[jHof]

Kinda new here, I've been posting some feed back already. My names Jeff and I'm just excited to have found such a wonderful forum like this. Very inspiring(Spell check?) Awsome to see some of the names of art work who I have seen before in publications and games show up here.

I plan on doing Concept Design for computer game companys. But I've been confused as to what I need to take as far as classes at college. I've been accepted at Savannah College of Art and Design in Georgia. There Design classes seem more like a "Commercial Design" class. I'm not one for all the strait lines, ya know? I know I'll be doing them, but Commercial Design is not for me I think.

Is Concept design more of what you learn in all your classes after you get some other major? Hope some of you Alumni out there can answer this for me. Thanks for any time you give me.

Nice to meet you all

[eclipse]

From what I've read of bios on concept artists a lot graduated with a degree in Industrial Design. From what I gather it's a lot of hands on modelling and creature effects stuff (depending on what school you go to I guess). But it all begins with those concept sketches.

[shardik]

most of the ppl ive seen as concept designers have an industrial design masters and some other field such as painting, computer graphics, or animation
you might wanna try Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, i know some people on here went there.

[TJFrame]

As an Art Center Grad, I can probably help out on the question of Industrial Design (at least at Art Center)

At Art Center, IndustriaL Design (ID) encompasses Car Design, Product Design, and Environmental Design. Each major focuses on things specific to its own, but there can be a lot of cross-over between majors. Whereas Illustration majors focus more on free-form painting and figure drawing as well as more experimental techniques. ID teaches you to design new things and then present and explain them to the world via sketches, renderings, and physical and computer models. The classes are a bit more geared to learning how to indicate various materials with markers and paint, how to design physical things that look good and hopefully are ergonmic. You get good at drawing things out of your head without photo reference and making sure your skecthes are accurate as far as perspective and proportions go.

It can be very tedious, and early on you spend countless hours going over the fundamentals of things like how to shade and render primitve shapes and their shadows. An entire 14 week class is spent just on perspective (and that's 5 to 6 hours per class!) Believe me when you are done you will know everything there is to freakin know about perspective including such estoteric things like the infamous "Trammel Method".

Anyway, another big part of ID at Art Center is model making. Youlearn to use model making tools and model and paint stuff like foam, clay, and super sculpy. These can be used to make models of cars, products, or creature maquettes. You will also take a lot of 3D classes and learn to model and animate using Maya or Softimage.

After about a year and a half of learning basic things general to all ID, you begin to branch off into your major. Since I wanted to focus on Entertainment Design, I ended up choosing classes and products geared to that. We have a series of classes called, obviuously enough, "Entertainment Design" In which you have sponsored projects from film companies and stuff. As an example, one term(semester) Universal sponsored us and we each had to pick a universal movie and design a theme park ride based on that movie. We presented our stuff to some of the big wigs at Universal's creative department at the end of the term. It was a lot of fun and we got to meet important contacts at Universal.

You can also take classes outside your major such as figure drawing and oil painting, film classes and storyboarding etc.

The only downside to Art Center is that its super expensive. Expect to spend 10 to 12 grand per semester just on tuition and supplies. Oh, and by the way, there are 3 semesters per year sicne you go year around - that averages to about 80 to 95 thousand for a full 8 term degree! I had scholarships, but its still expensive!


Hope this helps.

-TJ

[Vortx]

To add to TJ's comments about Art Center -

If you're tight on cash or not sure if ID is what you wanna do, then you might consider taking some night classes. Our school offers tons of classes, covering every subject. These classes usually run from 7pm-10pm on weekdays, and some full days on weekends, and range from $600-$1000 per term. There are tons of advantages to night classes. First of all, you are usually taught by the same teachers the full time students have (especially in the ID courses). Secondly, if you do good work, then you can use it for your entrance portfolio. Art Center, unlike most art schools, REQUIRES an entrance portfolio to enter.

But if you are serious about working as a professional concept artist, then you need to shell out the cash for a solid education as a fulltime student. Art Center will definitely give you the right training (if you are delicated), and it'll payoff after you graduate.

