Portfolio advice, from a lead who hires Concept Artists
(This was originally a twitter thread I wrote before the site self imolated, hense it's strange structure.)
I wrote this after a weekend of portfolio reviews -
1. Like a maths exam, please please show your working. I want to see thumbs options, mid options and of course a final design.
2. Arrange your portfolio, I don't want to bounce about between subject matter and pipeline. Your portfolio's narrative should be as strong as your work...
3. Please make worlds that excite the viewer, make them want to go in and explore them, explain to them the interesting parts of the town, or the way the character's hat unfolds. How will this draw the viewer in?
4. As I've said before the majority of your project work is explanatory not mood, make sure your portfolio contains explanatory work. Explained here -
5. A lot of beautiful post apocolyptic paintings, , but 80% of realistic games and film, we just give the environment artists photo ref, they are capable artists in their own right. Different work in stylised where you do need to create rules for how things can be translated.
6. Production art contains call out sheets, material references and flat graphics. This doesn't have to be your final image, but it should support it.
7. Design characters on a swatch(es) of the environment they will be viewed in. Not on white. I make swatch backgrounds from screenshots, it avoids assumptions that damage readability.
8. Reverse of this, put people in your environments, show me the scale.
9. It's not a deal breaker for a review, but if you intend to get a job, please show me your work on a screen larger than a smartphone (print outs probably the cheapest option with the best battery life).
10. Please have your contact details clearly visible, and by that I mean email address, I will not pass your social media contact on, I cannot input your form into my tracking system. EMAIL ADDRESS emblazoned and bake it in, sometimes recruiters do funky stuff to pdfs
11. Your portfolio will never feel done, not to you anyway. You will have learnt from your latest pieces and want to apply it to older work. But we know art is a journey. Send your portfolio anyway. I've been in the industry 10+ years and my portfolio is still not 'finished'.
12. If you are applying to an environment centric Concept Art position then please vary your times of day! Golden hour is cool but show me some happy sunny days, looming overcast days, what about at night? Vary your weather too! Sunny snowy day? Rainy Spring day? Stormy night?
13. If you are applying for a character centric Concept Art role then please ensure your portfolio shows a variety of body types and ethnicities.
14. Designing characters for games?
Please show back views and feet (!) Many potfolios contain only front views.
This is a problem because:
You haven't shown you are considering the design from all angles.
In many games rear view is the main view.
Stop cropping feet.
15. If you are entry / graduating and looking at Portfolios to compare content and standard of yr own work too, look at hired grad/junior artists as opposed to seniors Seniors and leads often have old or personal work in their portfolio which isnt representative of the day job.
16a. Show clearly the intended use case for your Concept Art. Mention the game type in the description. Are these player character designs for a 3rd person adventure game? Then more back views please. Bonus points for diagetic ways of showing health / equipment / role etc.
16b. Are these designs for an FPS? Then really the player view of the gun needs to sell the player style/ choices, in an FPS your weapons are almost your character. Are these world designs? What's the view distance? For an RTS your shapes need to read from above & a distance.
16c. The lack of clarification means I am judging the design in isolation, which both harms the design (you might be considering the backview of a char as the main adventure character.) Or an NPC, their waist up expressions may be important for conveying exposition and mechanics.
16d. Concept art is not separate from gameplay, great concept art serves the game team before it is a good illustration.
17. Play games. A variety of games. Think about them. IMO to be a good concept artist you need to understand the common language & references used by your peers. Also understand the principles and common language your audience are used to. FPS design rules are v.diff from RTS.
18. There are many skills that are needed in concept art, please show them. For example: Graphic design - logos, liveries, typographic use etc. VFX concepts - Abilities, Ambience, motion concepts. Architectural knowledge - How buildings are built! & more but I'm out of space :O
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Happy 2 Year Anniversary to The Chara Timeline ✨
I FINALLY made drawing references for you guys, yippie!✨
It’s wild how long I’ve been working on this comic without reference sheets. I’m never that consistent with my art style, so I figured it was a waste of time 🫥💀😔 this is my first full comic okay…
Thoughts and Feelings About the Comic Below ❤️💖💕💞
Wow. It’s been 2 years??? I thought I would be done with this comic in 2 months! I don’t know whether to feel worried or accomplished!!
(With months between each update, I understand why it’s been 2 years. I’m a slow writer and artist and well- many things have come up in my life that had to come first, like my sisters wedding! 💞 and college 😅)
I want to thank my family and friends (WHO DO NOT READ THIS COMIC- THANK GOD) 💕 AND I want to THANK YOU! The readers! 💐💐
You guys are relentless! I’m as impatient as traffic and yet you guys wait for weeks or months at a time for like 4 pages?! You guys don’t even complain!!! I truly want to thank you all for that ❤️ it helps me so much. Being busy and getting burnt out are common and it helps me feel relaxed that i'm not on a timer. Literally tho- you guys keep this comic chugging I swear. Tysm 💐
Unorganized rambling about the comic ahead :) ⭐️🔥
—
My feelings with this comic are actually so complicated. On one hand I hate looking at my older art because GOD IT LOOKS SO OFF I want to stab it, and then on the other hand I am so so proud of myself for even continuing it this far. Ngl the weird route has been one of my favorite parts of this comic. It took me FOREVER to figure out an ending, but damn do I still get chills >:) hehe.
