All that changed when Doom 3 was announced at MacWorld in 2001 and id Software showed the first glimpse of their new engine in a short tech video. The visual quality was quite impressive for the time and got me back to 3D again. The game would come out in 2004 and I was heavily getting into the Doom 3 modding community and making my own single-player levels for it. I spent lots of time in online forums and made friends with like-minded modders who shared the same interest and passion. After a while, I would also get more and more into modeling and texturing so I could give my levels a more unique look, which got me into 3ds Max and Photoshop. Every time I finish something (a level, a 3D model or just a texture) I would post it in the game art and level design community forums to get some feedback on how to improve. Most of those forums aren’t online anymore or barely active.

Skill Growth

In order to grow and learn more about levels and game environments, I would play a lot of first-person shooters and analyze every combat space that was fun to play or just amazing to look at. I’d try to understand what made that area fun. I would have tons of screenshots and notes for every game I played. Same for movies, whenever I saw an interesting scene I’d look at it closely and try to see what makes it work. The colors, composition, framing, cinematography, etc. Looking at other people’s work can be both inspiring and demotivating at the same time. You’re eager to improve and get on the same skill level but then you realize it’ll take you a long time to get there. So in order to grow, it’s also important to be patient. Especially at the early stage, it can be frustrating. You’ll often get honest feedback that might hurt your feelings and you won't agree with it because you think you created the best piece of art. But you have to step back and look at it with objective eyes and learn from your mistakes.