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A Day in the Life of an Agency Intern, Part Four
When she originally won an internship at SOE's The Agency through the Gamers in Real Life program, Julia Brasil had no idea that MMORPG.com would be tracking her progress, but that's exactly what our own Carolyn Koh is doing, checking in with the new developer on a regular basis. Today is part four.
Keep a look out tomorrow for the final installment, a short interview with Agency Producer Sherry Floyd about the intern experience.
| MMORPG.com: | What did you think this internship would encompass before you started working for SOE Seattle? |
| Julia Brasil: | To be honest, I had heard plenty of stories from colleagues about their internships, a few of which were quite intimidating. Some joked that they did little more than babysit computers and refill staplers. So when I started as an intern I expected to be doing small errands around the studio or watching over the shoulders of the real professionals as they went about their work. |
| MMORPG.com: | What was asked of you that was unexpected? |
| Julia Brasil: | Everything since day one! When I was asked if I would be interested in designing a space for the game, my jaw literally fell and hasn't really returned to its proper place since. The more I heard about Club Metamorphosa, the more amazed I became, it is a very unique and complex area and for weeks I kept thinking Sherry or Corey ( Corey Dangel, art director for The Agency) would come to and send me off to do coffee or something of the sort. After that it was just one more surprising thing after the other. |
| MMORPG.com: | What did you do during your internship? How were your skills used? Were they pushed? Did you find you could do more than what you had learned? |
| Julia Brasil: | Before I started the internship, I really didn't know what I wanted to do. I wanted to be a game developer, sure, but there is a wide variety of career paths within that. For my 3 months here I focused more on design (with the whitebox for Metamorphosa) and art (with the paintovers and later on with props). I had never used the Unreal Engine before and had just begun learning 3d modeling so it was very challenging in the beginning. As I progressed on the Metamorphosa whitebox, however, I realized I was working much faster than before and modeling in 3d was a bit easier. I obviously still have a long way to go but being able to put what I know to work has certainly taught me a lot. |
| MMORPG.com: | Did you get a project completed during your internship or will it get to be finished by the team? |
| Julia Brasil: | The Metamorphosa club is far from complete. It is a very large space and it would take a single environment artist at least a month to finish just the 3d model, let alone lighting it, and for a newbie intern such as myself, it would probably a colossal undertaking far beyond my capacities at the moment. |
| MMORPG.com: | What was your major at The Art Institute before you did your internship? Has anything you learned while at SOE Seattle influenced you to do anything differently when you get back to school? |
| Julia Brasil: | I was (and hopefully, still am) a Game Art and Design major at the Art Institute in San Francisco, and yes, my experience here definitely helped me find out what skills I need to improve on in the next year or so. |
;) | |
| MMORPG.com: | Why SOE Seattle? What about The Agency drew you? |
| Julia Brasil: | It has spies in it! What is there not to like?! Joke aside, I was always interested in MMORPGs and the process of creating them, which is quite different than a single player game. Unfortunately, I was never a big fan of high fantasy titles and the modern, high tech atmosphere of The Agency seemed like a good change of pace from the usual sword and magic of MMORPGs. |
| MMORPG.com: | That was the best thing that happened to you during your time at SOE Seattle? |
| Julia Brasil: | That is a tough question...I suppose participating in the brainstorm meeting for club Metamorphosa was very interesting since it involved both design and art teams, but were I to pick one moment in particular I'd say it was right after I finished the whitebox for Metamorphosa and had someone successfully run around it for the first time. That was awesome! |
| MMORPG.com: | Were there any lessons you learned that you’d like to share? |
| Julia Brasil: | I cannot stress enough the importance of doing an internship! It should be a requirement for any game developer hopeful out there, because you learn a lot in a really short time and you see the industry for what it really is. Also, for those who already are interns or want a more focused advice: Don't hesitate to ask questions! I, for one, was very afraid to disturb anyone with my problems, but there is no other way to learn. I found everyone at the studio to be really friendly and willing to help despite their busy schedules. |
As a long time programmer/developer (of business apps sadly, not games), I can say that an internship will probably tell you two things about programming/developing (and probably most jobs):
1) Will you actually LIKE doing it?
2) It shows you that school is nothing compared to reality.
I remember one of the interns I had who said that he did "More work on his first day (with us) than his entire school career" (He went to a business school specialized for programming). I had to tell him "Forget everything you've learned at school.... this is the really real world now."
In theory, the theoretical world and the real world are one and the same... in reality, they almost never touch....
I agree completely.
One thing that's always annoyed me about the programming world (and I know many disagree) is the the emphasis on maths.
I'm crap at maths. I was part of a 'guinea pig' program where we didn't learn how to work things out on paper at school. It was all calculators. Getting my degrees was damn hard for me, and I only just scraped through.
So what do I do now? Well, I did a bit in the games world, and currently I'm involved in research on artificial intelligence. Headed back to uni next year though to study psychology, but that's probably a mid-life crisis thing
So anyway, as much as I find this ongoing story boring as hell and bordering on sexism, there really is no substitute for experience in a working environment. Skool iz fer teh suxxorz!
I actually found this to be an in teresting read.I wanted to see how they treat her,what they allowed her top do and explain the working environment she was placed in.
I kind of think they should have leaned her towards some texture work,as she is more into art than 3d modeling,but no question it was still a great experience for her.I bet she learned more in one month than a whole year in school.The Unreal engine is maybe the most popular engine in the world right now,so it is great she was introduced to it.I am not sure she even knew or heard of it before hitting the SOE studios.
The other reason i think she should have been shown the whole ropes behind a map is because it can really change your way of thinking,when you see how hard it is to implement some things,such as the textures ,lighting ect. ect.You would of course have to understand the size of the player models,so you are not creating tight spots or places that will seem unrealistic or unreachable in the game.Personally i would need to understand the whole game play before i design a part of a map,because you would want it to play properly for fight scenes.
I am not really sure on this bar she was making,was it actually a playable part of the game?or was it going to be part of a cut scene or something like that?I have a short memory ,maybe i missed that part in the earlier parts.
I think this shows,that development studios really should look at developing their own members by setting up their own schools designed to train students the way they need them.Sure it might limit your over all training ,but very marginally,as most games out there are pretty much using the same kind of engines and the same outside programs such as 3D studio max,albeit that one may be getting outdated .
Julia Brasil" I found everyone at the studio to be really friendly and willing to help despite their busy schedules." Let me guess all the people that help Julia Brasil are guys and drop what they doing all just for you lol. Yeah I'm jerk.
Heh - yea...an honest one though.