Is Game Artist Good for my brother?

[TheeCakee]

He can draw very well, and draws allot. However, he doesn't like computers and is telling me that he won't do this if he has to sit on a computer and make the art rather than hand drawing it.

I just want to find something for him, he has had a ruff life with drugs and all and a horrible GPA. I am going away soon to Penn State to major in Computer Science and in a year or so he needs to be thinking about college as well.

[ThomasSLC]

I can tell you the most common hand drawing jobs in game development would be concept/character design or cinematics storyboarding, and even those are usually finaled using some program like Photoshop or Illustrator.

Having worked in 2d animation for many years I understand the desire to work with pencil and paper. But I also desire to stay employed, and that usually means learning new tools (Maya, 3dMax) and growing. Life is like that!

[TheeCakee]

Originally Posted by ThomasSLC

I can tell you the most common hand drawing jobs in game development would be concept/character design or cinematics storyboarding, and even those are usually finaled using some program like Photoshop or Illustrator.

Having worked in 2d animation for many years I understand the desire to work with pencil and paper. But I also desire to stay employed, and that usually means learning new tools (Maya, 3dMax) and growing. Life is like that!

Off topic from gaming though:
Seeing that you worked on some movies of my child hood, do movies and television require you to use Photoshop and such? He says he wants to do that.

[ThomasSLC]

Originally Posted by TheeCakee

Off topic from gaming though:
Seeing that you worked on some movies of my child hood, do movies and television require you to use Photoshop and such? He says he wants to do that.

While it's true that traditional 2d animation is done using only pencil and paper, these jobs are not as plentiful in the United States as they used to be. In fact, at the moment, Disney is probably the only major studio producing 2d films, and they're making them fewer and farther between.

As far as TV shows, the bulk of animation is done overseas, in places like South Korea and India, while most of the "hand-drawn" work created in the States is character design, storyboards, and layout which leads back to my original reply.

This is why so many artists (myself included) switched to computer animation.

That being said, while it's not at all impossible to get a job as a 2d animator, the truth is the available positions are far less which makes them much more competitive. Very strong life-drawing skills and draftsmanship along with a deep knowledge of animation principles are whats required to succeed!