The End?

Well I must say It's been nice at University, but if I'm not destined to go on and gain a degree then so be it...

I can't believe I've done so badly. I thought what I was doing was good enough, but there's always things you miss, like in my 3D work I never knew that you had to name everything you created until just recently.  Having to re-do all my 3D work in 3 weeks is just not at all possible, is it? On top of having to write another 15 or so blogs and do a lot of visual design.

At the moment, I couldn't be more miserable and depressed, I've failed and I know it, everyone keeps telling that you're only human and that 'they' will give you a chance to re-do stuff over summer, but I honestly can't see it happening. They just wasn't enough time to do everything that was asked of me at formative assessment, I passed one part of the course but the other two I just don't see it happening. Only just recently I found out that University is about teaching yourself and I realise what a complete massive idiot I've been all the way through the course asking for help on just about everything, the thing is I never knew that! I honestly didn't know that, and I've always been a slow learner, but in the recent months gone by i've enjoyed it like doing digital paints that I think I've gotten quite good at now? Well I don't think so, I mean I don't ever get any likes or comments of praise on my work.

Like I said before there's no hiding from it, I'm a failure and I know it. I thought I'd have done better but if given a chance to go back, then I'll re-do everything over summer if it takes it. I've messed up and I said to myself in my first blog I'm bottom of the pile out of everyone on the course and how good I am as an Artist and i still am today. It's like I've been relegated, i've been struggling at the bottom end of the class all along throughout the year and now it's time to just face what I had coming to me in the first place.

I wanted to re-do all my projects in 3D but I only found the time to finish just two of them and the other one was about 3/4th of the way done. I was rushing so much that I screwed up the folders on my CD that I handed in, I just wish we had like an extra hour, if I had I could of finalized everything, but there was so little time I just couldn't think. I've never been so stressed in my life and now I'm in a spiraling depression because of it, but it's my fault.
I even screwed the folders up on the disc but it won't let me change it and I forgot to put one of my projects on it. In fact one of my projects is in another project folder. It's been one crazy year and the thing is if I was this bad in industry I wouldn't get a job anywhere, but I've said to myself if I do make it back I'll do nothing but work myself to death as work next year is to final degree so it's very important.

Living on my own away from home and the pressure of all the work really has hit me like a 10 ton of bricks, I've gone about it the wrong way, I have no excuses.

I gave it my best, but if my best isn't good enough then so be it...

Y1 S2 T12 - Personal Review Of The First Year

It’s been an exciting year on the Game Art course. Moving away from home is always a bit nervous but I settled into DMU and the course really well and have enjoyed it. Along the way I found myself doing many different types of work I never imagined myself doing before.

The one thing I was worried about before coming was the fact that I hardly ever used a 3D software package in my life, I had some experience it in from college but not too much and not something as powerful as 3DS Max that’s for sure! In fact I never even heard of 3DS Max before I got here so this was a lot to take in at fist but given the time and effort I have adapted to it quite well. I’m producing work that I never even thought I would before, it was hard but like people said, it’s better to just throw us all in at the deep end in so that we can just learn to adapt to it quicker and then we feel comfortable around it for future tasks. The idea of having tutorials on the internet that we can always comeback to, I thought was a good idea, that helped a lot at first but as I progressed I sort of found myself not needing them as much and using the internet to look into things that were a bit more advanced.

When we first started we looked at one point perspective and I found it somewhat difficult, I think it was the fact that I was looking too much into it at first and it became difficult, but now it’s so easy that I know it like the back of my hand. It’s funny because every time I look down a street or path I’m always looking at where the vanishing point is and the horizon line. When we was doing the architectural project I found it so easy to do, but it’s because that it’s a really blocky shape, but at the same time in visual design we started to draw buildings using two point perspective which I found easy, again because it’s just blocky and easy. I’ve never drawn a piece of Art using perspective before so i thought it would be a bit challenging, but it’s really not, perspective is so simple and I love to draw to one point perspective, it’s kind of become something I’ve become a bit addicted to, but it makes it a lot easier.

I’ve enjoyed how in visual design we’ve got to go out and doing drawings, it’s as if we have a little adventure every week but with a new project at hand, we need more places to go to, I like how in the course we get to re-visit places like Bradgate Park etc and see how the colours change at different times of the year but however I don’t like how we must keep going back to these same places as it appears from what I’ve seen the second and third years do, it would possibly be nice if there was a lot more places to go to, like around the country perhaps. I went on the trip to Liverpool to the Tate museum which was a really nice trip and all but by the time we found a place to sit and draw we had literally 30 minutes and that was all, so had to make it count as much as possible! It was really interesting to go there and see all the work first hand like we saw some of Picasso’s work etc I think arranging more trips to around the country would be nice, I mean we are in the middle of the country so it’s not too difficult to get anywhere!

Over the past 7 months of the course I found myself doing a lot more painting, at first I thought I would do some, but not much as I prefer pencil more, but we’ve been taught in the way that if you take time to plan everything, use perspective and layer colours over each over there’s not a painting you can’t produce. I found myself wanting to buy a graphics tablet and using it to produce digital painting, I must say that in the short time I have been using it I think I’ve adapted to it quite well and next year I would hope to do a lot more. Next year I would like to do a lot more personal work given the time and get use to some more advanced techniques using Photoshop.