Man, i'm sounding like a salesman for art center =) Heheh. Well, time to get back to drawing. TJ, you are totally inspiring me...this happens everytime you show me new drawings. Good thing Ryan isn't posting his stuff here...heheh. I'll be free this weekend for sure...so i'll email you tomorrow. Time to watch Connan and draw...hehe...i'm lame...

-feng

[TJFrame]

Uh.. Feng, correct me if I'm wrong but YOU didn't graduate!


PS:
I'm working right now on a redesign of the 1950s film THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL. I'll post some stuff when I get it ready. later Feng

-TJ

[freddy flicks stones]

And to add to thst, there is another school in Sherman Oaks known as the associates in art. They focus on entertainment art, mostly in the animation respect, but they also have very well developed story telling classes, concept classes, and so on, they have a web site. Go to metacrawler and type in Associates in Art. I can't remember the URL. I taught there for a little bit. Just too far to drive three times a week cause I live in San Diego, and that is about 2 hours without traffic, fou to five with traffic. Driving badddd.....Cal Arts also serves up a few good concept classes, but only a few. As for the mid west and East coast, I am not too certain what to say as far as entertainment concepting goes. I know Michigan has a great Industrial Design school, and so does Toronto, but that's all I can say for back there...good luck finding classes...

[Vortx]

Heheh. But i got a good offer...remember? you were there (at joe's)....you told me i should take it and come back to school later...hehe. Right now, i like what i'm doing...and the money is good....so i'll stay here for a while.
Sometimes i wanna go back, just to pick up some inside drawing tips. O well, maybe i'll take a year off from work and go back and finish up. =P
Damn, it's 3am...finally finished a drawing i've been putting off for the past 3 days. Now i can sleep. (i'll be posting these up...hopefully soon)

-feng

[Harnish Studios]

Hi! New Sijun forum member here.

What is the www address for the Pasadena Art Center?


- Brian

[AliasMoze]

Damn, I gotta move out west!

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AliasMoze
:) :) :) :)
"That activates my hilarity unit."

[TJFrame]

Associates is a great and cheap place for people without the money/stamina for Art Center. You won't get that Bachelor of Arts (or Bachelor of Science in my case), but you will learn from and have access to people in the industry. The kinds of classes offered at a speciality school like Art Center, Cal Arts, CCS(Center for Creative Studies), or even Associates of Arts is light years beyond most public offerings (Except perhaps the now-defunt CAL State Long Beach ID course which the Concept Art GOD Joe Johnston of Star Wars fame studied at).

An important and often overlooked factor is that when you go to a school that has a long tradition of placing people in these types of jobs, and the instructors themselves are working professionals in the field, it makes the transition from school to a career much easier.

For example, at Art Center, not only do you have numerous sponsored projects with major companies that often lead to job offers, but companies recruit at school all the time. You never know when a big wig from company X is going to be wandering around school. For example my buddy was showing his work at the senior show and some Digital Domain people saw it, gave him a call, and offered him to work on a movie doing Concept Art
the week he graduated. He's now at ILM doing concept art. Some other friends of mine were hired right out of school for Disney Imagineering simply because they took classes from a guy who heads up the Creative Development division. He was looking for people and went looking in the easiest place possible: his own classroom.

The point of all this is that exposure to people in the industry is very important and a school in the midwest somewhere will not give it to you as easily. It will be harder to find people to network with, etc. I know this for a fact becuase I went to Industrial Design school in Arizona for two years and my teachers were like "If you want to get into the entertainment biz, you gotta get your ass to Art Center"(so I did)


So if you want a career in the entertainment biz like concept artist, animation, layout artist, matte painter, production illustrator, model maker etc., a specialty school in California is your best bet.

That's not to say that other schools in other locations aren't good or can't have good students, it's just that a specialty school in California will give you a head start

-TJ

[This message has been edited by TJFrame (edited June 29, 2000).]

[jHof]

Thanks for all the replies here. I got some great schools to check into.


TJ- Does Art Center offer Full ride scholerships? If so, are they only avalible to those comming right out of high school? I'm 21 and haven't been to college yet. Cuse I'll whip one up for them :P Hee hee. Sounds like such an awsome school. Hows the city around there? College kids get killed alot, you know being by LA and all.

