[Portfolio] Nick Kippes - Environment Artist

kippernicus · May 2012

Hello everyone. I'm just looking for some general critiques on just about everything on my site; layout, presentation, texture and model crits. Whatever you think I should work on, lemme know. Thanks in advance.

http://www.kippernicus.blogspot.com

FYI: I'm updating the Dorothea Lange Project env this weekend. I think I'll start a new thread for it. Keep an eye out if you're interested!

kippernicus · May 2012

Well, I can only assume that there's so much wrong with it that you all don't know where to start. Either that, or it's so incredibly brilliant that you're all speechless.

Really though, anything that comes to mind, let me know. I need to get this puppy in showroom condition and I'm at a loss in terms of where I should start.

Skillmister · May 2012

I would imagine this is why you have no comments

Well over a minute later and nothing..

Selaznog · May 2012

Your site is really clumsy and slow

johnicus · May 2012

I didn't have the same loading problems as the others, so I can try to offer you some advice.

The pictures do seem to load slow. It looks like you might be scaling the image thumbnails down within the html/editor to display them on the page? Try making separate thumbnails that are already scaled down that you can click on to display higher resolution images (i have grappled with that myself). It will save on image load time, which is precious. Some people looking at applicant websites only give you about 5 seconds to get your point across before they close it.

At ECGC this year, a lot of the speakers at various panels were stressing the necessity of getting your best work up front and keeping the content concise. Take a look at this page: http://matthewvia.com/ . Note the large image thumbs that you can click on for breakdowns of the process. Quick and to the point.

I would get rid of the frame set and try to simplify the design while maximizing the available space for display of your work. You have some great stuff, but people you want a job from don't want to dig for your best work and no one is expecting you to be a web designer, so keep it simple and clean.

jetskee96 · May 2012

The site did not load very well on my ipad, thats slightly distracting from your work. I would grt that fixed so its easier for people to look at and critque your art.

nick2730 · May 2012

site hurts my eyes, so bright alot of white space

cholden · May 2012

in the past few weeks I've seen 3 portfolios here that used this exact same, awful, layout. Did you all go to the same school or something?

Simplify this to a small gallery of 6-10 of your best works, contact info and resume on a neutral background. Nothing else.

mutatedjellyfish · May 2012

Sean "Cheeks" Galloway uses it as well. Maybe they're all copy-catting.

kippernicus · May 2012

Awesome. This is exactly what I needed to know. I have 0 technical issues when I view the site, so thank you very much to those of you that talked about it.

@johnicus: Thank you for the info and link. I had no idea about the image scaling thing. I think I'll go the same route as Matthew. It looks like the perfect example of what you're talking about.

@cholden: I'm pretty new here, so I'm not sure who you're referring to but thank you for your suggestion. Simple and effective, got it.

kippernicus · May 2012

Ok, I went through and changed the layout of the blog to something more simple. I'm hoping that it help the load times. I'll just have to keep it this way until I can get all those thumbnails resized and find a better site to show my work. Thanks again guys.

johnicus · May 2012

If you are looking for templates, Tumblr has some good ones and it can be routed to a domain if you have one. Carbonmade is expensive, but they have some decent html5 templates as well. Whatever you do, stay away from anything that uses Flash. I have been told many many times that when an art director is looking at 50-100+ applicants, they will often just get irritated and close it when they see a "now loading" bar thing

edit: And glad to help!

I'm basically just repeating all that I've been hearing from people myself this week, since I just graduated and have been working on my website all week.

matthewjvia · May 2012

The changes are an improvement, but the enormous scrolling page probably won't do you any favors either. If your first piece is exactly what an HR person is looking for, they will probably look through it. Otherwise, they are likely to just move on before they get very far. Having a homepage with large thumbs shows them all of your work at once and they can look farther if they want.

Don't include more than 1 WIP on your site at a time or it looks like you don't finish projects.

Don't assume that you will get a job with the portfolio you graduate with because that is really rare. I have been working on mine for a year since graduation and I feel like I'm getting close but I've had to get rid of nearly all of my school work to do it and I'm still working to get rid of what's left.

Only include your best work. If there is anything you don't feel confident about, toss it or replace it ASAP. You can expect that most people will judge you by your worst piece.

Be careful about putting art tests on your site. If the test is very recognizable, some people look at it as being a less credible work because they know it means that you didn't get the job. Also, sometimes the concepts for those tests are confidential, so be careful about that. Having said that, I have 2 on my site. I've gotten mixed opinions on including them at all, but if it's a good piece, you know it's not confidential, and if you fixed whatever kept you from getting the job, I don't see why not.

I would recommend that you remove the Random Works, since they are incomplete and I don't think they really add anything. Same for the Green Bastard, especially since that is your first Zbrush model and I'm sure you've improved since then. Also go ahead and remove the Gameloft test because your newer works are much better.

You're clearly improving, so once you get your WIPs done I think you'll be in a much better place.

kippernicus · May 2012

@johnicus: I have a friend that's going to help me set up a separate portfolio site. Thanks for the heads up on the flash thing. I'll be sure to stay away from that.

@matthewjvia: Thank you for that great advice! I've already taken most of my student work off of my site (graduated a year ago), so it's concerning that my new art is still coming off as such, but it's good to know. Thanks again man, I'll be taking all of this advice to heart.

kippernicus · May 2012

I just finished setting up a portfolio site using Carbonmade. It's pretty slick! Unfortunately, the free version doesn't support large image files. So, I put links into the descriptions of the projects that lead back to the corresponding pages in my blog, where there are larger pictures, until I can afford to upgrade.

kippernicus.carbonmade.com

kippernicus · May 2012

Ok, the site is now filled out with what I believe to be my best work. I also went through and organized my blog a bit more. Took out the turds, too. Almost 100% free of student work!

urgaffel · May 2012

Two things that stood out:

The brick wall is just one big texture. I'd have been more impressed if you had made it from tiling brick, decals etc.

Your cartoony dirt texture repeats horribly inside itself. It looks like you've taken a small section and then copied it around.

kippernicus · May 2012

@urgaffel: Thanks for the feedback! Yeah, I would've liked to make the building exterior textures separate, using decals and whatnot, but the AD wanted me to build the wall that way. However, I do plan on using that technique in the WIP I have posted there.

The Miner Descent game is still being worked on, so I should have time to fix that texture. I'll have to slap the other artists around for not picking up on that.

kippernicus · Aug 2012

Put some more work on the site in the "More Work" section. I also updated the WIP with some more texture work.

http://kippernicus.carbonmade.com/

[Portfolio] Nick Kippes - Environment Artist

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