Life changing or career building

Life changing or career building

For the purpose of this blog I will be looking into how Universities approach there role of helping students graduate with the necessary skills.

A lot of game companies ask for experience when advertising for jobs, while others ask for creative individuals. I feel that there is always going to be the need for both, depending on the job description. I would really like to concentrate on my chosen career path however I do feel that the way in which my university has taught me so far will help my progression into becoming a really good game artist. The saying goes ‘jack of all trades master of none’ and to a certain degree that is true but the fundamental skills necessary to become a good quality artist need to be nurtured before this can happen.

There is no point being a great modeller if you don’t understand colour theory or light. The same can be said of a concept artist, if they don’t understand the anatomical structure, then there drawings will look poor.

In my opinion the governments views on such problems are rarely correct and the can never see the woods for the trees!

If it was up to me then I think that what I would aim to do would be to engineer the briefs so that they could be tailored more towards a more specialised field whilst retaining the diversity enough to teach the student the necessary skills in order to help them become a competent game artist.

In theory the three years spent at university are kind of a fifty fifty split between what the curriculum says you need and a year of specialising, with the first year being a kind of tryout year.

When approaching projects on our course it is paramount to follow it to the letter, which is good training to enable you to do exactly that when working in the industry. There is no point completing a brief to then realise that you are well over the specification limits, to have to start all over again. Generally what we do at De-Montford is prepare for life as a game artist in the industry, we follow proper briefs and we try to use the design process to approach them. These are the fundamental skills that are necessary, along with a good appreciation for colour theory, light and so on.

I think that we at De-Montford University are being drilled the best way possible and that we will be turned out as good game artists by the end of the course. The fact that the final year is specialised, for me, is a real plus as I have had not had a lot of time to increase my skills as a vehicle artist and, as that is what I want to specialise in, must do so if I’m ever going to get my dream job.