3D Environment Art Portfolio Critiques- Graduating soon...Am I ready for the job?

tythomas063

Hello everyone,


 My name is Tyler Thomas and I'm graduating from the California State University of Northridge(Near Los Angeles) in this May 2019. My goal is to become a 3D environment artist and work at video game/film studios.  I'm nervous as hell but excited to be done with school lol. I will very much appreciate having any help to be aware of what I should do now.


 I will appreciate any critiques on my portfolio and advice with the job search as I'm hoping to find a job soon.  Do you honestly think I'm ready for getting a job from what you see from my portfolio? Or should I focus on creating my new projects during the summer? 



Here is my portfolio link: 

https://tythomas.artstation.com/ 


Main screenshots of my projects: 








Demo Reel: 

<iframe src="https://player.vimeo.com/video/332715234" width="640" height="360" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; fullscreen" allowfullscreen></iframe>

<p><a href="">3D Environment Art Demo Reel</a> from <a href="https://vimeo.com/user56604512">Tyler Thomas</a> on <a href="https://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p>




Thank you for your time to read and giving feedbacks. Cheers!! 

griffitii

Hi Tyler,

I've had a quick look at your stuff while on my lunch break. I can see that you want to go in the direction of environment art but I think you pieces lack a little 'umph'. I've described my thoughts below:

Alley - Thumbnail impressions: Looks stylised, steps look a bit too wavy, scene looks brown. Going though the images the scene is very simple yet the textures look high detail. I think there needs to be a bridge between them to unify them a bit more. Making the place feel more real (ie constructed as it would be in reality) would really help. There's an image with loads of paper sheets on the wall covered by litter, this looks weird. Get a sky HDR in there. Modularity looks good, don't have pure black in your windows, instead, add curtains or interiors to them. Scrolling right to the bottom reveals that it's based on concept art. I think what you've made isn't in line with the concept so either remove it or re-work the environment. If re-working, just set the camera to match and don't worry too much about different angles. Make your lighting more punchy (like in concept), a skydome and skylight will help with this.

Area 51 - Thumbnail impressions: Looks grey, quite desaturated. Again, punch up the lighting. Have more rubble/dirt build up in the scene around the door. This would be expected if the roof had caved in. You can use the build up to better strengthen the composition too. Whole environment looks a bit too clean as there is a lack of rubble throughout. Modularity looks good. Again, keep or lose the concept. Push the colours in the lighting to create interest and match the concept.

Watchmaker - Thumbnail impressions: Scale issues, no bulb in lamp, does look inviting though. The big one for me is the table looks very thick. As the camera is so close it'll be worth modelling detail into the table (think about how it would be made in real life) and put distinction between the different assembled parts (rather than changing the UVs). The wall texture doesn't fit the room, looks a bit squidgy. Add move/stronger bevels into your props. Cover the posters in the same amount of dirt and have them off right angles. Add a bulb to lamp and increase the spotlight outer cone to match the cone of the shade. Mug looks squished top to bottom, photo looks squished left to right.

You've got good base pieces here you just need to tighten them up a bit. I would concentrate on getting these looking better as you've already done a lot of the work Also, I already ever watch videos

Hope that helps!

Carabiner

Agreed with @griffitii 's feedback especially re: the Alley piece not matching the concept art. Concept is very paint-y and stylized and your execution does not reflect that. Modeling and modularity etc looks solid, as he pointed out, but matching concept art is a big part of being an environment artist.

One thing that I think about a lot to really polish off my projects is connection points. How are objects connected to other objects? You can apply this pretty specifically in the last piece. How are the posters attached to the wall (tape, pushpins)? How are the pieces of wood that make up the table connected to each other? Are they glued together with wood glue - if so, can still model them out more like griff said ... or maybe they're nailed together? Thinking about these kinds of details can really help push your pieces to that next level of polish.

