[Portfolio] – Joel The Bergman, Game Designer

joelthebergman

Hey polycount! I'm a long time lurker first time poster. I just recently graduated from university back in December. I spent the past few months putting my portfolio together and now I'm looking for a job in game design, or level design.

here's my portfolio site http://joelthebergman.com

I'm mostly just posting it here to pimp it, but I'd be happy to take critiques if there's anything you guys think I should change.


Joel The Bergman

Jonas Ronnegard

Hehe thought you were swedish based on your name :P but I see your not.

So by game designer you mean you only want to work with planning and story telling, map layout? or you want to work with 3d?

joelthebergman

I sort of consider myself a jack of all trades. I've done a little bit of everything from technical document writing to 3d modeling, rigging, animation and programming. Ideally I would love to mostly stick to planning and storytelling, but honestly I love making games and would gladly do pretty much any type of job within the video game industry.

Jonas Ronnegard

I see, I don't know how it is in the states, but it might be good to choose what you want to do, atleast if you want to work in a bigger company.

Maybe I wouldn't say this if the work in your portfolio was perfect in every area that you mention, but to be honest it's not, and I think no one will be able to be a master at all aspects of making a game.

So choose what you want to do, and get better at that, and make a portfolio that shows what you want and can contribute to in a game.

Game companies rarely take in people that can't do the work from day one, so it might be hard to search for a company in hope of that you will be able to find what your good at and what you want to do after you start working.

ErichWK

Hmm... I wouldn't recommend trying to be a jack of all trades for your first job... Spend your time getting really good at one aspect! It will be a lot easier to get a job, cause right now everything on your site isn't super impressive.

joelthebergman

I understand that it is fairly uncommon for someone to get hired straight out of school into a "game designer" type position but that's the job I really want to do and I haven't really seen any real "game designer" portfolios so I wasn't really sure what all to include. Which aspects of my work do you think ARE actually good so I can focus on getting better in that aspect?

Jonas Ronnegard

from my experience it's not uncommon for companies to hire game designers right out of school, what I think we both meant was that it didn't seem like you really decided on what kind of work you wanted to do.

It's true it's a bit hard to show your skills as a game designer in a portfolio, my tips would be to maybe make map layouts, make maps with an editor, and present a game idea In a professional way.

Friends I know that have been hired right out of school into a designer job, has gone specific designer courses and the companies have had past experience with people from the school, so that might be the reason why, but most had portfolios where they show maps made in editors.

'Edit'

Seems like I didn't lurk around your portfolio quite enough, I missed your map layout,
I think if it's a game designer you want to be, you should continue practicing that and get better,
look at others doing the same and maybe try to improve how you present your map ideas.

joelthebergman

OK thanks. I will start working on more level and map design stuff. It seems like a better way to showcase "game design" skill than say character models because with maps, I can show a focus on gameplay.

Do you think I should change the order of the pages or change how I'm presenting my work?

Jonas Ronnegard

Someone is probably gonna come in and say I'm wrong, as I don't have perfect layout for my portfolio, but I think the layout of your site seems fine, but if you plan to keep the models, maybe the start page should be your game designer work, and put the rest as other work, So you don't confuse potential employers.

Dan!

If I wanted to put together a game design portfolio I'd probably model myself after this guy-
www.androidarts.com

Dataday

joelthebergman wrote: »

I understand that it is fairly uncommon for someone to get hired straight out of school into a "game designer" type position but that's the job I really want to do and I haven't really seen any real "game designer" portfolios so I wasn't really sure what all to include. Which aspects of my work do you think ARE actually good so I can focus on getting better in that aspect?

There are a lot of students that end up going to trade schools thinking the can be uber game designers and make whatever is floating around in their head.

The hard reality is that it just doesnt work that way and game design is a lot harder than it looks.

The wake up call you need will be in the fact that you are not doing anything right if you want to be a designer (based on your portfolio).

There is no magic become a designer button unless you go indy.

I would recommend becoming a good environment artist, get a junior environment artist position, switch over to level design once there, then work your way up the design ladder, given you have the talent and the contacts for it.

Also if you are focusing on design...where are the LDDs and GDDs? Yeah the stuff no one wants to do but are often the most important. You need to show off design documents, not a couple pictures and a layout (anyone could do that).

Pick one area to specialize in and learn everything about that role, then go from there.