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Alexandra
Student
Newport Beach, California
1
Question
Updated
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What should I do to develop and establish myself as an artist in order to get into the Game Development industry?
I am a rising sophomore in college and I am interested in artistic game development. Do you have any tips on what I should focus on to succeed?
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Jarien Skywall
Technical Art Manager
4
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Boston, Massachusetts
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Jarien’s Answer
There are several different types of art for video games. The primary distinction is 2D or 3D. Depending which path you want to go with, there are different skills you should focus on. But pretty much any artistic discipline requires the same basic foundation.
Foundation art skills to have and techniques to practice are:
Principles/elements of design (depending who lists it, you may see anywhere from 7 to 13 principles/elements)
Staging / camera / composition on the page
Drawing, especially observational drawing (objects) and figure drawing (people)
Color theory
Perspective
Anatomy and proportion
Lighting
Obviously if you want to focus on environment design, for example, it won't be as important to learn anatomy and practice figure drawing. And if you want to create 3D characters, it won't be as important to learn about perspective and and camera composition. But - the very basics of all this stuff is good for any artist to know, so it's good to at least start with all of the above until you get a feel for where you want to focus.
Some examples of 2D game art are:
- Concept art for 3D games: This means coming up with the design for characters, environments, or props and drawing it (often done or at least finished digitally). Then a different person with the role of 3D artist would be responsible for doing the digital equivalent of sculpting and painting your concept.
- 2D animation / in-game assets for 2D games: This could be pixel art sprites, or simple 2D digital illustrations of different frames of an animation.
- Illustrations: This could be stuff like splash art for intro screens or loading screens, marketing art used in posters, etc.
- User Interface art (UI art): This would be stuff like icons and buttons for different objects, health bars and power meters for characters, indicators on a map or instructional overlays for the player, etc.
Some examples of 3D game art are:
- 3D models and textures: As mentioned before, this is like sculpting and painting on a computer. There are sub-discplines within this field - characters, props, or environments.
- 3D animation: This is basically taking a 3D model and making it move, like a puppet. Making a character walk or attack, making the different parts of an attack vehicle move, etc.
- Visual Effects (VFX): This means creating the colorful effects that pop in games usually briefly that indicate things like magic is being used, or a character is getting hit. This also includes realistic effects like smoke, fire, water, gunfire, or explosions.
- Lighting: This is the digital equivalent of setting up stage lighting, with virtual spot lights or light bulbs.
- Technical art: This one is hard to explain because it's hard to understand if you're not already somewhat familiar with 3D art. A technical artist essentially is half engineer/programmer, half artist. They do very technical things that are required in order to make art actually work in a game. The specific tasks of a technical artist can vary depending on the game's needs. For example, a technical artist would create the digital equivalent of a puppet's skeleton and strings in order for a 3D animator to animate a character. A technical artist also might optimize pieces of art to make them run more smoothly in a real-time game. Technical artists need to understand which art tasks or properties of pieces of art are more likely to make a game lag, and how to reduce the amount of computer resources (CPU, GPU, or video memory) that the art uses.
In the United States, it's really not necessary to have a college degree in order to be a video game artist. The most important things are having a good portfolio, being a nice person, and being reliable. But college can help you succeed if you have a hard time staying on task without other people giving you deadlines. Also if you ever want to teach or to work in another country, a college degree can help. It is widely accepted in the game development profession that most college programs that teach video game art do not actually prepare students for entry-level jobs, and are teaching outdated practices. There are various reasons for this, and it's up to each person what choice they make based on various factors in their life. But please know that with a small number of exceptions, if you're taking a college program for video game art, hiring managers don't care about your grades, they care about the quality of your work, and colleges often aren't able to require or even teach the quality standards that are actually needed in the game industry. Compare yourself not just to your fellow students, but to working professionals who have the rank of "junior" or "associate" - that's how good you have to be in order to get an entry-level job.
Finally, here are some helpful links. This stuff could take years to go through, this is just to give you a reference point you can come back to later.
Helpful information about applying to jobs and making a game art portfolio. A lot of this stuff takes a very tough-love tone. Don't let that scare you - as a sophomore you have several more years to practice and improve at art before applying!
https://80.lv/articles/10-insider-tips-for-artists-applying-to-game-studios/
https://twitter.com/JLHGameArt/status/1585326534730006528
Beginner's guide to 3D terminology. This doesn't really explain how to do stuff, it's more a dictionary.
https://blog.flippednormals.com/the-ultimate-3d-dictionary-for-beginners/
Giant list of tutorials, sorted by discipline:
http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Gumroad_Tutorial_List
Here's a wiki with a ton of information about the game industry in general, different art disciplines, and different game art tools and technology.