I'm sure if I try hard enough I can make the government pay for me to goto that school. Or not. Ah well... I'll see how SCAD goes over for a year or so. Thanks for your time if you can respond back with some info. I could prolly find out on there home page, I'm just in a lazy sketching mood right now.

[CapnPyro]

www.artcenter.edu

Hah, Fred thats awesome, one of my good friends is taking some classes at Associates, I was looking into taking a class or two there next semester.. I think my friends teacher is Glen Orbik, he does alot of illustration. I was also looking into going to ArtCenter since i want to be a comic book or concept artist, its just so bleedin expensive i havnt decided if its worth it yet. id probably major in illustration and take as many ID classes as possible. only downside with illustration is i suck and detest painting. ah well, i got another semester or two of jc to make up my mind.

-CapnPyro-

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http://home1.gte.net/capnpyro

[surphun]

uhh.. how did you get that scholarship TJ? also, what do you do if your out in the boonies and can't go anywhere? I've gotten letters from Pratt but I'm not willing to move back to Brooklyn.. is there some sort of "Big Art List" with some good colleges listed there? I just see the future looking dimmer and dimmer with me living in the midwest.

[WacoMonkey]

There are a lot of good ID schools out there, Art Center and Center for Creative Studies in Detroit being the two most well known, especially for automotive. I've also seen good people come out of Pratt, Rhode Island, Cleveland Institute, Ontario College of Art and Design in Toronto (my alma-matter), and others that aren't quite so expensive! A new ID program has started up at Academy of Art in SF as well, though it's too early to judge yet. They seem to have pretty good animation and illustration departments, however, and crossing over courses of study is often a good way to get what you want. There are also quite a few good schools for ID in england, for those of you across the sea.

The biggest hurdle with ID programs in general (apart from Art Center) is that they aren't very entertainment-design friendly. Product Design teachers in my experience tend to take themselves very seriously and look down on that 'fantasy stuff' ('spazzatura cosmico', as my old prof used to say...). You will have a hard time getting taken seriously if you are focussing on designing for entertainment, and you will probably have to do a lot of proving yourself to get what you want from the teachers. When I started in school, I had the hardest time proving to the teachers that I could actually design thoughtfully, because I had the handicap of (believe it or not) actually being able to draw pretty well, which a lot of teachers felt was a crutch (ie. if you're capable of rendering so that ANYTHING can look good, then you must not be paying as much attention to the actual design). Still, I persevered, and after a couple of years convinced them that I was serious about my direction and would get what I wanted out of them at all cost. By my senior year, 75% of my credits were independent studies and special projects related to entertainment design, doing freelance work designing themepark rides and getting credit for it, besides it paying for my school and living expenses! Of course this was long before anything called Entertainment Design existed anywhere as a curriculum, so maybe it's taken more seriously now.

As someone who's been hiring Conceptual Designers for about eight years now, I'll pass on a little advice. Don't get too caught up in what school you go to. Education is a tool for you to get the skills that you want, and it can come from anywhere. The best place is to do the research yourself, and find out what you need to learn and what skills will help you the most. You need to take this knowledge with you even when you go to a big hot Design School. Don't just blindly trust the teachers to tell you what you need to know. You are responsible for that yourself, and the teachers are just a resourse for you to exploit. If you take that attitude, and just practise till you bleed, you can learn most of what you need pretty much anywhere, at least enough to get you into the practical world, where the REAL education begins!

The claims that going to a school like ACCD (claims perpetuated by the schools themselves) guarantees you a top job in the industry are a myth. It certainly helps, because of what Feng and TJ pointed out - they have access to great professionals and contacts that you can exploit. But you still have to teach yourself. I've seen exceptional students come out of there, as well as complete talentless morons - and they actually graduated! I've interviewed ACCD Trans students while at Nissan who did beautiful drawings - but couldn't understand why their doorcut couldn't possibly open. there was a time when we didn't hire anyone from ACCD for several years, and Art Center told their students not to bother trying because we must have some bias against them, which wasn't true - half the design managers, including the design director were from ACCD - They were simply putting out a lot of students with a lot of flash and no substance, because that's what Detroit was looking for at the time. Different schools have different philosophies - ACCD for example focusses more (in my opinion, and at least in Trans) on rendering skills and producing a flashy portfolio than they do on hardcore design methodology and understanding what you're building. However this works better for entertainment, where things rarely have to actually function. Though don't make the mistake of thinking that entertainment design (even video-game design) doesn't require any real-world design skills - believe me, it does! Dealing with programmers is just like dealing with engineers, and understanding the market is just as critical as when designing the latest Walkman.

