parted company
polycount lvl 666
well guys it did n't work out at real time worlds. finished early. the work was just excessively technical and fiddly( for me at least).
I figured that going freelance would be easier , but in a way its a lot harder going.
Some of the fixes I had a to do were a bit silly , but yeah i prefer to actually do artwork , not spend 3 months exporting files without a batch exporter.
Suppose I take some of the blame , but without going in to too much detail I will say that I did my best and could n't really have put more effort in.
TBH making lods for six months was n't very appealing, but I needed the money at the time and took it, but in hindsight I knew it would be a real pig and I was proved right in the end.
I feel a bit down about it as they were a nice bunch of people, but I do have other plans and along with disappointment there is relief:)
I figured that going freelance would be easier , but in a way its a lot harder going.
Some of the fixes I had a to do were a bit silly , but yeah i prefer to actually do artwork , not spend 3 months exporting files without a batch exporter.
Suppose I take some of the blame , but without going in to too much detail I will say that I did my best and could n't really have put more effort in.
TBH making lods for six months was n't very appealing, but I needed the money at the time and took it, but in hindsight I knew it would be a real pig and I was proved right in the end.
I feel a bit down about it as they were a nice bunch of people, but I do have other plans and along with disappointment there is relief:)
Replies
Were you working on APB at Realtime Worlds? Crackdown was an insanely fun game, so I can't wait to see what they do with that. Hopefully we'll see your creds in the game?
Working at a studio might have it's downers, but I prefer it's stability over contract work (even if that stability is just an illusion). With contract work, I always found it a drag to be setting up additional gigs for down the road. I'm also nowhere NEAR as efficient working from home than I am in-office. Far too many distractions.
actually I was was working freelance for them with occasional visits.
I find with me I have a more misses than hits in terms of companies I work for, but I am a bit weird anyway:)
TBH I did n't want the contract , but was a bit skint at christmas and had no other offers:)
Working on APB was fun , but I am not really in to hip hop and stuff and would probably rather work on tombraider:)
Yeah Vassago LOD's are 'fun' unless they have 20 morph targets also
best of luck man!
I would n't wish lods's on anyone really, they are painful
Good luck, Ruz.
-caseyjones
Thats what we used to do on stadiums
Rhonokey - that sounds about typical of the organisation for a typical games dev here in the uk:)
i quite enjoyed it. It was like being on drugs
as you mentioned I am sure there was a reason for that.
mm I would actually prefer to take drugs than do that.
Its odd though I have been doing illustration for years and I keep getting hired to do drudge/ non artistic work. I wonder why this is.
I am lousy at technical stuff. all i want to do is make nice pretty zbrush models with textures.
Perhaps I am in the wrong line of work:)
I have pretty much decided not to ever work in a studio again.
I find myself getting bored and frustrated almost straight away.
In some studios you can make suggestions or ask questions , but some places you have to sit there and be a good boy, do as you are told , never look up.
I hate that - control freak shit you know the stuff - passive aggressive types.
all i want to do is make nice pretty zbrush models with textures.
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i might get to do that one day. For now though, i make games. Games require a hell of a lot more than prettiness.
Ask yourself what you want to make - do you want to make art, do you want to make cg graphics, or do you want to make games. If you're not fussed about the latter, there's other job opportunities out there that will keep you more than happy with the first two.
If games is what you want to make, then welcome to the occupation
I think its cause I got stuck working on mmo stuff
I came from an art background and enjoyed making nice looking stuff, but the tech side bores me a little.
I may enjoy working on more creative stuff in the future, just got to sit down and figure out what I want.
BUT I do actually enjoy making games , I just am not very good at the IT side ie exporting 2 billion files without making mistakes.
My mind tends to wander and I think about anything apart from the stuff I am doing:)
After about 7 months of being on the project, I'm finally making charaters, while still doing some of the technical shit on the side. It has pissed me off to some degree, because I'm an artist and my role is to make art. But it was a good experience and even enjoyed doing some of it because I got to learn a whole bunch from it.
I'm probably more of a technical artist than I am a creative one, but I enjoy making games that much that I'm willing to put up with the shitty jobs as long as I get to do my share of the enjoyable ones. But there have been times where I've considered looking for work at another studio (and may yet after this project is through), but some of the rad people there are what keep me around. Plus I'm working my way up the ranks, and doubt I'd get the opportunity anywhere else so soon.
-caseyjones
Myself, I`ve been forced down the management path, which is frankly a bit of a joke as by nature I`m about as politic as Mike Tyson in a hissy fit.
It`s all a bit upside down.
Hope you manage to find your way up
caseyjones - I did the same thing for 8 months on football superstars. I was never a tech guy and for 8 long months I had to work with the lead programmer and sort out this character customization system with him. It was very painful, but finally got it working which was good, but the system was so hard to work with it made me depressed to work on it:)
Thats why I left.
Its a shame because just as I was leaving they hired a top notch character dude who was really easy to work with.
firestarter - I could n't go that route, unless I was doing the artwork too, sitting in meetings all day and sorting out schedules in excel, could n't handle that he he. I am sooo undiplomatic.
With me 1 of two things normally happen. I get in a team where people respect me cause I am ok at doing 'nice' artwork , OR I get caught in a team where the guy in charge is the type who does n't want any input whatsoever and furthermore doesn't seem to trust me to do the job i was hired for even though they themselves are lousy at explaining things/drawing/managing etc.
