Noobie Mistakes
polycounter lvl 6
Hey, so on top of the obvious fact that this is my first post and that I'm a complete noobie to this forum (so sorry if this gets asked in various ways or it's in the wrong section.. I twwwied 
)
What are some of the most eye-rolling, irritating noobie mistakes people make in their portfolios? More specifically, when it comes to choice of what to showcase, are there certain patterns in the portfolios noobies make? I went to the talk/presentation Adam Bromwell held in Toronto for the IGDA (which inspired me to join up here) and he said that sci-fi hallways and medieval castle walls are done in portfolios way too often. Are there other assets you guys see roll into here too often?
Maybe there is a sticky for this exact topic and I missed it >.< haha.. atleast the title would be appropriate.
)What are some of the most eye-rolling, irritating noobie mistakes people make in their portfolios? More specifically, when it comes to choice of what to showcase, are there certain patterns in the portfolios noobies make? I went to the talk/presentation Adam Bromwell held in Toronto for the IGDA (which inspired me to join up here) and he said that sci-fi hallways and medieval castle walls are done in portfolios way too often. Are there other assets you guys see roll into here too often?
Maybe there is a sticky for this exact topic and I missed it >.< haha.. atleast the title would be appropriate.
Replies
Welcome to Polycount. Regarding portfolios, I think you want to know about environment artist portfolios, correct? People tend to put way to many things on them with a varying degree of quality. You only want to put your best work on your portfolio, don't dilute your presentation by adding in your very first models, becasue they will suck.
You are trying to advertise your skills as an artist, so right up front you should have pictures of your work with watermarked contact info on each picture (in case they save your stuff and need to find you). Don't use anything like flash (remember some people use old systems or netbooks even).
Naughty Dog's Tech artist recently did a talk, he said that he usually loses interest very fast when looking for potential Hires and would prefer if people had 2 varied and high quality environments right on their front page with as much subject matter as you can logically fit in your styles.
So, for example, make an interior scifi environment with lots of mechanical detail modeling for one environment and do a outdoor organic environment for your other piece. This shows you are flexible and are able to do a whole range of things.
Basically, keep it simple, don't make it a distraction.
Go and take a look at some of the best environment artists out there. You've already mentioned Adam, an easy way to find the rest is by looking in the polycounter job census. People who already have jobs in Naughty dog, Blizzard and Epic for example, have good portfolios. Look at how they've lit their scenes and what camera angles they've used. Also look at how they've set up their sites and more.
Good luck!
-Spelling mistakes
-No phone number
-No Email
-No Contact info in general
-They use flash (it requires a plugin, that some employers may not have, and it eliminates the ability to see it on iPhones, which is useful at conferences)
-They dont credit other people where they need to. If you did a group project at school, you have to say who else worked on it, and who did what.
-They are afraid to ditch their shitty work, because they are attached to it, but truth is it shouldnt be on your portfolio cause its bad
-They dont show their best stuff first
-They add splash pages (every click to get to your work is another chance the viewer will skip your portfolio
2. The work's quality varies widely (poor editing).
3. The work lacks stylistic diversity.
4. The work is presented poorly (annoying website, crappy music, small screenshots, bad lighting).
5. The work was completed in a group and individual contributions aren't credited/labeled.
All these are pretty big problems but can be fixed. The real issue, the one Adam hit upon with his talk, is that too many portfolios are nouns instead of adjectives. People make things -- characters, environments, animations, whatever -- but they're so focused on making the noun and getting through the technical bullshit that they forget games are supposed to be fun and awe-inspiring.
Good games are suspenseful, funny, sad -- they make you feel things. This is true from blockbuster games down to checkers. Most portfolios don't come anywhere near eliciting an emotional reaction. I'm not saying your environment props have to make me cry or your character model has to wisecrack like Nathan Drake, but I should be thinking something other than "Nice normals" or "Crisp texture" when I look through a portfolio. That stuff should be a given because people playing games don't care what your topology looks like. They want to explore and be inspired and overwhelmed and excited, all at the same time.
That's why sci-fi corridors are stupid. Not just because everyone's doing it, but because everyone's doing it and 99% of the time the result is a noun. Perfect and technically proficient, but lifeless. If you can make a sci-fi corridor that makes me feel the same way I did while watching Moon, then go ahead. But your work should show that you can do more than create nouns with technical skill. The industry needs artists.
