Are there so few game jobs atm?

JO420

Hi,just wondering if the field for game artists is really so limited atm?

i keep applying at various places and the jobs i do qualify for i dont seem to get any responses, mostly what i see is job titles for "Senior Artist", ive been really trying to make it into gaming for quite awhile but such lack of any positive news is really becoming frustrating.

Ive tried all the options advised to me networking,game recruiters sending out resumes and demos reels.


But none of it seems to work.

i really want to know if the market is really so saturated with that many people or is my work not of any decent quality to get hired anywhere.

ive been fighting this battle since 1999 and i get closer to giving up totally every passing year.


i dont know what else to do to get a reponse let alone interest in a company.

this is some of my recent work

http://boards.polycount.net/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=15736&an=0&page=1#15736


http://www.threedy.com/site/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=26644

adam

Hmm, sorry about your luck man. You defintely have talent when it comes to what we do. My suggestion is making contacts with people who work for some companies you may be interested in. They'd be able to tell you more or less when a good time is to apply, things like that.

Good luck to you and be persistant!

JO420

i also wonder if living in a town with almost no game studios hurts me as well,i live in houston texas which is very close to austin but i can seem to find any openings there and the few i do i apply and never hear anything.

ive met people from mary margeret.com and one of their reps said she would help me find work,i sent her all my info and never heard a thing.

Foehammer

try Dallas, you are much more qualified than myself, and there are several companies here that are hiring, Ritual, Gearbox Software and Terminal Reality, I've worked at one company as a tester and interviewed at Gearbox for a testing position (got the job but I couldnt take it) met a few of the guys and they are all great people. Come on up to Dallas!

JO420

thanx applied at all 3

skankerzero

Well, first off, do you have a website? Do you have any more samples other than the two shown?

I can see that you know how to use the programs, though, I say you're not quite there yet.

I'd focus on your texturing skills and I would check out some models and see how they modeled the joints and such.

Right off the bat, I can tell you those two need some improvement.

Living in a town with no game companies doesn't hinder your search much at all, especially with the internet now days. You have Austin and Dallas near you, and they both have a good amount of companies, with Dallas having more if I remember correctly.

JO420

Website im in the process of creating and making additional content.

by seeing how they modeled joints,does that mean work on my anatomy or how a modeled is built to animate.

JO420

other older samples from work and personal

JO420

Paul Jaquays

Everyone wants to be a character modeler ... Makes the competition that much more difficult. Your models are nice and look well constructed, but my socks aren't knocked off by them. On the other hand, your texture work shows off well. Have you considered putting together model and texture samples that show off your stuff as an environment artist? There's generally a larger need (by volume) for artists to create worlds, as opposed to characters. Once your foot is in the door, you'll have opportunity to show off those character modeling skills.

Josh_Singh

yes, Trying to break in as an environment modeller is much easier.

JO420

what are good practices to go by for texturing enviroments?

how many maps?

sizes?


from what ive seen people here do a section of an enviroment but i always wondered how many textures they used and sizes

skankerzero

What Paul said is very true. Usually, there are less character artists per team than environment artists.

Environment art is a whole league of it's own. It can be lots of fun. It isn't an easy position to get into either, but there is more need for environment artists usually. So that raises your chances.

Try modeling some environments, say, an interior of a restaurant or office building, then come around after and totally destroy the place and give it a totally different mood.

Josh_Singh

learning how to make good tileable textures is a valuable skill. Making normal mapped buildings and environmental props would make you stand out imo. Practice making landmarks, and things that would define an environment.

also if you can demonstrate modular environments (peices that can fit to one another seamlessly) that would be nice to see as well.

dont give up!!

JO420

should i restrict myself to a certain amount of textures and sizes?

Josh_Singh

just stick to 512's or lower depending on the size of the object.

adam

JO420, I'm currently trying to break in as an environmental artist myself. I'm in the middle of a few art tests right now with certain companies. One of the tests I recently completed. If you go my website you'll see the test + the requirements they asked me to do it with. That might give you an idea of something you could do in terms of limiting yourself.

JO420

thanx

JO420

do i put the lighting as part of the texture or can i use max lights?

Paul Jaquays

Go for a mix of painted and "real" lighting. In addition to tiling type textures, try building some structures. Make some detailed buildings and some very low poly buildings (as if made for an RTS game). FPS type games are using fairly large textures (512) and use a lot of them. MMOGs are likely to use smaller textures ... or try to get more mileage out of the larger ones. For buildings you may be lucky to get a texture page as large as 512.

Sage

Hmmm maybe the problem with your reel is that you are not showing what the company wants to see. If you apply to a company that makes FPS games you may not make much of an impression if your characters are made to look like they fit in RTS games. Also timing is critical. You should try to schedule an informational interview with artists at the companies you are interested in since that usually leads to job interviews in the future. Good luck.

Alex

NoSeRider

[ QUOTE ]
You should try to schedule an informational interview with artists at the companies you are interested in since that usually leads to job interviews in the future. Good luck.

[/ QUOTE ]

How do you do that?

http://www.igda.org ?

Sage

Call the studio up and ask to speak with the lead artist, or email him/her if the email is available and if you are lucky you'll get a response. Later.

Alex

oXYnary

What mods have you been on? Alot of people I meet tell me more than anything else mod experience impresses them as it shows you follow through on items and know some of how the development process happens. You cant beat real experience using the limitations of engines.

Rick Stirling

Also with enviroments you ofen use texure sheets - a 256x256 texture with 4 or 8 textures on it - think like a uv map, where all the sections are square and there is no space.