So you need to know what you want (what you NEED..) to learn so you can get that out of the teachers, or you may be unwittingly handicapped. Almost all schools tend to find a formula that works for them, and end up producing cookie-cutter students if you let them. The bigger schools are like that, because the student is a product that they are producing for their biggest clients, usually big companies like Ford who give them most of their funding. But remember that the ones who get the best jobs are the originals, the ones who stand out.

As much as the expensive, private Art Schools claim that they are the roughest, toughest, and that you have to be the best of the best to make the cut or you won't get past Sophomore Year, at the end of the day they are just a business like anything else - if you can pay their exhorbitant fees and get most of your work done, you think they'll kick you out for not being the biggest talent?

Point is, you still need to take responsibility for your own education. Going to ACCD or CCS is not a slam dunk, and you have to balance how far behind being in debt 90 G's is going to put you when you do get into the working world. And a BA or BS Degree doesn't mean sh*t in the real world unless it's go an awesome design sketched on the back. I don't even look at it. The portfolio, sketchbook and personality are really all that anyone cares about in the real world, as I'm sure Feng can attest.

Good luck!

Phil.

[ozenzo]

hey WacoMonkey great advice, but you said "So you need to know what you want (what you NEED..) to learn so you " can you clarify that...meaning what do I(or we) need to learn!
I do design work for two small businesses, mainly done in a cad program and some graphics(logos and such), but I would like to do stuff on a much larger scale....like the stuff I see posted by the professionals here ...
...so my question is what should I be studying and do you think that any of that can be learned outside of school?, or do you think that schooling is a necessity to do what..say you , fred, or spooge do?
Any suggestions?.... suggestions from anyone would be greatly appreciated!!

[Fred Flick Stone]

