How to train the best of the best

Here is a job description for a being a concept artist at Bungie Studios.

Concept Artist
Bungie Studios is looking for an exceptional concept artist who will work closely with the Art Director and Art Leads to establish a style and feel for the environments, characters and objects for exciting new Bungie titles. You will also work closely with the production art team to help them envision what the finished results can be for the in-game content they are creating. As the ideal candidate, you should amaze us with creative designs and artwork and have the capability to inspire greatness in those around you.


Essential Functions

· Collaborate closely with the Art Director and other concept artists to produce quality. designs that define and expand the look of the game.
· Create concept art for primary and secondary characters, objects and environments.
· Create thumbnails, sketches, model sheets and production paintings within deadline.
· Ensure that Concept art is consistent with defined visual style for the game.
· Contribute original visual design ideas throughout pre-production and production.
· Create additional illustrated concepts for marketing and PR needs.

Desired Qualifications

· Strong understanding of character proportion and costume design.
· Ability to quickly iterate concepts given input from the art director.
· Professional attitude and an ability to take constructive criticism.
· An exceptional understanding of mood, lighting and architecture with a keen eye towards form, shape, structure, and silhouette in regards to illustration and design.
· Superior eye for light, value, composition, color, staging and detail in environmental design. · Strong foundation in the traditional arts, including, but not limited to, figure drawing, landscape painting, and illustration.
· The ability to carry an idea from the conceptual phase to the finished illustration and an understanding of translating these ideas to real-time game content.
· Self-driven, good communicator and a great team-player.
· A passion for games.
· Experience with Photoshop, Painter. 3D software knowledge not an absolute requirement.
· AA/BFA preferred, or at least demonstrates through portfolio an industry standard level of art.


This is a top games company, so understandably, they can have high standards. How do you ready someone to be able to get a job like this over three years of teaching them? Here is a job description for Rockstar North, based in Scotland:


Environment Artists

We'd like to hear from the industry's most talented environment artists.You will be designing, building and texturing the world, have the technical knowledge to achieve great looking results and the skill to get the most from next-gen consoles.Advanced skills in one or more of the standard industry 3D packages essential. Knowledge of 3DS Max an advantage.


Both of these job descriptions stress the need for technical experience. The Bungie job description says that 3D software knowledge is not an absolute requirement. So if you’re an outstanding artist and can digitally paint you can get a job with them. This is the same for some other companies too. So why then, on this course are we being taught 3d software skills. I think I can answer that. The purpose of this course is to get you the skills needed to get into the industry. In the current climate, you have to be a fucking good artist to land yourself a job as a concept artist at a top end company. Giving students the ability to do everything makes them a valuable asset. Games companies are chucking people out or breaking up all over the place at the moment. So having fewer employees that can do everything is better than having more employees that are limited to certain fields. Putting together a course that will produce industry standard applicants is hard work. I think what is essential on any course, is to give the students the basic knowledge of everything. Then when they have that knowledge they know where to go from there, and then it’s really up to them how hard they work to build on those skills. Giving students a good understanding of liberal arts puts them at an advantage when they come to learning how to make thinks in the software. Giving students tonnes of experience in Photoshop and max means that yes, they will make things that work. But will they make things that are good without the strong base in understanding life drawing or landscape painting or they ability to understand shape and form for example. I see how it would be hard to put together a course that produces talented people, but it is my opinion that emphasis should be focused on training students in traditional and basic art skills. Students should be taught and shown how how to do technical things, yes, but only enough for them to be able to develop those ‘’technical’’ skills in their own time. Putting it even more simply, chuck a whole load of knowledge at them, give them the resources to utilise and see where they go but focus on the traditional side when teaching.