Jeremy Estrellado - DiNusty | Lead environment artist Q&A

Jeremy is one of the most well known artists in the Environment Art scene, working at Ubisoft Massive on The Division series, streaming on Twitch and creating a huge online community - The DiNusty Empire. In this Q&A we delve into topics such as building skills and landing that first job, preventing burnout, scoping projects and getting feedback as well as the future of DiNusty.

Introduction

My name is Jeremy Estrellado and I am a Lead Environment Artist at Massive Entertainment, A Ubisoft Studio in Malmö, Sweden. While I am currently in Sweden, I started my career in Seattle, Washington in the United States. I decided to get into game development when I saw my relatives getting into the same industry. One used to be at Lucas Arts but has since moved onto another industry outside of direct entertainment. The other has been at Blizzard Entertainment for over 10 years now. The first game I worked on was during my internship, at the since closed, Flying Lab Software. I worked and helped ship a Pirate MMO, Pirates of the Burning Sea, a PC exclusive in 2007.

When working with a team what do you find the most helpful traits for junior to mid-level artists?

The ability to take on a new workflow and development process. Nothing feels worse to a junior than taking an asset to finish just to experience re-work after re-work. Learning how far to take something so that an Art Director can tell you what they like and do not like so that you can react quickly. The ability to iterate is much easier and less painful once you find this balance.

For artist just starting in the realm of 3D what do you think are the most important concepts to learn and any tools/software you would recommend learning?

Just like traditional art I think that replicating reality early on in 3d is the key to strong long-term growth and quality across the board. I would suggest taking the time to create things you see in real life in as much detail as you want. You do not need to have textures or materials figured out just yet. Once you can replicate then the next step IMO is getting those details into game. Still no texturing and just focusing on good clean bakes to get that high poly into a game engine on a low poly mesh. Of course this is not all that you should be doing. Think about a reward system that you can use. For example, if you really want to make materials for these assets you can. Just use it as a reward mechanic to focus on the main path which is mastering the workflow of high to low for real time.

Learn the tools that you need to get the job done. You do not need to master all the software to get the jobs. Make sick looking art and people will want you working for them. That being said let’s get this message out there… Blender… is in AAA right now! You can get a job with Blender and if the studio that you apply to doesn’t use it they will hire you knowing that you can achieve the art you have shown on your portfolio no matter the tool. They will be willing to help you learn the tool they use knowing that your artistic eye is only temporarily blocked by a simple tool adaption.

What skills do you find most frequently lacking for artists trying to get their first job? How can they improve or learn these skills?

Understanding more architectural design or some understanding of interior design / decorating. As a level artist you spend more of your time trying to prop a space to look like reality that building props. Knowing that a support pillar should be here or there because of the size of the room is something that people will feel in there subconscious. It feels wrong and they don’t know why. You can improve by either taking classes or just researching online. There is so much information out there now it’s astounding.

When it comes to composition, what are some of the things junior artists or students often are lacking or forget?

Often early on in our career we tend to try and focus on the quality of the art or a pretty camera angle. Switching from being just an artist making a pretty shot to someone who is part of a team with a goal to make a successful game, you must remember it’s not just the art anymore. This usually comes with time but if you can understand and get behind this sooner, you’re going to be in a much stronger asset to the team sooner.

With the growing popularity of procedural workflows such as Houdini how do you think the job of an Environment Artist is changing?

In all honesty this hasn’t changed the life of your average environment artist. When it comes to a tool like Houdini you can gain a lot of speed but again, it depends on your situation. In AAA the teams are large which means that you will have a tech art team. They tend to manage and build pipelines for you that make such tools just an easy step in the workflow. In an indie team you could be part of the process for building that workflow. I’ve been part of a game in production using Houdini and never even had to have it installed on my PC.

If you’re trying to be part of the workflow of building Houdini into a studio’s pipeline then you’re already deep in the tool I would imagine and your team will set you up for success as such.

Do you do anything to start your day modelling? Such as a warm up or?

I myself am usually doing too many things these days to do a day model. Usually where I gain growth is through seeing and understanding. Being part of a community, I can see a presented problem and contribute to the solution if it’s one I have solved before. This is one of the many benefits of being part of an online art community.

