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Nessa posted:
Just gonna echo the poster above me. Go with "lame". Just say "Creative" - that covers all those bases. Yes, you'l be face-to-face when handing out a card so you can explain what you do. Don't be cute. You're a design professional - emphasis on PROFESSIONAL. Leave the cutesy crap to the folks on easy and fiverr who are undermining the industry and making creativity look like a hobby or parlor trick. Your card, it should be noted, is your very first piece of your portfolio. It's your entry and should show the breath of your design abilities (as much s a card can). So don't skimp/be funny/etc.
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Jan 28, 2017 17:07
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Ferrule posted:Your card, it should be noted, is your very first piece of your portfolio. It's your entry and should show the breath of your design abilities (as much s a card can). So don't skimp/be funny/etc. Also don't go too over the top design-wise. Your card should be engaging and visually interesting without being gaudy or difficult to read. Designers often take cards a bit too far and it doesn't show their skill, it shows their lack of restraint and taste.
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Jan 28, 2017 18:05
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Anony Mouse posted:I'm glad you found something that will work out! We had shown the client a different romantic travel website as an example. She really took to this other website and it seems she just wants that website now. She also now wants a blog for some reason. Her hosting is on Wordpress and neither me nor my partner have taken the CMS class so we have no experience with building a Wordpress site and will have to learn over the next 2 months to build the website for her. We're going to have to have an in depth conversation with her about exactly what she wants and why. In our initial interview with her, I asked what feeling she wanted her audience to have when they came to her site and her response was "I want them to feel that they want to hire me." This project will certainly be an excellent learning experience if nothing else, even if it fails. quote:As for a "tagline", feel free to drop it and keep it simple. IMO your name, contact info, and professional title are all you really need. When you give it out you will ideally be in a face-to-face situation where you can give a stronger first impression than your card ever will. Toeing the line of trying to be cute can backfire. My instructor for this class (not a designer) encouraged us to have one. I don't know what I would put for a single "professional title" either. Designer? I have until the end of the semester to really refine my card, resume, portfolio and personal branding. There is a student expo at the end of the semester where industry folks come to check out the students' work, though one instructor said it might not be happening this year. I just received my next Art Direction assignment which is to create a 12 page magazine "documentary". (It was originally a film project, but the instructor changed it to a print project.) It will showcase our portfolio as well as contain a personal biography. Something we could hand to potential employers at expo, so long as we still have an expo. I'm excited about it! Ferrule posted:Just gonna echo the poster above me. I guess I just don't know where the line is between "too cute" and acceptable. Or will that differ from person to person? How does one appear professional without seeming boring? How does one showcase some personality without falling into the "too cute" trap? Many of the creative professionals I know in real life are illustrators and colourists, so they often involve cute illustrations as part of their personal branding. I would like my branding to accurately reflect myself and my style, but I don't want to commit the faux pas of being "too cute" in my effort to do so. Do you have any good examples of business cards and branding that are professional, but also have personality and style? I would greatly appreciate another perspective! I fear my own preferences may lie in the "too cute" camp.  kedo posted:Also don't go too over the top design-wise. Your card should be engaging and visually interesting without being gaudy or difficult to read. Designers often take cards a bit too far and it doesn't show their skill, it shows their lack of restraint and taste. Agreed. I don't want to over design it.
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Jan 30, 2017 00:32
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Is there any advice for someone in their late 20s that took far too long to realise what they want to do in life and now have to try and self study art while working? I've been working full time and I found it almost impossible to study along side that, I'm taking a 50% pay cut and going part-time to give myself more time to study. I'm just worried about making up lost time and standing out in an industry that seems to be having more and more freakishly talented 18 year olds.
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Mar 27, 2017 09:00
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ijyt posted:Is there any advice for someone in their late 20s that took far too long to realise what they want to do in life and now have to try and self study art while working? What are your goals specifically? Do you want a 9-5 art job at an office or do you want to freelance. Also what kind of art do you want to create? Graphic design, illustration, comics, animation, fine art, concept art, etc. JuniperCake fucked around with this message at 11:05 on Mar 27, 2017 |
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Mar 27, 2017 11:01
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ijyt posted:Is there any advice for someone in their late 20s that took far too long to realise what they want to do in life and now have to try and self study art while working? I know a guy in his late 40's that just started in the animation industry after a career in the marines. You aren't too old. He actually had an advantage when he started because his seemingly unrelated work experience made him easier to work with than some of these younguns who never had a real job before and have no idea how to act in a professional environment. My advice is to stay positive, do the art you want to get hired for making, and put yourself out there.
