I am thinking quit been a 3d artist, need advice!!!

GeorgeNasiotis · Dec 2016

Hello guys i need some advice with what i should do.So i am looking for job over 18 months now. I have 5 years of experience and i am from Greece (i have a EU permit to work). I am sending applications all over the world and in all levels. from junior to mid level, even for internships that are not for students. I had some interviews and second ones and art tests and everything but steel i didn't manage to land on a job. My experience with the hole process is more negative i think, and i will explain why. I did art tests for 5 different companies and i i didn't got feedback from any of them. Three reply to me only after a follow up email and one not even that. I know that this is how the industry works, but to give to someone a 5 days of your time and not even bother to reply to you that you are not a good fit or whatever for me looks unfair. Anyways to my point, i think my self as a 3d generalist as my skills variate from modelling, texturing, rigging, animation, photogrammetry and 3d scanning. I have mainly worked as a freelancer for the last 5 years and trough those years i have worked for 2 published video-game titles (one on Facebook,ios and one on android) and 5 different other projects that never reached that point. i have worked with museums and companies doing 3d scans of exhibits and products for their wed sites. i have done TV intros and other stuff. my online portfolio is on those two places:
http://www.nasiotisgeorgios.com https://nasiotisgeorgios.artstation.com/

Now i know that is not the ideal portfolio and there are a lot of thinks that can be improved. what bothers me is that i think (might be wrong) that i think that i a qualified for a junior position. Also the money i made as a freelancer is not enough to maintain my self. I am in the point that i am thinking that i might be not good enough to do this. So i am asking for your advice, should i keep looking or quit and do something else. I am not looking for someone to pet my solder, i would appreciate the truth as hard that it is. Thanks

slosh · Dec 2016

I'll be honest with you...your folio is not what it needs to be. I think you are definitely not qualified for even most Jr positions. Maybe you are spreading yourself too thin by focusing on different things as a generalist. Some studios just give art tests to everyone and if that is the case, they may just look at your art test, determine you are not a fit, and move on without contacting you. I agree that this is a terrible way to treat anyone putting in 5 days of work but unfortunately, it's a reality. I would hate to tell you to give up if this is your dream. Perhaps you can get a job in another industry to support yourself and then work on your 3d in your free time. My advice would be to focus on something more specific. If you like modeling and texturing, do just that and make a few props that are top notch. Your folio is your most important asset when applying and yours is still well below the bar of current standards.

oglu · Dec 2016

what slosh says + kick everythig from your folio that does not reflect your current skill...
spend the time to do a new folio instead of writing emails...

its hard to get a good folio... i know...
good luck...

Asura · Dec 2016

If you really love making game art I'd say stick with it. Perfect practice makes perfect.

Disclaimer I'm not in the industry but have been in this scenario and it's helped me focus and level up where I can.

Like @slosh said, you should think about a focus. Weather it be Realism or stylized, characters, monsters or props and narrow it down to a mix of what you like and where you want to be as an artist. You can make a list of studios based off what you come up with. For example if you love realistic characters you might wanna try naughty dog, if you like stylized monsters go for blizzard.

Then take a day or two to gather all the references from games they have made and compare what they do to where you want to put your focus. That way you are actively judging yourself by similar standards that the HR guys would hire you at. A lot of the guys that work at these places have breakdown vids of their workflows and mindsets when the attack an art piece as well. I find these to be super cool

!

Hope that helps.

GeorgeNasiotis · Dec 2016

Asura

oglu

slosh

Hey guys thanks for your replays the were very helpful but maybe i hadn't so clear of what i had to do and i mean i like more doing the supporting stuff. I was aiming more to smaller studios that have maybe 2-3 artists so i can be involved with all the aspects of a project. but from what i am getting here is better to aim in big studios doing only one think very good. Anyway Thanks again guys!

PyrZern · Dec 2016

I think the presentations of those pieces are pretty poor as well.

More images, less sketchfab. 2-3 screenshot each piece, with wireframe, maybe also with texture sheet.

