Advice for aspiring character artist?
polycounter lvl 4
Hello fellow polycounters!
I'm in the last two months of getting my degree in Game Art and I want to prepare one or two character portfolio pieces. Do any of you have advice on what makes an effective character artist portfolio piece? I want to be able to show I can do both realistic and stylized, but beyond that I am at a loss.
I'm in the last two months of getting my degree in Game Art and I want to prepare one or two character portfolio pieces. Do any of you have advice on what makes an effective character artist portfolio piece? I want to be able to show I can do both realistic and stylized, but beyond that I am at a loss.
Replies
Not to come off a bit offensive, but shouldn't this have been in issue maybe in the second year or mid way through the art program. I know art schools don't always deliver, but also there needs to be some out of the box effort from the student.
To answer your questions, not a character artist here but a universal advice would be to pick your target audience or studio. Is it Blizzard style art or realistic, pick want you enjoy and produce a high quality finish product. Don't forget breakdowns and posing the character.
Maybe others more inform in the area can help
Character art roles are few and far between, many aspiring character artists settle for environment roles as their first position to gain experience (I'm not downplaying environment art here, it's just the fact there are a lot more positions), so maybe consider some probs and weapons to help bulk out your portfolio a bit.
Once again, like optinium said, keep your skillset broad enough to fill a character support role as well as a specialized character artist role. Knowing how to rig is nearly a must these days it seems as well as a character artist, I recommend studying character tech art skills in your spare time when not working on portfolio pieces. This includes shader stuffs, rigging, effects, etc, anything that can help bring your work to a new level but never lose sight of that goal. Get a good set of SOLID characters and props first and foremost.
As secretpro said, you probably should have the beginnings of a entry level portfolio already in the works at this point.
Just a thought.
Optinium, I have recently been told about 4 core pieces (showing off anatomy, cloth folds, hard surface, and fantasy anatomy) are pretty standard. Would you agree? Thats a good tip about hard surface props and weapons, I should add at least one for each character?
^^ this. Make something that you like in the style that you like, it will show through in the finished product if you really enjoy what you are making. Hitting a checlist of things takes the fun out of it.
In one of his online lectures Hai Phan mentions that it is a lot better for a beginning character artist to model from someone elses concept rather than design your own, and I agree with this viewpoint. It takes a long time to be a pro character concept artist, for now you should just focus on the modelling side and build your design skills over time.
Short story shorter: Find a franchise that you like, dig out some of the concept art and make something
A very full portfolio of hyper realistic characters is the 'easiest' way to land a job in the industry.
Its the easiest way to demonstrate fundamental knowledge (Anatomy, wrinkles, surfacing, ... etc) and there's generally a WAY higher demand for it.
Something I often get my students to do, is off the top of their heads... name all the fantasy studios in North America...
Then name all the studios that make military, period piece games, sports games, etc etc.
For every Blizzard/Bethesds/Bioware game that's made, there's 10x more Tiger Woods, NHL, NBA, Madden, type games.