Taiwan travel independent development developer interview: independent development is "self-realization" rather than "let go of self"

_ After an independent development, quented became a mature developer. Learn to balance the tangle of dreams and reality is a class of every developer compulsory. _

Hello everyone! I am a Chinese medicine shop owner LuCI, the senior designer of the current foreign independent development company, mainly sharing some experience and design information from abroad. Today, this article is mainly in the form of interview, and develops experience and experience with developers who do independent developments abroad.

Interested to read more about independent development design thinking and articles, you can come _ independent development design Chinese medicine shop _ stroll!

The object visited this boss is the academicist Hugo Shih of the CARNEGIE Mellon University Entertainment Technology Center (CMU ETC). He is also the developer of the brigade, currently in the United States, a mobile independent development publisher Applovin (a very popular Hyper-Casual independent development), a very popular Hyper-Casual independent development, has served as Technical Artist (TA, Chinese translation as technical art).

It was also developed the independent independent development before the main reason is HUGO. And the process of his independent development is quite a lot of interesting stories, so I hope everyone listens to his "Independent Development Tour" and related information about TA position. So I hope that I can learn more about different information through this interview.

If you are interested in two friends chatting, you may wish to listen to all content through the next connection! It also talks about a lot of interesting things.

independent development Design Chinese Medicine Board LUCI · [Exhara Developer Interview] EP002-HUGO Shih, Applovin Technical Artist (2021: 07: 30)

is another building of the blood?

Hugo In fact, university is a big building, the research institute is graduated from the construction of the building, its own non-learning independent development related background. After graduation, I worked for a short period of time after the soldiers, I was working in the cultural media company and served as the design and practice of interactive exhibition. Produce exhibition activities in the Forbidden City Exhibition, Center Preservation and other units. However, after returning, I decided to go to the field of the country "independent development design and production", so I gave up the burden of the original studied and went to my dreams.

Talking about this discussion why many people in the field of media technology are architectural. For example, the joint founder of Taiwan independent development Company Sigono Li Siyi (famous "OPUS" series), the current Mircosoft Hololen Chief Designer Tang Shengkai, the young generation of water wolf sun (live main, independent development practitioners) is also the construction department of.

Hugo said that when he was studying, it was just the beginning of several buildings. Many chemical effects produced by the construction industry with computer technology, so many people open the Pandora box for several fields. Because of the curiosity of many 3D related knowledge, Hugo started self-study, and started to play 3Dmax and other modeling software, so gradually towards the field of non-construction industries, and also opened the door that he did not return.

When I came to the Entertainment Technology Center of Carnegie University, Hugo had already settled the goal to become technical art, so the content worked in the team from the drawing, modeling, written, and developing Maya Mel Tools and so on. In the second school year, he joined the US EV EA project. The last semester was studied during the study. He worked in a independent development company in Los Angeles, helping to develop PlayStation Home's content, the company later unfortunately, but Before the end of the internship, I found a work in WEVR and seamlessly. When Hugo joined, WEVR was first developed toward VR virtual real-world development, and the company's well-known work has "theblu".

But later hugo left Los Angeles because of feelings, career, and moved to Northern California. The so-called "people don't be mad boy", in the process of chatting with two dads with children, there is a kind of look back, I see yourself, but this is not necessarily a bad thing. Because of a series of flare, he also opened the road to the stand-alone independent development.

Independent development is "self-realization" rather than "let go of self"

Now I recall, hugo feels that I am stupid. The reason is that the type of "RPG war independent development" "" RPG war independent development "is selected, but ignores the evaluation of the overall project. For him, the size of the RPG war independent development, the design skills, and the experience of development are needed to have certain levels. Even if he once wanted to find a teammate, but because of personal factors, he only had himself. For him, a team can be a very unreal goal.

RPG war independent developments for him, spent too much time in developing and pondering they are not good at, and the original intentions of themselves are different, he also realizes that this will go, only spend more time For individual growth rates, it is not a proportion. After the impulse and ideal, I decided to have a long pain than a short pain cut the RPG war.

And Hugo additionally chooses another new case that is more suitable for Idea with the idea. And this independent development is called "Escape Blueprint). I still remember that the boss often went to the hugo home, helping him to test with a group of ETC alumni. This case is also successful within more than a year, goes to the App Store and Google Play, and also get the gold medal of the _2015 BarrmT independent development design competition.

Hugo said that "falling blueprint" is actually a case that can be mastered. In addition to music is a money to buy, design, development and art are all finished.

The boss will be too much time to hear some independent development developers will take the same lost. I feel that I have to do my favorite type, or the type you want to play. It is indeed feasible, but whether it is a company or an independent team, ** must first consider the structure and ability of its own team, making it more practical than the current content. Of course, there are two times, but not everyone can do it.

The growth after independence

After the "falling blueprint" is completed, he will help him find a lot, and it will help him return to the workplace. It feels independent not just a form of out the mainstream, and more mature is more mature. Even if it is not a company product on the listing, it can get a certain amount of energy in self-learning and in progress. Just like everyone will say a word "learning is you!"

This boss is also very sensitive. Because of the graduation of the "ANAMORPHOSIS" _ "After graduation, I won the work of Sony PlayStationVR after I have been developed. Hugo also obtained the opportunity to work in the American independent development industry because of independent development.

Developing the importance of Side-Project, is quite important for people in the independent development rolling! Whether it is a personal efforts to show your enthusiasm, technology, or thinking. It is undoubtedly a matter of helping yourself.

Another point allows Hugo to feel the relatively, if there is a personal work, you can get the focus of the interview to get on the work. So the vast majority of the interview can be grasped, and these are very common, you can also add a problem. After all, when I developed independently, I will definitely understand a lot of eyebrow corners, and in addition to you, no one will know my work better than you! Therefore, regardless of the development of any project, remember to record the process and ideas of the development.

