I like to use a lot of different software – I have fun learning. It’s a bit of a hobby of mine.

Blender

Blender is my go to software for concepting, modeling, UV-ing and everything NPR (non photo realistic) related. It’s free to use for personal and commercial products and it has some amazing tools.

I also teach an Introduction to Blender class on schoolism.com if you’re interested.

Zbrush

If I need to do any high fidelity sculpting, Zbrush is still my go to software although I haven’t had the need for high fidelity sculpting in a while. The little sculpting I need to do, I can easily do in Blender.

Gaea

Gaea is a fantastic terrain creation software. It has a wonderful UI, is very easy to use and creates amazing looking terrain.

Substance Painter and Designer

Substance is my favorite tool when it comes to texture creation. These are all around amazing programs.

V-Ray or Corona in 3ds Max

If I want to do a raytraced rendered image – my go to combination is either V-Ray or Corona in 3ds Max. Both of these render engines are amazing and will give you fantastic photo realistic results while still being flexible enough to give you full control to manipulate and cheat if you need to.

Unreal Engine

Unreal is my preferred game engine. The UI is relatively easy to navigate and it’s an incredibly powerful engine with lots of amazing tools like the terrain creation tool, vertex paint, POM etc.

After Effects

At home I use After Effects for any compositing needs I might have. I’d prefer to use Nuke because I generally like working node based but a Nuke license is quite a bit more expensive.

Blender is an incredibly powerful 3D creation software with which you can create all kinds of NPR (non-photo realistic) looks. I’m hoping to do some NPR tutorials or perhaps even a class about it soon but in the meantime I recommend doing a quick google search – there are a lot of online tutorials out there that show different techniques to achieve an NPR look with Blender.

Most studios still use Maya, 3ds Max or Houdini as they often times have a full pipeline built around these programs. A lot of the bigger studios might even have licenses for all these programs so the artists can choose which software they want to work in. Blender is still the new kid on the block but it’s quickly gaining momentum and more and more studios are starting to add Blender to their list of programs you can work in. I’ve been able to use Blender at the last two studios I worked at.

Yes you can. A great portfolio is a great portfolio, no matter what software you used to create it. Just know that you may need to learn another 3D software on the job but that’s more common than you might think. A lot of studios have their own proprietary tools and/or software so new employees are often expected to learn new tools.

You don’t need to know how to draw and paint per se but a strong understanding of fundamental art skills does translate to 3D and will make your 3D artwork stronger.

I receive a lot of portfolio review requests and as much as I would love to, I can’t always get back to everyone. I am truly sorry and I hope you understand.

My advice for you is to seek out artists at studios you’d like to work at and look at their portfolios. What are they focusing on in their portfolio? How are their portfolios arranged? What quality is the work and most importantly, is your work of that same quality?

Personally I never felt ready to get a job – I simply put together my best work and tried applying. I figured if I get a ‘no’ back or nobody replies at all – then clearly I’m not ready yet and I need to keep working on my craft.

My advice is to put together the best portfolio you can, see what your teachers or peers think of it and if they like what they see, then put your work out there and start applying. Afterwards just continue to work on your craft until you get that first ‘yes’…and then continue to work on your craft some more.

My first question to you would be – which area would you like to work in? VFX or games? They have very different workflows and use slightly different software as well.

Next I recommend you pick up a 3D modeling tool like Blender, Maya, 3ds Max or Houdini. For texturing I recommend you learn a texture painting program like Substance or Mari. If you want to work in games you are also going to have to learn a game engine like Unreal or Unity for example.

Focus on achieving natural and realistic lighting and materials in your scenes. Start putting together a couple of environments. Think about your fundamentals like composition, values, colors and storytelling. Can I look at your scene and tell what kind of person lives in that apartment or can I tell what city or country I’m in? Did something happen here? Adding different kinds of story elements will make your environments come alive and add more interest.

Once you have a portfolio, it’s time to apply and get a job.