My nephew wants to become a game artist. Is this a good career?

Absolutely, it's a huge and ever-evolving industry. As long as this plan isn't an excuse to sit around and play more video games, and if your nephew puts as much time and energy into this plan as any professional artist does, then he should do just fine.

He *MUST* learn how to operate as a responsible business person too. He has to learn the professional end of freelancing, in the case of the very good possibility he doesn't end up working as a staff artist. He has to know how to manage himself as an independent contractor. This is really really crucial. There are tons of really talented artists out there who are living paycheck to paycheck because of poor management on their part, or because the people who hire them may be predatory. It depends a good deal on who he ends up working with, and in what part of the country, but he must know when hes getting took.

He must also learn soft skills of professionalism. Meeting deadlines, acting like a pro, dealing with people, etc.

Think of who will be hiring him.. business people, who's job it is to get their projects in on time and underbudget as possible. Even art directors have a little bit of business savvy, leadership and negotiation skills in them.

He has to learn basics of art too, not just how to draw whats popular now, or anime styles. not just digital stuff. a traditional background in art would serve him well as shadowofdeath said. he might want to think about what part of game art he might want to do. if its into animating the characters or doing figures, he might want to look into figure drawing, character design, how to do character rotations. If he wants to do background art, he might want to look into learning aobut layouts and composition and such. Even if he wants to do 3d modelling and such, a fine art or traditional art background is important.

If he wants to, he can try to *coughpiratecoughcough* some software and pick up some books to help him get started, then he can skip those classes if he goes to art school.

in the end, if he really wants it.. it *can* be a good career... but there is a really high career drop out rate. a lot of people who try never get in, or end up doing something related to it, but not exactly what they wanted to do.

anyway i wish him good luck.

Deffinatley. Last I heard game artists where in high demand. The difficulty of getting into the industry however may also be affected by where you live.

definitely! its a very competitive career which will make lots of money from the most popular video games!

yes it is, as a matter of fact i am going into that field. i am currently in school. my only advice is stay away from drawing anime when starting out, draw from life only. until you are comfortable with it should you move on to fantasy or anime. if he works hard and has the right attitude it will not matter if he lacks in some areas,and this is coming from many of my teachers (all industry professionals for 6+ years). good luck to him and i hope to work a project with him one day.

it is a good career but the amount of money he would be making would depend if the game was put on the shelves and bought by people so it can be risky.but the gaming industry is huge and getting bigger.+5

yes.

Only if he can do it VERY well, because the competition in that industry is "cutthroat," to say the least.

+5

Yes it's an excellent career, but there is a lot to it. He'll never be out of a job and will make good money depending on what he's doing. The work environment is team-based and is pretty laid back. But there is a lot of computer programming, math, and physics involved in creating a video game. I'd suggest going to school for it.

really it is what he thinks is correct for him. i t will be hard for him to start of with but soon he should get into a good company and then it will be much easier for him, or he might want to become independant game designer then that will be even harder for him i recomend the program game maker from yo yo games to get him started

sorry double posted delete this if you can