Josh Jones- Level Design: Internship Update

joshjoneswol

Hello everyone!! I am excited to have a big update for all of you whom have been helping me out. Version 3.0 is up and running in my portfolio pages.
Fixes from suggestion:
Cut out the fat!! (Done)
Reformat the page so its not so all over the place ( DONE)
Fix Resume to not be so large....Done
Easier Navigation ( Done)

To do: Update Movies from suggestion.
add more Documents for levels
create better view of oblivion level
*still need a idea on how to showcase scripting?

Ok so time to beat me up!! let me know your thoughts and of course all suggestions as you see...I listen and have no issue on having harsh criticism, it only makes me better and that is all your trying to do and thats great to me!! so I will hold my shield up and wait for the beating LOL...

Have a great day everyone.

http://wolgameclub.org/jj/index.html

DnS

A few quick suggestions.

1) Remove the IGDA button from your main page. Its out of place and really has nothing to do with you looking for a job.

2) Remove the quote from Albert Einstein. Are you Albert? No? Ok.

3) Your website currently shows up as "Index2" on my browser tab. It should have something more descriptive than that.

4) The art that borders your main page looks tacky and low quality. Every other page looks much more professional. Remove the tacky looking art as it doesn't add anything to your site.

5) Please remove that ridiculous looking hat.

joshjoneswol

Fixed the front page ty!! didn't even see it! ( fixed)

Sorry was a marine its who I am ridiculous or not..LOL (hat)

Got your other suggestions as well...working on it.

DnS

The reason I suggest you remove the hat, or at least have a more professional picture of yourself (if not just removing the picture entirely), is just that, it isn't professional.

Honestly, being a marine is great and all, and you should be proud of yourself regardless of who you are, but you're looking for a job. You want to present yourself as being as capable as possible of performing the job you're trying to get hired for.

The interview itself is for the prospective employer to learn "who you are". If you want to have a webpage about who you are, make a personal one and keep it separate from your professional portfolio.

Rick Stirling

Use more text and less image based text. It loads MUCH faster, and it's easier to edit. You'll be wanting to edit it to present your BIO page in a readable font with more whitespace, to put 99% of it in lowercase, to remove (LAUGHING), to change "APART" to "A PART" and to replace some fullstops with commas.

A 'MISC' section? That's no better than 'STUFF', and the entire page is utterly pointless.

joshjoneswol

will do for both of you, got it..ty very much for your time and energy on it.

joshjoneswol

ohhh and also I thought being able to bump map was important in level design? so good advise I will take it out if its pointless

oobersli

ya, I would drop the misc section. looks just like ya took a diffuse into cb and then saved out all the map options.

If you do decide to keep it though, rather label it, diffuse, spec, disp, AO, normal mapping for game env. Labeling it like you have now makes it seem like you don't know what your presenting.

joshjoneswol

yes I was wondering that...so I will keep it and label it cause I am good at mapping, and creating textures...is that useful? for level designers?

DnS

As others have said before, it depends on the way in which any particular studio you're applying for utilizes their level designers. Having a basic understanding of mapping and texturing will never hurt you as a level designer.

That said, always hold any work you place on your website to a high standard. If you have a knowledge of mapping and texturing say so, but if your examples of said work are not of professional quality, I wouldn't display them.

Rick Stirling

[ QUOTE ]
ohhh and also I thought being able to bump map was important in level design? so good advise I will take it out if its pointless

[/ QUOTE ]

So is UV mapping and poly distribution, but you wouldn't have a page on those either.

TWilson

Looks like it all gets the art across pretty well. Looks like you've put a lot of time into your presentation.

-I would leave every <title> of your page as Josh Jones Art or something to that effect. You dont know which page people will be on when they hit the bookmark button. "bio" in my bookmarks isnt helpful.

-minor nitpick: when I click an thumbnail one page 1 of gallery I'd like to see art right away...Just start me on image 1 dont make me choose again.
-What about instead of "Thanks!" at the end of one environment bumping me into the next one with "Next Environment>"?

joshjoneswol

Sounds good to Rick and to T.
Thanks guys will work on this tomorrow.
Thank you for all your time and thought processes.

Josh

Sage

Very nice update, looks way better than before, keep it up.

Alex

Jesse Moody

Keep at the hard work. Keep working on your art and updating your site. I will echo a lot of the guys comments above and one big thing for me is going straight to portfolio and art without having to click 3-4 times.

joshjoneswol

Ty both Alex and Jesse.
Note I am in a 9 week class now and the class was originally designed to have us make a game enviroment in 3dsmax, I asked the professor to allow a few of us to do this in Unreal 3.
Now I know what I have been asked to do, now this is for Jesse and others can chime in here as well if you like. I have two students that are working to become Environment Artists.
Designing the "goods" going into the level. Any suggestions for them, poly counts? screen shots from after the project...ect? What would you like to see from them, and I will echo this back to them. They told me to tell you they are at your mercy so please feel free to just make requests and we will fill it.
They would like to be able to make portfolio pieces and want to give someone like you exactly what you expect in a SR year project....I guess that is what i am asking. What do you want to see from them?

joshjoneswol

Some are going to try and goto your studio which is really cool that you are here ..BTW

Heck I would like to work for your studio as a intern but no reply yet.....any woot back to you LOL

joshjoneswol

Alex,
I also wanted to say thanks for pushing me so hard. I do listen and I can take the heat, alot of students depend on me to get it right here, so that I can transfer what I know to them in the game club. So I am excited that you are happy with the update...I will keep them coming.

Lee3dee

Wanted to give you some tips on getting that level design internship your after and what I did to get where I am.

A lot of the levels in your portfolio contain rooms filled empty spaces. One thing I learned when I started my portfolio was I looked at the levels created by other UT2004 mappers. They all packed the screen surroundings with meshes, made it pleasing to the eye. I originally thought that typically the role of level designer was to create my own meshes which meant my levels usually took forever. Plus it never occured to me to build the level first in BSP, get the gameplay working and then populate the environment. By taking a look at the different mappers out there in internet land it really helped me see what my maps were failing and where they needed improvement.

This was my first map in UT2004


Its built with meshes using 3dsMax and took me about 4 months to complete. It had no anti-portals or any optimization but it proved that I could release a map to the community which in turn provided me feedback to make it better. I still see people playing it online.

Where as in this SWAT4 map

it only took me 2 months because I created the initial layout in bsp, tested the gameplay with bots and then used a large majority of the meshes that were available in the game packages.

Generally a level designer gets their art from the artists, rarely do they create their own meshes. We make the game fun to play If you applying for a job/internship as a level designer you need to loose the environment artist approach to making all your own art and start using the art thats been given to you in the game. HR people are going to look at the levels you have designed, how well you setup the gameplay and how the screens look. They aren't going to be looking at your art skills. The art skills may actually hurt your portfolio against the next person in line for the opening.

Just remeber, don't give up! I busted my ass for 6 months, learned UT2004, made a few maps and landed a full-time job. Anything is possible.

[oh and Gearbox's Internship page: http://www.gearboxsoftware.com/index.php?p=cogs&s=openings ]

Sage

You might want to look at Cholden's sketchbook for some design tips. Here is the link

http://boards.polycount.net/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=283125&an=0&page=0#Post283125

It should give you some ideas on how to make things.

Alex

joshjoneswol

To both of you...great posts, I got your link and great to know to use the assets in the engine. I am going to do that this term then, no reason to wait and see what I can come up with. I will update everyone once this level is completed so you guys can hit me up on that as well. Thanks dare I say team? cause this seems to be a nice little team of instructors. So great job everyone..be back gimme a few weeks for the updates.