2013 Darren Geers: Concept Artist

Industry Perspectives

Darren says you will have to do a lot of freelance work before you are able to get into the industry. It is very competitive and social networking sites are important way to get known. You will need a dedicated focused website specifically for concept art. This is a hard road ahead, but if you are dedicated and your work is more excellent then what is professional and work late hours and all your family think you are a little crazy you may make it.

SKETCHES:

Darren's Sketches are what got his first AAA game. They are gestures in action poses. The characters had a lot of costume design, they were doing something instead of straight up studies. They move through the action that the character will perform in the game.

Studios like Valve look for that type of drawing

• Understanding of Anatomy.
• Line that moves through the form and is not just an outline
• Create a Move Set - Characters in the poses of one move (4-5 poses)
• Need drawings, they will look at traditional drawings and Figure Drawings (This drawing counts)
• Multiple styles are what the studios want Show that in your portfolio

THe game industry:

WORKING INDIE VS WORKING AT A BIG STUDIO:

Studios have very different ways of working

Indie:

Pros: Intellectual property is yours - you have full creative control

Marketing through a publisher like Xbox live arcade, Steam Greenlight, mobile apps

You get decide when the game is finished

Stick to a schedule if you are releasing the game

Cons: No money in indie games, Very Competitive Market, Highly critical peers

Have to do a side job, High risk, long hours, Self Funded, Stressful working

Studio Examples:

Braid, Super Meatboy, Fez, Minecraft

Watch Indiegame the movie

Gaia online flash based game online

Notch was the lead programmer for Mine Craft

Look up the history of minecraft

What sells this game: Control that the player has is, You build a story line and give a sense of discovery

Building it for every age level made it more accessible

LARGER STUDIOS: Zynga, EA, Ubisoft, Valve, Blizzard, Behesda, etc

pros: - Money! Stability and security (most of the time) Notoriety, working with large creative teams with similar goals and interests, location and job perks (paintball, movies, food) AAA game titles (AAA = highest quality i.e. quality, broad market, high sales, tema, big budget, polished production quality, bug free, first place in marktets with great marketing and hype. ) Access to the latest and greatest.

cons - Corporate, You're a number in the larger scheme of things, very little creative control of the game itself. Long work hours, location (Coasts).

Valve Studio Tour:

Behesda Game Studios Tour:

EA Redwood Studio Tour:

How darren got his start

• Darren got started in the industry as a digital illustrator doing book covers, character commissions then got into browser based MMO's (Brunelleschi, Furzies, Loraon) creating Indie Game art assets.
• Darren interned with a company Brunelleschi Facebook architect game failed due to lack of player base
• They communicated over Weekly Skype meting updates from email. He did very little finished work - and submitted quick sketches.

Darren is currently working on

• Science fiction Intellectual Property for Studiovania.
  • Dave helverson his boss at Studiovania, he started Game fan magazine in 1992
  • Darren sketches in photoshop with tablet - Line work only
  • Character orthoscopic views in 2d
  • Character Movements are determined in 2d
• He is also freelancing on a project that Noah Bradley is doing the Environments for Ferus, a John P. Thomas Game in Development

making it in concept art

• In Concept art there are 1000s of people to compete against
• Most of them fail.
• How can you succeed?
  • Go to conventions promote your work
  • Draw constantly
  • Super meat boy - has a great dialogue about starting in the industry

THE future of the concept art industry

• Casual games are making all the money now
• Competitive games have a big learning curve because it takes so long to master for the audience.
• Xenga grew to its size by either buying direct competition or copying the competitions games.
• Character artist needs to be able to 3d model Draw and do 2d art
• Character Art is moving towards 3d
• Another Kendall Alum- Jason Heuser works at Kicksi, In San Francisco
• Doing promotional work for the mobile game industry
• It's not just about networking any more , you have got to be really good too.
• A Concept artist can make 50-70k$ per year in house
• You can do a lot of online communication with clients - Darren did Meetings via Skype With Pezus games
• Being a Concept Artist is 60-70 hour work week

you can find work in these sites

• Kickstarter or indi go go are places to find funding for self published jobs
• Book covers is a growing industry with all of the self publishers
• Get the Royalties only of it will be printing, otherwise you will not get enough money - Get the money up front
• Deviant art jobs forum You have to set the rules for them
• DAJobs
• Esign is an adobe site
• Echo sign signed contract site
• Use Paypal for payment options
• Freelancer.com
• Behance
• LinkedIn

software used in the industry and asked for in portfolios

• Photoshop
• Flash
• Painter
• Illustrator
• AfterEffects
• 3DSmax - industry standard for film
• Maya
• zbrush/mudbox
• Blender
• Unity
• Voxel
• etc, etc
• Weebly site is free as a portfolio site

DEMO

Darren Geers did a demo in our Imaging for Game, Animation and Film Class on creating a Character sketch, here are his techniques:

• Size 4 brush
• Flip the drawing - Command f set to flip image
• Use arrows to move through the brushes

Vimeo Interview: http://vimeo.com/57175235