Thursday was a very cool day. We went to class as usual and after lunch we went back to the hotel so we could get ready to go visit Glass Egg Digital Media. Basically what Glass Egg does is 3D animation for video games. They generally don't design entire games, but big game companies like Microsoft and Sony contract with them to design objects and environments. For example, they designed all of the cars for the Fast and Furious games and over half of the cars for the Forza games.
When we walked in, we first saw some regular cubicle type desks where people were doing non-animation work, but in the back there was an entire floor full of colorful desks and tons of computer monitors where the artists were hard at work. We weren't allowed to take pictures of this space because of the nondisclosure agreement that Glass Egg has with their clients. We weren't told what games any of the art was for but we saw artists working on a myriad of things. We saw fantasy characters for a Japanese game, we saw cars being designed based in photographs of real cars, we saw robots being designed for a mobile game, and a whole lot more.
The thing that surprised me the most was how much detail goes into the cars. The artists design every single detail inside and out. Every but and bolt on the engine is designed and the exterior of the car is modeled like a real car so that when the car crashes in the game they can simulate the most realistic crash possible.
The other really interesting thing about this company was that the CEO, Phil Tran, is a vietnamese refugee who escaped the country at 12 years old just seven days before the fall of Saigon (or liberation, depending on who you ask). Phil started at Morgan Interactive in San Francisco and started an animation branch in Vietnam some time ago, and when Morgan went bankrupt he turned that outsourcing branch into it's own company. Phil basically created animation outsourcing which is really cool because it is now a very large industry, especially in Asia.
When we walked in, we first saw some regular cubicle type desks where people were doing non-animation work, but in the back there was an entire floor full of colorful desks and tons of computer monitors where the artists were hard at work. We weren't allowed to take pictures of this space because of the nondisclosure agreement that Glass Egg has with their clients. We weren't told what games any of the art was for but we saw artists working on a myriad of things. We saw fantasy characters for a Japanese game, we saw cars being designed based in photographs of real cars, we saw robots being designed for a mobile game, and a whole lot more.
The thing that surprised me the most was how much detail goes into the cars. The artists design every single detail inside and out. Every but and bolt on the engine is designed and the exterior of the car is modeled like a real car so that when the car crashes in the game they can simulate the most realistic crash possible.
The other really interesting thing about this company was that the CEO, Phil Tran, is a vietnamese refugee who escaped the country at 12 years old just seven days before the fall of Saigon (or liberation, depending on who you ask). Phil started at Morgan Interactive in San Francisco and started an animation branch in Vietnam some time ago, and when Morgan went bankrupt he turned that outsourcing branch into it's own company. Phil basically created animation outsourcing which is really cool because it is now a very large industry, especially in Asia.
After Glass Egg, we went to dinner at a Vietnamese barbecue place where they give you raw meat and you cook it on a little grill in the middle of the table. I got deer and goat, both meats that I have never had before. Both of them tasted great, but the texture of the goat was a little hard to chew, I preferred the deer.
Phil and his business partner Steve also own a very popular night club in Ho Chi Minh City called Lush so needless to say that's what we needed up doing Thursday night after dinner and that was also quite fun.
Phil and his business partner Steve also own a very popular night club in Ho Chi Minh City called Lush so needless to say that's what we needed up doing Thursday night after dinner and that was also quite fun.
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