Study those books with concept design in them, that is study Ralphs, Joe Johnston, Doug Chiang, Giger, Darrow, Shuster, Mccaig, and on and on...
grab the Disney art books, look at all the concept illos in them.
All the new DVD's have concept art sections in them, and on...
Almost all this creative stuff is in your head. No one is going to teach that stuff to you. But, a good understanding, no a great understanding of perspective, and form are really necessary to start with. The problem with many design illos. is that the artist designs the forms without understanding form, and this can cause many, many technical issues when trying to build the design.
A basic understanding of how things work is also a handy tool to have under your belt. This again is not learned in school, but you can begin training yourself for this by doing faux design work for yourself and for the portfolio you plan to build. Faux meaning, come up with a story idea, or borrow someones novel already written, and take some of the designs the author describes and try to concept them on paper. If it calls for a tank like mechanism, go on line, or go to the book store and get the info you can on tanks, how they work, how they are built, the blueprints, good close up images of the components included in the tank. Read, read, read, and become familiar with the tanks construction, then begin to design your own. If you do the right research, your tank will be that much closer to "believeable" or "workable" for the visual context it will be used in. Research is key. Do enough of this,then it will be a matter of knowing your drawing skills to get you th the final render.
Many times, difficult objects are drawn in three view, or top side and front line art blueprints. Then an image of the object is rendered in paint or photoshop, within the context it is to be used for.
For characters, usually a front, side and back are necessary, with a page of expressions if it is to be animated in some way. Again, research is key. If you are designing a psuedo cyber knight, you would want to get a book, or reference on armor, study the components, how it works. Then you might want to go further, and maybe study football uniforms, hockey pads,lacross gear, mountain climbing wear, and modern army uniforms. Then blend, cross over, do what ever it takes to tweak what is already known, and make it something new. ANd if you are designing creatures of any sort, a good idea is to get anatomy books for animals. Very different makeup of musculature than humans. I see too many monster designs with human limbs on them, argh, no more please. Get the imaginations out, and the animal anatomy books, and cross reference the two.
For environments, you will again, research the climate you wish to pursue, based on story of course, then culture, then some architectural styles that you feel are close to the direction you are going in. Draw some notes in your sketchbook of the found architecture that influences your design, to get familiar with the new forms you are about to embark on. Look for good images of environments at the time of day you are looking for, and study the color palette. Use these colors for your background.
The rest is drawing skills to put it all together. Do you know your perspective? Do you know form? Recession of size and shape in atmosphere, etc.? These skills will help you better conceive your idea.
Now beyond all this, you will want to stay away from all the reference for periods of time and explore your imagination. These concept images will probably not look correct, or work believeably yet, but that is ok. This is time to find things that nothing can help influence, because there is no reference for it. This is really where the great designer will emerge from, because of the freedom of any restrictions. Once the designs are laid to paper, then go back to the reference to see how mechanically you can get the concept refined to work correctly without major form flaws, or mechanical failures. And this is the time to refine the forms of the concept, clean it up, make it look sharp.
Things to remember
1. drawing skills intuitive so this stage never fights you
2. understand mechanics of objects, creatures, etc. or learn to teach yourself. YOu will be doing this for every new thing you have to design that you are totally unfamiliar with
3. Reference and research, basically the same as number 2, but I wanted to isolate the importance
4. Enjoy the work, if you don't your designs will show it, and more than likely be very commonplace to uninspiring
5. Explore your imagination, learn to understand that the ideas you have are alright, they aren't freakish and adolescent. Courage is key to this. Many of you think you have it till you hit the paper, then blam, creators block....
6. This is a side note, but I have seen many portfolios with sketches in them that were just not good for the book. Many people do not understand what concepting is, and assume that it is just the sketches you have in your sketchbook before you do the final render. This stuff doesn't fly in an art directors eye. He see's this stuff, and thinks, "wow, no drawing skills", because the !!WRONG!! thing was put into the concept portfolio. Keep any sketchy stuff out of the folios. If you have to, learn to stay clean with everything you draw, including your sketchwork.

Anyhow Oz, hope this helps a little, and did you get your package yet in the mail? It should be there any day now...good luck with the pursuit...

[SewerRat]

Does CCS have a website? I'm just outside of Detroit, so I might want to check it out while I'm planning for my future.

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[ozenzo]

Good God Fred, you are like a dictionary..no an encyclopedia set of ideas!!....you have been a great help in my artistic endeavor I thinK I said this before, but art was my first love until a friend of mine played"Hey Joe" for me and that's whan I fell in love with another art...Music!!..and of course all my efforts went into that...I was going to be a rock star...heh heh heee....well I never gave up drawing I just did it more sporadically and focused more on music,.. it's great that guys like you are out there to give a guy a hand ...Thank you Fred Flick Stone........but it makes me wonder why I never heard about any of this stuff from art teachers.....maybe they did just what they had to to get a teaching job and didn't really Love it...who knows at least I'vefinally found some people who have the same convictions about art as I do!! well thanks again!!

Fred- not yet but I'll let you know and thanks again!!

[yoszi]

not that i know anything,

Can't you just close your eyes and think tank and the tank appears. Sort of like laying in bed at night in complete darkness with eyes closed, when images start to pop up in your mind. You think about something and it just appears. Sometimes it's a complete drawing. That doesn't happen during daylight when it could be captured on paper or happens rarely and it's very vague. When you sketch something brain makes up shapes accordingly, the drawing doesnt come out of your head in the first place. Shouldn't the mind steer the hand not the other way around.

