Week 19

I think it’s very easy for people in our creative industry to dismiss the whole idea of Liberal Arts/academics because they don’t have to deal with that curriculum anymore. For most people who have being aiming for this industry, academic subjects and accolades are just a means to an end which you can easily label as illogical and crap and stifling for creative people, whose talents and interests should have been recognised by educational institutes instead of repressed [one of the main points in the intriguing TED video clip we watched today]. I see the liberal arts and the whole process of compulsory education as a means to attempt to make well-rounded individuals, and the institutions I went through communicated that. I’ve never had any bitter feelings towards the methods of education, and I don’t think studying mathematics and humanities is pointless even if you’re not going to be using those skills in your future career.

I don’t think creative subjects are exactly stigmatised, as my schools have always encouraged me in those areas; my art teacher had blatant disregard for the idea of assessment, and his own work and teaching methods was so concentrated on traditional techniques he was way more focused on getting us to make pieces that looked visually impressive rather than what fitted the mark sheet, thus everything we made was basically extremely shallow, and 6th form graduates from that school had practically zero chance of getting into an art college. My art teacher at a different 6th form college was the opposite, the creative process is supposed to be about reworking ideas until reaching a final outcome, and the marking structure was completely set around supporting/sketchbook work and was meant to run parallel to the actual process of making a painting or sculpture or dress etc. Similarly, in Foundation Art, one part of the course was keeping a creative journal to discuss contemporary artists and their work which might influence you. So while a lot of teaching methods are disengaging and plainly bad, I don’t think the ideas behind marking and grades are' wrong'. I also think that those who’ve worked harder for their studies deserve to be recognised, so I do like the idea of University being a more exclusive thing that only hard workers are able to get to. The problem is what schools value as hard work.

I do have a personal attachment to the values of the education system which makes me biased, mainly stemming from the fact that my working-class parents and grandparents paid for me to go to ridiculously overpriced private school; which was not the pinnacle of effective teaching methods, but it got the results and it was probably an overall step-up from the alternatives. After going through public school, my Dad went back as an adult to get English and Maths GCSEs because he wanted to be acknowledged as an intelligent person as well as the better job prospects, and thus he has this unshakable high regard of the values of academic degrees. To brush them off as worthless lines on a CV, I think would be a disrespect to what my parents did and what they did for me and are doing throughout my own educational process - which is constant support, funding, and reward but never pressure. They’ve always known I was going to study art, and always encouraged me to work for whatever I wanted, and I chose the option of picking up as many good grades as I could along the way because you only have one chance, and my Dad always says he regrets not going down that route. Would he have been happier if he did? I don’t know, but the least I can do is value what’s been given to me when many other people’s creativity is not nurtured or valued by parents or institutions. I think I’m an extremely lucky person in this respect to be from such an encouraging background so out of principle, even though I agree that there some things that are seriously wrong with the system, I take pride in what I’m able to put on my CV even if others think it’s worthless. I think it would be ungrateful, in my own circumstances, not to be even a little bit proud.

I realise I sound like a square, but it’s more just an emotional reaction to what we talked about today. Also, I despise the idea of spending so many years of your life doing something, only to think of it later as a waste of time. I think that’s really negative, and there is always some value in anything. Just watch me eat my words when I end up as a bitter, snarky old lady..!

To actually address the task, I don’t see why you can’t have a highly-trained individual who also has a good liberal arts background. The whole process of going through school is to give you that background, and I see university as the process of training one specific thing. Though I suppose if you think of it that way, it’s best to have a good idea of where you want to end up early on, otherwise three years just isn’t enough to start from scratch. That’s why I think, can I really get to industry-level in 3Dsmax in just 3 years? Well, more like two now. We’ve had our whole lives to practise our traditional art skills; can I really get to the same level in such a short time? I suppose I must think of it as just a different way of applying those skills. I think by a ‘good liberal arts background’, employers want well-rounded individuals who are aware of the world around them. Really, I think there should be much more emphasis in schools on the subjects of cultural studies, debates, politics, current events, morality, that kind of thing, which in my opinion when taught well would be a better way to produce intelligent, aware people rather than the divisions of ‘faculties’ from so early on.

Week 17 - Game Engines

A game engine is a piece of software designed to render 2d/3d graphics, sound, animation, AI, and a physics engine [ to simulate Newtonian physics and approximate effects and conditions in a real life or fantasy world], among other features. To economise game production, they are typically used over and over when creating different games, falling into the category of middleware as they provide reusable tools purchasable for different companies, reducing the time and cost of development.