Thumbnails are bad. Don't just show 1 Fox from a side view with poor lighting. Put in a few foxes. Maybe 2 grown foxes and a smaller one standing close together. Give them some stones/rocks, ponds, and some grasses. Put some rabbits and raccoons to the side. Or maybe the foxes are chasing after a rabbit , who acts as bait while his rabbit family run the other direction... or something. MAKE THINGS INTERESTING TO SEE, you know. Make the colors brighter, and more contrast. Especially for smartphone games.

3d scanned assets are dimmed. And just floating there in nothingness. Make a table. Put them on the table. The soup cans, the milk, the bottles. Or maybe put them on a shelf, you know. Give context to your pieces.

Your highpoly game characters also seem super dense in poly for no reason. There are no overlapping armors or what not. And the mesh aren't that complex either. You could cut the tris in more than half, and I bet they will still look as good. And they don't have proper joints for deformation either. (knees, elbows, fingers, etc.) And pose them. Avoid T-Pose, especially for game character.

Old church looks pretty dim. Though the model itself isn't bad, IMO. Why not throw it into Unreal Engine, and give it some landscape, nice sky and lighting ??

That's my .75 cent. I'm guilty of some of the things I comment on as well.

Joopson · Dec 2016

I think your portfolio does need work. No matter what sort of company you're aiming for.

I don't know anything about animation, but I can see that your animations are often too fast and twitchy to be believable. And your models and textures feel very inconsistent. On another note, many of your more "realistic" textures are plainly photosourced, in a way that suggests copy-pasting, and not authoring. The seams in many places also suggest that.

You seem to have a solid grip of the fundamentals, but I don't see any work that uses those fundamentals all together, in a piece of work that feels complete and polished. I agree that if you spend time really banging out portfolio work, you could get to a level where people are willing to hire you for a junior job, probably within a year, but at present, I just don't think the work is there. To be successful as a generalist, you have to do everything well, and that requires a lot of dedication and flexibility.

slosh · Dec 2016

"I was aiming more to smaller studios that have maybe 2-3 artists so i can be involved with all the aspects of a project"

You can try to be a generalist for smaller studios but just know this, you better be damn good at EVERYTHING. I can't see this happening for most people without building experience over time in a studio setting. Even if you are going for a generalist type of position at a small studio, pick a focus and excel at it. The other aspects of gamedev will come once you get a job. By trying to learn multiple things at the same time, everything ends up mediocre and your folio suffers because of it.

pior · Dec 2016

You could keep the purple gorilla, the Aztec bird and the steampunk cat and make some great presentation images out of them. You can pretty much get rid of all the rest. Also the animations are mostly hurting the models.

Toku · Dec 2016

You gotta work it out for yourself man, The only difference between a Jr and Mid level artist in a lot of places is title and time spent working at the company, they expect you to hit the ground running and deliver work that will go into the project without needing feedback. There are few places who are willing to train up artists since gamedev degrees are everywhere now, and the competition is so high. You either need to invest a lot of hours emulating other peoples styles so you can make production quality work, or put your art on the back-burner and focus on doing something else until an opportunity appears. Some artists don't even start their career in this industry until they are 40, be it because they had other careers and have been developing their art along side it or have been in situations where it took them that long to get their skills to where they needed to be.

One thing I would say about your work is that it has a lot of character and shows creativity and individuality. But there are certain techniques which are used everywhere for good reason, I spent a lot of time trying to circle around making an asset with my own take on it, for example using different brush settings or composition compared to a tutorial I watched thinking it would end up looking the same quality but different in aesthetic but usually it was a mistake which broke the look of the piece. If you want to get work focus on a style that already exists and do plenty of studies, and show some more complex modelling, Also you need to show your process for optimizing realtime work, like tiling UVs, decals, substances etc.

Yasou!

kanga · Dec 2016

Do something part time to bring in money leaving time for 3d. There are super folios out there to use as a reference. Why does it have to be one or the other. Looking at your stuff it has quality but like others have said it is thin and it could be better presented. Keep developing your stuff while doing what you must to keep yourself fed.