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Apr 3, 2017 21:03
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Alright, I need some advice because I went down the rabbit hole and now I have to fight my way back up. I've worked on demo reels for previous years in corporate/small business but this year I decided to make one centered on esports since I've been doing it on my free time for the past 3 years. Problem is, I have no idea what I'm doing, nor do I have any idea what people are looking for. Case-in-point here: https://vimeo.com/212394255 At first I was like, "Yeah... YEAH. This looks good," and now I'm like "Why have you burdened the Earth with this..." Sure, I have a demo reel for interviews and the like for when I show my corporate clients (and potentially this industry as well), but when it comes to showcasing this kind of gaming/graphics work... I'm a bit lost. I do have connections, but right now I'm hesitant to directly show anyone. Anyone have any insight for this kind of work? Any thoughts on how I could potentially re-work this if it needs a rework?
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Apr 11, 2017 14:40
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First impressions, totally raw because I'm drunkposting: The intro and outro are goofy as gently caress. I mean, text flying in and out of place screams After Effects preset. Everything else looked competent if not exactly inspired. I've seen worse in local metropolitan TV commercials. Starting at ~00:42 I couldn't tell exactly what you were responsible for. Did you animate the character models from 00:44 to 00:54? If not, then it's a bit pointless to have in your reel because that's not your work. If you did, then maybe there's a way to make that more explicit although I can't tell you exactly what that might be. Nothing else in the reel is animated like that so it stood out. gently caress I sound like an rear end in a top hat don't I. Hmm. Well I guess the impression I get is that you've been doing YouTube channel intros. I think maybe you don't need to show the full footage for every piece you've done, except for the particularly good ones, like maybe Virtus.pro and Nerd St Gamers. Everything else can be cut down to show only the sexiest parts, like 00:54 to 00:59. The whole thing would actually be improved by being 30 seconds shorter. I hope any of that helps, if not feel free to punch me. If nothing else ditch/rethink the intro/outro.
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Apr 12, 2017 08:55
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Like above, I thought the intro and the outro looked like a preset you would find in iMovie. The ice effect and fire effect on the virtus.pro logo was confusing to me - are the two logo variations what you are shocasing in this emo reel, or did you create the fire and ice motion graphics treatment for a client and THAT is what you are showcasing here? if the former, consider changing the ice, as it suffers from the same preset problem as your intro/outro. I can't tell exactly what you're showcasing here. Are you responsible for the logo design, the motion graphics, the t-shirt designs, or what? Why do you have a clip of T-shirts just sliding into place? If you're showcasing the motion graphics you did, that section is really unimpressive. If you're showcasing the t-shirt designs, they're too small to see and also not that interesting to look at. There's also a lot of direct capture footage of a game where there's not much evidence of your involvement, I would stick to the shots where you integrated text or other graphical elements into the footage. Overall the general feeling I walk away with is confusion. I don't know exactly what you're responsible for creating in each project, and aside from Fragadelphia I don't know which clients you worked for or the scope of your involvement on a project.
