Tips for Getting A VideoGame Art Job

Portfolio Tips for VideoGame Art

c.sineni

version 1.0

newest updates: Nov 9th, 2005

If you would like to contact me, I can be reached at NOSPAM_lsineni@midwaygames.com, remove the NOSPAM_

Please put your name, plus “Portfolio Tips” as the subject so the spam filter doesn’t put your email in a junk folder- like “Billy Zane- Portfolio Tips”

The opinions expressed by the author of this document are entirely his own and do not reflect the position of his employment or the copyright holder of the thumbnail images. The thumbnail images contained in this document link to publicly available images (on the website http://www.ign.com/ ) The use of the images are in no way supported, associated or endorsed by their copyright owners or IGN. Please email if you need a thumbnail image removed.

Introduction

As an Art Director at a studio with several concurrent games, I make it a priority to be involved with all artist hires, as the whole studio is only as good as the quality of the people who work there. It is not uncommon to have weeks where I sort through hundreds of portfolios, and in looking at so many submitted works, I have noticed some commonalities between people we hire and people we don’t.

While the gist of this is written for a entry-level artist point of view, most of this applies to all skill levels, as a Senior Artist’s portfolio can often get to desks in the same pile as students right out of school, and without better information gets prioritized the same and goes through the same HR processes.

The points of view in all of this (particularly the discipline content section) are based on the projects my company produces, which is exaggerated photo-realistic style games. There are probably simple parallels to other styles, such as children’s products, that hopefully should be obvious even if examples aren’t given.

It should also be noted that this is not a guide to get into film or broadcast. I am not aware of the criteria they use for their portfolios. If you are more interested in 3-D film Cg, Pixar has an excellent portfolio guide for working in their industry.

http://www.pixar.com/companyinfo/jobs/howto.html

If you are trying to make one portfolio that will serve several different types of industries, I think it will be very difficult to do, and don’t recommend it- you should tailor your portfolio to the industry and discipline you are applying for.

Portfolio Presentation (physical media)

Discs:

I get into disagreements with other art directors about which are better- DVD movies or CDs (data discs). I prefer data discs, but I have heard others prefer DVDs. My advice is to include both if possible.

CDs (Data Discs) : I prefer CD data format because it is the easier to use in how my company operates. When we receive portfolios, we share them with many people to provide feedback. The easiest way to share portfolios is to just copy them to our network and ask people to send feedback via email. Imagery can also be much higher-res than what can be put on a DVD movie. Also, we will often forward images around via email to people to quickly show them an applicant’s work.

DVD Movies : I don’t like DVDs because:

1. They are low-res (640 x480). Non-animating work should be viewed higher than this.

2. They are hard to share (one copy) with a group of people, and easy to get lost once shared.

3. Viewer has less control to understand content of images (moves fast; is blurry).

4. DVDs often don’t work on many systems- some work well on PCs, some work well on home entertainment systems, different formats like DVD-R , DVD + R, etc …

That said, I have heard many HR reps say they prefer DVDs. So my only recommendation is if you really want to send a DVD, include a data disc CD as well and make everyone happy. Including an CD with a DVD is a relatively cheap investment.

VHS Movies : VHS is dead. Most people don’t have a VCR in their office, so they can’t view your portfolio.

Case:

There should be a case to cover the discs (DVD cases are good). This case should also be able to hold a printed resume inside it – separately attached resumes can get lost. If you have some small printed images that fit inside the case (a mini-printed portfolio) that can often tell a lot about an artist as well, before they can even get to a computer.

Cover:

The cover of the disc should have all of your contact information. The front and back cover should also have some simple clean images of your best work- a few really impressive images will get your work fast-tracked through the hiring system while a cover with just your name (or nothing) get sorted a low priority. I can’t stress enough how important this cover can be- it is really your first and sometimes only impression.

While many of us are fans of super simple minimal design (like just small text) on a cover, good looking relevant imagery really does sell your work, and gets it a priority.

CD/ DVD Label

Again this should have all of your contact information. It sounds silly, but many people put a disc with no label in their case, and often cases and discs get separated. You don’t need a proper stickler label, but at least hand writing saying your name + info. Again a good image behind the label is also helpful incase the disc and case get separated- people will see the disc and associate it to the work.

Portfolio Presentation (web)

Unless you are applying for a User Interface role, I would avoid using Flash in your web portfolios. This is why I would avoid flash:

Flash, more often than not, bloats your content and makes it slower to view. When webpages are slow, people tend to not want to bother to look at it.
It is difficult to extract data out of Flash for easier sharing.

