'm from the US, I've thought long and hard about the cost vs reward of going to college, my general opinion is I might have better luck on my own since the first time I went to college didnt pan out and I'm still paying off those debts. Thank you a lot for the links, I will be sure to check those out. Like I said above my primary worry is that I will not learn everything I need to know in terms of vital things that I should know.
Thanks for the inspiration though, I just need to keep plugging away at it, I will be posting WIP's on here at some point soon (perhaps tomorrow) when I get it to a somewhat acceptable state. Thanks for the good wishes and all the advice

@Two Listen
I'm going to have to read through that wiki, seems like a lot of good information is stockpiled their. Thank you for the critical advice on my portfolio, I will get rid of the 2D art works, I was trying to show a mild variation in terms of talent, but 2D art is not where my talent resides sadly.

@BIGTIMEMASTER
I'll have to look into that, currently I work as a cook at applebees, 4pm-1am Friday-Tuesday. Its a job, it pays my bills, but its a lot of work. But as I said I will have to look into that since its a possibility for me.

Thanks to everyone for replying, its made me feel considerably better about my situation, I need to finish projects, keep experimenting and trying new things as well. I cannot thank everyone enough, thank you all.

Zi0 · Apr 2019

If you have enough self discipline, motivation and a realistic view on what quality level you need to hit in order to get employed then learning at home is totally doable. You also need to decided which specialization to choose, environments are a different field compared to vehicles and weapons.

alexk · Apr 2019

Selt taught artist here. The big thing about learning any sort of skill is that it takes time... alot of time. And I really feel for those who try to self teach while holding a job, like you. It took me 2 years to get up to a hireable level and I was lucky enough to live with my parents back then, so I was able to devote the time needed to learn 3d art. My advice is to pinpoint exactly what you want to do. Saying that you want to do enviro, weapons and vehicles is too broad and will take way too long to get good at three separate disciplines. Pick the one you can see yourself enjoying doing for 40hrs a week for an entire career. Next is to always strive for progression. Each week, you should be seeing some sort of improvement, whether it be big or small. Be honest and objective with yourself on your work. Find where you're struggling and weak at, then work to improve it. Lastly, always compare your work with shipped AAA titles. If it's not up to par with them, then figure out where you need to improve or what you need to learn to get there. Keep doing all these things in a consistent manner and it'll add up over time.

I also had many, many overly ambitious attempts when I was learning. They're really a punch to the gut but you have to step back and see why you can't do a particular scene. Tackle each problem one by one and also keep scaling down until you are at a comfortable project, even if it's a simple garbage can. After a year into my self teaching, I realised I couldn't even make a high quality garbage can. I accepted that and worked on a garbage can until it looked like it could be in a shipped game. And in the end, it was sort of a spring board because I learned what it took to make a high quality asset and the next year, I progressed dramatically.

For your folio, you need to texture your stuff, and then present it in a real time engine such as Unreal, Unity or at least Marmoset Toolbag.

Hope this steers you in the right direction!

oglu · Apr 2019

alexk said:

Selt taught artist here. The big thing about learning any sort of skill is that it takes time... alot of time. And I really feel for those who try to self teach while holding a job, like you. It took me 2 years to get up to a hireable level and I was lucky enough to live with my parents back then, so I was able to devote the time needed to learn 3d art.

Same here but for me it took 7 years to get to a decent level. I nopened Max the first time in 1999.
There was a lot of back and forth and a sprint at the last year.
Take your time and dont get frustrated if you cant make it in one year.

Advice for a self taught artist?

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