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Apr 12, 2017 11:16
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Anony Mouse posted:First impressions, totally raw because I'm drunkposting: I agree, it needs more work and looks tacky as hell. I'll get to work on something that takes more of my time. Anony Mouse posted:Starting at ~00:42 I couldn't tell exactly what you were responsible for. Did you animate the character models from 00:44 to 00:54? If not, then it's a bit pointless to have in your reel because that's not your work. If you did, then maybe there's a way to make that more explicit although I can't tell you exactly what that might be. Nothing else in the reel is animated like that so it stood out. Would it help to have like... lower thirds on sections to explain stuff? I did everything with the 3D animations aside from modeling them myself. Anony Mouse posted:gently caress I sound like an rear end in a top hat don't I. Hmm. Well I guess the impression I get is that you've been doing YouTube channel intros. I think maybe you don't need to show the full footage for every piece you've done, except for the particularly good ones, like maybe Virtus.pro and Nerd St Gamers. Everything else can be cut down to show only the sexiest parts, like 00:54 to 00:59. The whole thing would actually be improved by being 30 seconds shorter. Nah it definitely is helping, I'm used to doing live-action demo reels for editing, this area is completely new to me. I'll keep these in mind and go back to the drawing board. gmc9987 posted:The ice effect and fire effect on the virtus.pro logo was confusing to me - are the two logo variations what you are shocasing in this emo reel, or did you create the fire and ice motion graphics treatment for a client and THAT is what you are showcasing here? if the former, consider changing the ice, as it suffers from the same preset problem as your intro/outro. I'm showcasing the entirety of the animation (it's based on a looping GIF I made a while back.) Everything was done by hand aside from the actual logo design itself (3D work, ice effect, fire, etc.) I just don't know how to be like "hey, this is what I did" without blatantly pointing out everything for each clip. gmc9987 posted:I can't tell exactly what you're showcasing here. Are you responsible for the logo design, the motion graphics, the t-shirt designs, or what? Why do you have a clip of T-shirts just sliding into place? If you're showcasing the motion graphics you did, that section is really unimpressive. If you're showcasing the t-shirt designs, they're too small to see and also not that interesting to look at. There's also a lot of direct capture footage of a game where there's not much evidence of your involvement, I would stick to the shots where you integrated text or other graphical elements into the footage. Noted. The T-shirt section sucked. The capture footage was animated, but I suppose I should stick to motion graphics only for this. gmc9987 posted:Overall the general feeling I walk away with is confusion. I don't know exactly what you're responsible for creating in each project, and aside from Fragadelphia I don't know which clients you worked for or the scope of your involvement on a project. That's the feeling I felt the entire time. I went into it like "man I just gotta throw everything I did into this", but it makes zero sense to me. I wanted to showcase everything from 2D work to 3D work, onto things like element particles and character animation. I suppose I'll cut it to like... 30 seconds and only highlight a specific area (like motion graphics or something.) I appreciate both your feedback. I'll get back to work later today. 
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Apr 12, 2017 13:51
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Really could use some advice on how to get the ball rolling on some freelance work. The rent is too drat high and I need a side gig to make some extra money. I'd really rather try to pick up some extra cash doing something I love. I've never really done freelance outside of people I already know so I don't really know where to start. I don't even have a website currently but I'm planning on changing that asap. I just don't really know how to sell myself or how I would go about starting to get work. What are some good ways to get myself out there? Strategies, networking. making myself stand out etc. Is there an app that people currently like a lot? Secondly, I want to basically start an entirely new body of work when it comes to my own stuff. I'm thinking of using a pseudonym. Is this a bad idea? More than anything I just don't want dog portraits or whatever the hell I pick up doing freelance directly associated with whatever I'm working on for myself. That, and my name is really long and no one can remember how to spell or say it.
