Griffin Rosnack's GDC Write Up

Post date: Mar 17, 2017 8:17:21 AM

This was my second GDC, and personally this has been a more informative and impacting experience. I was able to use my gained knowledge from last year and approach opportunities and people more effectively.

I arrived late Tuesday but ended up socializing at many of the company sponsored mixers and events around San Francisco. I find these to be immensely helpful in connecting with important and interesting contacts, as well as like-minded students willing to share advice. First I went to the Polycount & Marmoset party. Like last year it was very crowded, but I was able to strike a conversation with several students and a freelancer. I then had the luck to be invited into Tripwire's private party. One word of advice I would most definitely give to all GDC travelers is to not only connect with new individuals, but with your existing friends too. Melvin had a contact with an individual from Tripwire and thus allowed me and several other students exclusive access to a private party. This event was by far the most engaging of the night. There present was the current art director for Killing Floor, as well as the marketing manager, a lead environment artist, president of Tripwire, and many others. I got a lot of in-depth information of the company and what positions the employees had before. Atlanta seems like a very attractive spot for game development and I'm now thoroughly observing the area. The final mixer of the night was the GitHub party, where I reconvened with many Ringling colleagues and made plans for tomorrow's schedule. A very surprising evening with some of the best connections I made on the trip.

Wednesday, I mostly spent the day observing the show floor and observing new technologies. One of the largest presences this year at GDC was Lumberyard, taking up more show floor space than last year. They were more exuberant to showcase specific tools for artists instead of being general. One of the features that caught my eye was for character modification. With Lumberyard, you can very easily attach objects to joints on a character's rig, and then apply one of four different methods of physics. For example, you can easily attach a sword to a pirate's hand, and then have a sword sway smoothly with the character's animation in a strict cone shape. I think this gives great dynamism to character integration and is something to be researched into. Houdini also had great talks, one of which showed power tree integration into developing an open world Ghost Recon game. Certainly a powerful tool I hear on a constant basis that can possibly improve my workflow. The evening was spent at Gnomon School's party. I had a spontaneous portfolio review with a senior environment artist from Square Enix. Although as straightforward and brash as the reception was, I got great pointers as to how I can invite more interest into my models and creating more breakdown sheets for meshes.

Thursday was when most of my portfolio reviews occurred. The first interview was at the Hi-Rez studios booth. There I met the current art director for Paladins and got great critique. One important note he gave me is to find function and reason behind every design choice. As artists, we tend to focus on aesthetic appeal as a means of creating art, but its very important to observe and research how objects are structured and how materials complement the structure. That feedback will help certainly for my future projects. As well as getting more information about internships at Hi-Rez, I then headed to WildCard Studios from a student recommendation. There I got the best reception for my portfolio. The environment artist complemented the dirt and grime I added to my props and only critique given was for more breakdowns for certain assets. Otherwise the employee generally seemed thrilled and wanted me to apply for a position at the company. I am currently in the process of finishing my application. Overall, this year I felt more comfortable with showing companies my work. Being able to spend time on an extended project for school definitely helps you achieve good results for your portfolio, and would recommend lesson plans to be more geared towards longer and detailed objectives.

Friday was a wrap-up day, observing the remaining talks and conversations people were having at the convention. I went with Zaq to learn a professional's technique about the creation of tiled marble flooring and wood flooring in substance designer. One of the most eye opening demos, the individual was able to make all textures and blends solely with Substance's given images and files. As much of a challenge it may seem, the powerful modification nodes laid out by Substance gives you room for a lot of experimentation. The demo was the most eyeopening on a technical scale from the conference, and look forward to utilizing more materials created in Designer. PopcornFX was displayed as a better alternative to Unreal's cascade. Although I would like to see more live implementation, it would be very useful to explore as VFX is still a desired position for many companies. One of the major differences when compared to last year was the absence of long lines. Booths such as Oculus had shorter lines now that VR has become more accessible and there have been more shipped VR titles in the past year. Virtual Reality is still a hot topic for the gaming industry, and while the industry has been trying to revolve around it, we will have to observe how consumers will react to it over the next several years.

Like last year, GDC immensely proved to be an engaging, fun, and informative experience. The biggest learning points from my observations were:

• • Friends help other friends make connections, invite your colleagues to exclusive mixers.

  • Never take tough criticism harshly, make sense of what the interviewer wants you to improve on.

  • Get perspectives from all different kinds of companies, some will see you as a better fit for the company.

  • Invest more time into creating breakdowns for individual assets and models.

  • Spend time at developer talks, try to learn someone's process and see if you can apply it.

  • Show up at GDC with a portfolio you're comfortable with for best possible feedback.