I’m still miffed that I named this project “Deltarune: The Chara Timeline” I could have gone for something so much COOLER. Doesn’t help I use like 7 different titles for it either. We got Deltarune the Chara timeline, Deltarune chara timeline, THE Chara timeline, chara timeline, Ct??? Man,,, I’m crazy. I take after my family so hard. We have 3 names for each of our dogs 💀.
Comic/Animation Tip i have learned. It is VERY GOOD to make the character relatively simple in design. Shape language is also super important, ((but I never really got around to doing that before I was half way through the comic, woops.)) These things can make ur process go by so much faster. This whole comic has been a HUGE learning curve. LIKE OH MY GOD. I had to learn how to draw backgrounds, write dialogue, plan a story, learn how to draw fast and draw noses (which god damn I really still can’t). And I had to learn how the heck to squeeze art into a tiny page and make it not look grainy. It's intense!
Anyways.... this has been such an awesome opportunity! Thanks Toby Fox!
I totally ran out of “art time” for my iPad and wanted to finish this today. So it’s a bit rushed. I’ll add weapons and possibly the other characters later :)
Oh shi- I forgot to add this grainy image of the next few pages lmao
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SWEET TOOTH SET
Oh my gosh, I am so excited about this new set and finally releasing it!
I seriously can't get enough of these pieces - they're just so cute! Every little detail is lovely, from the bow in the hair to the hearts on the nails.
AS IT’S TOO MUCH TEXT, I’LL LEAVE THE DESCRIPTION OF EACH ITEM PLUS THE CREATOR’S NOTES BELOW THE CUT.
ALL ITEMS ARE:
TEEN TO ELDER
BASE GAME COMPATIBLE
MADE FOR FEMALE FRAME
DISALLOWED FOR RANDOM
360º GIF & THUMBNAILS (HOSTED IN IMGUR)
MY SITE (NO AD.FLY): BONBON HAIR | APPLE PIE NAILS (TWO VERSIONS) | BISCUITS EARRINGS | CHERRY TART DRESS (TWO VERSIONS)
Free release on 17th October 2023
PATREON EARLY ACCESS + MERGED OPTIONS
TERMS OF USE | SEND YOUR FEEDBACK | REPORT AN ISSUE
Thanks to all the cc creators that I used in the pic. And thanks to @maxismatchccworld, @simblrcollective, @s4library, @wewantmods, and everybody who reblog this post!
If you’re a cc finds and want to be tagged when I post, please, let me know. You can send me an ask or in DM.
With your help, more people can know about my work! 💖 Love you all, XOXO 💖
DESCRIPTION OF EACH ITEM:
BONBON HAIR
HAT GAME INCOMPATIBLE
6.476 POLYGONS
119 SWATCH COLORS
- 24 plain colors from EA Color Palette
- 95 plain colors from my Candy Color Palette
YOU WILL FIND IN LONG HAIR OR/AND STRAIGHT OR/AND UPDO
APPLE PIE NAILS (TWO VERSIONS)
Same colors description for both versions.
1.320 POLYGONS
113 SWATCH COLORS
- 55 plain colors
- 58 color combinations
YOU WILL FIND IN ACCESSORIES/FINGERNAILS
BISCUITS EARRINGS
360 POLYGONS
10 SWATCH COLORS
- All plain colors
YOU WILL FIND IN ACCESSORIES/EARRINGS
CHERRY TART DRESS (TWO VERSIONS)
Same colors description for both versions.
5.446 POLYGONS
55 SWATCH COLORS
- All plain colors
YOU WILL FIND IN FULL BODY/SHORT DRESS
CREATOR’S NOTES:
Let's start with my favorite item of the set, Bonbon Hair. It's the cutest hair I've ever created, and I'm really proud of it.
The bow is adorable, and I was finally able to make a great 3D model of it. I'm really happy with how the hair looks - it's exactly what I had in mind. I hope you love it too!
One thing to note is that the bow on Bonbon Hair isn't removable and won't work with hats.
Usually, I prefer hairstyles that can be worn with hats, but for this one, I needed more space for the bow's texture. I also drew the bow's shadow onto the hair's texture to give it more depth and a better overall look.
I also made sure to keep the polycount low - around 6k polygons.
I could have made it lower, but it didn't look as good in movement. So, I kept it at a higher polycount to maintain good movement without too much distortion.
I designed the dress to complement the hairstyle, adding a bow at the back for an extra touch of charm and romance. I used a new mesh from the latest kit that I couldn't wait to franken-meshing with it.
My goal was to create a vintage silhouette and style, and while I'm not sure if it was successful, I'm very happy with the final result. At the end of the day, it looks cute, and that's all that really matters.
The nails are a kind of old wip that I finally decided to finish.
It's one of the cutest designs I've ever come across, and I was determined to recreate it in The Sims. I love a stiletto design, and for me, one of the best nail art is this one; it matches the nail's format and is so cute.
The nail includes two color options but only one spec option.
However, I plan to create additional versions in the future, including a glossy and matte finish, possibly as part of a mini set that I'm working on that will have this and other versions of some of my recent clothing designs.
Next up, we have the Biscuits Earrings. These were originally a work in progress meant for a different set, but while I was styling the Sims, I realized how well they matched with the current Sweet Tooth Set. So, I quickly finished them up and included them as part of the set.
By now, it's all. Unfortunately, I've been working very slowly lately; thanks to this heat wave, I feel most of the day like I'm melting. It's scorching in here, guys. I don't understand how a person can say global warming is a lie; really, how?!
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