Dear Polycount,
I feel as if I'm at an impass,
When I was seven years old, my father brought home Sketchup from work, and I took right to it, making cubes and space ships out of primitive shapes, than he bought Max 6 and brought it home, and I made my first gun. Six years later, I discovered the modding scene and began my first dive into game art; two years after, I graduated highschool early to work at a fabrication studio in New York. During my stay there I worked in construction, fabrication, sculpture, and building concept renders for clients in 3d. Now I'm back in Ca living with my friend and his mother, and after ten years of 3d modeling, I feel as if I've still only made a slight improvement. I see others starting out knowing nothing, and within a year or two, they've attained a professional work level, I want to know how its done.
I'm seventeen years old, and I have one passion in life; art, and now, as work becomes a necessity, the need for an outstanding portfolio has arrived; and I have lots to learn.
Thanks very much,
Payton Q.
When I was seven years old, my father brought home Sketchup from work, and I took right to it, making cubes and space ships out of primitive shapes, than he bought Max 6 and brought it home, and I made my first gun. Six years later, I discovered the modding scene and began my first dive into game art; two years after, I graduated highschool early to work at a fabrication studio in New York. During my stay there I worked in construction, fabrication, sculpture, and building concept renders for clients in 3d. Now I'm back in Ca living with my friend and his mother, and after ten years of 3d modeling, I feel as if I've still only made a slight improvement. I see others starting out knowing nothing, and within a year or two, they've attained a professional work level, I want to know how its done.
I'm seventeen years old, and I have one passion in life; art, and now, as work becomes a necessity, the need for an outstanding portfolio has arrived; and I have lots to learn.
Thanks very much,
Payton Q.
Replies
thanks for posting here, we love articulate members with a passion for 3d here; Welcome to polycount. This place is wonderful for learning from some of the best in the business.
I started 3d when I was around 12/13 with truespace, and eventually started using max as well. I've been doing for a long time now, and I even own my own studio. I've been on polycount for 13/14 years now, and I've learned a lot; so he sky is the limit!
I think if you keep your creative passion, and educate yourself on your own terms, you will find success in this field. Consider balancing your 3d pursuits with other technical skills; programming is a fantastic one. This will give you a fresh perspective on many issues our field faces.
Learn from what others post in P&P, and post your own work up, no matter how self conscious you may feel, ; you can get great crits here.
Don't become an LOLcats General discussion joker if you can avoid it. There are many fantastic members to learn from here. Measure your comments, and get to know the great folks here. Again, welcome, and enjoy.
PS: this post belongs in General Discussion
Practice and post here. Get critique. Improve the work and repost. Get critique. Practice some more.
As far as getting a job, being part of this community is the best thing you can have going. I've gotten a lot of job hits from my friends on this board and certainly learned most of what I know from the critiques they've given.
You're only going to be as good as the effort you put into it. I was a glass cutter in Minnesota for a number of years and that was bone crushing work, extremely challenging. I worked 12hr days with only 2 20min breaks. My body ached, my feet killed me and my hands were stiff and numb from lifting glass all day. But every day after work I would come home create models and textures for another 4 or 5 hours. If you don't put in the time, there will never be a payoff.
wiki here- http://wiki.polycount.com/
also look into eat3d,zbrushcentral, gnomon, 3dmotive,
the tech talk portion of this forum has plenty of Q+A
programs of interest include- maya,3dstudio max etc,
game engines and realtime solutions include- unity, UDK, marmoset, and realtime viewport shaders such as Xoliuls shader, and 3 point shader,
the bathroom is around the corner, there's a coffee/chicken wing dispenser in the hall and the pool and ladies swim team is on the roof.- Good luck happy learning!
Here's a challenge - 12 months from now you're going to post an "I got a job" post in GD, so get to work.
You're only 17. You're young. Be patient, study hard and don't forget to enjoy these years. I don't know what your status is but age 17 is no time to be stressed over a job if you can avoid it. If you're looking to work on something, join a modding group, for example. Take a fun project, and FINISH IT.
Also, a final tip, and probably the most important one:
Study. Fine. Art.
Learn to draw, paint, and sculpt.
Study anatomy, proportions, scale, composition.
Learn color theory.
These are basic skills that will allow you to look at things in a completely different way. And we all need to study fine art daily, as much as possible, since you never, ever finish learning it. Or anything else to be honest. :X
I cant recommend enough watching tutorials to learn. They are how I learnt to start with, and how I continue learning. Us game artists are incredibly lucky we have such a good community that are willing to share their skills. Make use of it!
Good luck, and post some work!
