Advice for a young come-up

#1

Hey all,

My name is Tanner, and I am currently a student attending UT Dallas in the animation/design program here. It is my first year, and so far I am loving it. I decided to take the Modeling and Texture route, taking ‘Modeling & Texturing I’ next semester. While at the moment I am interested in character modeling, I am also interested in Animation. I may take an intro Animation class as well to get some more insight into what its all about…

I’m here though to seek some advice on the right path and just have a question or two to ask if you wouldn’t mind helping. Before starting in the animation school here at UTD, I was very interested in Architecture, and actually majored in it at Ariz St for a year. It was a very selective program, and unfortunately I did not make it into the program but to this day am still interested in the design of buildings and houses. And while I am interested in modeling, I can’t help but think that I’d have more “fun” or enjoy doing houses/buidlings/landscapes or whatever field that is.

What I’m asking is, are there any specific jobs that might fit the criteria above, as in designing houses and buildings for films or games? If so, how might one get started on that track and what is the official job title?
Also, any feedback on the Modeling field, what to expect, what to do/not to do, what to learn, etc.
Any and all insight would be hugely available!

Thanks for your time!
Tanner

#2

If your interested in the design of buildings you should be doing a course in Architecture. There you will use a variety of tools to work through your concepts. The only role I can think of that’s modelling buildings is that of working as a visualization artist in a firm of architects or sub contractors. So you have to decide if you want to be the guy designing the buildings or the guy who models and renders other peoples vision.

b

#3

Not necessary. You can get trials of all the CG software, practice and learn alot on your own and with YOUTUBE.

CAD/Revit=Focus on real functionality and design

Maya/Max/C4D/SI etc= Looks and design

Photoshop= VERY USEFUL TOOL TO LEARN PERIOD

#4

Tanner,

Let me start by saying that I too started in out in architecture and am now in a digital arts program. I am not sure exactly what path in CG I want to take as well, but a combination of architecture and digital art does sound interesting.

There are definitely jobs out there that involve designing buildings for video games. I know someone who studied video game design and was involved in designing an oriental-style house for one of his early projects. I am not sure how tough it is to get into that specific area in game development but it is definitely something worth looking into since you are still interested in the design aspect.

As mr Bob pointed out, there are also career possibilities in ‘architectural visualization’. From what I have read this does not involve designing. As an architectural modeler you would use drawings given to you by an architect or engineer to create an image of what a building could potentially look like. Here is a link to a site that has specific job descriptions: http://jobs.cgarchitect.com/.

I hope this helps. Please let me know if you find anything else of interest in your search.

Best of luck.

#5

I agree. Youtube is our friend. You have to learn to find the good informative videos and ignore the ones where people are showing their own skills off and not really teaching us much. Once you do that is saves a lot of time that can be spent learning.

#6

Starting on March 9th and for 12 consecutive weeks we will be releasing as open source between 5 and 9 hours of video training per week in Maya Dynamics, RealFlow, and hopefully Nuke Compositing and VFX Production. Hopefully this will help.

Cheers

#7

This thread has been automatically closed as it remained inactive for 12 months. If you wish to continue the discussion, please create a new thread in the appropriate forum.