Cheerio

GeorgeNasiotis · Dec 2016

Hey Guys thanks for all the advice! I have to think more about it because make a leaving is a priority. But you are right. leaving in a country with no studios and working mainly in upwork (or odesk) wasn't helpful to focus on one think. I grubbed anything related to 3d i could. I like more hard surface modelling and the " technical " stuff, like 3d scanning and photogrammetry. I was thinking that is better to show works you have done for clients that doing your stuff for your self. so i haven't put anything in my portfolio that i have done for me. So i guess i will discard everything and try to make what i liked better.

Thanks all again!

RustySpannerz · Dec 2016

Something I like to do is look at other people's portfolios and see what I would need to learn to get to that level. Because that's all it is, the amazing artists are not some transcendent beings, who were born kicking 3d ass and chewing animated gum. They're just guys like you and me who learned what they needed to and worked really hard to get to where they are.

FourtyNights · Dec 2016

Have you thought about specializing in 3D art? Would you like to be a character artist, an environment artist or a prop artist etc.? I'm not against being a jack of all trades (a 3D generalist), but as slosh said, it's really tough to be good at everything. Some smaller studios might even need some rigging and animation skills from a 3D generalist which makes it even harder to master everything. So, IMHO, I'd recommend specializing.

Ravenok · Dec 2016

Quit or don't quit, wherever you go you will have competition and you'll have to surpass it to get a job.
As people said, your portfolio needs work. Remember this is the only thing companies have to judge you with other than tests, and with a great portfolio you'll get more tests, and more job offers that don't require u to take a test.

You need be obviously great at one thing. Choose it and make a few great portfolio pieces, and show all of that off, and nothing more. Having one incredible piece of work in a portfolio and nothing else says a ton about your ability, you don't need quantity. Adding bad work to your portfolio only weakens the good parts of it, it's only damage. Nothing more.

It's a tough field. I always thought that to get a job in this field you have to at least be great. There's no "good enough", average will get you nowhere. It's not easy... but it's how it is when there's so much competition. Choose something to be good at and become a professional. If it's technical understanding or artistic capabilities, u gotta shine above your competition somehow.

BTW, Living in a country with no evolved industry doesn't mean you won't get a job. It might mean you won't get to work on a AAA title, it might mean you'll find a job doing something else with your 3D skills, but getting a job is probably possible.

miguelnarayan · Dec 2016

Your portfolio has little, almost no information on what you can do, so it is normal that someone asks you to do an art test.
I know I only do mostly 2D art, but before this I've done my fair share of 3D freelance for many people. I know that the industry works like this and trust me, I've encountered worse things than not replying to my tests, like actually rip offs.

This is what I'd do:
Find something you really admire and work towards it, get art of books, make a folder full of artworks you'd like to try make/inspire you to make something (but blunt copies) (be realistic about the skill level required, keep it at 70% ambition, 30% polish)

I know life in Greece is tough, economically, I'm in Portugal myself, and it's not too different, so I can see eye to eye on why you're having doubts and the rush to get a job.
Get a part time or full time job as a security measure, then work towards your 3D art in your free time, if one fails, you still have money to live by.
I'd recommend focus on a subject to improve at the time, do a set of props, then environments, vehicles... etc..

ez_flow · Dec 2016

Here's an idea for you and it's worked well for me. If there is a specific studio you are applying to, find other artists who work there via LinkedIn. They usually have a link to their portfolio. Ask yourself, is my portfolio at this level or better? If not, then use those examples as a model to get to that level. You will find subtle hints on what the studio is looking for in the portfolios of their artists (ie. subject matter, cartoony vs realistic, hand painted vs photosourced). Best of luck.

JamesMeader · Dec 2016

You've received some solid and excellent advice and I don't really want to repeat a lot of what others have said.

I have also had similar thoughts go through my head about my career as it hasn't been all clear sailing. However I don't think I actually have it in me to quit.

I think you definitely need to look at other artists who are generalists and look at how their work is presented because I think you could definitely do with a complete overhaul when it comes to presenting work.

Some of your animations are pretty solid but the stuff you have on your artstation is weak. There's totally potential and you have experience in the industry which is half the battle. You just need to ask yourself is this something you will fight tooth and nail for? If not then it maybe time to look at other options.

All the best.

I am thinking quit been a 3d artist, need advice!!!

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