Task 4

EA - 2D Artist/Illustrator

The 2D Artist will be responsible for creating breath-taking Hidden Object scenes, using a mix of technical skills and traditional illustration concepts. We’re looking for someone with Photoshop skills that transcend the realms of mere mortals.   The ideal candidate will bring a strong understanding of perspective, composition and color theory and have a proven track record in traditional and digital illustration techniques.

Responsibilities:

• Working with the Lead Artist and a team of 3D and 2D artists, design scenes for Hidden Object games
• Work with 3D artists to determine the proper textures and lighting of each scene
• Using Photoshop and other software packages, place objects (up to 90 of ‘em!) in each scene
• Execute a final paint of each scene to maximize visual impact
• Select and prep photo files to create new objects for placement
• Assist with the art direction of outsourced assets as needed
• Accurately estimate the time it takes to complete tasks on time

Required Experience and Skills

• Expert level knowledge of Photoshop (digital painting) and Illustrator
• Strong fundamental skills in use of line, light, shadow, color and perspective
• Ability to work within established art styles
• Excellent communication and team skills
• Must have an upbeat, positive attitude and enjoy working in a team environment
• Ability to modify work based on feedback and critique from fellow Artists, Engineers and Producers
• Eagerness to collaborate with team members to consistently deliver final game assets that meet the established standard
• A good understanding of games, with the ability to identify flaws in design, art, and “feel”

Education/Experience:

• Preference given to candidates with game industry experience, but a strong portfolio may be sufficient.
• High school diploma, or equivalent, required
• Degree in Art and design recommended
• Experience having worked on a variety of platforms (PC, Android, iPhone, iPad, Facebook) is a plus

Modeler - EA Sports

Role Overview:

The design of a character is vital to the overall creation of a game. Character Modelers at EA might work on anything from the cute, cartoony style characters of The Simpsons' or MySims? to the photorealistic character models you see in our EA SPORTS games. Regardless of the style, it's important for all characters in all EA games to be emotionally believable. They must be characters that draw gamers into the action or story of the game. The Character Modeler is responsible for building the geometry of organic and inorganic characters in the game. EA Modelers are skilled in human character modeling of both realistic and stylized figures in Maya/3D Max. Character models are highly complex and detailed in video games with some characters coming close to 500,000 polygons.

What skills does EA look for?

A Character Modeler must have strong organic modeling skills, strong drawing skills (light, form, shadow, color), knowledge of the human anatomy and form, and strong texturing skills (including photographic manipulation, texturing, and color correction. In addition, they must have excellent organizational skills (goal setting, working towards milestones, etc.), as well as strong Maya knowledge, and PhotoShop skills. When reviewing a demo reel a Character Modeler, EA looks for the reel to showcase the artist's ability to create realistic models while also showing a flair for creativity. The reel will include highly detailed and clean texture work.

The reel should showcase the following:

- High quality, character models in low, medium, and high polygon counts

- Ability to create realistic models - Clean texturing skills and an eye for color

- Good use of light and shadow

- Excellent sense of scale and form

- Excellent level of finish drawing skills

- Excellent drawing and/or sculpting of the human form, exhibiting a knowledge of anatomy, proportion, weight, and volume

- Ability to work from reference materials, such as photography or concept art

Bioware Programme

BioWare’s games have continually achieved critical and commercial success. All of our published titles are highly rated at www.gamerankings.com; in fact we have 6 games in the top 1% highest rated games of all time! Today BioWare has over 800 staff at its locations and continues to grow. In 2008, BioWare was acquired by Electronic Arts, a leading global interactive entertainment publisher. In 2011 EA created the BioWare Label, alongside EA Games, EA SPORTS and EA Play. For more information on BioWare, visit www.bioware.com, or follow us on Twitter at www.twitter.com/bioware. To join the millions of fans already registered with the BioWare community, go to http://social.bioware.com.

Technical Artists are the bridge between art and programming departments, having the capability to understand the nuances of art creation and technical code. Being able to demonstrate efficient techniques for creating high quality art and exploring new paths for future pipelines and content. This role in the art department is critical to the success of our titles.

What skills does BioWare look for?

A Technical Artist must have a passion for building new tools, methods and innovative ways to create art.

Their portfolio must demonstrate the following:

• An ability to think, communicate and problem solve in both Art and Programming terms

• Ability to plan, develop and maintain asset pipelines

• Oversee and enforce best practices for art asset creation and implementation, optimizing assets when required

• Strong knowledge of 3DS Max, 3D hardware, Shader, Max Script, MEL and Programming experience

• Experience with animation pipelines, mo-cap, rigging and skinning is a benefit

• Understanding of visual FX, Lighting, Level Building and Character Art techniques

EA Jobs - Reference October 2012 

Task 2

Action Plan

Last year I came into the course with not much knowledge about any digital or traditional art and design background. And after using PhotoShop i decided i would like to get better at digital drawing. Throughout the first year i did a lot of drawings on PhotoShop to improve my skills as well as working to hard to complete units. I am very happy with my grades from my first year, although i would like to improve my grades to get a base a grade boundary of merit. Although i enjoyed drawing in Photoshop, I was always keen to look into 3D modelling. I was looking to go into the industry as a low level 3D artist for a games or film company and work my way up. I happy with my first year and i am looking forward to the second year, especially the 3D aspect.

