Week 24- Feedback

The Game Art course has been a really challenging experience for me so far but also one that has offered a lot of satisfaction. I have found that all the skills that are being learnt are really difficult to pick up initially but that once you are through the initial discomfort they become very satisfying to develop.

At the beginning of this year, I hated doing 3D modelling but after getting to grips with the intimidating interface I actually find it quite relaxing and enjoyable to create things (providing Max doesn't want to spontaneously combust in my face or act like a "terrible two" who wants his own way).

I have found it quite stressful when we have been given tasks such as one day projects on top of other work, but it has made me work harder to understand 3Ds Max or techniques in painting. I think that if done at a sensible time, they can be really useful to create a challenge.

The traditional Art classes have been enjoyable, especially when we have got out of the class to see parks and the space center and pumping station.

I would really like to learn some photoshop skills though. I still am really unconfident with how I should approach the tools and making different types of pictures. I have learnt a little on my own and from watching other people, but I really feel like I'm just scratching the surface of what I could do and that maybe I am not arranging my layers properly etc. I have picked up things from magazines that have been useful, but I find that I use those techniques so often that it just doesn't look any different everytime I paint. I find it much easier to learn new skills when I try something somebody shows me, and with photoshop being a computer program, I often feel overwhelmed with all of the buttons and I don't know where to start.

Maybe the occasional workshop showing techniques used in industry would be useful, maybe even getting somebody from industry to show us how to do something and we could work alongside him/her?

I have enjoyed hearing the guest lecturers, but all in all have actually found it quite discouraging listening to what they have to say about the industry. People like Jolian Webb made me excited about what I could achieve because it looked like it was worth something morally and that even within standard Blitz games that I would be able to create something brilliant. Other lecturers just told us that we would never be paid well for the first X number of years and that we would have to work ridiculously hard on something we wouldn't be passionate about and to be honest that seemed to be all they spoke about.

I liked finding out how certain games work: the guy from Sega Rally really interested me when he was telling us the different ways they "create illusions" to make the game seems realistic. For example, the ways in which they created mud on the cars and the environments surrounding the tracks. That was facinating and other lectures like that were equally as facinating.

Game City was brilliant, I can't wait to go again next year. I loved hearing about the physics engines for games and seeing the producers of different games talk about them. I was also very impressed that they come to us to ask for new ideas. That made me feel like I was a part of it.

I look forward to the new year of teaching. I would like to see more things like the hands on workshops we have been doing as they have made me consider new ways of designing and creating. Overall I have been happy with the course even though it has been difficult so far. I definately feel like I am learning. I have been able to come home and show people what I have done and feel proud of it.