This may be outlandishly obvious, but for some reason it never occurred to me until this week. Here’s a tip for Art Managers and Artists both!

Art Managers, when I find a portfolio of an artist I like (even mildly), I go to his Links page and find a list of all the artists he links to, which are usually his friends or coworkers. I’ve been finding an absolute treasure trove of great artists I keep liking more and more. I don’t know why this didn’t occur to me sooner, but my oh my has this been fruitful. :)

So, Artists, in your websites and portfolios, link your friends! Get them to reciprocate! It’ll make you all a lot easier to find by chaining your sites together and giving hiring managers like me MULTIPLE paths to finding your portfolio. Remember, it’s all about accessibility and making yourself easier to be found. Get your name and your work out there.

Wow, been awhile since I updated! I’m still alive!

So, yeah, in August I was laid off, and so were most of the other developers at NCsoft Austin. They’re moving the bulk of their main development to NC West \ Seattle, which is ArenaNet, who are a very talented group of people I expect great things from.

In the meantime, I’ve found another job in the Austin area, which is totally great because considering the horrible bloodbath the Austin game development scene has been lately, I thought I’d have to uproot and move somewhere else. :)

I’m an Art Outsourcing Manager, the project is cool as hell, the team is outstanding (all ex-NCsoft people I’ve either worked with before, or know peripherally and respect), the office space rocks and I’m really happy here so far. The only bummer is that I can’t say what I’m working on or even who I’m working for, and it’ll be that way for a very long time. :)

The most fascinating part is that it’s on a new project from the ground up, and I’ve never been involved this early in development before. For once, I’m actually going to get to set up an art outsourcing pipeline FROM SCRATCH! And I’m going to document exactly how I do everything, detail my successes and failures, what I learned from them and how to do better next time, and I’m going to post everything I can about it here. I’m really really excited about it. I have a lot of rough content in progress and I’ll be posting articles in no particular order or on any discernible schedule. :)

In other news, I took three months off before starting the new job and got to do a lot of relaxing, reading, studying, thinking and travel accomplished. :) It’s been quite nice. My girlfriend and I took an awesome trip across the Yucatan peninsula to check out all the ancient Mayan ruins we could fit into a week (a handful of photos of that here on Flickr), then I got back and started learning about dieting, nutrition, longevity and general health.

I’ve abused my body before with crappy food, beer, no exercise, too much caffeine and energy drinks, and I’ve decided I’m done with that. I had my genome sequenced at 23AndMe to get a rough idea of the kinds of diseases I may be susceptible to and I’m started on a vitamin and supplement regimen to hopefully help fend off aging, oxidation, most types of heart disease and cancer. I’ve been working out more regularly and cutting out grains and carbs and focusing more on non-processed meat (when possible) and lots of vegetables. I’ve stopped drinking coffee entirely and instead I drink mostly decaffeinated tea. Also cutting back on beer, which sucks. :)

Since I started all that, my energy level has gone through the roof, I rest and sleep better, I can focus on things like I’ve never been able to before, I virtually never get food coma, I’ve stopped having anxiety \ panic attacks (which were rare, but any is too much), and I feel a lot more healthful and balanced. I’m reading up all I can on nutrition and what to put into my body to help me live longer and more healthily, and finally taking responsibility for health and long-term survivability of the big fleshy bag of meat and bone called “my body” that I inhabit. It’s quite an empowering feeling, and that’s my biggest passion right now.

Aside from that, I have other fun industry-related projects I’m tinkering away with quietly and will announce if they come to fruition like I hope they totally will. I am busy, I am active, and I’m ready to get back in the habit of WRITING!

And on the note of writing, I’m going to gradually phase back in some of the more introspective self-improvement related posts that I used to do more often, because I’ve gotten more positive responses to those than any of the outsourcing articles I’ve done. There will still definitely be organized articles on outsourcing methodology and techniques, don’t get me wrong! I just think I’ve strayed a bit from what I originally wanted to do with this blog, which was to have it essentially be a combination of a public journal, but also a place for me to share insights and information on subjects that interest me that I think could help other people learn and improve themselves.

Whether it be making a better portfolio, or managing an external team, or even learning interesting stuff about marketing, I just want this to be a place I can talk about it all and have discussions with interesting people (you guys! :D ) about it all and satisfy my need to write and share.

Anywho, that’s all for me from now. I’ll be back as soon as I’m able!