Date: March 8th, 7:00
Location: Scooters, 108th and M
Attendees:
For our 3rd meeting, it was nice to pick up a little momentum with the attendence. This time around saw the OGDA welcoming 2 art students and a recently graduated art student. Leah Smith and Kim Nelson currently attend Metro's Elkhorn campus. Shane and I met them when we stopped in to speak to their class about the OGDA. We were quite pleased to have a few people from that visit join us. They tagged recently graduated Michael Kingery in the process who decided to come with as well.
For the 2nd time, the venue was the Scooters at 108th and M. Until someone comes up with a better idea, this place looks good. (Free WiFi comes in handy sometimes during the meetings.)
The topics of conversation meandered throughout the course of the evening. For the most part, introductions took the front seat. In this case, it also included the group having a chance to look at the art portfolios of the newcomers. It was interesting to see three completely different art styles - all of which could easily find their way into games.
Another part of the introductions was centered around the types of games that each person played. Again, the result was indicitive of how widely varied the game industry is. In fact, there was very little overlap of titles or even genres between the six people.
The art students were curious as to what call there was for concept artists in the game industry, what role they played, and when. They were, of course, reassured that there is plenty of room for talented people who can convert the ramblings of an art-neutered designer into a visual entity.
Dave took the occasional time to relay experiences from the recent Game Developers Conference from which he had just returned. (You can find his notes on the conference posted on this page, on the IA News blog and AI-related stuff on IAonAI.)
The laments of Dave, Shane and Jared from past meetings about not having artists handy in the OGDA turned into probing questions about the abilities of the 3 art-centered newcomers. While there are potential ways that talents can be shared in the group, there is still a sizeable need for someone who can whip up 3D models and insert them into Shane and Jared's respective projects.
Jared took some time to show what his project was looking like from an art standpoint and tied it in to a discussion of how he is handling an art production pipeline with a remote artist.
There was some scattered discussion about the potential of working on a joint project. However, there still was the matter of needing a bridge between the concept art and the production art. We are hoping that someone will fill that role soon enough. There is definately interest in that regard, but we are still waiting to achieve that "critical mass" in the OGDA where there will be enough people to make projects like these a viable idea.
We touched on the idea of scheduling of future meetings. Given the schedules of the people still in school - whose classes tend to be in the evening - it made for some difficult decisions. We also don't want to exclude people who work (or recreate) on Saturday nights. No best solution worked its way to the top. For now, it looks like Saturday night is the best bet. Most people agreed, however, that a set night (e.g. first Saturday of the month) would make things easier to plan for in the future. That will likely be a discussion topic for the next meeting.
All in all, it was not a bad 3rd meeting simply based on the idea that we are generating interest in the community. Most of the six people mentioned that they knew someone else to potentially bring to the next meeting. We are hoping to get to the point where we have 10-20 regular attendees. It certainly is doable... it's simply a matter of time and a little leg work. |
