JACK OF ALL TRADES
- Feb 24, 2017
- 3 min read
Another week, another guest lecturer at the University Of Bolton. This week saw Jonathan Reilly the senior creature character artist at Double Negative. Jonathan started off his career as a character artist for Bizarre Creations, moving on to environment artist at both Sony and TT Fusion (Reilly, 2017). This background however did not limit Jonathan from just staying in the games industry and this aspect of transferable skills is where this blog aims to look in-depth into today.
Above: https://www.brandman.edu/blog/20-transferable-skills-alternative-career-choices-teachers
So if an individual in the games industry has the skills (like Jonathan) in modelling and environmental design and more, where can they launch their career other than the games industry. This is a key question for anyone stuck between employment in the games industry which is a ruthless industry with many developers being made redundant between projects each year. Transferable skills are not limited to modelling and art work however, every aspect that a game industry developer works on can be transferable into different industries, from coding, to music production and more (Aliaga, 2010).
Taking modelling for example (3D), it allows an individual to produce CG work for television and films, indeed this is one track that Jonathan himself took unto undergoing, moving from character artist within games to producing characters and more within films such as the Jungle book (Walt Disney Pictures - Fairview Entertainment, 2016) producing Shere Khan. There are even films being produced that are entirely computer generated graphics, such as the resident evil (Capcom Studios - Digital Frontier, 2008) CG films, which would allow a previous games industry developer to work upon the CG environment elements such as production within Maya and more.
(Above) http://villains.wikia.com/wiki/File:The_Jungle_Book_2016_Shere_Khan_Poster
Next looking into music and special effects production for computer games, with artists producing voice overs, folly work and more. This is directly transferable to the film and TV industry as most productions are heavily edited in the ways of sound. With sound effects overlay onto production materials to recreate noises that may not have been in the initial scene, for example a scream in the distance or a train passing by. Looking deeper, a game soundtrack such as the work by Hans Zimmer on Crysis 2 (Crytek, 2011), could be argued to be at the exact same quality required to be within a film soundtrack, indeed Hans Zimmer himself works on many films including but not limited to the Christopher Nolan Batman films (Legendary Pictures - Syncopy, 2012). Thus it could be argued that a soundtrack producer for video games could do the opposite leap from Hans and move from Video games to full film soundtrack production.
(Above) http://collider.com/interstellar-score-hans-zimmer-dark-knight-trilogy/
Another aspect that can help a game developer move into a new job elsewhere other than the games industry could be coding, as coding affects most computerised systems and programs in some way. Languages such as HTML and Javascript are both universally used, if the programmer knows both it will open a lot of doors into other professions, such as building applications (which is not too dissimilar from game development) and more. Programming knowledge could even open doors towards online security roles.
The vast amount of skills that developers learn and use give them keys to other roles in other industries, they just have to know what that industry requires and the ability to market themselves towards such a role.
References:
Aliaga, R. (2010, August 24th). Video Games and Transferable Skills. Retrieved from Gamasutra: http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/RaulAliaga/20100824/87907/Video_games_and_transferable_skills.php [Accessed on 27/2/17]
Capcom Studios - Digital Frontier. (2008). Resident Evil: Degeneration. [Motion Picture]. Culver City, California, United States: Sony Pictures (US).
Crytek. (2011). Crysis 2. [PC Software]. Redwood City, California, United States: Electronic Arts.
Legendary Pictures - Syncopy. (2012). The Dark Knight Rises. [Motion Picture]. Burbank, California, United States: Warner Bros. Pictures.
Reilly, J. (2017). Jonathan Reilly - LinkedIn Profile. Retrieved from LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathan-reilly-49358a27/?ppe=1 [Accessed on 27/2/17]
Walt Disney Pictures - Fairview Entertainment. (2016). The Jungle Book. [Motion Picture]. Burbank, California, United States: Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures.
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