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Apr 19, 2017 00:39
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veni veni veni posted:Really could use some advice on how to get the ball rolling on some freelance work. The rent is too drat high and I need a side gig to make some extra money. I'd really rather try to pick up some extra cash doing something I love. 1. Tell everyone you know (and I mean "everyone" literally) that you're freelancing and are looking for work. Don't rely on apps or websites unless you live in the third world and can afford to compete with other people who also live in the third world. Consider printing up business cards and handing them out to folks. If you're good at what you do and people need to buy the service you're offering, you'll get work. 2. Don't use a pseudonym because then how will you cash the checks people give you? This is silly. If anything, form a company (even a faux company if you don't want to register an LLC or S-Corp [which you should consider]) and go by your company name. This is what I do because as silly as it sounds, having a company name gives you an air of legitimacy. It says, "I'm smart and capable enough to at least form a company, so I'm probably smart an capable enough to do the job you need me to do." 3. Have a boilerplate contract ready. Do not do any work without a contract. NO REALLY, I MEAN IT. People take advantage of freelancers. If you have a contract, you send a signal to these people that you're not to be hosed with and they will avoid working with you (read: screwing you) altogether. 4. If you expect to have any significant amount of work, seriously consider forming a corporation. It's not nearly as hard or expensive as you think it is, and Legal Zoom is a perfectly valid and affordable option. Note that if you accept payment as a corporation you also have to jump through some hurdles to pay yourself (ie. payroll taxes), so use a third party service like Quickbooks Payroll or whatever to do that stuff. You do not want to try to do payroll by hand because it's insanely complicated. The benefits of having a corporation are: A) a layer of legal protection between you and angry, lovely clients, and B) numerous tax benefits. That's basically it. If you're good at what you do, you can make a living doing this. I say this from personal experience because those four steps above are exactly what I did three years ago and I'm still living the freelance dream. If you don't already have experience managing clients that may be a bit of a learning process, but it's not really all that complicated. Feel free to PM me if you have specific questions you don't want to post publicly, I'm happy to share whatever knowledge I might have. kedo fucked around with this message at 01:07 on Apr 19, 2017 |
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Apr 19, 2017 01:05
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kedo posted:1. Tell everyone you know (and I mean "everyone" literally) that you're freelancing and are looking for work. Don't rely on apps or websites unless you live in the third world and can afford to compete with other people who also live in the third world. Consider printing up business cards and handing them out to folks. If you're good at what you do and people need to buy the service you're offering, you'll get work. Thanks! All seems like good advice. I definetly planned on having a contract in place as I'm a pretty big pushover and I even feel like I would need to to remind myself I need to get poo poo done asap. As far as forming a corporation is concerned I'd definetly consider it after gauging how much work I'm able to get. For now I plan on continuing to work full time at my day job. My goal here is less to make this my main gig out the gate and more to pick up and extra 3-500 dollars a month to supplement a pretty big rent increase without having be dead broke all of the time. To be clear on the Pseudonym thing, I meant I was considering using one for my personal art and using my real name for any freelance work I'd pick up. Not the other way around. It's corny but I have always kind of wanted to use one, but if it's a really bad idea I'm not married to it. I guess one other big question I have, is how do I go about figuring out what to charge? Oh, and how to steer my focus towards specific types of work. maybe that's a stupid question because my portfolio should do that for me, but say you get offers for work and you know you wouldn't be the right person for the job. Is it ok to just politely decline or does that make you look bad as an artist? For example I don't consider myself very good at landscapes and I would not hire myself to do a landscape. But there is a decent range of stuff that I think I do well (portraits, realism, cartoonish stuff...) I personally don't think I'd be cut out for something like Video game concept art for example, which a lot of freelancers seem to find work in. I know the best answer is so improve where I am weak as an artist, but in the meantime... veni veni veni fucked around with this message at 01:46 on Apr 19, 2017 |
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Apr 19, 2017 01:33
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veni veni veni posted:To be clear on the Pseudonym thing, I meant I was considering using one for my personal art and using my real name for any freelance work I'd pick up. Not the other way around. It's corny but I have always kind of wanted to use one, but if it's a really bad idea I'm not married to it. Almost all of my freelance work has come from friends, or former coworkers. Talk to everyone you know even tangentially related to your field an let them know you're looking for work. If there are meetups or conferences in your area start heading to those and talking to people in person. Personal networking. Of course you should decline work that's not in your field of expertise. If I said "yes" to every person who wanted me to do web design my portfolio would be full of crappy websites and unhappy customers. Learning to say "no" to work not suited to you, or to a customer you know is going to be a problem, is one of the most important lessons you can learn as a freelancer. In regards to what to charge, that is the eternal question that freelancers always seem to ask themselves. The answer is really pretty complicated, an something that you'll have to figure out on your own as you go. A lot of it depends on where you live, an illustrator/graphic designer in New York, NY will make, on average, a lot more than one located in Boseman, MT. Talk to some other creative types in your area and see what they usually charge. Personally, I have a target hourly rate and try to budget projects around that. Most clients will rather pay a flat fee instead of an hourly rate, so there's a lot of estimation on your end for about how many hours a thing will take, plus time for revisions. No matter what you end up charging, I'd recommend putting in the contract an up-front fee, and incremental payments at different stages rather than one lump sum. If you or the client has to bail, you at least have payment for the work you've on up to that point.
