Universities
To begin this task I will list Universities which provide courses which are relevant to my chosen career pathway and clearly identify the qualifications and UCAS points required to be accepted. I will also have to describe what the course entails, such as the skills and knowledge they will teach and then evaluate how each of these courses will meet my required progression for the future.
University of brighton – Games art and design ba(hons)
This course doesn’t entirely revolve around having GCSE’s and they would prefer the highest grades from an Extended Diploma over the grades of DMM-MMM where at this point they could potentially give a conditional offer. The UCAS Tariff point requirements are relatively low considering I’m aiming for the highest grade possible and if I manage to achieve this I will surpass their requirement immensely. This will benefit me greatly due to the fact that I failed my GCSE’s in 2014 because I had to leave school due to mental health issues and bullying.
The course states that it is for students who want to design imagery and assets and will cover aspects of character and environment design with a focus on visual narrative and play. Therefor this course doesn’t seem to fit my needs due to my lack of interest in character design and narrative within games, However I will explore further into what they have to offer.
The course seems to focus around a variety of aspects of games development in general however seems to lack content for teaching my desired specialism which is 3D art, as you can see there appears to be only one area of study based around image making, visual effects, asset creation and concept art. This would be good for me however the rest of the course doesn’t appeal to me in any way and the title of the course being ‘Games Art and Design’ is fairly misleading.
Currently their only open day for the course is on the 8th June 2019, I have no intention of visiting this course as I am not satisfied with the contents of the course at all therefor I am going to keep this one very brief.
university of hertfordshire – 3d computer animation and modelling BA(hons)
The qualifications for this course include 72-168 UCAS points which can be achieved if I complete my extended diploma in Level 3 Games Development with relatively high grades such as distinctions and possibly merits. They also require you to have GCSE Maths and English at a grade 4 or above (Grade C if taken prior to 2015) which unless I take a year out to obtain these I will not have, as well as an extensive portfolio which I will be building up further throughout this next year.
The first year of this course they will teach you the latest software and animation techniques as well as the essential skills required throughout the degree such as character design, narrative and drawing. After this year you will have the experience in your chosen area of study and will have the chance to switch to either of the two other degree routes.
In the second year they focus around film, animation and cinematographic practices including film language, illusion of life character animation and post production for integrating and compositing 3D-SFX, as well as a self initiated project with ‘professional help’ to complete the second year.
In the final year they prepare you for life after university such as employment, they require you to make a final short film project using all of the skills learnt throughout the year and produce a showreel and a professional website in preparation for work in the industry.
I’m quite interested in this course as I think in the future it would be quite fun to explore different aspects of 3D even if it’s within movie/film production as well as cinematography. Although I’m not entirely sure whether this is suitable for my progress in the future as I would like to work on assets/environments within video games themselves instead of working on movies, plus if I really want to go down this type of pathway in the future I can experiment throughout this next year to see whether it interests me or not.
Below is a list of current campus open days where you can have a tour of the university itself, I couldn’t find the open days for the specific course in question which is why I’ve included this. This could actually be useful because if I’m going to be attending a place of education for 3-4 years I would like to explore the campus to see if it’s a good fit for me and whether or not I’d be comfortable going there and if i’d be comfortable traveling that far.
University of hertfordshire – 3d game art & design
The course above stated that after the first year you can decide to switch to other degree routes, I’ve explored the website to find the other courses they say you can switch to and this one in particular seems to fit my interests far more than the one above.
This course revolves around the development of 3D art within games aswell as level design and environmental design. Over the 3 years you will have the chance to work in groups to create game levels within games engines which would be particularly useful as I’d like to further develop my team work skills in the future. This course includes a final project similar to what I’m used to on the Level 3 games development course where you create assets or work as a team to create a level including characters and assets from scratch.
The requirements to obtain a spot on this course are exactly the same as the course displayed above meaning I will have to retake my GCSE exams, This will be a pretty big deal for me as I struggle to multi-task and therefor will not be able to do this alongside the current level 3 course I’m taking.
Overall this would be an extremely suitable university course for me as it includes everything that I’m interested in such as the development of 3D assets and environments for games as well as working in teams to produce a level for a games engine which would be great experience for when I eventually graduate.
university for the creative arts – games arts
To begin with, the requirements for UK applicants are to have one of the listed requirements bullet pointed below as well as 4 GCSE passes at grade A* – C and or grade 4-9 including English.
There is a very good point behind their requirements as they state that they occasionally make offers which are lower than standard entry criteria, to students who have faced difficulties that have affected their performance and who were expected to achieve higher results. We consider the strength of our applicants’ portfolios, as well as their grades – in these cases, a strong portfolio is especially important.
After reading this I gave them a call and explained my past difficulties where I had to drop out of school and failed my GCSE exams due to bullying and they have said that as long as I achieve relatively high grades they will most likely accept me with purely a Level 3 extended diploma in Games development. This means I won’t have to spend an extra year retaking my exams, however if they don’t accept me I will have to take them accordingly.
This course states that during the 3 years of learning you will explore 2D and 3D development, current tools, technologies, games design disciplines, critical thinking and the context of game-play. The various skills learnt throughout this course will be taught using industry software such as Autodesk Maya, Quixel Suite, Zbrush, Unity, Unreal, Marvelous Designer and more. They also provide the opportunity to use production cameras, workshops and digital editing studios as part of the degree.
I’ve explored further into this subject and found some 3D artwork produced by students including characters, environments and props such as weaponry and others. Some of the artwork shown in the video below are extremely impressive in my opinion however.. others not so much, that being said this isn’t a huge issue as it’s not necessarily the way they have been taught but more how experienced they already were when they started or different levels of skills within the field.
The work I found above peaked my interest as I found some artwork very visually appealing as well as the various links to industry and many teaching methods which will be very useful for developing my skills further in the future. Due to this I have found various dates as to when I can visit the university to explore the features and work spaces provided for the game students and possibly even to visit surrounding areas.
De Montford University (Leicester) – Game Art
De Montford University’s Game Art course has achieved the highest ranking possible under the Teaching Excellence Framework which indicates the outstanding learning and teaching they have to offer with a 98% overall student satisfaction rate.
This particular course at De Montford requires a variety of criteria including 5 GCSEs at grade C or above, 120+ UCAS points, an Extended Diploma at DMM and an extensive Portfolio. Due to the high standards set at De Montford, I can understand how they set the requirements higher than most of the other choices I’ve researched.
Below you can see the student gallery of various pieces of artwork produced on this course, as you can see the work is incredible giving evidence to my previous statement about high standards. I’m sure I could eventually get to a stage where my work is at the standards or close to some of these students however currently I don’t think i’m quite there yet.
This course teaches you a variety of industry standard software including 3ds Max, Photoshop and unreal engine. From the image below they only seem to have these as an option for producing 3d Art whereas other universities teach a wider range including z-brush, substance and others.
This course states that it will teach you the basics of 3d modelling through a variety of projects and texturing them using photoshop and ‘other digital origination tools within the first year as well as practicing various traditional art styles and exploring historical contents and future developments of computer games, technology, art and culture.
In the second year you will learn more advanced techniques for 3d asset creation alongside them introducing you to Unreal engine to learn topics such as lighting, level design and shaders.
Overall the course focuses rather intensively around traditional art and research which lacks 3D modelling content in my opinion, however that’s just my perception of the modules.
DMU offers open days on various dates throughout the year, mainly toward summer holidays/end of the year. I doubt I will attend one of these open days due to the fact I don’t think this particular study would be beneficial for me in the future because of the lack of practical work based around 3d art.
James' 2nd Year - Level 3 