Growing as a 3d artist isn't easy and it's a lot of hard work, but one of the things that helped me grind through the tough times was the laid back, fun environment here on PC. You can come here and learn from some of the best and at the same time be sure to find a laugh or two.
Anyway, sorry for derailing the thread. It's been said time and time again, "age isn't an excuse", but in all reality it really can be. It's great you're ambitious and ready to turn into a great artist in a years time, but let that go a little. You're seventeen, often times artists that jump into 3d have had years of prior experiences with art in other mediums. It really does take time. If you're dead set on being industry ready in a year or so, specialize in something that companies often look for. Work on specific types of props in a specific art style and get really good at that discipline. You're really putting your eggs in one basket, but it's your fastest ticket in if you're looking simply to get in fast. Often times if you have 1 or 2 really incredible props, companies will scoop you up knowing you can reach that quality level.
Again, you're 17 dude, don't stress so hard and keep in mind there's a lot to life, not just games, not just getting a job making game art. Anyway, best of luck, and welcome to polycount!
Heres a speedsculpt I did the other day
To give a general feel of my (sculpting) ability.
Is there any expansive free resource of character tutorials? After reading through a couple hundred pages in google results, I'm starting to get irritated with the lack of new material. Almost all of the ones I find have been there since I started 3d work, modeling basics are still relevant, but theres close to nothing about the sculpting and retopo process....
Thanks,
Payton
If that's a speed sculpt, you've got no problems, son.
Seriously you're 17. Just keep at it. You'll be fine. I'm jealous that you've had such access to 3d at a young age. I got into this at the old age of 22. I had been doing graphic design for years previously. But you're already ahead of most people (including myself). Just draw, sculpt, model. Focus on improving. Keep posting new work here. Polycount is a great resource. Probably the best one I know of. There is an infinite amount of talented people willing to take 5 minutes and give an opinion. That's an amazing thing to have. Stay positive too. Don't get jaded about things at 17. That's what your mid-30s are for!
Its cause this is just a speedsculpt, My father worked at warner bros and disney when I was young as well as working with Don Bleuth and others, I was born drawing! I've been sculpting since I was six(?) with playdough making heads and such. My poly modeling is a little on the rusty side, I have a small problem with wrapping my head around the depth of it, proportions get crossed, zygomatic archres end up by collarbones and chakras get F'ing exploded.
Generally, anything related to sculpture, I don't have a problem with, I can always build out a quadrified base with wonky proportions and fix them in HP before retopo, I'd just like to improve on my poly modeling; as well as my uvw optimization, I've gotten to the point where I can unwrap anything I model, but my space optimization is absolutely terrible...
Damn luckiest kid ever... !!
Was the luckiest kid ever, moved out when I was fifteen.
On a far more smiley note.
Quadrified a head from the game TES:IV Oblivion, trying to get a more feminine look for the female elves.
Any pointers on making it more feminine?
Hey mate, Will do on the brow, the ears however, are an engine thing (Swappable ears on a single head) So I'll have to do those seperate....
The last 2 years I was working on average 12-16 hours 7 days a week. Actually, it put me in the hospital for a while, lol.
Just work every chance you get, if you want it bad enough its not that hard really.
2 hours from a sphere.
Uploaded with ImageShack.us
One thing to remember though, don't always try to act like you know everything (not saying anything about you, just in general, because I don't know you lol). We're all in this learning process together, and I think Polycount is as good as it gets.
Cheers and have fun making art!
-Do this craft every day if you want to get better.
-No seriously. Every. Flippin'. Day. 1 hour. 6 hours. 12 hours. Just sit down at the computer and do it.
-You're already off to a great start and have HUGE potential in this industry. You've artistic ability, that's entirely apparently from the few pieces of work you've posted. Keep at this and you'll be teaching us a thing or two in the coming years. I guarantee it.
However, is there anything I can improve on? Anybody see any wierd odd shape to the sub orbitals or the maxilla or something? I'd really like to make this look fantastico!
Thanks!
Payton
Not really satisfied with it, but I can't quite put my finger on whats wrong... Crits and comments welcome!
maybe do a few with less polish but more emphasis set on proper bone structure, keep em coming though if you can stick with this work regiment and put up with the criticism on here you will improve super fast:thumbup::thumbup:
-woog
Thanks,
Payton
Just do it every day. It doesn't matter if you only have an hour or more. You get better and faster every time, even when you think you don't.
Don't get discouraged and keep following your dream. I just got my first actual job as a game artist at 21 years of age and it's incredible.
Everyone's already mentioned how much potential you have, so just keep at it man.
You never stop learning in this industry.
-m
hope it helps
-Woog
However,
+10 to anyone who guesses what game this is for!