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Apr 19, 2017 09:23
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Agreed with gmc9987 about saying no to work (and pretty much everything else). It's hard in the beginning, but it gets easier with time. Whether or not saying no is the right thin go do is something you can figure out pretty quickly. I go with my gut most of the time because the few times I haven't and I've joined projects that weren't quite in my area of expertise or interest, they've been terrible. In terms of rate, it's really just a matter of doing math. Use a freelance calculator if it'd be helpful to you. Here's two extremes: super simple and more complex. The short version is you figure out how much money you need/want to make per year and then divide that by the number of hours you can bill, less vacation and sick leave. Remember that as a freelancer you're also responsible for buying and maintaining all of your own supplies and materials (including things like your computer, an internet connection, a car and gas if you have to drive to meet clients, etc), so they should be factored into your costs. Freelancers chronically undercharge when they first start out. It's worth the time to do the math, but at the end of the day it's reliant on you having a good understanding of what you're worth in your chosen market. My fees work much like gmc9987's. I have an hourly rate but I price projects as a defined scope of work for a set price based on an estimate of how much time it'll take me. The main benefit here is that if I am efficient and can get things done quicker, I make more money. The downside is that with bad clients I can blow through my estimated hours and make less money, so for new clients I don't know or for people I know to be difficult, I'll add an extra 5-20% on top for protection.
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Apr 19, 2017 16:14
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Great advice guys. Thank you! The calculator puts me at a rough estimate of $24 an hour. Does that set off any alarms as high or low? That's actually about what I was thinking of charging initially so that seems about right to me, but I don't want to overcharge or fleece myself either.
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Apr 19, 2017 16:59
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veni veni veni posted:Great advice guys. Thank you! Way, way too low. If you're selling illustration services and are good at it, I'd expect to pay a lot more than that. $24/hr is low end salary money. Remember this isn't a salary – you're going to lose a substantial amount of the money you earn paying for things wouldn't need to if you were someone's employee (tools, taxes, etc.) Heck, you lose almost 8% right off the bat paying the employer's half of FICA taxes.
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Apr 19, 2017 17:25
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Where would you start if you're starting over? I need to boost my resume and rebuild my portfolio after years off and a dead hard drive that took most of my portfolio. I have some old student work, but it's mostly illustration-oriented. I'm currently trying to get back into graphic design, but this time as a full-time job instead of the small, freelance thingies I've made in the past. I have a design degree, proficiency in most of the Adobe Creative Suite, and can draw like a champ. I'm already applying for some freelance work, but I don't have much of a portfolio to show off until then. Any advice on what I should do in the meantime?
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Apr 21, 2017 06:02
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Today is my last day of class from my 2 year program studying web and print design. We had an Expo to showcase our work to potential employers on Wednesday, and though a few people took my resume and cards, no one handed me their card or talked about any particular positions they had open. The animation expo next door brought in a few game development folks, one of whom asked why I didn't have "game designer" on my resume after I expressed interest in designing game UIs or doing character design. Is that something I should consider if I want to reach out to local gaming studios? Right now, my plan is to keep my eyes open on indeed for new job postings and print up some little flyers to drop off at local businesses. There are some businesses down the street from me who haven't updated their brand in 20+ years. I'm also considering sending out cover letters and resumes to companies that aren't actively hiring, but that I would be really interested in working for. I'm wondering if there's anything else I could do to improve my chances of finding a good job.
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Apr 21, 2017 19:04
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Putting words on your resume is next to worthless unless you have work in your portfolio to back it up. A creative worker's portfolio is equivalent to an office worker's resume. Your actual resume matters very little in this world.KittenofDoom posted:Where would you start if you're starting over? I need to boost my resume and rebuild my portfolio after years off and a dead hard drive that took most of my portfolio. I have some old student work, but it's mostly illustration-oriented. Anything interactive is where the money and jobs are. Print isn't dead (nor will it ever be), but it's far more niche than it ever was before and there are fewer and fewer good jobs doing print every year. What kind of work do you want to do? Graphic design is a vast industry.
