Canaday, when you say environment artists rarely work in their program do you mean they aren't making their own assets? That's one of the reasons I wanted to an EA. Is it like dragging and moving preexisting modular stuff?
I don't think it's all bad to have both characters AND props. I think the assumption is that if you spend most of your time making characters (and perhaps guns or accessories), you might ONLY be good as a prop artist, and be a bit limited on other environmental work, such as building modular sets, putting together a scene…