For example, if there are images or movies of your work embedded in Flash and those need to be sent around for feedback, it is very difficult to do.

Flash pages tend to have small images of work or movies so that they can fit the design of the page, so your portfolio design hinders your main area of focus that you are applying for.

The company you apply to will have many people looking at your site, and we all hate waiting for a long webpage load, when we could just have simple copies local for sharing. If it is too much effort to go through your portfolio, your work may not get viewed.

Keep pages simple without a lot of extra graphics and things that long times to load, simple thumbnail galleries often work best.

If you are applying for a User Interface Position, then Flash is actually encouraged as it will give people the best showing of your skills of interface design and graphics and presentation.

Portfolio Content

Solidly Demonstrate a single art discipline: Most large to medium sized companies really only want to hire you for one skill- Animation, Character, Environment, UI Artist, Cinematic, FX, or Concept.

For example, companies don’t need to see spinning cameras, around a poorly rigged badly animating ugly monster, in a smeary world with silly FX. We would rather just see good examples of one art discipline, because that is the work you will be doing for a company when you get there.

Schools are notorious at encouraging their students to have a well rounded portfolio, but companies only hire people for one position- check the Gamasutra job ads and see how many of them are for well-rounded artists vs specific artist roles. The only ones who are looking for well-rounded artists are either extremely small (some mobile games industry prefer this) or don’t know what they are doing.

The reality is there are very few (great) jack-of-all-trades in videogame art- most people can be great at one and a half discipline at best. While school is a great time to flex your art muscles and try a lot of different things out, when you are at the stage of presenting your portfolio, make sure you can at least demonstrate one discipline very well.

Always make it clear on your cover letter or resume what type of role you are interested in. HR recruiters often can’t tell by your work, and they will get your portfolio before artist leads.

Always compare yourself to the best: When your work is at a company, people in the company are very aware of the high global standards of Game and Cg art, and will compare your art to it.

Whether you are senior or junior artists, your work has to complete with the best out there. Your goal should be to do work that is held to the highest caliber- if you aren’t getting as good as results as top artists, figure out why and make your work amazing. Your artistic eye is immediately questioned when sub-par work is turned in, even if you have experience.

Always check what the new bar in quality is at sites like these:

http://forums.cgsociety.org/

http://www.cgchannel.com/

http://www.conceptart.org/

Another thing to do is look at current games- if a game is getting great review scores in art, ask yourself if you could have made art for that game- does your work hold up to that bar? Play the games and try to figure out what they did, and emulate it.

3-D Software Advice

This gets asked enough- neither Max nor Maya is popular enough to warrant learning one over the other. While obviously it would be great if applicants were well versed in both, it is more important to have great artwork than knowing a package (unless you want to be a technical artist). If you show great work then a studio knows they can trust your eye, if you show that you know every software but bad work, then they aren’t sure what you are capable of. A side note to this is it is a big plus for animators to be familiar with the MotionBuilder software.

Ideal formats of content (assuming CD data disc or Web-based portfolio)

Images: Just use Jpegs (no PDF or Targas or Bitmaps or PSDs). Jpgs are great because every application can view them, and they are very easy to share and forward around. If you are worried about too much compression ruining your image, just save them at a high setting. It is always best to have somewhat high-res images of your work (at least 800 pixels above size)

Images are a preferred way of showing the work in your portfolio, unless you are showing something with animation (movement). “Tabletop” spins of your 3-D models or camera flythroughs of spaces is only nice as a supplement to high-res imagery of your work.

Video files: Quicktime, WMV, or DivX now are pretty much the standard. Avoid large uncompressed AVI formats as they often don’t playback well. Also avoid other unconventional formats not listed. It is often better to have several movie files of single content than one long demo reel where things blend into each other. That way somebody could be pointed to one file- “Check out x movie” rather than “skip to 2 minutes and 34 seconds to see what I’m talking about”

Docs: Always include a digital copy of your resume with all your contact information (including webpage and email address) - .doc, .rtf, or .html format is preferred, PDF should be avoided.

Art Disciplines:

Animator:

For some reason I have not figured out, almost everyone wants to be an animator. Not sure if this is odd nudging from schools (often Computer Graphics are still called Animation Departments) or just some deep rooted desire to express human-like locomotion.

It is important for animators to be able to demonstrate they understand weight, physics, gravity, timing, impact, and nailing the performance, as well interesting but realistic move sets. Basic walk, run, and idle cycles are a must for showing off skills. A scene of two characters interacting is also extremely helpful.