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Apr 21, 2017 19:11
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That's true! I'm going to develop a few more portfolio pieces that really showcase the kind of work I want to do.
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Apr 21, 2017 22:21
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kedo posted:Putting words on your resume is next to worthless unless you have work in your portfolio to back it up. A creative worker's portfolio is equivalent to an office worker's resume. Your actual resume matters very little in this world. quote:Anything interactive is where the money and jobs are. Print isn't dead (nor will it ever be), but it's far more niche than it ever was before and there are fewer and fewer good jobs doing print every year.
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Apr 22, 2017 06:35
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Well I'm not an illustrator, so there may be others in the thread who can offer you better advice. However my two cents about freelancing in general is that it's great if you have a skill that's in demand or are talented enough that you'll have plenty of work to keep you busy, but it's awful otherwise. There are plenty of industries that require illustration. Is illustration still your end goal? Or is graphic design now your end goal? How deep are you into either career? As both gmc9987 and I touched on a few posts ago, freelancing successfully requires a network of people speaking well of you and your work (at least in our experience). I worked in a studio as an intern, then designer, then senior designer for about seven years before I tried freelancing, and because I had seven years worth of contacts in my rolodex I was able to hit the ground running. On the other hand, a good friend of mine tried freelancing right out of college and he had a heck of a time finding even the shittiest of gigs. My suggestion is to figure out your end goal if you haven't already and work towards that. Know that if you don't have that strong network of people, you're going to spend a lot of time trying to drum up business instead of improving your craft. If that's the case, I'd say pick an industry you're interested in and start poking around for jobs. Flesh out your portfolio while you're getting the lay of the land.
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Apr 22, 2017 16:24
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I was extra stupid and decided to start my freelance illustration career right as I moved to a foreign country with a different language, the only way I was able to successfully do that was because I had some business contacts in the US who were able to give me a solid 20 hours/week of work on some long-term projects. I still don't know if successful is the word to describe my situation, but between my wife and I we're able to pay the bills and we're welcoming a child into our lives later on so I suppose we're OK. The big nerve-wracking things about freelance, though, are A. inconsistent income from month to month, and B. taxes and lack of paid time off (at least if you're stateside, we get some tax breaks and paid parental leave where I am). About a third of my income comes from graphic design, and of the illustration gigs I have about 70% of them are for things I don't have an interest in or have a huge passion for. The big thing to keep in mind before going the freelance route is that projects that excite you, and that are really fun to work on, aren't a given. Most of the time, especially in the beginning, your bills will be paid by the illustration equivalent of being a cubicle worker. You have to be OK with that beforehand, or you'll be hugely disappointed in the long run.
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Apr 22, 2017 16:43
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gmc9987 posted:The big nerve-wracking things about freelance, though, are A. inconsistent income from month to month, and B. taxes and lack of paid time off (at least if you're stateside, we get some tax breaks and paid parental leave where I am).  I can't remember who it was who noticed the big indie comics community in Canada being made possible by glorious  single payer. Thank your lucky stars daily if you are not an American!
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Apr 24, 2017 14:34
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Neon Noodle posted:C. Motherfucking health insurance. Ugh, true. Thanks for reminding me about the biggest item in my business's monthly budget. 
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Apr 24, 2017 15:26
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Neon Noodle posted:C. Motherfucking health insurance. Ahh. Right, that one should have been up at the front of my list. One of the only reasons I'm able to do freelance for a living is that I live in a country that isn't actively trying to kill people below the poverty line.
