[Lord_Zimboomboom]

Hi everyone,
This is my first post here, and I've gotta say, great UBB, all you guys are really helpfull. You rock the party that rocks the party.

I'm working away at the moment towards getting a job in the games industry. And slowly getting together a body of work. I'm mainly interested in designing, builing, texturing and animating low poly characters.

So my first question is what, what do employeers REALLY wanna see?

I've been sketching of a concept for a charcter, drawing character boards, building them low poly in max, texturing and then animating with biped for walk cycles etc. But what need to know is - What sort of polycounts should I be looking at 500? - 1000? 3000? And how many textures for a model? 1 x 512x512? 1x512x512 + 1x256x256?

My other question is, I was going to make high poly versions of these same characters, textured and animated that would be used in cutscenes (ie polycount and texture size goes out the window), is this a waste of time? Should I be concentrating on maybe making one or two of these to show I can do high poly and devote more time to low poly?

Any help would be really appreciated!!
(Please don't flame me if you think this doesn't belong here,remember, I'm only a newbie!)

Cheers,
Peter.

P.S.
I can't seem to find many websites of good lowpoly modellers/texture artists, anyone know of any?
P.P.S. My site is also on its way soon.

[Brain]

Hello happy QANTM user @:-)

What you're doing is just what employers want to see. Initial design of the character, refinement, modelling, texturing and animating. This shows that you can take a character from start to finish all by yourself, which is darn faboo.

Regarding polycounts, it's best to vary. Show an impressive model that's only 500 polys to double the "Wow!" factor; show a grande 1000 poly model that you frequently use in Quake 3; show that 10000 poly Antonio Bandarez model, etc etc. Same with texture maps. Show that you can texture an entire model with one map with little wasted space, then a model with 3 texture maps that look just as brilliant. Prolly don't max 512x512 for game model textures, though 1024x1024 could be rightly acceptable.

If you display a wide range of skills in various polycounts/texture sizes, you'll be tastier to any employer.

[Tendril]

Heya, all these brisy ppl...
Are you doing the games course
Zimboomboom?
Brain: Hows it going for you? Have you graduated yet?

I dont know if im the best person to be giving advise seeing as i dont actually have a job.. But it seems not to matter how many polys, or how big ure textures are. Games companies will recognise if your talented no matter what you give them...
So yeah, do a variety of stuff.
Hope that helps...

[Jason Manley]

here are a few things that I like to see in portfolio submissions...any number of these things will help. You don' necessarily need it all but you do need some of these things.

ONLY INCLUDE YOUR VERY BEST WORK.

read that again...only include your best work!!!

1 figure work (1 page gestures, 1 page short term drawings, and 1 page finished LONG term drawings)

2 sketchbooks...sketchbooks with anything you enjoy drawing and or painting..inside...a nice full sketchbook of quality stuff...mmmm yummmy.

3 nicely finished (have the ideas worked out) character, vehicle, level, well developed archetecture, monster, and other concepts. you want to show that you can DEVELOP ideas...different versions of items or whatever can be cool too. I need to be able to tell what it is just by looking at it. if I look at a concept of a watermelon juicing cannon blaster and on first impulse I think it is an airplane with big sunflower seeds on it..then that doesnt work...heheh

4 models...low poly - high poly a nice concept behind them helps..but a good model is always appreciated.

5 animations...stance fidgets...deaths...get ups...runs...walks....anything...little effects are cool too as we often need people to do spells and other visual goodies. nicely done cinematic sequences are wonderful too.

6. textures...good color...great surfaces...a few of these can help to cement you into a position. (personally...textures made only with photos "unless they are awesome" dont really do it) I like to see good use of color in textures...not monochromatic. a different company may want more cartoony textures...it just depends.

7 landscapes and other drawings from life (this shows observational skills...you will be using these skills every day)

8 finished illustrations...good compositions.

9 fine art stuff...your personal work.

10 anything cool that you made...even sculptures. we hired a guy last year who had a portfolio of awesome sculptures. they were so good that we just knew he could be a help..and also inspire others around here...anything you do that is artsy.


what you submit depends on the position...you do not necessarily have to submit stuff showing you can do everything. Do not show stuff that weakens your portfolio. you will be judged more often on your failures in the portfolio than on the successes. I have often heard the words "wow..i really like that model..but did you see that ugly page of concepts"...or that kind of thing...if it aint good...it aint worth showing.

you want to WOW your prospective employer.

keep it simple...6-10 pieces are usually enuff to get your foot in the door...and about 1-3 minutes of an animation demo can get you in as well...

and finally...be prepared to show more work...use your first portfolio to show your strengths...if you need anything else after that then you will have some things around to show.

best of luck

jason manley
concept arteest
black isle studios

[FireFry]

Now this is the thread I've been waiting for Thank you Jason, I'll be keeping notes of what you just said

[roundeye]

the great agent44 kindly made me this when i asked him the same question. i hope he dosent mind me sharing this...
its pretty big, but i found it helpful
http://204.225.71.133/~ben/portfolio.jpg