If once again, will you choose "like" or "Can I"?

When you talk about this boss, I asked Hugo a question: If there is a chance, would you choose the independent development you want to do? Hugo said: "This depends on" There is no knowledge "and" there is no less learned lesson "" because the independent independent development really needs "enthusiasm", there is no enthusiasm, it is hard to support, because you will not do a salary Burning yourself!

In fact, the mainstream market is a bit distance for independent independent developments because the development speed is gap with the market. It is like eating chicken is very red, but there are very few independent teams have the ability to develop a chicken type independent development. Moreover, the marketing marketing is also a level that is lacking in independent independent developments, which requires the capital to operate **.

But Hugo also mentioned at the same time, not because it is far away from the business independent development, choose completely to give up. Many things related to the market are still needed. For example, which platform is now the mainstream, which platform is suitable for your product, which is the red sea needs to avoid and so on. For independent developers, this problem is to take a balance point.

It is very interesting that hugo has developed friends in the United States, most of them choose a trend to develop their favorite themes, not much care. This boss is discussed with hugo, and the conclusion that can be obtained is the relationship between "social environment".

At least social welfare in the United States can be collected, although there are not many, but if each meal shrinks, you can live OK. This boss is also very sensible in Sweden, because in the welfare, it is indeed better than Taiwan. Compared with Sweden, you can receive unemployment subsidies (80% of the original salary, longer more than a year), so developers can also be more peace of mind.

游 是 is a bias but the industry

Hugo mentioned that most independent developers will encounter, probably "family factors" .

"Self-reliable portal out of business to start business and do independent independent developments" This thing is not easy to understand. Because the independent development is an investment will have "possible" recycling products, and plus the industry and very niche industry, so many times the elders or people are not easy to understand what this industry is doing, and hugo I have also experienced such a period.

Taiwan's popular people's attitude towards independent developments is not as good as those in general industries. But do you know, 2020 independent development Industry revenue reached $ 179.7 billion, has surpassed the sum of sports + audio and video entertainment industry. So it is a bias, in fact, it is not very biased, especially the future, and the influence of digital independent developments for people's lives will be larger. From today's Z generation, they can be observed. They are not only using a general social software, and they will choose to use the sandbox independent development to be a social tool.

Back to the theme, he solves the development of the time course is to give yourself a "stop loss point", just like investment. When he is developing the first RPG independent development, it is necessary to spend the time, money and cost, etc., and the resume of a independent development and achievement, if this ultimate goal cannot be reached. More flowers in front of it is white feet. Hugo recommends that you understand your goals and development motives, and set "stop loss points", limit the design and development scale of the project to be within the scope of implementation.

You can not gain knowledge without practice

"Tangible dreams and reality" is that all independent development developers must learn a must. Many times we will have a very far dream, especially in the creative independent development industry, everyone's ideas are very tonal, but when they return to their lives, how much money we have, how much money we have, how much resources can be operate.

Therefore, in order to set the scale, more careful thinking is required to produce a suitable product. The failure cases are constantly changing in the independent circle, or the mainstream industry company, so we can only learn from every experience. Become a mature developer, you must learn to address such a mentality.

The changes in this industry are too fast, and now popular independent developments are not necessarily hot after a few years. The independent development development has no absolute success, nor does it absolutely successfully developed the development process. However, there will be suitable or best development methods to explore, because every company, every team, every item is different.

It is no wonder that there will be a stalk in the recent "Amazon's own rocket successfully, the Amazon independent development studio failed to dissolve. So knowing the difficulty of developing independent developments? XD". (So ​​Sigono's team is very powerful, successfully pushing space dream to the international!)

Finally, hugo gave you two small advice to friends who want to enter the independent development industry:

2. We must be determined! In the independent development industry, there is no perseverance and sincerity, it's hard to go.

补充: 小 一 下 什么 「美

As far as the boss is aware of technology Art Technical Artist (hereinafter referred to as TA), it can be divided into two large direction: towards TA facing the tooling, with TA facing computer graphics class.

Simply put, many times, it is unable to do (or don't want to do), you will ask TA to achieve (art toolman?).

According to HUGO, it is mainly divided into several business scope:

Integrated Class Work Content (Integration) : Integrate Art Resources, Program Resources, and Tool Resources in the independent development Engine. Familiar with the operations and integration of the independent development engine.

Tool Developers: Transfers Technology Development Tools are used to other artists and related personnel, and tools can be divided into process tools and art tools.

Rigger (people of the bunch of skeleton) : Mainly based on the tools such as tied the role skeleton, or the tools that need to be used in tie the skeleton. Most of them are cultivated by animation schools, considerate a narrow understanding. Recently, this position is getting bigger and bigger in the independent development industry, and many companies will hire such talents. You can introduce a professional tutorial course in this figure below, a professional tutorial course in CGMA USA.

VFX (special effects): Although many 3A companies will have a full-time VFX personnel, they are not every company. Hugo said that there are many mobile independent development companies to divide such tasks to VFX Artist or TA.

SHAder and material creation and management: Mainly in the production of rendering effects needed, or making special materials to achieve independent developments.

He said that in fact, the difference in general program is that the program will be more focusing closer to the task of the independent development core independent development, data operation, data, AI, independent development overall interaction, etc. The TA will be like a bridge that is specially docked with the art department, sometimes even need to deal with the UI problem of the independent development. Finally, I hope that everyone will like this, and help. If you want to hear more interview types, please don't be polite, strive to knock down the bowl, the boss will work hard to give more content! \ Okay! Ok ~ I am the boss of Chinese medicine shop LUCI, there are time to put the pulse! independent development design Chinese medicine shop Medium original link