Another way I warm up is confronting a problem I want to solve that just requires that I’m in the software for an hour or so. Once solved I know I can replicate the solution when the time comes. A lot of the modelling I do in my head thinking about how to build something or ways to get a look early on to speed up prototyping the concepts vs completing an asset to its final form.

When considering cinematics, do you often have them planned from the start of the environment or plan them as you create the environment?

While it doesn’t always happen as planned, sticking to a process is important and makes sure each party that’s invested in the scene gets the time they need to make it the best. It starts with a storyboard and then the scene gets built out to support the shots needed. Once the scene is there and approved a first pass on character placement and blocked out animations are placed. From that point everyone’s work should just be iteration unless something big must change. You can guarantee one big change always happens, usually at a bad time hehe. Worry not, remember everyone is in it together. At the end of the day we’re all trying to make an amazing game.

When working with Level Designers what do you find is the best approach to provide or receive feedback and changes either artist to designer or designer to artist?

In most scenarios’ gameplay trumps everything and yes that includes art. There are ways to come to an agreement which involve listening and understanding the problem. The best advice I can give for this is understand the problem. A lot of the times both sides come forward with a solution but what you should be doing is understanding what the issue is and each side figuring out what works for their side of the answer. It is a joint effort. Artists should understand the players experience as your point of view and making it smooth. Level designers should understand what they are asking for when it comes to changes that might take the scene too far away from the visual goal that has been requested of the artist. These types of conversations only get easier with time and experience.

How do you prevent burn out?

Working on keeping work at work is especially important. If you are working from home for whatever reason I would suggest building routines that allow your brain to transition into different mind sets. For example, morning routines and putting on indoor shoes. Something I also do is walk the amount of time it takes to get to work. It gives your brain that time that you usually get to think. Simulating walking home also allows your mind to decompress from being at work even if you were at home the whole time.

Another thing to keep in mind is that you should listen to your friends or coworkers. If they think you are working too much maybe you are. It is also okay to ask your friends directly about what they think about it. I would say that it is not common for someone to directly tell you so check yourself from time to time. 

Do not check your work email at home.

Understanding how much you can do in a day is important. Reflect that in the tasks you take on for the day and for the work week. Taking on tasks that you can do in a day followed by a prep for the next day’s tasks can be extremely rewarding. Get that dopamine hit and you are going to be in a great mental state at the end of the day. This is rewarding and that is the point.

For you leads out there, you can do 1on1’s either weekly or bi-weekly to just see how your team is doing. Also make sure to recognise the hard work they are putting in. Positive reinforcement as well as mentioning something for them to focus on long term. For anyone who does not know, a 1on1 is a sync with your lead where you can bring up issues or questions that your lead can answer or help get answers to you with the connections and knowledge they have.

Why and how did you start DiNusty? What have you learned along the way? How has the community grown?

DiNusty was my Starcraft 2 handle back in the day. Back then I was streaming Mon-Fri every morning for 3 hours before work. It was much the same format of playing and learning from wins or losses and discussing them with chat so we could be better Starcraft players :D. I hit a moment in my life where I wanted to continue to work on art from home. I needed something that would help push me to stick to it. By deciding to stream it, that put me in a position where I was expected to be present at least two times a week. While I knew this it’s always nice to know that I will always be learning. 

If I have learned anything it is, the more you learn, the more you understand how much you do not know. Going from being just a way to push myself it has evolved into a resource and a hub for many others from people completely new to 3D to 15+ years in the games Industry. The Discord community just passed 5k members and the YouTube channel is approaching 9k subscribers and new people are always introducing themselves and contributing to the learn and teaching for others. It’s so warming to see.

How has DiNusty changed since you started it? Was this intentional or just happened naturally?

The original idea was just to push myself to get better at art by holding myself accountable. Today over natural progression it turned into an Empire machine of sorts that self-propels everyone including myself forward in skill and craft. Makes me want to cry.

What are the plans for DiNusty’s future? 

I have stated plans in the past for what I want to do for the Empire. Expanding on the experiences from start to end with artists is how I like to think. If there is one big takeaway you should get from what you should expect and see in the Empire, it is this:

Learn – through our Stream, YouTube and Community discussion.

Understand – The industry, common workflows, and being a professional.

Produce – Scenes or props, participate in our monthly challenges, and publish finished work.