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Apr 24, 2017 18:10
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Duck Party posted:I know a guy in his late 40's that just started in the animation industry after a career in the marines. You aren't too old. He actually had an advantage when he started because his seemingly unrelated work experience made him easier to work with than some of these younguns who never had a real job before and have no idea how to act in a professional environment. My advice is to stay positive, do the art you want to get hired for making, and put yourself out there. I'm 31, and started in the VFX/Animation industry less than a year ago (I was 30 when I joined). While this stuff was a hobby of mine for a while, I'd taken a 5 or so year break and had only been expanding my skills for about 9 months before I got the gig. How I got the job was a confluence of fortuitous events; I was sure I was merely at hobbyist level, but I wanted to do way more community engagement than I did my last go-around. Since I love Pixar and Renderman was now free for non-commercial use, I started posting to their community, and taught myself some coding so I could contribute to their Blender plugin. After a couple months of writing tutorials, fixing small bugs, sharing my work and chatting with other artists, I got contacted out of the blue by the founder of the studio I'm at now. After a little confusion as to wtf, I discovered one of the artists I'd been chatting with had recommended me since the studio was looking for a texture artist. I nailed the test, got the job, and promptly discovered that the studio was doing Season 2 of Amazon/Ridley Scott's Man in the High Castle. That not being crazy enough, after about 2 months I guess I made an impression with my work ethic and willingness to dive in and teach myself if I didn't know something, so I was promoted to lead artist and given some enormous tasks (texturing the entirety of the Volkshalle interior - seen for like 5 minutes total over 2 episodes and used as part of the finale of the season, creating and texturing 30 unique civilian models that would be randomized into a crowd of 100k, lighting 90% of an exterior city night shot), along with managing a handful of artists, assigning tasks and reviewing their work. I'm 100% sure I would not have been able to handle this at 18-21; both the crazy hours (over ~3 months I had 4 days off total, and my hours averaged at around 12 and as much as 20, then once crunch was done I had no paid work for a couple months), the responsibility, and the fact that it's an entirely virtual studio so I work from home (can an 18yo even manage that freedom?). Having that extra decade of experience would've been nice, and switching careers at 30 was scary - there was no guarantee I'd find work, so when I left my job I figured I'd be spending a year building up a portfolio with the hopes of maybe getting a freelance gig or working for a tiny indie game studio, with my old career as a fallback. But making that call turned out to be one of the better decisions I've ever made.
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Apr 28, 2017 16:01
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Maybe someone wiser than me can offer some career advice, cause I'm going nuts here. So I got my BFA in graphic design almost exactly a year ago, before that I'd been doing design work as a junior designer and/or intern and since then I've been doing contract gigs varying from okay to cartoonishly terrible. Overall though I've got about 2.5 years of agency experience, plus all the skills you'd expect from a designer. Naturally, finding work has been hard to impossible, I typically don't get past the "submitted an application" portion of the interview process and it's not for lack of trying. I guess my question is: Do I suck??? Am I too green? How do you do this.
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Apr 28, 2017 21:37
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Post yo work.
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Apr 28, 2017 21:42
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Everything I've done worth showing is on my website, I know at the very least I'm about to pack up and move everything to wordpress to have more control over the web design.
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Apr 28, 2017 22:52
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Your portfolio looks fine to me. There's nothing about it that blows me away, but your work seems solid enough that I wouldn't discard your application at first glance. However there's a lot of school work in there (or at least things that look like school work), which means I would immediately put you in the "inexperienced," pile which is synonymous with, "going to cost a lot of money to get up to speed," pile. There are also a few production issues that would cause me to think you don't pay attention to details. I'm talking about low res images here, that should be very easy to fix. To be completely honest, without any sort of interactive design experience/chops, you're going to have a tough time finding a job because there are simply far, far fewer positions that are solely print or branding these days. It won't be impossible of course, but it'll probably be a long process. I'd suggest focusing on networking. You get okay jobs by submitting blind applications, you get great jobs when you know someone. Replace school work with real work in your portfolio as soon as you can. In short, you don't suck, you come across as green, and this is a tough industry. What kind of places are you sending applications, and for what type of position?
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Apr 28, 2017 23:04
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kedo posted:To be completely honest, without any sort of interactive design experience/chops, you're going to have a tough time finding a job because there are simply far, far fewer positions that are solely print or branding these days. Depending on where you live (and that's not even a big issue) the above quote is garbage. Get into packaging.
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Apr 28, 2017 23:35
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I tend to go for positions at marketing agencies, designer positions that list 1-3 years experience. I figure places like that would probably have more print/branding jobs come in, but I'm pretty adept at web design, though I've only ever done two websites for one client (One I just did the graphics, and the other I did the graphics and code but they decided to shift gears out of nowhere and the second site was never finished). Are projects done or completed purely for my own amusement considered "School" projects?