After the first year i do think that some things need improvement. For example, i think that my weakest blog was my contextual studies blog. Part of the reason that i got a pass was because of the unfinished work and the standard was not as high as my other work. I did enjoy the lessons because i liked diving into creating ideas for a new game, also i thought that it helped me get away form Photoshop so i could try other things that were more conceptual. I need to make sure that i do more self led research at college and at home. Referencing is not something that i do to often. I need to make sure i do reference things to avoid things like copyright and plagiarism. But also for myself so i can remember what i was looking at. Time and time again i forgotten what image i was drawing and cant find it again. However this this year i have already started to improve on this as you can see in this blog in task one. When i do manage to sit at home and do work i get distracted, not by TV or games, but by drawing. I tend to get into a different mindset and convince myself that drawing on Photoshop is a good idea. I would also like to improve my evaluations. One way to do this is I like having a little check list of things to right about. I have no probelem writing about a subject as long as i know what the title of that paragraph would be.So i could make a list like, what was good? What was bad? What to improve ect.

My main aim for this year is to get started on some 3D modelling. I am really looking forward to do the unit of 3DS max. I think that it will help me get to grips with the basics of the programme and then (like last year with Photoshop) i can continue my own personal development in the programme by watching countless tutorials experimenting and practising. Another thing that I really want to start using is Zbrush. I am really interested in this programme as it combines my skills of drawing with a 3D aspect. I really want to be able to use 3DS max to model something, then sculpt it in Zbrush, and then enhance it in Photoshop.

I am hoping to go onto the game design degree next year. I feel that in order to do this i need to achieve the highest possible grades this year and start focusing on my 3D elements of my work. I will also in my own time start using Zbrush to try and learn basics like tools ect, to try and get a head start on things so im not so blind sighted when i enter the degree. I am very confident in myself and my work that i can achieve the necessary grades to get onto the degree and also to succeed in it. I realise that it is going to be hard work but by putting as much effort i can into this year i think that it wont come as much as a shock.


Some of my best work from year one:

Crested Gecko

Hayley Williams

Jennifer Lwarence

Master Chief

Work I would like to achieve this year:

3DS Max Car

Zbrush T-rex 

Task 1

ILM (Industrial light and magic)                          Animator

ILM are computer graphic company. They have worked on very high profile projects such as "Rango" and several of the "Transformer" movies. As you can imagine the jobs that are offered by this company require the highest of skill and determination. One job that I found was an animator job at Lucasarts. Which is part of ILM. 

Requirements:

• Bachelor's Degree or equivalent in Traditional Animation and 3 years experience, or at least 5 years of experience working in cel, stopmotion or computer animation.
• 2+ years as an entry level Animator in conjunction with recommendations for advancement by the Animation Supervisors and Department Manager.
• Expert knowledge of traditional animation principles, acting, film production and compositional design.
• Ability to take on a delegated task with a minimum of supervision.
• Knowledge of Unix and shell scripting; expert knowledge of Maya, proprietary and other software programs.
• Good organization and communication skills.

This is a job at its highest level. It requires expert skill and knowledge of the field of work. This is also considered an entry level job at this company. Senior animators,developers and game designers require even more skill.

September 2012

URL: Industrial Light & Magic Lucasfilm Recruiting


Creative Assembly                                     3D Character Artist

Creative Assembly are the creators of the famous Total War franchise. The games are massive scale RTS games which allow you to control massive armies. One of the most resent instalments in the franchise is Shogun total war. They also have Rome total war 2 on the way son to be released. 

Requirments:

Required:

•Visual flare and talent

•Expert knowledge of Max/Maya or equivalent package

•Expert knowledge of Photoshop

•Knowledge of ZBrush/Mudbox or equivalent

•Knowledge of games development pipeline/environment/engines

•Self-motivated, good communicator, positive can do attitude, team-player

•Love of character modelling

Ideal:

• Proven experience implementing game characters

• Character rigging

• Formal art training

• All round art ability

• Love of games

Characters are the central idea in the game. The game allows you to control cast armies and control huge amounts of men. The game allows you to get right into the action and watch the chaos as two rival armies collide. Therefore the detail and emotion in the characters needs to be at the highest standard.

Programmes like maya and 3DS max would be used alot in this job, nad you would have to have a clear understanding on how these programmes works, as well as be able to model ideas and drawings that other team members may give you.

September 2012

URL: The Creative Assembly » Jobs

Blizzard Entertainment                                Cinematic Concept Artist

Blizzard is the founding comapny of the biggest and most popular MMORGP in the world. World of Warcraft has a massive fan base and even has a yearly show, which they present all there new content and allow the best players in the world to fight in championships. Natualluy, they only employ the best and brightest.

Requirments:

• Experience with Photoshop, Painter, and other 2D art/painting programs

• Experience working in the pre-production aspects of game development and movie-making

• Exceptional understanding of human and creature anatomy

• A keen eye toward form, shape, structure, and silhouette in regard to illustration and design

• Superior eye for light, value, composition, color, staging, and detail in environmental design

• Experience with the creation of design blueprints for sets or environments

• Understanding of Blizzard Entertainment's distinctive visual style, and a passion to push it to the next level

• The ability to carry an idea from conceptual phase to finished illustration

• Unrelenting self-motivation and drive

To understand the level of skill needed to be able to work for such a massive company, you would need to watch a cinematic trailer for one of there games. After that, you can really appreciate the time and effort that they put into their trailers. The concept design for the characters is not only of a good standard, but all ideas are fresh and original. To be able to do this kind of work requires the highest level of intellect and imagination.

September 2012

URL:

Blizzard Entertainment - Cinematic Concept Artist (In-House Contract) - CGHub.com Jobs


Blizzard Entertainment:Community:Blizzard Art