Another thing that happens is that sometimes you get the 'nitpick' brigade who seem to delight in being anal for the sake of it.
ie move that vert 1 mm and ... no ok I have changed my mind again, move it back.
I am sitting getting to the point where the little veins in my head are starting to pop:)
I don't mind if people, are thorough, but sometimes it can be a bit unnecessary if this is not actually improving anything visually ( diminishing returns).
common sense seems to have deserted some people these days.
I don't want to be totally negative here, but it seems that the bigger the company I work for the less fun I will have.
There must be a some kind of equation for this.
I have helped shipped two successful titles in my career and they were quite rewarding to work on, but I think in future I will be going down the indie game route or in to another branch of CG.
I have agreed to finish up the block of work I was doing for RTW then its upwards and onwards hopefully.
Oddly enough I have only been in the industry for 3 years and already i am sick of it ha ha.
Another question I have is, why do some game devs start companies in the middle of nowhere?
If it was me I would be starting out in camden high street or oxford circus, not on craggy island which has no tesco , no pubs and no fun:)
Surpised they don't just buy a building in a town and rent part of it out to other companies. least they would have some money coming in whilst making the game
yeah i can see that , but industrial estates are a bit grim usually.
Surpised they don't just buy a building in a town and rent part of it out to other companies. least they would have some money coming in whilst making the game
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Where are they going to get that starting capital? A building in town big enough to also rent out isn't cheap.
it was n't really a serious proposal rick, my tongue was firmly in my cheek
after reading all this complaining - valid or not - in the case an AD approached me asking if i knew someone to offload work to, you'd not make it onto the list by a long stretch man, no matter how good your output was.
with that attitude towards doing only the cool bits of the work, you'll have one hell of a time in any project-driven industry. the jobs out there are for people who manage to finish their stuff not run away as soon as the revisions and technical issues are kicking in.
seems like you'd have to start your very own thing where only you get to have the final say on things.
How about the concept/pre-viz side? Ever thought about going that route?
its good that you made a judgment like that without knowing the full facts on any of the points I have made.
Snowfly - thats the way I am thinking now. just do the stuff and sell it.
Other people can mess around and butcher it if they want.
concepting is not my scene, but my wife is a cool concept artist, and I am working up some of her stuff right now.
anyway you are the one complaining here - on a public forum where you also post a job-wanted ad. hm.
you guys are both quite good artists. I've had the pleasure of working with thomasp in the past and he always delivered quality product. Ruz, I've seen your great talent and I think you'll have wonderful success if you work closely with your clients. I hope you two will set aside this bickering and realize you're both great artists with quality output. thomas, don't stress yourself over his decision.
cheers mates.
I have had nothing but repsect for the people I have worked with, just one or two managers made my life a bit hard at times.
I left monumental games only after a long hard think and only left after they had found a replacement - The system I was working on was left in full working on order.
The sitiuation with RTW was more complicated , but I did put in full effort, doing lots of revisions for them, but they still were n't happy.
I decided it was n't worth my while financially to carry on, though i am still finishing off the last block of work as a sign of good faith.
cheers,
Gav
i might get to do that one day. For now though, i make games. Games require a hell of a lot more than prettiness.
Ask yourself what you want to make - do you want to make art, do you want to make cg graphics, or do you want to make games. If you're not fussed about the latter, there's other job opportunities out there that will keep you more than happy with the first two.
If games is what you want to make, then welcome to the occupation
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QFT
stop trolling dude
I am sure there are things about the job you hate.
the fact is it 'is' mainly zbrush these days. All i was saying is that its becoming increasingly technical and I don't like it.
I did enjoy certain aspects of working in a game company but I have come to the point where I have decided to stick to what I am best at.
If you can;t respect that then you have the problem, not me.
As an aside, were game jobs filled with less of this techy stuff back in the day?
I remember spending 3 weeks modelling/texturing a cricket stadium and two weeks getting it to work properly in game:)
I think there will be a time where it will become even more specialised where there are just guys doing high res stuff/specialised texturing modelling tasks and nothing else. in fact I am banking on it:)
Its mainly MMO games where I have found it a bit much at times.
People want more and more customisation these days and its down to the artist to knock out literally hundreds of assets. I just find it hard to keep track of a large amount of files like that.
Yes there are aspects of the job that are highly technical that we all have to suck up, but If you're a really good modeler and barely doing any modeling, and not so good with the script writing and automation stuff, then that role probably isn't for you.
With an mmo in particular you need some really smart people figuring out pipelines and writing scripts to automate processes, and If you don't have that stuff set up well you'll be putting too much of a burden on artists that simply aren't wired for or experienced with that kind of problem solving.
Anyway, good luck with your next step Ruz. Freelancing does of course mean that you get to pick and choose far more, but there are other negative aspects that come with it as you know.
I blame myself really for knowing in my head that some jobs were n't suited to me yet still taking them.
I have done it twice in a row and won't make the same mistake again.
you know I am not a total dunce - I can rig and skin stuff pretty well and have even done a little coding/scripting +
I am a reasonable animator - but some things I have been asked to do have literally given me a migraine - processes that can be automated should be automated but generally the coders are just too busy to do scripts until later in the project when its normally too late.
I am doing the best work of my life of late and I just hope I can figure out a way to use the stuff I have made in a productive way, not lurching from one crisis to another