blah,

[Fred Flick Stone]

yoszi-unless you have an absolute understanding of everything in life, have a picture perfect photo memory, and have the worlds greatest hand eye coordination then yeah, you can draw that tank. I don't know anyone like this, not even my engineering art friends.
Now, are you speaking in terms of just drawing, or do you mean as a professional. You will never get anywhere just imagining tank, and poof it appears. There are so many issues art technique wise that you are going to have to suffer through that in the end, you may not end up with a tank at all, but some crazy looking object with a tube sticking out of it, or whatever. I am not causing argument here. Merely trying to understand your angle on this. The way you are talking is how I hear art teachers tell there students to draw. I don't listen to these art teachers because they have no clue. THings just don't happen, you have to make them happen.
BUT, sometimes, the imagination is not in activity, and mindless scribbles are important to get some inspirational juices flowing.
And I would have to say that you are a bit incorrect in that the Drawing doesnt come out of your head...where does it come from then? THe foot, the stomach? THis image had to start somewhere. THe imagination is the first place you go for something new, if that isn't working right, then photo influence, if that isn't working for you, then it's time to take up basketball or something. Point I am making is that the image you see is a mental assembly or photograph of a concept or an idea. Sometimes you might see it in full context, or detail, but to get it onto paper is a daunting task, if you have no basics under your belt. Learn the right way to do concept art, or art in general I should express, then that Idea lurking between the ears is going to come out as clear as a bell, because you aren't fighting the hand eye coordination issues, which is why you learn art principals in the first place...
No arguing here, just explaining...
Keep the faith that you can draw what is in your head, learn the basics, and the rest should flow like clear running water, not like oil, slow and murky...

[yoszi]

I'm just saying that something i see in my head is way better than what i manage to scribble on paper. I pick up a pencil and see nothing, while before falling asleep something can just appear out of nowhere (mental assembly) and it can look pretty good. Therefor it would seem logical not to start with sketching but going to a dark room and imagining things. It's just a though that's going through my fat head. I dont know if that;s possible. Certainly i havn't seen any ppl doing that (that would be something).

I draw with very loose outlines and i will usually see some shape in tem. I dont start with an image in my head. The drawing comes from my head but it's initiated and dictated by random pencil lines. My head is usually empty when there are any lights on. I'm actually thinking of going to a washroom equipped with drawing materials and some lamp i can easily switch on/off.

I dont mean drawing like that professionally, and drawing all the details. I'm try trying to have some fun while going through learning basics. I find this mental assembly intriguing.

[This message has been edited by yoszi (edited June 29, 2000).]

[TJFrame]

This thread is becoming quite interesting.

- jHof/surphun:

As far as scholarships go, full-rides at Art Center right from the start are EXTREMELY rare, so rare in fact as to be not worth worrying about, but partial scholarships are quite doable. In my own case, 3 people in my class had 1/2 tuition scholarships the first semester - a buddy who now is at ILM, another buddy who now designs cars at CALTY, and myself. I never re-submitted my portfolio for review each term after that, but one of my friends did and eventually got his tuition completely paid for. It's kind of a pain in the ass to prepare it during the semester. Looking back I wish I would have though, and I recommend to anyone out there going to Art Center currently to always try to get their scholarships upgraded as often as possible. DONT BE DUMB LIKE ME!

- wacomokey:

" The claims that going to a school like ACCD (claims perpetuated by the schools themselves) guarantees you a top job in the industry are a myth."

I have never seen anyone from Art Center claim any such thing. As I said, it gives you a big advantage, but not a guarantee. I have seen completely sucky people come out of Art Center, but I have seen a bunch more who kicked ass royally. On the other hand, I have reviewed MANY portfolios and, I'm sorry to say, most of them are not good. Many people who have graduated from lesser known or unaccredited schools send in portfolios that are shoddy and amateurish. For example, we've had people come in for interviews wielding color copies and sketches on loose notebook paper with wrinkled resumes. Say what you will about Art Center portfolios being too flashy and slick, but you'll never find an Art Center grad pulling crap like that. It's beaten into you since day one to present your work in a professional manner.

I'm not trying to defend Art Center per se, because they are many problems with it and many other great schools. But you said yourself that it was difficult to get guidance and acceptance at your school. Going to a place like Art Center, or CCS means going to a school where people understand what the hell you're all about and have instructors and class tailored to it.

"and a BA or BS Degree doesn't mean sh*t in the real world unless it's go an awesome design sketched on the back"

Again, true to some extent but I have gotten different opinions from people about this issue. Some are like you and say that it means nothing to them. Other art directors and producers have told me that it does help to have a degree from a well known school and that people who have a full degree can command higher salaries that someone who is equally skilled but has no degree. For myself the point is irrelevant now because I did graduate and I felt proud when I did because I had proved to myself that I could compete head to head with other talented people and complete the difficult task that I had started. Other people might not give a hoot about a degree, so it's mainly up to personal preference. But all in all, I do agree with you that professional portfolio is mainly what counts.