I’ve enjoyed the lectures we’ve had, we seemed to have a lot however in the first semester and I really thought about 3 would be enough. They’ve all basically told us the same type of thing in every one, implying what you do in industry and what types of jobs they are out there and what jobs are harder to get. It’s been fun though when they talked about making a good portfolio and told us what is good to see and what isn’t like animals in bikini’s, enough said...

We’ve had lectures like the deadliest Artist that have been fun to watch and I remember when we had one guy that came in from the course in the past and he basically told us not to worry about becoming better etc and that we’re all heading the same direction and he even said to us, that he couldn’t do this and that and his 3D work wasn’t good but now he’s giving professional a run for their money.

It’s been fun watching our films on a Wednesday, and I liked watching them more in the second semester (because there was more). The blog has been my favourite part of the course, next year I would hope to do a bit more personal work again given the time and maybe talk about things in the gaming industry more, like we’ve talked how it’s the fastest growing industry in the world and still growing, it would be nice to talk things like that more but it’s all going to be about working in teams since we have the queen building project coming up soon. But to talk about what’s going to happen in the future of gaming etc, they are really interesting talks that have even sparked up on FaceBook a few times.

Overall I’ve really enjoyed it, we were told to make a final painting to sum up this year and what it’s been about, basically I went along with creating a digital painting of Abbey Park because I took a really good one point perspective shot of on one of the bridges there. It’s my final because it sums up how I have gone from always avoiding paintings because I’m not that good at it, to now producing colour digital paintings that I’m enjoying a lot, there’s no denying I’ve become better and I hope that next year I can become even better, which I’m sure I will. I also think what is a better way to sum up the year than incorporating what we’ve learned back at the very start in week one? Being one point perspective, in colour, digitally done, showing my progression and development of being on the course. If I’ve improved this much in such a short amount of time then next year-just next year...

Game Production & Visual Design Developments

In Game Production this year I’ve been introduced to 3DS Max and however that it may have started out a bit slow for me I’ve really gotten use to it and produced a lot of good work I would say, though it seems no however good you think your work is there’s always someone to criticize it, but it’s a harsh reality.

My work has been a bit sloppy and messy throughout so I have had to come back and address things, at first I thought I’d just produce everything in 3D however I could get it done but after a while you realise that there’s no hiding from having to unwrap assets instead of mapping everything and that the mesh flow must be good and clean that that everything must be named and have the correct sizes! I thought it’s overcomplicating it at first but to be professional you must take the time to do it and not be lazy! I avoided the 3D work as much as I could at first because I thought it was hard to get use to and I’m sure we’ve all been stressed with it at some point but like I say you can’t hide and I have bothered to get myself into gear and do it.

I’ve now tackled my fear of understanding how to unwrap assets and model them efficiently, I have found myself asking for help quite a few times along the way though. Next year I’m not going to ask as much for help unless I really need it, University is about self teaching yourself so I need to do a lot of that, no one else can help, like we’ve been told countless times, this is not school or college and at first I treated it like college, but I’m a slow learner so over time I do eventually understand things! So I’m going to do that especially after basically being told by one of the third years to shut up and just do it, because critique is overrated and makes no difference according to him, being a third year I definitely believe him.

In visual design well what can I say? I’ve gone from doing pencil sketching to now being more confident in drawing much more complicated objects such as cars etc that a year ago I’d have never been able to do! Now I’m drawing all kinds of stuff and why is because perspective and going back to basics of drawing has really helped me a lot! I have a better understanding of colour theory and have become much better as a painter, I mean I can’t just always produce pencil sketches my entire life.

In life drawing I’ve gained a better understanding of the human figure and different forms of it, though I do need to practise it more, I can’t believe however how simple it was just to not look at the page your drawing on and just let your hand follow your eyes, my drawing of the figure have turned out a lot better this way though sometimes it doesn’t seem to work because of rushing things, I need time to plan my drawings and work out that everything is in proportion before I render so I mostly just thumbnail sketch everything because it’s easier and everything looks a lot more accurate! When we only get 20 minutes to produce a rendered sketch just isn’t long enough and I end up going wrong because of the rush, though I think this is something I need to address, GETTING FASTER! I’ve spent so much time doing one drawing after another on Photoshop and I spend way too long on the images I produce, drawing a banana took me 6 hours to do and it still doesn’t look right!

I’m not sure where things are going to go in the next year but I know that over summer I’m going to practise my skills and techniques in 2D and 3D so that I don’t forget nothing and be fully prepared as from now on it gets harder. I understand depth, composition, colour theory, perspective a lot more this year and I would say I’m well on my way to becoming a Game Artist pretty soon, my only worry is my grades but only time will tell.

I guess over the summer I will have to keep practising my skills in 2D and 3D and probably in the meantime it will be good try and download UDK because as I seem to have mastered the basics in 3DS Max we’ve all got to go back and learn the basics of a new program this October! Best get a head start huh?