Present – Your portfolio, build your brand, and social media presence.

Network – Empire meetups, Artstation active, and community involved.

Anything that we can add in the future must fit inside and add value in one or more of these categories.

How would you describe The DiNusty Empire to someone who has not heard of it? What is the community best at? What would you suggest for someone joining to thrive and become a good member of the community?

I would describe The DiNusty Empire as a community with the goal to lift you up whether you’re new or a veteran to games and expand your artistic and technical understanding of everything within our field that is video games for artists. It should be noted that it’s primarily but not limited to environment art.

Become active in the community. Posting work and giving feedback as well as just being an active person in general chat will build a kind of relationship with others around you. This alone makes people want to help you and seek help from you.

Can you talk a bit about the portfolio critiques you do, how you select the candidate and how you prepare for each portfolio review session? Is there a structure? 

I have a page that you can apply within that gets sorted through by me. I slot in 8 portfolios for a stream which lasts about 2 hours. That stream happens on Thursdays once a month. When we get 2 months ahead or about 16 portfolios, I usually close it, so people are not waiting around for too long. This has been a constant struggle to maintain but I feel it is worth it.

If you were starting your career from day one over what would you do and where would you focus? What would you tell younger Jeremy?

If I could back and talk to day one Jeremy, I would tell him to organise his emails earlier. That is something I wish I did a long time ago. Stuff only got crazier as time went on. Also listen to your leads and do not hesitate to ask for feedback.

How do you scope your project when you are a beginner? How would you work on a smaller scene but keeping it interesting?

Of course, making the scene smaller is the common answer. There can be a lot of internal push back but remember this, you can always make more scenes from it in a series if you wanted to. For example, making a storage room. Then make a storage room in a big walk in freezer. How about a storage room in a post-Umbrella zombie outbreak? Smaller scenes give you a faster reward and time to do the 0% to 100% push. Getting into the last 20% is the part where you can learn a lot and if you keep the scene big your going to miss out on that valuable experience.

Do you seek out feedback and if so where do you ask for it? How do you respond and implement feedback?

Everyone should seek feedback. Even if you are a director you should be listening to the reactions of your team to really get a sense of what the big picture is that is being painted. Depending on the content I seek out feedback from everyone. If the things I want feedback for are bigger overarching things I need to make sure that it’s matching art direction. In that case I should go to my Art Director for feedback.

Noting down the feedback in points is especially useful for being able to act on it easier. One thing to note is that sometimes people will react with things that bug them. Find out either why it bugs them or note it down that it’s not really feedback but a pain point on something that they are reacting to. 

Understanding how to fix something like that comes with experience over time. I would suggest trying to poke at the issue to get feedback you can act on but if not, you can use your gut to try and resolve the issue they are pointing at. Just make sure to go back to double check you’re resolving the issue and not creating ten more.

What has been the most useful information, technique, or advice for your career?

Listen to people. Hands down it’s listen to people. I do not care if you are an intern/junior or a director. Everyone has something to say or give that has value. The only thing they might lack is the experience to know the possible outcomes that more veteran developers might know already from past experiences. That does not mean we should not value or stop the curiosity of someone new to it all. That is where all the new and real discovers are.

Any additional tips or advice you would like to share with our readers?

When you eventually get into games or land that next big job, do not forget you were hired because you proved yourself to be an asset to the team. Proving yourself is now done for the time being. Take the time to enjoy life outside of work. Slow down on the personal art and just enjoy your achievements. We all know you worked hard for it so go out and celebrate with friends or play the game you have been wanting to get lost in. You earned it.

What can we be on the lookout from you in the future?

The empire is my personal focus these days and with the last meetup in Nottingham being so successful at connecting artists, I think we should be having another one soon enough. Just need to find the right time to do it.

Outro

Thank you for the opportunity to speak to your community. My name’s Jeremy Estrellado and I am a Lead Environment Artist at Massive Entertainment Ubisoft in Malmo Sweden. I have been doing AAA game development for over 13 years. It should always be remembered that at the start of the 13 years I also was hungry to learn and push myself into this industry to allow my creative mind to flow. That has not changed since and to know everyday someone is starting that journey is exciting to say the least. Be sure to catch me on Twitch as we adventure through Blender, trying to make sick art while also answering questions and learning along the way. <3