PS: Ashton and Keegan say "HI"


- the Fred Flick Stone/yoszi debate:

Personally, I'd have to agree with Fred on this one. I always start a project by immersing myself in reference books and movies and becoming a "mini-expert" on what I'm working on. Not only is this fun to do, but after a while, you CAN draw stuff pertaining to the project right out of your head without any reference. For example at the moment I can whip out a tank right now from my head complete with subtle details like smoke dischargers, bolted mudguards, towing cables and hooks, hatches, spotlights with guard rails, etc. because I spent weeks and weeks drawing them from books. But the first step was getting an understanding of what the subject matter was all about - before you create what will come, understand what has gone before.

As for faux design. I COULD NOT AGREE WITH YOU MORE! THIS IS SO IMPORTANT. not only does it give you something to frame your work around, but it also shows potential employers how you think and solve problems. I have gone so far as to take a year off from work a few years ago and write my own full length 120 page screenplay. I went out and bought 12 books on screenwriting and created an entire background world for my script. I'm in the process of creating visuals for it (The first 3 images of mine posted in the "Quick Concept Sketches" thread.) Of course, you don't have to go to this extreme, but for myself it is so much more meaningful to design things when there is a larger framework to draw from. I'm also doing a personal project of redesigning the 1950s film "The Day The Earth Stood Still" And I'm coming up with a whole background and rationale for why the stuff will look and work the way it does.

My portfolio sections always start with loose thumbnails and notes of reference materials followed by straight concept sketches and idea refinement, then final renderings and 3d models or maquettes. The point is show them how you got from A to B to C. If you want a job doing concept work, this is crucial. Don't just show finished renderings unless you want to be a straight illustrator.


Excellent advice Fred!

that's my 02 cents for now. (whew, my fingers are tired!)

-TJ

[yoszi]

It's hardly a debate, it's just an idea that could be totally useless in practice. I didn't say that doing research is not helpful. Sketching is faster than lets say painting, or modeling, just as assembling something in your head is faster than sketching. I guess that's what i'm getting at. Why not try to exercise putting design in your head along side sketching exercises ?

[WacoMonkey]

Ozenzo - Best way to find out what you need to learn is from the horse's mouth. Find the people who are doing the work you aspire to, and find the people who they are doing work for. Look at all the books that have published their work, interviews, etc... Read Cinefex cover-to-cover religiously to understand the process and constraints of the industry you are supplying too (or Game Designer, or Next Gen Games, or Animation, or...). Pore over all of this work, and try to understand why they designed the way they did. The star Wars sketchbooks are great, because they show the evolution of designs. Reverse-engineer the process to figure out why changes were made or necessary. When you've exhausted all of this - contact these guys. Ask questions. Most of these people are enthusiasts just like you, and in my experience, a lot of them are friendly and more than willing to help aspiring artists (provided they have the time!). They were where you were once. Make a trip out to L.A. with your portfolio and before you get there, try to set up as many meetings as possible. Find out who the art director is at Effects or Game companies, and tell them that you are a student out from wherever, and would they have some time to just look at your work and give some feedback. You may think "these guys must be tired of being hounded by fans" well, maybe George Lucas and James Cameron, but most Industry people are relatively unknown and you'd be surprised how few people bother to try this. If it's clear you're not trying to hit them up for a job, most people will be happy to find a half-hour in their week to help someone out, and you can learn a lot. I did that spring break of my senior year. Flew out to L.A. from Canada, called every Effects House and Studio in the Creative Directory and Yellow Pages. Had about 50% success, but that was still enough to fill a week, and I made some great contacts and learned a tremendous amount about the industry. On a long shot I even called up Syd Mead and - surprise - he spent a whole afternoon with me critiquing my portfolio and letting me watch him paint! Anyone professional who spends the time to post on this forum and others (though I must admit I don't have the time to as much as I'd like) is someone like that, who has not forgotten what it was like to be struggling to follow their passion and is willing to share the wealth. Use it.