My company, as with most large videogame companies, is more interested in realistic human motion as opposed to a highly exaggerated cartoony ‘squash and stretch’ style. Consumers mostly purchase those kinds of games, so that is what we make and need our artists skilled in. Just as a note, there aren’t nearly enough jobs for all the cartoony reels in the world- it is probably the most common portfolio we get.

Many profession game companies use motion capture as a main step for creating their animations, and then animators clean up the files (usually in MotionBuilder, the best software for editing motion capture). Animation skill is still extremely important in working with motion capture data. Any experience you can get working with motion capture data and MotionBuilder would be a huge plus to your resume.

Any “technical” knowledge is also preferred- understating character tessellation for deformation, character rigging, etc. The ability to grasp how animations would be used in the game (how they blend into each other) are all great skills to demonstrate if you feel comfortable in those areas.

A great reference for animators is the 10 Second Club. They have forums where people critique animation, and they even have rigged models to animate to. This is invaluable because great animation can look bad on poorly rigged and constructed characters. For most game jobs, it is recommend to animate on the more realistically proportioned reference models they have.

Animator Recommended Content format:

Animations have to be presented in video files. Ideally this information would be on a CD-ROM or website.

Content Recommendations:

· Animation cycles: walk, run, idle (waiting) etc.

· Single playing animations- Falling down and picking self up, jumping, opening a door.

· Two person interactions (a tackler, a hug, a robust dialog, etc)

· Facial animation information coming soon- highly recommend Jason Osipa’s “Stop Staring” book.

Character Artist:

Different companies have different needs of character artists, but here are some things we look at. Artists must be able to demonstrate full-body realistic proportioned textured characters in as close to photo-realistic style as possible. That means:

- Must show off modeling skills of how you build polygons.

- Must show off material, texturing and UV ability- for face, clothes, accessories, skin.

We have stacks of portfolios that show off great modeling but no texturing. While at some companies this is a separate role, most places will have you doing both and it is important to demonstrate all of those skills. We won’t hire a character artist without being able to demonstrate texture abilities.

Creature, fantasy, and Sci-Fi work is all very cool, but make sure they are supplemented by real-world examples. Even if you work on a game in a non-real world, the established artists at companies will get placed on the most interesting characters, and entry level roles might have to do the secondary characters like NPCs and generic soldiers that will require these skills.

Cartoon-style work is okay to see, but not necessary for companies doing realistic work, which again is majority of large budget titles in US market. Make sure it is supplemented with work mentioned above.

Being able to demonstrate proficiency in Zbrush work is a huge plus, as well as ability to demonstrate normal map creation from high-res geometry and how it applies to low-res geometry.

Weighting / Rigging- Demonstrating rigging is an inconsistent requirement between studios, and even teams within a studio. A common approach is that most studios are so particular about weighting that they will teach you their style, or they have technical artists to do the weighting for you. Some studios will require seeing weighting samples, especially for senior artists. Keep in mind volunteering bad weighting on your portfolio (when it isn’t needed) will do more harm than good.

Character Recommended Content format:

Characters should just be jpg image files, ideally this information would be on a CD-ROM or website.

No video files needed, unless demonstrating weighting on a range of motion.

Content Recommendations:

High-res jpg images of various angles of the character (front, back, perspective) It is good to include both textured and untextured views- wireframes are very good as well.
High-res jpg images of textures/ materials are very helpful.
High-res jpg images of UV layout are very helpful.

One recommendation I have heard that character artists should have in their portfolio is a re-created celebrity in modern day clothes (like Brad Pitt in Fight Club), and get them down from head to toe (face likeness, clothing, etc.) That one model can really show a whole gamut of skills.

Character Samples (click thumbnail to larger image at IGN):

Environment Artist:

Artists should be able to demonstrate elements of 3D game environments. The cornerstone of environment skills are modeling, materials and UVs, and lighting.

An ideal portfolio will show a variety of things- highly detailed props, interior and exterior architecture, terrain and foliage, destruction states of objects, etc. Having a good composition and spatial understanding is crucial.

It is recommended that you are able to demonstrate a wide variety of environments- sci-fi hallways are great, but make sure you supplement it with other environments as well- real-world urban, natural settings, etc. If the work is too fantasy and abstract it might be difficult for employers to tell how you skills apply to their game.

It is highly recommended for entry-level artists is to show any game engine mod work they have done- creating a environment in Unreal or Half-life with all custom textures and models can really show how you would work in a game engine.

In regards to materials, you should be able to demonstrate a diffuse, specular, and bump to your materials. You should also be able to demonstrate baked-in effects ambient occlusion, global illumination, and other fx that most real-time engines aren’t capable of performing.