Think flash, 4 layers of menus, intro screens, heavy AJAX scripting that doesn't do much. Think having only an ingame render with no wireframe, flats or specs, or inversely - half a dozen images pertaining to a barrelcrate. Also applies to resum
This times a million. This is some of the best advice anyone could hope for with regards to portfolios.
True but I like to think of it as a theme where the best ones create something unique that hints at sci fi but doesn't look like a generic metal corridor. Take my sci-fi corridor for example which doesn't have metal in sight...well a little
Regardless the biggest turn off for me is 3D / 2D tabs on a portfolio. As soon as the site loads I should see art within seconds. In fact I use thumbnails on my site and even I'm starting to think that's a bad idea. It should be a long vertical row of 1200 width images with a decent quality but not too high or they'll load slow.
http://wiki.polycount.com/CategoryPortfolio
A portfolio takes a couple hours to put together layout wise anyways - upload your images, write your contact info, paste your resum
Take these as an example
http://www.philipk.net/
http://www.metalliandy.com/
http://www.brameulaers.com/
http://www.adambromell.com/
http://www.digitalmarino.com/
All of these are great examples and you don't need a masters degree in web design to make em.
This last one is one of my favorites - http://3dbrushwork.com/ I love that it is done in Wordpress and now I kind of wish I had made mine in Wordpress too tbh, cheaper and easier.
EDIT to Below Comments - Yea I do agree guys, I like it more as its a bit unusual being in wordpress and such but it DOES flaunt the rule about clicks to get to the work. Not a great example for site design but he does think outside the box.
He put both the breakdowns and final images on one page, and further divided them, which is very clumsy.
If he put all the finals together as one image you have to click, as well the breakdowns, that would have been much more understandable for the previous click in the first place.
But as of now, you click the images you want to go, and then you have 6+ more images to click. No.
Click on image and click on breakdowns or final, yes. Or you know, you could have them organized from the beginning on the first page like that, saving you one click.
I think Pior up there has it nailed pretty good on his site. The title says he's a character artist and then you get instant character art.
http://www.pioroberson.com/
Personally Pior's has wayyy to many thumbnails for me to ever go through all that stuff without spending a long time. (Just my personal preference, and general laziness don't attack me plz).
My favorite's are the foolproof portfolio's that literally have a seamless row of art in list format. I don't even have to click anything or go back/forth! All i need to do is scroll. Super easy to digest.
Examples:
http://www.emptyworks.com/
http://www.richardjohnsmith.co.uk/
http://gamekorean.com/taehoonoh/index.htm
http://orbart.free.fr/index.php?Gallery=105
http://www.adambromell.com/
http://www.tylerwanlass.com/
http://www.peperaart.com/
http://www.benbolton.com/
I just rarely have the patience to sit and click on like 15 thumbnails...
Why not put up a thumbnail, which has several models on that pages which fall under the same category?
Example:
Low Poly (For single or projects pieces)
Hard Surface (High medium poly)
Sexy Ladies in High Heels (High medium poly)
Starship Troopers (High medium poly)
--
Sketch
Concept
Porn
I honestly feel page basis stacking is a much faster way to go about things. It's all up to you, but around 5-7 thumbnails which have a robust amount of work in them are much better way to deal with stuff.
If you want to show more, keep a small tab on you right of the screen, call it something like 'Further Breaksdowns or MOAR stuff" and if someone wants to kill some time, they can look at the pictures with specific tags from there, no need to mess up your primary clicks.
It sounds like you're making things more complicated. Why not just have a thumbnail linked to a page where the end result lowpoly, highpoly, wireframe, textures etc are in for each model? Make sure you only keep the best pieces of your work, that way you have less thumbnails to worry about.
Actually that's what I meant, a single thumbnail which takes you to several images, and each "model" is a widrescreen image with all the breakdowns.
The only things you categorized from the start is your personal preference of what you want to show as you strong pieces. And everything else can be listed by the side.
As far as why I haven't posted anything, mostly it's because I am admittedly very new and I know that as proud as I am of my progress, everything I've made are still *my first pieces*. I was given good feedback by some profs so I'm spending my break making some new assets. I will post them on polycount so you guys can rip'em apart.
Thank you again!