Enivronment Artist

[matthewzanetti]

Hi, I'm currently studying Computer Games Development at Abertay University, working as an artist hoping to specialise as an environment artist.

Currently I'm doing some research for a module (Professional Specialisation) and looking into how I can differentiate myself from other applicants and was wondering if there was anyone with experience in the industry that could give me some advice.

My undergraduate degree was in Interior Architecture so I was looking to use this as my starting point. As that goes here are some questions I have been asking.

1. Is it possible to specialise in purely creating interior spaces or are environment artists expected to work on all aspects of the gaming environment?

2. What is the true value of architectural knowledge when it comes to games?

3. With games becoming more advanced and the environments more believable is there any scope for someone to be employed to design the spaces in an architectural manner or is it still very much the level designers job to block out the spaces and then tell the environment artists to make it look like an airport/church, etc?

4. Primarily I imagine an architectural knowledge will be extremely useful in the concept design/research stage but is it something which could have weighting all through out the development cycle.

thank you for taking the time to have a look at this for me.

Matt

[Julius]

Given by the lack of replies you guessed already that this is not the right place to ask

For discussing with some industry insiders I would suggest you head over to www.polycount.com

People around here are usually independent/hobbyist "one man does it nearly all" developers who wouldn't even dare to thing about this kind of specializations