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Apr 28, 2017 23:40
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TheHan posted:I tend to go for positions at marketing agencies, designer positions that list 1-3 years experience. I figure places like that would probably have more print/branding jobs come in, but I'm pretty adept at web design, though I've only ever done two websites for one client (One I just did the graphics, and the other I did the graphics and code but they decided to shift gears out of nowhere and the second site was never finished). Are projects done or completed purely for my own amusement considered "School" projects? Kinda. You should focus on a project that is a problem and then solve it. Meaning, don't just make a poster for a band you like. Find something that's "wrong" and work through the design process to fix it.
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Apr 29, 2017 15:41
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Ferrule posted:Depending on where you live (and that's not even a big issue) the above quote is garbage. Get into packaging. You sure about that? Designers at every company I've ever worked at or with are expected to have at least some working knowledge in all or most most of the common mediums. Interactive design is an absolutely huge piece of the puzzle, and ignoring it entirely in your portfolio is not a smart move. Even if TheHan has zero intention of ever working as an interactive designer, showing that they at least have a basic understanding understanding of it displays a more diverse skill set which is desirable to every employer.
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Apr 29, 2017 16:33
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Similarly, my portfolio is also mostly school projects, though some of them were for real local businesses and a couple others were real clients we worked with and built websites for as part of our Capstone class. I also did a logo design for someone else's Capstone website, but they ended up not picking a final colour scheme in time. I've been applying for jobs this past week, but there's very few that come up. I spent a decent amount of time preparing a cover letter for one position that seemed really great, but then Indeed asked if I had the required bachelor's degree. I do not have a bachelor's, but I do have a collective 3 years of directly relevant education and have been using Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign for over 10 years. That's all in my cover letter, but I'm worried that I'll get glossed over because of the lack of a bachelor's. I don't know how Indeed works on the employer's end. All of my instructors had been very encouraging and reassuring about my job prospects, but I'm still worried. I'm going to keep fleshing out my portfolio and replacing older work and school work with any real projects I get in the meantime. I sent out prospecting emails to a few companies and got a response from one saying that they're not hiring now, but will keep my info on file since they were impressed by my portfolio.
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Apr 29, 2017 18:46
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Duck Party posted:I know a guy in his late 40's that just started in the animation industry after a career in the marines. You aren't too old. He actually had an advantage when he started because his seemingly unrelated work experience made him easier to work with than some of these younguns who never had a real job before and have no idea how to act in a professional environment. My advice is to stay positive, do the art you want to get hired for making, and put yourself out there. JuniperCake posted:What are your goals specifically? Do you want a 9-5 art job at an office or do you want to freelance. Also what kind of art do you want to create? Graphic design, illustration, comics, animation, fine art, concept art, etc. I got banned and forgot to reply, but I've gone part-time at my current job because my bosses are great and understanding, so I'm currently hopping between Schoolism, Scott Robertson and Proko videos, about 4 hours a day + weekends. In terms of what art,  . It's too early for me to know what I want, but I think creature design might be fun, animation too.
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May 5, 2017 19:46
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ijyt posted:I got banned and forgot to reply, but I've gone part-time at my current job because my bosses are great and understanding, so I'm currently hopping between Schoolism, Scott Robertson and Proko videos, about 4 hours a day + weekends. In terms of what art, Super cool that your employer is being supportive of your goals. I've had employers like that in the past, and I am so incredibly grateful to them for giving me the opportunities to flex my skills. As far as what you want to do, you should try to figure that out sooner rather than later. There's a lot of overlap in skills for visual creative jobs, but each one also requires specialization and the longer you wait to dive into the specifics (the things each job needs besides "knowing how to draw") the harder it will be to stand out. The two jobs you mentioned, animator and creature design, are really different, with totally different skillsets and even working hours/conditions, especially depending if you are talking about 2D animation, 3D animation, movies, TV, or games. It would do you good to learn more about the working conditions and job security present in the fields you're interested in, lots of people think animation sounds cool but don't realize that an animation job usually comes with tons of overtime, burnout is incredibly high among animators.
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May 6, 2017 15:43
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Ask me about being laid off 3 times in 3 years!
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May 6, 2017 16:33
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