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Dream Big? Maybe too big...

character artist game art design university

So last weeks Critical Studies lesson involved us learning about what key skills are needed within the gaming industry and analysing the variety of different jobs and roles. This led to us all being set an exciting - yet daunting - task of finding our dream job. I'm still not 100% sure on what I'd like to do yet however the past few weeks have involved working on a variety of different character design projects that have been set during visual design classes - as well as the gladiator project we're currently working on in game production. So far I've had great fun working on these different projects which is what has led me to believe that I may like to be a character artist.

Anyway, back to the job spec.

Character Artist

Responsibilities:

• This individual will be responsible for sculpting hi-res realistic characters, including organic and non-organic assets.

• This individual will create deformable and efficient models with clean topology and optimised UV layouts.

• Bring to life artistically rendered characters and assets with a high level of realism.

Requirements and Skills:

• An advanced knowledge of sculpting human anatomy, shape, light and form. (This is something I'll need to work on. I have basic knowledge of modelling characters using 3DS Max and I'm planning on hopefully gaining more experience with this over the summer. Since I've started at DMU, I can definitely see an improvement in my life drawing when looking back through my work. This would definitely help for the latter part of this requirement.)

• A keen eye for colour and texture painting. (This requirement is something I definitely feel I need to work on. I've not had much experience with texture painting - however I'm painting my textures for the current gladiator project so I guess I'll see how that goes!)

• Experience generating normal and ambient occlusion maps. (I understand the basic fundamentals of normal maps and why they're needed within an object, I feel that every project I've completed so far has led me to understand the various maps more and what areas of the object they should be used on - or if they should even be used at all. With specular maps, I tend to whack my texture into CrazyBump then fix them up in Photoshop and hope for the best. Probably not the best way of doing things but... Spec maps are something I feel I definitely need to work on if this is the role I'm aiming for.)

• Candidates should be able to work with minimal input and be comfortable working in a team environment. (Due to having worked in team environments before - in college projects and councils within my job - I feel I'm happy when working in a team. I can often be quite shy at first when working with a group of people I don't know for the first time as it's a pretty daunting task, but this soon passes over so it's something I'm easily able to work around. I feel working within retail has also helped me to improve my confidence and soft skills which is key in the gaming industry.)

• Base knowledge of optimisation - working with lower resolution textures and low-poly game meshes, as well as experience or a desire to work with more high resolution assets. (Due to the models we're producing in game production at the moment, I can say I'm familiar with creating low-poly assets. I'm also confident using low-resolution textures as it's something we also work with during game production lessons. However in the future I would like to be creating more high-poly characters to gain more experience with the 3D modelling side and to be able to recognise the significant differences between the building process.)

• Candidates should expect to take an offsite test. 

• Candidates should be willing to work with and draw reference or base starting points from scan data. (I'd be more than happy to do this, I'd need to focus more on anatomy in order to make sure the model with have the correct proportions but I feel that with my current progress in life drawing lessons, this is something I could achieve easily. I hope.)

So looking back at what skills I've currently got, and what skills I need to work on - I feel this is something I can definitely achieve providing I stick to my guns and put my all into this. I can see a vast improvement already from the short time I've been on this course so I can't wait to see what my progression is like over the next two years!