Key Advice from the Creative Assembley

Not a lot was on offer career-wise at the eurogamer expo however I managed to get a sit down and portfolio discussion with creative assembley's lead artist Kevin Mc Dowell for some invaluable critique and advice. This face to face chat was something rare from a job-seeking games graduate perspective so I thought I would share it with the rest of you budding artists and it was a bit of a wake up, shake up call for me.

The creative assembly team were responsible for one of my favourite games series the 'Total War' franchise, and are currently hiring people to work on a new alien IP, so i was excited to get chatting with their lead artist and also pretty nervous.

He had looked through my portfolio as I had looked on anxiously, awaiting some sort of response.

However it was not the response I had wanted but more so one I needed to hear, Overall he did not like it.

There was too much contrast, over saturated, the quality of work was mixed and the presentation was messy.

The content was too weird he explained, too much emphasis on lovecraft type creatures and the attempt at graphic design was poor.

With the mining over now came the gems of invaluable advice.

He told me to use more reference, he could tell from some pieces that were excellent that reference was used and to keep doing that, avoid having too much going on and with graphics keep it simple.

With some pieces the advice was developed more...

This bit was described as 'f**ckn awesome' noted use of reference 'this is your goal, do this!'

These parts were pretty good, not too bad could use more reference material

These parts are not of high quality and bring the piece down as a whole, no visible evidence of reference

Bad Graphics, Always used Vector based software although i get what you were going for

Overall this experienced advice was very welcome it was a little bit hard to hear but I had to admit it was spot on, I had actual thought this about my work and yet didn't address these issues. I also took note that he had seen the effort and the ability in my work but that I was just working in the wrong areas.

So what now, well i kept those notes, scrutinised my portfolio later that evening and decided it was time to go back to the drawing board. Right now I am going over websites, artist videos, magazine tutorials and seeing just what kind of portfolio I really need and what kind of hard work needs to be done. I had questioned my goals and questioned the logic of my pursuit and have come out of that more organised and determined. I have also developed a great desire for game industry advice and guidance towards my beginnings in it and I would advice any students/graduates to pursue and use such information well.

My portfolio remains somewhat unchanged but since this wake up call too weeks ago, a better and improved portfolio is currently underway. Developments and the finished reel will be sent here first so watch this space.

I will also progress my findings toward industry advice an potential information interviews in the future to aid any other graduates and students, competition will only lift our work to new heights.