In this course, as part of the team-forming activity, you will be creating a “game portfolio.” The character of this document depends on the role you’d like to play on a game design team. AS outlined earlier, there are a few basic roles to fill on any game design team in this class:
- Designer
- Developer
- Artist
- Quality Assurance
- Management
You should orient your portfolio for one of these tasks. Please keep in mind that this portfolio is not merely about completing an assignment for a class. For those of you who want to get into the game industry it is an opportunity to start the materials you’ll need to apply for a job. For others it’s a good thing to practice both in professional resume and graduate application preparation. To help you understand how to structure this material, please visit the following resources:
Game Career Basics:
http://www.gamecareerguide.com/features/361/game_careers_the_basics.php
Game Career Guide:
- Putting Together a Compelling Resume and Demo (Everyone):
- Game Design Portfolio Overview (Designers):
- Game Programming Demo Portfolio (Developers):
- Porn Elves and Other Offenses of the Common Student Portfolio (Artists):
- So you want to be a Game Producer:
If you decide not to read any of these materials, you should still understand that content is king. Your portfolio should be expository. It should show what you’ve done and demonstrate what you can do. This is true of artists, designers, developers, managers and QA.
Portfolio Samples:
- Art Portfolio (mostly concept art, former student): http://www.raingate.net/
- Art Demo Reel (environment models, former student): http://www.sergii.com/SergiiB_demoreel.mov
- Art Demo Reel (environment and props, former student): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmoM0Q_3-LI
- Technical Artist/Game Developer: http://gtproductions.net/index.php?tab=games
- Developer Portfolio: http://www.mollyjameson.com/ProfessionalProjects/index.html
A few folks you may know:
- Robin Hunicke, Designer Portfolio: http://www.cs.northwestern.edu/~hunicke/
- Jenova Chen: http://www.jenovachen.com/
- Brenda Brathwaite: http://bbrathwaite.wordpress.com/consulting/
last updated: 8/29/11