If you have done any complex shader work you might want to include an explanation of what you have done in addition to the visuals.

Being able to demonstrate proficiency in Zbrush work a huge plus, as well as ability to demonstrate normal map creation from high-res geometry and how it applies to low-res geometry.

Often at companies some environment artists will create ambient environment FX, like steam, flaming torches, smoke, etc. If you have an aptitude for this and can do competitive work, then it is encouraged you include this. See the FX section for more info on this.

Environment Recommended Content format:

Environment samples should just be jpg image files, ideally this information would be on a CD-ROM or website.

No video files needed, unless it is supplemental material (like a flythrough of an area shown in a still, or a movie or .gif to demonstrate how a material reacts to different camera or light positions, etc )

Content Recommendations:

High-res jpg images of detailed props at various angles (front, back, perspective). Props can include ornate architectural details (like columns), vehicles, everyday objects (crates, . It is good to include some untextured and wireframe images of these as well.
High-res jpg images of whole environment scenes, ideally demonstrating a variety of genres (real-world urban, natural settings, sci-fi, fantasy, etc.) with lighting. Again it is good to include some untextured and wireframe images of these as well.

Environment Samples (click thumbnail to larger image at IGN):

Prop Samples (click thumbnail to larger image at IGN):

Concept Artist:

Some brief tips:

Concept art really is used different at many places. Rather than cover the multitude of the importance of concept art and where it can fit in a production pipeline, here is what rather large development studios looks for in concept artists.

While all concept artists should be well rounded, large studios will look for concept artists with specialties. We tend to think of concept artists as either character concept artists or environment concepts artists.

Character concept artists work on visualizing characters. There are often different stages to working on characters. These are different types of character drawings:

Mood and feeling of what the character is about, often several roughs are made to create this. These are best in color.
Anatomy – basically a blueprint of how the character should be built. Often this is drawn for the modelers in a “t-pose”.
Material + texture drawings. These are drawings that have the material qualities of the character in them. This includes the actual photographic blemishes in the face, tooth of the cloth, etc. This is often where character designs fail in 3-D - the loose mood images often don’t convey the full effect of what a character will be.

Environment concept artists work on visualizing environments. They have to be able to convey:

Architectural relationships, structure and perspective – need to understand how the space is built. Some environment concept artists spend a lot of time doing industrial design depending on the project.
Material and texture – the materials and surfaces of the environment need to be explained- really loose paint strokes of color are great for early concept work and getting the spirit of the environment down, but more detailed treatments of the texture to the surfaces are needed so there is a more accurate blueprint of the space. This is where most 3-D environments fail, and the it is the job of the concept artist to prove this out in 2-D before a 3-D artists commits this to 3-D.
Mood, lighting, and atmosphere- the artists working off the concepts need to understand what the feeling will be like in the space.

These artists the bar which environment concept artists should shoot for:

Craig Mullins

Sparth

John Salvatore Wallin Liberto

Ryan Church

Again, concept artists should be well rounded to handle both genres, as often in development the need for one or the other is lopsided and being well rounded means you can contribute to either, even if it isn’t your specialty. Small studios may only have one concept artist and require that person to do all concept work.

Storyboarding ability is also a huge plus, as game teams often use concept artists for this. A solid understating of cinema is needed for storyboarding.

Concept Recommended Content format:

Concept samples should just be jpg image files, ideally this information would be on a CD-ROM or website.

Content Recommendations:

High-res jpg images of technical work, full color illustrations, etc.

Character Concept Samples (click thumbnail to larger image at IGN):

Environment Concept Samples (click thumbnail to larger image at IGN):

FX Artist

Some brief tips:

For entry level artists, it is HIGHLY recommended you work in real-time engine (like Unreal or Half-life) to demonstrate your FX ability. Particle systems in Max or Maya, or 2-D effects like Aftereffects are just very different than game system effects. Working within the limitations of a game engine is the best way to convey your skills.

Must demonstrate billboard style (sprite) particle systems for game engine using proprietary tools.
Must demonstrate polygonal and texture effects used in conjunction with sprites. This means you must show some modeling ability, even if it is just for chunks of debris.

FX Recommended Content format:

FX samples should just be both movies and jpg image files, ideally this information would be on a CD-ROM or website.

Images are helpful to see what the work is like without clicking on a movie, and again is easier to share- an image can be easily emailed, etc. But seeing effects in motion is a must.

Content Recommendations:

You should demonstrate movies of common fx that happen in games: