As a child I spent most of my days daydreaming about fantasy scenarios, worlds, colours and super powers. As I grew older the daydreaming never really went away, in fact it had gotten more vivid and I have gotten more creative. It would often frustrate me because I had no way of showing the worlds I imagined. Consequently, this is why I love art, even though I wasn’t the best Illustrator, every image I made conveyed a story.
My interest in Games Design started when I played Final Fantasy X for the first time. I thought the story was amazing, combined with the world design, made me realise that this would be a perfect way to conceptualise my stories. My Father helped me realise that this is possible as he is a CAD Technician and he’d often show me how to use CAD software.
My first experience with CAD was through Sketchup at the age of 7 and I loved designing my own houses there with the help of my father. This love for Sketchup manifested into a hobby and over time, this hobby of mine became more advanced through the introduction of ProDesktop in high school and AutoCAD and Microstation from work experiences.
In 2017 I joined the Level 3 Games Design course at Coleg Gwent. My experience with CAD helped me stand out in class, AutoDesk Maya was just a simple step forward for me. The most challenging part about Game Design is learning how to use a game engine but it wasn’t overly complicated to understand. My favourite memory here is the asset pack project I produced in year one. I wanted to figure out ways to make my creations look great so I decided to push myself to make the best work possible.The project not only showed me that I have the qualities to be a game artist but also a leader or game director as I led my teammate and instructed him to make things to my standard and if he couldn’t then I’d show him ways to improve. We ended up winning the asset pack project competition within the course which motivated me to be the best overall student in terms of skill.
I am a person that always strives to improve and further my skills, I am very self directed, therefore, I not only undertake the workshops during lessons, I always aim to further my learning by undertaking tutorials outside of the classroom. At home I would practice industry level software like ZBrush and Substance Painter to help prepare myself for a generation of games that focuses more on immersion than ever before.
With games such as Witcher 3 and the recently released Red Dead Redemption 2 setting new standards within the industry and also VR technology improving immersion, I believe that game companies now have higher expectations for the next generation of game designers. As an aspiring environment artist I made sure to set an ambitious final major project for myself that is currently in development. This project will be produced via a PBR workflow as I intend to make the environment visually realistic. Each asset will be made on either Maya or Zbrush and textured in Substance Painter taking advantage of the Substance’s baking tool to further enhance the appearance of low polygon assets.
I am a person that prepares for any situation, making sure I have the right knowledge before I start a project. I also bring a positive attitude to lessons and I’m an easy person to approach making teamwork really easy, I am also a confident speaker making it easy to pitch ideas and give constructive feedback.
This is why I am perfect for this course, I am a quick learner and I study independently if it means being a model student and a skilled designer.
Nick Amalin 