Good luck! It's a difficult career choice but it's fun and rewarding!
http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Polycount
Foundation art skills to have and techniques to practice are:
Principles/elements of design (depending who lists it, you may see anywhere from 7 to 13 principles/elements)
Staging / camera / composition on the page
Drawing, especially observational drawing (objects) and figure drawing (people)
Color theory
Perspective
Anatomy and proportion
Lighting
Obviously if you want to focus on environment design, for example, it won't be as important to learn anatomy and practice figure drawing. And if you want to create 3D characters, it won't be as important to learn about perspective and and camera composition. But - the very basics of all this stuff is good for any artist to know, so it's good to at least start with all of the above until you get a feel for where you want to focus.
Some examples of 2D game art are:
- Concept art for 3D games: This means coming up with the design for characters, environments, or props and drawing it (often done or at least finished digitally). Then a different person with the role of 3D artist would be responsible for doing the digital equivalent of sculpting and painting your concept.
- 2D animation / in-game assets for 2D games: This could be pixel art sprites, or simple 2D digital illustrations of different frames of an animation.
- Illustrations: This could be stuff like splash art for intro screens or loading screens, marketing art used in posters, etc.
- User Interface art (UI art): This would be stuff like icons and buttons for different objects, health bars and power meters for characters, indicators on a map or instructional overlays for the player, etc.
Some examples of 3D game art are:
- 3D models and textures: As mentioned before, this is like sculpting and painting on a computer. There are sub-discplines within this field - characters, props, or environments.
- 3D animation: This is basically taking a 3D model and making it move, like a puppet. Making a character walk or attack, making the different parts of an attack vehicle move, etc.
- Visual Effects (VFX): This means creating the colorful effects that pop in games usually briefly that indicate things like magic is being used, or a character is getting hit. This also includes realistic effects like smoke, fire, water, gunfire, or explosions.
- Lighting: This is the digital equivalent of setting up stage lighting, with virtual spot lights or light bulbs.
- Technical art: This one is hard to explain because it's hard to understand if you're not already somewhat familiar with 3D art. A technical artist essentially is half engineer/programmer, half artist. They do very technical things that are required in order to make art actually work in a game. The specific tasks of a technical artist can vary depending on the game's needs. For example, a technical artist would create the digital equivalent of a puppet's skeleton and strings in order for a 3D animator to animate a character. A technical artist also might optimize pieces of art to make them run more smoothly in a real-time game. Technical artists need to understand which art tasks or properties of pieces of art are more likely to make a game lag, and how to reduce the amount of computer resources (CPU, GPU, or video memory) that the art uses.
In the United States, it's really not necessary to have a college degree in order to be a video game artist. The most important things are having a good portfolio, being a nice person, and being reliable. But college can help you succeed if you have a hard time staying on task without other people giving you deadlines. Also if you ever want to teach or to work in another country, a college degree can help. It is widely accepted in the game development profession that most college programs that teach video game art do not actually prepare students for entry-level jobs, and are teaching outdated practices. There are various reasons for this, and it's up to each person what choice they make based on various factors in their life. But please know that with a small number of exceptions, if you're taking a college program for video game art, hiring managers don't care about your grades, they care about the quality of your work, and colleges often aren't able to require or even teach the quality standards that are actually needed in the game industry. Compare yourself not just to your fellow students, but to working professionals who have the rank of "junior" or "associate" - that's how good you have to be in order to get an entry-level job.
Finally, here are some helpful links. This stuff could take years to go through, this is just to give you a reference point you can come back to later.
Helpful information about applying to jobs and making a game art portfolio. A lot of this stuff takes a very tough-love tone. Don't let that scare you - as a sophomore you have several more years to practice and improve at art before applying!
https://80.lv/articles/10-insider-tips-for-artists-applying-to-game-studios/
https://twitter.com/JLHGameArt/status/1585326534730006528
Beginner's guide to 3D terminology. This doesn't really explain how to do stuff, it's more a dictionary.
https://blog.flippednormals.com/the-ultimate-3d-dictionary-for-beginners/
Giant list of tutorials, sorted by discipline:
http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Gumroad_Tutorial_List
Here's a wiki with a ton of information about the game industry in general, different art disciplines, and different game art tools and technology.
Good luck! It's a difficult career choice but it's fun and rewarding!
http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Polycount