Passionate about animation and video games? You might want to explore a career as a game animator/designer. With a Bachelor of Vocational in VFX Film Making & Animation, you're well-equipped to work in the gaming industry. But, how exactly can you get started? Let us walk you through all the essential steps.
ALSO READ : The Career to consider after Bachelor of Vocational in VFX Film Making and Animation: Rigging Artist
How Do the Skills You Acquired during Your Degree Translate to Game Design?
Here’s a common misconception: game animation and film animation are the same!
No, on the surface, both may involve storytelling, character development, and visuals, but games require a completely different approach to animating and designing. In film, everything revolves around a controlled narrative, with each frame carefully coordinated.
In gaming, however, the player becomes an active participant. As a game animator, you must anticipate every unpredictable move the player might make. Characters can’t just walk or run in a straight line; they must be able to dodge, crouch, interact with their environment, or react in real time based on player inputs. This requires an entirely different mindset and skill set, yet what comes in handy are the fundamentals of motion and design that you honed during your Bachelor’s in VFX.
Here’s how you can harness your film animation skills to excel as a game animator or designer:
- Understanding Weight and Movement: In both VFX and game animation, weight distribution, gravity, and how characters move through space remain crucial. The difference is in how you control these movements. In games, you’ll create loops, ensuring that your character’s movements can seamlessly repeat or transition without interrupting the player’s experience.
- Emotional Expression: Conveying a character's emotions is important, whether on the big screen or in a game. As a game animator, you’ll have to take this one step further, ensuring that the expressions remain consistent even as the player moves through different situations.
Game Animator vs. Game Designer: Which One is Your Ideal Fit?
When considering a career after a vocational degree in VFX Film Making & Animation, you must at least know everything about the two most popular career paths in the gaming industry: game animation and game design. Though closely related, they require very different skills and perspectives.
Game Animator
Game animators bring characters, creatures, and worlds to life, giving them the physicality and motion that make them engaging.
Whether it's a warrior leaping into battle or a simple background element swaying with the wind, animators ensure that every movement is fluid and convincing.
As a game animator, you'll work on:
- Character Animations: These range from walking, running, and fighting to more subtle actions like breathing or looking around.
- Creature Animations: Not everything in a game is human. Designing animations for creatures—animals, robots, or completely fantastical beings—requires imaginative anatomy and creative thinking.
- Environmental Animations: Players are usually drawn into the game by its background – be it swaying trees or waterfalls. A game animator makes sure these details don’t go unnoticed.
- Your film-based VFX background will equip you with the attention to detail and storytelling ability essential for game animation.
But the biggest challenge? Adding interactivity.
In this profession, you’ll need to develop animations that react to a player’s choices, which is something static film never demands.
Game Designer
While animators focus on how things move and interact, game designers construct the framework that holds a game together.
They create the framework, rules, and gaming mechanisms.
This demands both a creative and technical mind, capable of bridging the gap between artistry and technology.
Game designers are responsible for:
- Level Design: Crafting environments that are both visually stunning and functional.
- Gameplay Mechanics: Deciding how players interact with the game, whether through puzzles, combat, or exploration.
- Narrative Development: Weaving a compelling story into the game's framework, ensuring that it feels natural as the player progresses.
Though game design is more on the technical side, your storytelling skills from VFX film-making will give you an edge.
In game design, you’ll essentially direct the experience, much like you would in a film, but in a more open-ended, player-driven way.
Working in the Gaming Industry: Is There Really a Scope? If Yes, Where?
It’s no secret that the gaming industry has become more popular in recent years. From mobile games to massive multiplayer online (MMO) ones, the market is full of opportunities. Moreover, with technology like virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) on the rise, the demand for skilled animators and designers is only going to increase.
Where Can You Find Your Niche?
There are countless subfields within gaming, from indie development to massive AAA productions, each with a unique culture and demands. Here are the key areas you may want to explore:
- Indie Games: These smaller teams offer more creative freedom to animators and designers. If you want to participate in almost every aspect of a project, indie gaming might be for you.
- AAA Titles: These massive productions, like those produced by industry giants such as EA or Ubisoft, offer more resources and are more specialized. Here, you might focus solely on character animation or environment design.
- Mobile Gaming: With mobile gaming growing exponentially, there's a demand for more streamlined, efficient animations. It could be your calling!
- Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR): VR and AR are pushing the boundaries of game design and animation, requiring new approaches to storytelling and interactivity.
Building a Portfolio That Stands Out
Whether you aim to become a game animator or designer, your portfolio will play a key role.
Unlike a typical CV, the portfolio showcases your best work and gives potential employers an insight into your creative and technical abilities.
Essential Portfolio Tips:
- Diversify Your Work: Show that you can handle a variety of animation styles or game mechanics. Include human and non-human animations, both a mix of realistic and stylized work.
- Highlight Your VFX Background: Leverage the fact that you have experience in VFX. Perhaps you worked on creating realistic explosions or dynamic lighting effects—these skills translate well to gaming.
- Show Your Process: Employers want to see not just the final product, but how you arrived there. Include sketches, drafts, and behind-the-scenes breakdowns of your projects.
Conclusion
The gaming industry is constantly evolving, and as a professional, you must keep up with the changes. Whether it’s learning a new software tool, like Blender or Unity, or familiarizing yourself with the latest advancements in AI-based game design, continuous education is key. Remember, while technical skills are important, gaming is a highly collaborative field.
Animators and designers must work closely with developers, sound designers, and even writers to ensure a cohesive final product.
Building a network of professionals can lead to new opportunities and collaborations that may define your career.