In that last scene, it's jarring to me that there aren't small cast shadows under the props under the lamp. If you're in UE4, you could try adjusting the shadow bias setting in the light to get some small shadows under there. Also might be worth looking at getting more SSAO in the crevices to ground it.

Alex_J

Not an enviro artist, but I just wanted to reiterate what the otehrs said about the alley scene. When it comes to the stylization and colors and lighting, it can be good to exaggerate too much, and then dial back, rather than playing it too safe from the get-go. Without the vibrancy of the ref, you scene feels very drab, like the standard COD "middle east" environment.

Zi0

Like mentioned before for the alleyway you need to match your reference closer in order to capture the look and feel from the concept art.

The sci fi corridor looks boring, there is too much repetition in the greeble on the walls. The floor planes look very simple shape wise. Its very brown like games from 2006. Look at other sci fi corridors and try to figure out why they are nice to look at.

Look at things like contrast in colors, interesting shapes, lighting etc.

As for the watchmaker, except for the stuff already mentioned before, the scene only contains very basic props with easy shapes. I think you need to challenge yourself a bit more. I think a great exercise would be to try to create something small yet of a high quality, a small diorama for instance? I would also suggest to create a couple of good looking props, many envartist start as prop artist.



You maybe might get a job at a small studio at best but I would recommend to try to lvlup your skillset.
Good luck!

Shrike

as with any graduate, id highly recommend to power through 2-3 months with focused work and churn out new things, replace all old stuff from your portfolio with new ones. Youre pretty close but it needs a bit more time and just do more stuff. At this point, the new ones will always be noticeably better, especially if you get some feedback on them.

Better to work 2 months and search 1 month than search 3 months is what I say

tythomas063

Wow! Thank you, everyone, for these incredible feedbacks which has helped me to figure out where my skill level is at and what I should do before getting a job.  

@griffitii Thank you, John! Btw your hallway complex is looking great!   
I totally agree and understand that my portfolio is not amazingly impressive. And thank you for your great critiques! 

Alley:  First thing that I should have mentioned above but I forgot is that I don't want to make stylized texture that you can see in the concept art. I wanted to get the "stylized realism" looks like Gears of wars, Halo, Uncharted, etc. But I understand what you mean by the bridge between modeling and texturing. Basically, I should have modeled the buildings and props with more complex design to fit with these textures, right? 

What do you mean by making lighting more punchy for alley and area 51? I'm guessing you meant that the skylight should have a color contrast to warm directional light? Cool and blueish color for a skylight? 


Thank you! I definitely can make the changes to Area 51. But I'm not sure about Alley since everything needs to be modeled again with complex design? 


@Carabiner Thank you, Carrie!   Right, I actually didn't want the painterly textures as I want to practice more with "realistic" texture. But I understand what you mean. 
I haven't thought of the connection points before which I definitely going to keep that in my mind when I make those changes. 

@Alex Javor Thanks, Alex! I understand what you mean about the "middle east" environment. Funny thing is that I was playing Halo 2 during the time I was working on the Alley which I believe it may have influenced my work lol. Basically, I should dial down the warmth color and add cool color for the skylight? 


@Zi0 Thanks, Ziemowit! I agree with you and I was not sure how to make it less boring. I believe I can adjust the wall with devices to make it looks less repetitive. I'm also unsure if I should change the floor because of the concept art. But after hearing from you and others, I will definitely try to change the design of the floor to make it less boring. The images you posted clearly looks so much better than mine and I can see why. The color(something like yellow), complex details, and lighting with a contrast color are what I'm missing in my scene. 


@Shrike Thank you, Eric! I totally agree with you. I definitely will pick more complex concept art and keep making more beautiful environment arts. Once I make a new project, I will remove all of my old projects due to everyone's suggestions. I guess I will find a part-time job(probably data entry) and work on my portfolio on my free time for 6-12 months before searching for a job in the video game industry. 


Thank you, everyone! I'm super happy to hear all of your advice and I'm going to focus on improving my skills and making more environment arts before searching for the jobs in the studios.