If asked 10 years ago, "what is your dream job?" a junior animator would likely name one of the major film studios who were creating blockbusters like Monsters, Inc., the Star Wars prequels, Shrek, or the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Today, many of these 10-year veteran animators have moved from film animation to game animation to work on mega-hit series like Halo, Team Fortress 2, Half Life, Ratchet and Clank, and Uncharted.

What happened in the game industry to encourage such transitions? And what does game animation have to offer junior animators?

Many of today's animators were raised on video games with rudimentary characters consisting of a few large blocks arranged in semi-recognizable shapes. Early games such as Pac-Man and Super Mario Bros. focused on gameplay over visual style due to technical limitations of the hardware and the fact that the games were created by computer engineers with little artistic training. As such, Mario's character animation in his first feature game consisted of five frames: two for running, one for jumping, one for turning, and one for dying. Compared with animated films of the same time period such as An American Tail or The Little Mermaid, video game animation was virtually non-existent. In fact, many animators grew up in a time when the video game industry was not considered to be viable employment for an animator.

As technology improved, video game animation became more attractive as a profession. One feature-film-animator-turned-game-animator said "every five years, a new generation of game consoles is released which raises the bar on what can be done in a game. The current generation of consoles allows for games with character rigs more complex than the rigs I used when I began animating for feature films. Just think of what the next generation of consoles and computers will allow!" The evolution of technology creates new possibilities that seemed impossible a few years ago. In 1995, rendering a single 2k frame with the equivalent of 5 million polygons in Toy Story took 4-13 hours, while 2009 games Uncharted 2 and Ratchet and Clank Future: A Crack in Time render 5 million polygons 60 times every second. As consoles and computers improve, the technological difference between animating for film and games diminishes.

But what about the artistic differences?

Animators working on the next DreamWorks film animate less frames-per-week than animators working on the next Tinkerbell feature. And in many cases, game animators final more frames per week than feature film animators. This is understandable because most movies clock in at roughly 2 hours, while many games are 10 hours long with varying levels of animation requirements. Similar to film animation, game animation requirements vary by studio and project. One difference at game studios is the lack of a hard release date. Film studios announce movie release dates a year in advance with little room for change because of the competitive summer movie schedule and merchandise tie-ins.

For some game companies, there isn't a concrete release date. Video game studios Valve and Blizzard have the mentality "it is finished when it is finished," and rarely announce release dates until they are certain the game is near completion. Blizzard premiered an extensive trailer for its long-awaited game Starcraft 2 over three years before the game's release in July 2010. Release flexibility gives game animators more time to polish their animation and lessens the impact of "crunch time," which occurs in the last few weeks before a project's release. Films like Iron Man 2 or Avatar may have crunch times for many months in order to finish all of the visual effects before the release date.

Artistically, animating games provides many challenges and opportunities. In film animation, as long as the animation is visually appealing in the director's camera, the animator can "cheat" poses with actions such as stretching the arms twice their length or breaking other parts of the rig to fit the scene. But in game animation, the camera reacts to the player's actions and may rest anywhere in the 3D space around the character. Therefore, game animation must look realistic from all angles. This challenge also offers new opportunities, as described by one game animator "movies are relatively short, linear, non-interactive stories while games' interactivity and length create the opportunity for a deeper, emotional relationship between character and player. Instead of creating animation for someone to watch, you create a way for them to be; they are your character and can project themselves into the story while you bring their actions to life. This freedom allows for more creative control over the animation since you are no longer constrained to a linear, unchangeable scene that was established years in advance by the film's director. Instead, you determine what you want the player to feel with his actions in the 3D space."

The industry's relative youth and reliance on technology over pre-established practices offers many other benefits to animators. While the majority of animation for blockbuster movies is created within a few hours driving distance from Hollywood, California, blockbuster games are created in studios across the nation. Prospective animators can use websites like www.gamedevmap.com to find amazing studios in most major cities. Currently, many movie studios, especially visual effects studios, hire on a "run of film" contract basis, while the trend in game studios is to hire salaried animators. Movie sequels require months of preparation and high overhead, which discourages studios from retaining animators during the down months prior to a movie's release and the sequel's green light. Alternatively, game franchise sequels or downloadable content can begin production immediately using the previous installments' assets. Finally, while many major movies require thousands of artists to create (Avatar alone employed more than 1,000 visual effects artists), many major game studios create AAA games with teams of less than 200. The smaller numbers once again offer animators more creative control over their animation than their movie counterparts as well as more robust profit sharing options.

The growth of the game industry from rudimentary five frame animation to a feature animation equivalent has turned the heads of both veteran and junior animators. There's been robust growth in the gaming industry. Analysts released a recent report that predicts worldwide gaming revenues will total $70.1 billion in 2015. That's an increase of 16 percent from the $60.4 billion recorded for 2009. To add to the boom, more entertainment studios are creating franchises exclusively for gaming and adding plans for gaming labs to their operations. But, like any rapidly growing industry, there are certain areas that still need to improvement (examples of this include the "EA Spouse", "R* Spouse", and "Infinity Ward exodus" controversies). Veteran film animators have learned (the hard way) to be wary of the industry for such reasons. Before determining if either the game or film industries are the right fit, animators need to research the companies in which they are interested. With proper research and preparation, the game industry offers many challenges, opportunities, and rewards that any animator can appreciate; a stark contrast to 10 years ago when feature film animators easily dismissed the entire industry.

When asked "what is your dream job?" junior animators don't limit their wish list to just the studios. The bustling boutiques such as Valve, Blizzard, Bungee, and Insomniac are also high on their list as dream jobs.

 

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Jay Epperhart is an Animation Mentor graduate, former Pixar artist, and Technical Care Specialist at Animation Mentor. http://www.anotherj.blogspot.com