TJ - I didn't mean to come down on your alma-mater. Don't get me wrong - it's a great school, in fact one of the best. Undoubtedly it is the best place to go for conceptual design - if you want to and can afford to spend the money. I wish I had gone there myself (if I wasn't the one paying!) But over the last thirteen years or so (since I started thinking college) I've heard the same mythology from Art Center, that the standards are exceptionally high, and because of that you're a shoe-in for the best jobs in the industry (keep in mind, I'm primarily talking about Transportation Design, which at the time was the real 'jewel in the crown' at Art Center). I don't mean the students or even the teachers - I mean the people who's job it is to sell the school to prospective students, as well as prospective sponsors. And in some cases, that includes the department heads.

So I'll tell you my Art Center story, and let you judge. My apologies ahead of time if part of it sounds in any way like tooting my own horn, but I think it's a good lesson. Maybe my bad experience has tainted me a little bit, but by no means has it made bitter about the school, and I've been in the industry long enough to have seen all the good and bad and developed (IMHO) a pretty informed opinion.

When I came down to California to look for work after getting my ID degree, I also interviewed at Art Center for the Masters program in Product design, figuring if I didn't get work (and a visa! I'm from Canada...) I would go to school here so I could be close to the industry and make my contacts, etc... I interviewed with the head of Product (someone Olson, maybe?...) and despite the fact that I had graduated top of my class and that other OCA grads had been accepted to the Masters ID program, he told me that he couldn't accept me for the masters program. He was very complimentary of my work, but told me that it lacked that Art Center 'zing' and wasn't quite up to the standards of an Art Center Grad. He said that he'd very much like to have me at ACCD, and proposed that I could get advanced standing and start in 5th semester. He tried to make it sound like a great deal, and that hey, an ACCD degree was like gold, so it would be worth the investment - I could even get scholarships. I must admit I was a bit demoralized leaving there. But hey - it was just my fall-back anyway, right?

Quite literally the next day, I went down to San Diego to get a tour of Nissan Design, was surprised to find them set up for an interview, and after spending about four hours there, got offered a job on the spot. Much later, after I'd started, I found out from my colleagues that they'd interviewed about 200 applicants for the position I (inexplicably) got, including many Art Center grads. Now I'm sure a lot of it was being the right guy in the right place at the right time, and NDI is well known for being a bit unconventional, but I guess I find that a little ironic. Either ACCD's standards are a little skewed, or (and more likely in my opinion) they just wanted a little more of my money. So am I bitter? Hell no! I got a great job and saved myself tens of thousands! But I can't help thinking of it as a cautionary tale about private colleges. As it turned out, I paid off my school debt in a little over two years.

As for flashy portfolios, I have no problem with them at all! I'm all for it! My portfolio would probably been considered 'flashy' too. What I have a problem with is flash at the expense of substance. A lot of automotive portfolios I saw come out of ACCD were very dynamic and zippy and expressed the 'emotion' of the car, but not the actual form! This is all good and well for "ooh ahh!" factor, but you can't model from it, which immediately became evident when I saw the models they attempted themselves from their sketches - no understanding or communication of actual three-dimensional surface at all! And as for practical design issues, read my post above. For what it's worth, I blame a lot of that on direction from the automotive industry in Detroit. I think they gear students toward selling themselves to get the jobs, rather than equipping them with the tools they'll need when they get there - and it certainly seems to work, so who am I to judge?

So anyway, you and Feng look like you're among the good ones (really nice work guys!) so we've got the positive examples right here! I was a little late to post on vortx's thread, but the stuff I saw rocked.

As for degrees - never seen it make a difference in salary in THIS industry, but who knows? your experience obviously differs from mine. If you plan to teach, or if you're going into 'real' product design, it makes a big difference for sure, in fact, it's essential.

I do think this is a really important thread for people planning to head in this direction, though, so I thank everyone who's contributed.

P.S. Say hi to Chris and Sean for me. Those guys rock, do they not? - and make sure Sean eats something!!!




[This message has been edited by WacoMonkey (edited June 30, 2000).]