Key technologies include a rendering engine, the mathematical process of creating an image from a 3-dimensional model containing geometry, texture, lighting, shading and viewpoint. The word can be compared to how a traditional artist ‘renders’ an image. Scene graphs in games are used to describe logical and spatial relationships between objects in a scene, and can also be useful in reducing memory budget and increasing speed. Recent trends are favouring accessibility, and engines are being developed more for devices such as mobile phones and web browsers, e.g. Shockwave and Flash.

Additive or subtractive environments describe the process by which objects are created within the engine. An attitive environment exists as an empty void, in which the game world is created and sealed off without the void space leaking into it. The Quake engines, MaxFX, and Half-life are all examples of additive engines.
A subtractive environment is the opposite, as in there is an endless solid instead of a void, and objects are created by removing parts of the solid and the game world is formed from negative space. As additive enviroments are easier to manipulate, a large cube can be removed from a subtractive space and things can be built within it, emulating an additive environment but without the problem of the void leaking in. Some popular engines to use subtractive environments are the Unreal, Dark, and Serious engines.

Using middleware engines can be a big advantage to developers as mentioned previously; it prevents ‘re-inventing the wheel’ – why recreate something that already exists unnecessarily? Engines also are becoming more and more complicated, and creating an original piece of software would be extremely demanding requiring vast amounts of expertise. Also, engines that have been used in successful games are naturally attractive to developers.
However, the licensing of the third-party engine can also be costly, and may require modification to meet the developer’s specific needs. Creating an in-house engine may produce totally unique features for the games using it, with the opportunity to re-use it and sell as middleware in the future. Considering these disadvantages, a safer choice with less risks of failure would be to use pre-existing software, although it would be interesting to see more original engines being developed for specific purposes.

Week 15 - The Industry

The fact that our course exists is indication that roles in Industry require specialisation, now that it has begun to mature over the years. Companies need a wide range of skills to function, and must have people that are very good at a certain thing; e.g. a games artist, rather than someone who can design a game, make the artwork and write the code averagely. That may have happened back when console games first began to compete, and even into the early nineties where production teams remained relatively small, with may of the staff were multitasking; but the games industry is now fully comparable in scale with other commercial entertainment identities.

Although our course is specialised for this Industry, many of the skills we’re training are transferable. With the current climate the future of getting jobs is foggier than usual, but I’m trying my best to counter that by developing my traditional art skills. Courses such as illustration and fine art had appealed to me before I discovered this one, but I’m very happy to be here because it seems that I share the tutors’ sentiments about the importance of drawing and uses of Photoshop, etc. In other words, I’m keeping my options open but still dedicating myself to what we do here. After spending some actual time on Max during the last project, I don’t feel quite as intimidated by it, but I have a lot of catching up to do – although everyone seems quite relaxed about it, so I don’t feel pressure in a negative way; perhaps because I’ve always had my traditional art to fall back on. That’s kind of arrogant, isn’t it?

I’ve been quite worried recently about the negative atmosphere surrounding the employment issue. I can understand why people are worried, and I’ve been trying to take an interest in it rather than my usual ‘it doesn’t affect me right now, everything’s peachy’ attitude. I think, generally, worrying too much about anything is bad for one’s mental health, so recently I’ve become a more ‘take it easy’ kind of person. But, when a real issue that has a possible chance of upsetting things gets too close for comfort, all the worry I didn’t have comes all at once and motivates me to get things done in a whirlwind of neuroticism; but usually all that applies to is deadlines for things I haven’t done. I’ve had bad working habits in the past and it shows. Anyway, last week’s session with Mike did put my mind at ease about it, that we already are specialised and don’t need to concentrate that much on one really specific thing, that companies are always seeking out graduates, and so forth. It was comforting to me, although that probably wasn’t the primary purpose of that talk..!

So, despite everything I’m still fairly confident that I’ll be able to find a job, although that positive attitude may come partly from the fact that I utterly despise and fear the idea of failing at anything [though I’m not the aggressive, overtly competitive type, perhaps you can tell]. The situation the industry is in is likely to fluctuate even more in the next few years, and as a result, I’d say its logical to presume that to preserve stability and prosperity, they will continue to pick out the very best and refine this even further, and that’s why abilities of being able to meet deadlines and be highly productive are so necessary.